How to partition and format a USB memory stick for Linux/Windows

The partition tables of flash memory sticks are often not very compatible with linux, but can easily be made so. Note: you follow these instructions at your own risk (I've done this to two different memory sticks so far with 100% success)

plug in memory stick
>fdisk /dev/sda
delete all partitions on memory stick
create one primary partition
change type to "b" which is VFAT
exit fdisk
>mkfs -t vfat /dev/sda1

You should be able to mount /usb (dependent upon your fstab)

For Suse 9.1 we use:
mkdir /usb /usb2
echo "/dev/sda1            /usb                 auto       noauto,owner,user 0 0" >> $newfstab
echo "/dev/sdb1            /usb2                auto       noauto,owner,user 0 0" >> $newfstab
/etc/init.d/hotplug restart