I am thinking that I might download and install the FC3 test on my second hard drive and I am wondering what partitioning scheme to use. I have read that the recommended partitioning scheme is about a 2gb swap, 100mb /boot, and whatever size for /, but I have just read some other articles saying that /home and /usr should also be mounted on seperate partitions so that user data and installed programs can be saved in the event a reinstall is necessary.
If the linux kernel is stored on /boot, user data & files on /home, and installed programs go to /usr, then how big does / really need to be and what data will that partition actually store? I have an 80gb HDD, so space is not really an issue, but I am curious as how I should format it. How does this look?
Drive 1 swap - 2gb
Drive 2 /boot - 100mb /home - 20gb /usr - 20gb / - whatever space is left
Also, since I already have a 2gb swap partition on my 1st HDD for my current FC2 install, can another linux install on the second HDD use it also (since I can only run one at a time anyway...), or must the swap parition be on the same physical drive as the OS?
And yet another question: Are there RPM packages availbe for FC3, or will I have to install everything from source? Can the FC2 RPMs that I have installed now be compatible?
On Sun, 2004-08-01 at 00:03, Andrew Konosky wrote:
I am thinking that I might download and install the FC3 test on my second hard drive and I am wondering what partitioning scheme to use. I have read that the recommended partitioning scheme is about a 2gb swap, 100mb /boot, and whatever size for /, but I have just read some other articles saying that /home and /usr should also be mounted on seperate partitions so that user data and installed programs can be saved in the event a reinstall is necessary.
If you are playing with FC3 test 1 I would not keep any critical files under that OS. As such saving /home or /usr IMHO should be a mute question.
Much of this depends on what you plan to use the system for. For a true multi-user server using different mount points for various directories is a good idea as it can prevent the server from dying if one of the less critical partitions are filled up for some reason. (usually a user that generates tones of files for some reason causing / to fill up and halt the system.)
For a single user system IMHO this is not as important. You can always backup the /home directory if you are doing an upgrade or re-install. So for a workstation I normally setup a /boot, swap, and / file systems with the bulk of the space in the / file system.
If the linux kernel is stored on /boot, user data & files on /home, and installed programs go to /usr, then how big does / really need to be and what data will that partition actually store? I have an 80gb HDD, so space is not really an issue, but I am curious as how I should format it. How does this look?
The biggest user of space under the above layout would be in the /var directory, specifically /var/log and /var/spool (mainly mail, mqueue).
A lot of this depends on what applications you plan to run. Database servers I would setup a separate file system for the data directories. Webservers would have special partition for the various pages. A development system would have file systems for work areas and software repositories.
For a personal workstation put everything under /. It will save you lots of headaches when you find that you guessed wrong and need a much larger /usr file system since you installed so many packages.
Drive 1 swap - 2gb
Drive 2 /boot - 100mb /home - 20gb /usr - 20gb / - whatever space is left
How much memory do you have on your system? Normally they recommend swap be twice what your memory is. I usually consider 1GB for swap the most you should ever really need regardless of how much memory you have. If you find you are using a lot of swap space then you probably need more memory as your performance is probably dropping rapidly as you use more swap. And if you ever really need more swap I believe you can add more swap partitions (at least you could under older unix systems, have not had to do that under linux yet).
Not sure having /usr as a separate file system will really save you anything during a reinstall. If I was reinstalling /usr is probably one of the file systems I would want to replace completely. Again if it was a multiuser system a separate /usr makes some sense.
Also, since I already have a 2gb swap partition on my 1st HDD for my current FC2 install, can another linux install on the second HDD use it also (since I can only run one at a time anyway...), or must the swap parition be on the same physical drive as the OS?
Excellent question! I can not think of any reason you should not be able to use the same swap space for two different install of linux as long as they both are not trying to use it at the same time.
And yet another question: Are there RPM packages availbe for FC3, or will I have to install everything from source? Can the FC2 RPMs that I have installed now be compatible?
Not sure on this one. I think there is a different set of repositories for FC3. I am sure some one will respond with an authoritative answer on this one.
articles saying that /home and /usr should also be mounted on seperate partitions so that user data and installed programs can be saved in the event a reinstall is necessary.
Definitely /home and maybe /usr/local. You may want to keep a periodic backup of /etc and /var/log/rpmpkgs (the output from "rpm -qa"). But /usr should be completely managed by RPM and you can rebuild it from the rpmpkgs log.
If you are playing with FC3 test 1 I would not keep any critical files under that OS. As such saving /home or /usr IMHO should be a mute question.
I wouldn't risk exposing my primary /home to a test system. You may, however, want to copy some or all of your primary /home directory to the test system. This was mentioned on the -devel (or was it -test?) list as a way to test that your home directory will actually work and migrate to the new system.
I always maintain my /home directory from one system to the next. But I don't install test releases on my main machine.
Much of this depends on what you plan to use the system for. For a true multi-user server using different mount points for various directories is a good idea as it can prevent the server from dying if one of the less critical partitions are filled up for some reason. (usually a user that generates tones of files for some reason causing / to fill up and halt the system.)
Users can't completely fill a filesystem; only root can fill a filesystem. A portion (by default 10%) of each partition is reserved for the system. Users may be able to cause some services to complain but the system itself should remain fairly operational.
For a single user system IMHO this is not as important. You can always backup the /home directory if you are doing an upgrade or re-install. So for a workstation I normally setup a /boot, swap, and / file systems with the bulk of the space in the / file system.
I always keep /home on its own disk(s). This way it is completely independent of the operating system itself.
For a personal workstation put everything under /. It will save you lots of headaches when you find that you guessed wrong and need a much larger /usr file system since you installed so many packages.
Yep.
Drive 1 swap - 2gb
Drive 2 /boot - 100mb /home - 20gb /usr - 20gb / - whatever space is left
On a test system I would do this: swap 2 GB / (rest of disk)
On a full "production" system I would do something more like this: swap 2 GB (perhaps two 1 GB partitions on two disks) /boot 100 MB / 20 GB (or maybe 30-40 GB if you plan on going wild) /home (very large RAID or LVM partition)
I also do the following strictly so that after an OS upgrade I don't have to reinstall weird, non-RPM, system-independent programs and shell scripts I use (e.g. cross-compilers, etc). But be very aware that /opt and /usr/local will eventually "eat your branes(tm)" if you mess around with the defaults in /etc/ld.so.conf and the PATH variable. /usr/local 10 GB (or whatever you think you will need) /opt 10 GB (or whatever...)
How much memory do you have on your system? Normally they recommend swap be twice what your memory is. I usually consider 1GB for swap the most you should ever really need regardless of how much memory you have. If you find you are using a lot of swap space then you probably need more memory
Depends on what you're doing. Swap isn't all bad. Running out of physical RAM is very bad and some uses of swap can prevent that. More RAM is better but increasing the swap can be quite adequate for some things.
For example, VMWare can benefit greatly by setting its temp directory to /dev/shm, increasing the size of /dev/shm to 1 GB or more and adding enough swap space to compensate. It seems to prevent many unexplained guest OS lockups and other problems. < http://www.vmware.com/support/kb/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=844 >
Not sure having /usr as a separate file system will really save you anything during a reinstall. If I was reinstalling /usr is probably one of the file systems I would want to replace completely. Again if it was a multiuser system a separate /usr makes some sense.
I don't think mounting /usr separately makes any sense on a standalone system nor any RPM-based system. It might have made more sense in the past on some systems, I guess. I've tried running standalone systems this way and it typically does nothing but waste disk space.
Excellent question! I can not think of any reason you should not be able to use the same swap space for two different install of linux as long as they both are not trying to use it at the same time.
Sharing swap will work fine. And, the installer should automatically detect and setup all the available swap partitions.
On Sun, 2004-08-01 at 07:12, David L Norris wrote:
Much of this depends on what you plan to use the system for. For a true multi-user server using different mount points for various directories is a good idea as it can prevent the server from dying if one of the less critical partitions are filled up for some reason. (usually a user that generates tones of files for some reason causing / to fill up and halt the system.)
Users can't completely fill a filesystem; only root can fill a filesystem. A portion (by default 10%) of each partition is reserved for the system. Users may be able to cause some services to complain but the system itself should remain fairly operational.
Very true. It is funny seeing a file system at 105% of full. :)
But things like sendmail and apache can grind to a halt since they should be run as non root users. Much of this depends on what the system is being designed for, as stated previously.
For a single user system IMHO this is not as important. You can always backup the /home directory if you are doing an upgrade or re-install. So for a workstation I normally setup a /boot, swap, and / file systems with the bulk of the space in the / file system.
I always keep /home on its own disk(s). This way it is completely independent of the operating system itself.
Good idea if you have the drives.
For a personal workstation put everything under /. It will save you lots of headaches when you find that you guessed wrong and need a much larger /usr file system since you installed so many packages.
Yep.
How much memory do you have on your system? Normally they recommend swap be twice what your memory is. I usually consider 1GB for swap the most you should ever really need regardless of how much memory you have. If you find you are using a lot of swap space then you probably need more memory
Depends on what you're doing. Swap isn't all bad. Running out of physical RAM is very bad and some uses of swap can prevent that. More RAM is better but increasing the swap can be quite adequate for some things.
For example, VMWare can benefit greatly by setting its temp directory to /dev/shm, increasing the size of /dev/shm to 1 GB or more and adding enough swap space to compensate. It seems to prevent many unexplained guest OS lockups and other problems. < http://www.vmware.com/support/kb/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=844 >
Good points. I have not had any reason to run VMWare. :) (that always seemed to be a novelty, not a serious solution for anything.)
Not sure having /usr as a separate file system will really save you anything during a reinstall. If I was reinstalling /usr is probably one of the file systems I would want to replace completely. Again if it was a multiuser system a separate /usr makes some sense.
I don't think mounting /usr separately makes any sense on a standalone system nor any RPM-based system. It might have made more sense in the past on some systems, I guess. I've tried running standalone systems this way and it typically does nothing but waste disk space.
Excellent question! I can not think of any reason you should not be able to use the same swap space for two different install of linux as long as they both are not trying to use it at the same time.
Sharing swap will work fine. And, the installer should automatically detect and setup all the available swap partitions.
On Sun, Aug 01, 2004 at 06:12:06AM -0500, David L Norris wrote:
articles saying that /home and /usr should also be mounted on seperate partitions so that user data and installed programs can be saved in the event a reinstall is necessary.
Definitely /home and maybe /usr/local. You may want to keep a periodic
On most systems, I solve this by moving /usr/local to /home/usrlocal, and making /usr/local be a symlink.
On Sat, Jul 31, 2004 at 11:03:45PM -0500, Andrew Konosky wrote:
I am thinking that I might download and install the FC3 test on my second hard drive and I am wondering what partitioning scheme to use. I have read that the recommended partitioning scheme is about a 2gb swap, 100mb /boot, and whatever size for /, but I have just read some other articles saying that /home and /usr should also be mounted on seperate partitions so that user data and installed programs can be saved in the event a reinstall is necessary.
Here's my suggestion. I'll try to be brief. Remember that this is a test release, and will be temporary. I've already re-installed several times for testing purposes. Partition sizes aren't critical, because they are temporary. I'd mirror your existing system to the second drive, then upgrade that. The installer should fix your existing GRUB on your old system, so you (most likely) won't be stuck if something goes wrong and the new install won't work. If you're testing, it would be best if you test the install/upgrade system as well. If you think you will most likely install FC3 fresh when it comes out rather than doing an upgrade, maybe a fresh install would be better. Simulate what you're likely to do when FC3 comes out, and you'll be doing a better job of testing. Yes, there are RPMs for the test releases. You'll use the "testing" repository, and probably have 100 updates right off the bat. I know I've updated at least 250 packages by now, and gone through 5 kernels. Things are always changing, updating isn't even possible at times because things are broken.
All that being said, testing sure is a lot of fun. I'm having a blast. Heed the warnings about running a test on a critical system, though. You could be left stranded at any time.
Well, I just use this computer as a desktop workstation. I keep windows 98 installed so I can play games and because some other members of my family are very technology impaired when it comes to computers. I don't really need FC3, but I have an extra hard drive now becuase I bought one online, and it was defective, so I sent it back. The RMA exchange was going to take 2 weeks, so I bought another one at circuit city. Then they told me the first drive was "non-refundable," and I have this second hard drive sitting around doing nothing. I would try to sell it, but it's an OEM drive and you can get a 160gb Western Digital drive now for even less with all the rebates out now on regular ATA drives.
My computer is a self built AMD XP1800+ on a GA-7DX motherboard with 512mb PC2100 RAM and Radeon 8500LE. I have enough RAM for most stuff, and I've only experienced one instance while running linux that the swap has actually been used, and it was only a 3% use. I had all sorts of programs running on all 4 of my workspaces.
Since I already have a 2gb swap partition on the first drive, I won't bother making a new swap on the second drive. I know in Windows, if you put the virtual memory on its own partition on a seperate physical drive from where the OS is installed, it can help performance because the two drives can be accessed at the same time, rather than a single drive multitasking between the OS and the swap space. I went ahead and made a 2gb fat32 partition on the new drive for this purpose. Since I will have the same setup for linux (swap on 1st drive, OS on second) will I see any similar performace improvement when using swap in linux?
I don't need really want 2 installs of the same linux distro on my computer, and since FC3 is unstable still, I will just wait until it is in a release version and use FC2 as my primary OS. I might experiment with Suse or Debian or something, but have 2 Fedoras would be a waste of space for me.
I think what I will do is just do a new install of FC2 on the second drive and partition/configure it with a 100mb /boot, 30gb /home, and the rest on /. All my files that need backing up from my current install I have already fit on one CD, so I don't have much to reconfigure. This way I will have Fedora on its own drive and can use my windows drive as the experimental drive.
What would be the advantage of using an LVM filesystem on home rather than ext3? Right now, the windows drive is the master with grub on it. If the windows drive will be my experimental drive, I am guessing it would be better to put grub onto the Fedora drive since I won't be messing with it much? But then grub must also be on the MBR of the master drive, or will it work on the slave drive too?
Jeff Ratliff wrote:
Yes, there are RPMs for the test releases. You'll use the "testing" repository, and probably have 100 updates right off the bat. I know I've updated at least 250 packages by now, and gone through 5 kernels. Things are always changing, updating isn't even possible at times because things are broken.
Not exactly.. The testing repositories are for testing updates aimed at the stable releases. The repository used in the fedora testing phase is the "development" (also known as rawhide).
-- Pedro Macedo
On Sun, Aug 01, 2004 at 01:44:59PM -0300, Pedro Fernandes Macedo wrote:
Jeff Ratliff wrote:
Yes, there are RPMs for the test releases. You'll use the "testing" repository, and probably have 100 updates right off the bat. I know I've updated at least 250 packages by now, and gone through 5 kernels. Things are always changing, updating isn't even possible at times because things are broken.
Not exactly.. The testing repositories are for testing updates aimed at the stable releases. The repository used in the fedora testing phase is the "development" (also known as rawhide).
You are right. I was too lazy to mount that partition and check the yum.conf. Testing does indeed use the "development" repo.
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Andrew Konosky -
David L Norris -
Jeff Ratliff -
Matthew Miller -
Pedro Fernandes Macedo -
Scot L. Harris