Dear all,

I am relatively new to Linux. Still trying to get my way through. I kinda like the system. Its cool.

I have a problem with my disk partitions. I have installed Linux Suse 9.1 as a dual boot system with Windows XP.


I actually wanted to allocate 5GB partition for Linux. However, something went wrong and I now have partitions as following:

dyn239181:/home/kumaaravelan/ns-allinone-2.28/ns-2.28 # df -h
Filesystem Size Used Avail Use% Mounted on
/dev/hda6 3.1G 3.0G 90M 98% /
tmpfs 252M 12K 252M 1% /dev/shm
/dev/hda2 32G 32G 681M 98% /windows/C
/dev/hda3 1.8G 12M 1.8G 1% /windows/D


Linux is using only 3.1GB on dev/hda6. I want it to also use the /dev/hda3 (windows/D). Can I reformat that for linux extended Partition so my home directory can be using it? For your info, the D folder is currently on NTFS file system.


I have got Partition magic in Windows. But I am not sure if that is the right way of doing this. If there is a way in Linux to claim that 1.8G space, I would be happy to hear it...


Thanks a bunch in advance!!




kV

I thought it would be good information to add my fdisk -l result:


Disk /dev/hda: 40.0 GB, 40007761920 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 4864 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/hda1 1 4 32098+ de Dell Utility
/dev/hda2 * 5 4173 33487492+ 7 HPFS/NTFS
/dev/hda3 4174 4403 1847475 7 HPFS/NTFS
/dev/hda4 4404 4864 3702982+ f W95 Ext'd (LBA)
/dev/hda5 4404 4468 522081 82 Linux swap
/dev/hda6 4469 4864 3180838+ 83 Linux



What is my best option here? Can I move the whole Linux partition up to claim the hda3 space? or should I treat is as a separate linux partition and just mount my home directory there?


Thanks again!

ok, so in short, you want to use /dev/hda3 as your home directory for linux?

assuming hda3 is not a logical partition, first put a linux filesystem on /dev/hda3. Using linux as root type,
mke2fs -j /dev/hda3 << for ext3 filesystem
mkereiserfs /dev/hda3 <<for reiserfs filesystem

I think all you need to do after that is have linux mount the directory as your home directory. edit /etc/fstab to do that.
good luck!

Thanks for the help.

But the file system is still NTFS. Dont I have to delete the partition and recreate a new one (linux partition) with fdisk first?

hmmm, sorry I couldn't help.

the commands I wrote do format/erase a linux partition and put a new/clean filesystem on it. I've never issued the commands on an NTFS partition before though, so that must be the problem.

Open cfdisk and delete /dev/hda3, then (still in cfdisk) make the partition a "linux" partition. Once that is done, try putting issuing the commands that I wrote of earlier. That will do the trick for sure!

Hope that goes well for you. I will check back and try to help if you have a problem or a question.

FatBlueDuck,

Well, actually, it worked. NTFS is still recognised and works in Linux Suse 9.1 that I am using. I can read and write to that partition just as I could with a linux partition.


Thanks a lot. Really!


wishes,
KV