I have looked over the Slackware setup utility and have become quite familiar with it. I've got the whole bootloader thing down. I have generally messed around with Slackware in a virtual installation. Now that I'm going to install it on a physical computer, I want to know what file system setup is the most efficient. This computer is relatively older but not quite ancient.

I've generally come up with this scheme:

/ - ext2
/boot - ext2
/home - ext4
/var - xfs
/var/log - (maybe xfs. but I hear that log-based file systems are better. advice?)
/usr - ext3

If you have any advice on how/why I should change this, please post. Advice on why I should use another partition scheme would welcome, too.

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EDIT: Updated scheme:

/boot - ext2
/ - ext4
/home - ext4
swap - swap (duh)

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EDIT: I've installed Slackware and am satisfied with the setup.
I've used the updated scheme above.
I've separated the \boot partition in case a hypothetical ext5 get released before the computer turns to dust (Unlikely. Might happen any day now).
I've used ext4 on the other two becase the performance and safety balance was just right.
The swap is obviously setup as swap. :P
Thank you, for all that have provided answers.

how the computer will be used?
unless there are some specific tasks for which one file system is significantly better than the others, choosing a simple configuration, e.g. all ext4, would work just fine.
also, the rational for fragmenting the fs into /, /boot, /usr, home and so on doesn't always justify the additional complexity.
for a desktop with no special requirements, the simpler option might the better one.
oh, I almost forgot - welcome to slackland!

The computer will generally be used for ... general things. I do program stuff in multiple languages and don't really do much media stuff. What partition scheme do you recommend?

/ in ext4
and eventually /home in ext4

ext4 here too for / and /home.

I've never had any problems in any way whatsoever with this simple set up.

I'd be interested to hear arguments in favour of using different file systems for different directories.

I now use ext4 for new installs, although I keep some ext3 partitions working on older machines.

I have found that keeping /home on a separate partition is well worth any potential conflicts with configs.

I am not a distro hopper, but I multi-boot different Slackware versions on the same machine at times and often share the home directories between them - takes a little thought...

So ext4 (ext-du-jour) for both / and /home is usually good for most uses for me.

At one time I began using a separate /boot partition shared among versions due to restrictions on kernel image locations on large hard drives. This worked well and became a habit, but is not really necessary any more.

Finally, I always setup one or more shared data partitions which I mount with fstab entries (like /mnt/sdata, /mnt/sdata2, etc), then use symlinks to access them for various purposes. For example, I sometimes move my mysql data directories onto a shared partition and symlink it from /var/mysql/ to allow sharing of data across versions and make my sometimes large and multiple databases generally more maintainable and portable.

No separate /boot? I always have a separate /boot partition. Is there a reason not to?
What is the generally recommended size for the / partition? Half the disk? Less? More?
On the virtual machine, I just had one partition. Bad practice I'm assuming...

EDIT: Ninja'd by astrogeek.

EDIT2: Updated the first post to reflect some changes.

Using ext2, is not good idea.
ext2 doesn't provide journaling options.
In case of improper shutdown, you are not able to recover files.

Using separate /boot partition is good idea.
Just for an example, in future ext5 is released and your bootloader not able boot from ext5.
In such condition, you can convert / partition with ext5, because you are using separate /boot partition.

I am sharing /boot partition with two linux distroes.

I've gotten in the habit of (at least) three partitions:

swap partition - slightly larger than RAM for suspend/hibernate to work.

/boot - about 1Gig ext2 because if it is damaged then there's no journal or complicated data structures to worry about. Rescue CDs will have a pretty easy time of getting the partition into a state where it will either work or I can copy over what was lost to get the machine back on-line quickly. Really, how often is /boot changing, anyway?

/ - What is left is usually ext4 because of journaling, etc. Better data protection at the cost of (slightly) greater difficulty in recovery.

After that, partitions as needed for other distros, data, Windows, etc.

I would recommend JFS, as being efficient and having low CPU usage.

XFS is good as well.

If you can give some system specs I can be more specific.

Keep in mind that the choice of the right filesystem also can be dependent on your hardware. For example, if you use SSDs you should use filesystems that support the TRIM feature, which would rule out ext2/3,

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@linuxxer: I don't really touch the \boot after I get it up and running. So, the no-journaling isn't an issue.

@H_TeXMeX_H: The computer has 4G of ram a core i3 and 500G of rom. I prefer the console over extreme flashy interfaces, so graphics card is a minor detail.

@TobiSGD: I have a 500G hard driver and it's not super fast. It's about average, but I've found it to be reliable (knocked on wood).

and what is reason to separate /boot in nowadays?
and why system on one partition is "bad practice"? i almost always use one partition for all system ( /boot, /home, /var , /usr, etc) and not have any drawbacks for that...
sometimes /home on different partition is not bad idea, but separate /boot, /var, etc...? :-O

If you want to use LVM for the /-partition or have an encrypted system a separate /boot is the way to go.

It depends on the usage of the machine. I for one am not using a separate /home on my machines (desktop usage), I use a separate partition for my data, my user's config files are backed up automatically every day, so no need for separate /home.
Putting other directories, like /var or /usr/local may be a good idea under several circumstances.
For example, a separate /var may make sense on web- and mailservers to keep data and OS apart for lower downtime if an OS has to get a new install/restore from backup.
A separate /usr/local may also be convenient if you use it for user-compiled programs and you have to re-install the OS.

For the "normal" desktop user I don't see advantages to separate directories to different partitions.

Or RAID differ than RAID1....but small number of us use that features, especially on desktop, as so...