[SOLVED] slackware/multiB partition scheme suggestion (newbie here, just deleted M$ windows)

Ubunoob001 · 10-19-2010, 10:33 PM

Hey all,
So I am very excited. I have just (dont gasp!) deleted Vista, and have deleted all my partitions using gparted (from an Ubuntu 10.04 live CD). Very excited about my Slackware 13.1 install tonight or tomorrow.

Can you please recommend a partition scheme that would satisfy the following conditions:

1. Good for multi-boot
2. Flexible
3. Sufficient space for Ubuntu 10.04 (so far my primary OS (will be reinstalling))
4. Sufficient space for Slackware 13.1
5. Efficient position for Swap
6. Sufficient space for an additional Distro to tinker with/change (Gentoo, Arch etc down the line)
7. A good, but not huge, spot for LFS down the line.

I only have 150 GB internal but have plenty of external space for docs/movies etc.

how do you Slackware users feel about /home partition etc? or at least a place to share all the docs from among OSs (if this is even practical, and doesn't make things messy, otherwise i can use external space) Anyhow thanks for the advice.

Richard Cranium · 10-19-2010, 11:23 PM

Use LVM and file systems that can be made larger while mounted (I know that reiserfs and xfs allow that. ext3, AFAIK, does not.).

I currently maintain a "small" primary partition of 512M for /boot which is formatted as ext2. I currently run mirrored software RAID on all my linux disks and use the various md devices as LVM physical volumes. I then allocate what I think I'll need on my many logical volumes.

CAVEAT: If you make /usr too small, you'll end up (on Slackware, anyways) with the possibility of packages that didn't install completely. While it's possible to shrink logical volumes, it can be tricky depending upon the file system used on it.

LVM is easier to use than you might think. I resisted using it for a long time, thinking that it would make things more complex. Actually, it simplified things (for me, anyways). Now that Slackware supports having your rootfs on a logical volume, it's even easier to use than before.

markush · 10-20-2010, 02:41 AM

Hello Ubunoob001,

here an example from my laptop (320GB HD): ... fdisk -l

Code:

fdisk -l
Gerät  boot.     Anfang        Ende     Blöcke   Id  System
/dev/sda1   *           1        4462    35840983+   7  HPFS/NTFS
/dev/sda2            4463        8286    30716280    7  HPFS/NTFS
/dev/sda3           12749       38913   210167648+   5  Erweiterte
/dev/sda4            8287       12748    35841015   83  Linux
/dev/sda5           12749       16013    26223367   83  Linux
/dev/sda6           16014       16079      530113+  82  Linux Swap / Solaris
/dev/sda7           16080       18038    15735636   83  Linux
/dev/sda8           18039       20650    20980858+  83  Linux
/dev/sda9           20651       31094    83891398+  83  Linux
/dev/sda10          31095       38913    62805093+  83  Linux

Code:

notebook ~ # df -h
Dateisystem           Size  Used Avail Use% Eingehängt auf
/dev/sda4              34G   14G   19G  42% /
udev                   10M  296K  9,8M   3% /dev
/dev/sda8              20G   12G  6,8G  64% /home
/dev/sda9              79G  5,1G   70G   7% /usr/local/public
/dev/sda5              25G  9,6G   14G  42% /usr/local/arch
shm                   2,0G     0  2,0G   0% /dev/shm
/dev/sda2              30G   20G   11G  65% /usr/local/windata

Explanation: I'm dualbooting Windows XP and Linux Gentoo and Arch. /dev/sda1 is the windows-system partition (c: ), /dev/sda2 is d: on windows and in Linux mounted as /usr/local/windata.
/dev/sda3 is an extended partition for Linux. /dev/sda4 and /dev/sda5 is / for Gentoo and Arch, /dev/sda6 is 512MB swap for both. /dev/sda7 and /dev/sda8 are the home directories for the Linux-distributions. /dev/sda9 is mounted as /usr/local/public and holds data which I want to access from both Linux-installations. On /dev/sda10 resides an image for Clonzilla to restore the Windows XP. I use to mount the respectively other distribution on /usr/local, this is usefull to compare the configurations.

I'd recommend when dualbooting more than one Linux-distributions to use grub instead of lilo since it will be much easier to maintain.

Markus

Ubunoob001 · 10-20-2010, 08:31 AM

Many thanks for the suggestions. They were helpful...on to the Slackware Install.