how many partitions should I create?
 

and how much space in each partition?

/ = 2 gbs?
swap = 128 mbs? (do i really need more than that? i have 512mb)
/usr = 15 gbs ?
/opt = 1 gbs ? (KDE gets installed here)
/home = rest

any more partitions?

It's totally up to you,

I use:

swap = double ram
/ = 512mb
/tmp = 512mb
/var = 1gb
/boot = 256mb
/usr = 10 - 15gb
/home = rest

KDE shouldn't be getting installed to /opt - in fact I don't have anything in /opt...

Swap space is very good if you use alot of programs that take a while to open, first time you open it it loads into the swap space and then after that continues to read it from there, speeds it up usually...

Hope this helps :)

KDE shouldn't be getting installed to /opt - in fact I don't have anything in /opt...
 

Slackware installs KDE in /opt by default.

Ah ok, i've only ever used Fedora and Redhat so i thought it was normal to be installed to /usr

Thanks auditek747 :-)

I've used three different distros and there all put together
a little differently yet all work the same.

Yes, they all work the same because they're all Linux. Similarly, a Volkswagen, a BMW, and a Ferrari are all cars-- so ultimately are made up of the same general set of parts and they are all operated in the same general way, but they're all "put together differently", which is what makes each individual car a Volkswagen as opposed to a BMW or a Ferrari.

Linux is the same; "under the hood" they're all Linux, but different kernels and different kernel tweaks (the engine), different UI options and tools (leather seats or cloth, CD player included or extra, hatchback, sedan, or convertible, general visual style), and the underlying design philosophy of how the distro is put together in terms of how you add new software and hardware, where it is installed to, and how it interacts with its various intenal parts (can a GPS unit be added easily, does the gearshift knob break off after 6 months, does the configuration of the electrical wiring system make it difficult to replace the standard car horn with a custom horn sound) are what makes Mandrakelinux distinctive from RedHat Linux or SUSE LINUX (not to mention Slackware and Gentoo), just as the analogous changes make a Volkswagen distinctive from a BMW or a Ferrari.

Depending on what you feel comfortable with, find attractive, and how you use your computer most easily, the way a distribution combines these factors is what makes that distribution more useful or comfortable to you than others; just like if you want a really fast car with a lot of "impress" factor, you'll want to consider a Ferrari, but that's no use if you only use it to go grocery shopping. Ultimately, it is that "X" factor of how an individual distribution meets your personal needs and desires that determines which distro you'll want to settle down with (if you're the "settling down" type).

Nice post motub :)

edit:

Here is mine after a fresh Gentoo install (iBook) with only Fluxbox as a WM:
4gb for /var would be serious overkill on most distro's (200mb would be plenty), but Gentoo uses that space when building large packages. I prob could have got away with less, but I have enough space. /data carries my photos and mp3's and such. I also have a 512mb swap partition, but it really never gets used. With 640mb's of RAM (and only up to 200 being used on average), I sometimes notice 5-10mb's of swap used.

Re: how many partitions should I create?
 

if you share Ram with video you might need more swap - also depends on what you are doing.If you open a couple of hundred pic's you are out of Ram pretty quick.

My /opt (with java,OO and some smaller stuff) comes in at about 350 mb and kde 3.2 at about 250 mb.
you wont need 15 gig in /usr.I got everything but the kitchensink installed and that gives me about 3,5 gig.
You might also think about just doing a / , swap and /home partition - space you don't use up in all those partitions is lost,wasted,useless :D :D :D

15 MB for /boot is more than enough, how many kernels do you want to choose from.

Kristian

Does anyone have anything different to roughly Swap = 2x Ram?
Are there disadvantages to making it (much) bigger?

I have 192Mb Ram. Say I set my swap space to 500Mb. Will that increase performance when working with many or big files or is anything above 2x192=400 a waste of space?

It will only increase performance if you actually ever need that much swap, otherwise it is pretty much a waste of space. But with disk space as cheap as it is these days (I see you have 100gb's) a 512mb swap is usually a safe bet.

I have about 9 gb to give to my slack install. How should I divide that up? I also have Winxp which is taking up most of my other space. I'm planning on getting rid of as many programs on Winxp as possible, and then giving the space to slack, but not yet...

I know my swap should be 2x my ram, which is 512, so I guess my /swap should be about 1 gb.

What other partitions should I create, so everything isn't dumped onto the / partition during install? What would be best to keep my system stable and secure?

Really, the easiest thing to do is create a / and a /home partition. You could get more complicated, but until you get a good feel about your personal needs you might wind up with a lot of wasted space. You will gain nothing from having a 1gb swap partition. I have 512mb's of ram on my desktop and rarely use more than 10mb's of swap even while compiling huge applications. A 512mb /swap will be more than adequate.

The real advantage is making a /home partition. That keeps all your personal data safe in the event you ever need to re-install, every personal configuration changes you have made will remain the same and all your personal files will be untouched. By doing that, you could re-install and on first boot all your apps and desktop will look/act exactly as they did before.

Partitions
 

Since I am really new to Linux I thought that i'd try and pick some of the experiened user's brains. We have a 550 Dell computer that I am going to make into a web/ftp server. I bought the Linux 9 Bible for some groundfloor info. We are going to be using the Corp ediiton of Linux for our Web/ftp server.

Right now we have a 15 PC peer-to-peer network running Windows 2000 (sercurity is not an issue). We have a new Windows 2003 server coming in about a week.

Our web server has a 40gb hd and 384MB RAM. Currently it has Windows 2000 installed on it. We are going to configure this machine as a ftp/web server for our clients to access their files (docs/dwgs/etc.) instead of us emailing/mailing/faxing them to them. If I was to install Linux and blow away the Windows 2000 install what are the recommended partition sizes. I found the recommended partitions:
/boot
/usr
/var
/home
/tmp

but no good info on the partitin sizes. I have a 40gb harddisk that I plan on installing for client files (figured that this would be the easiest way for security).

I read the info in this post but it was directed mostly at a dual boot system, which I could do with my machine if I wanted too.

Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

George

:newbie:

Well I had a 120gb HD to use for Slackware so i made :-

/ = 10gb
/swap/ = 1gb
/home/ = rest

I think 1gb swap was the main overkill with me having 1gb ram, but i do play games allot and watch allot of Anime/Movies :)

@George: If your gonna do a standard 2gb (3gb in Slack10) install, then with a 40gb HD I would use 5gb for root (/) - 500mb for /swap/ & the rest for /home/....you don't need 10 different partitions :)