WinXP+FC2 partition blues...
 

Hello.

I am trying to install FC2 (with XPpro) ultimately running an apache server over dsl and zoneedit and want the following partition scheme:

hd1: ntfs, winxp, 5 GB, primary
hd2: ntfs, userdata, 65 GB, extended, logical
hd3: ext3, /boot, 100MB
hd3: ext3 /, 5 GB, Linux
hd4: swap, 1024 MB

At installation automatic with keeping previuos partitions does not work, and running disk druid manullay, it will also not work, it will say a missing / .

What is the problem?

Anywone can point me to clear procedure on running a apache server with zoneedit and a non-fixed ip would be appreciated.

(I want to run my own simple web server at home, serving family pictures to just a few family members)

Thanks and regards,
TheSandyBear

are you sure you absolutely WANT that partition scheme?

like I suggested on this post, you could put /boot before the windows partition and that should be fine.

c ya

Putting /boot after the Windows partition is fine; my main system is like that (Windows is /dev/hda1, /boot is /dev/hda2, swap is /dev/hda3, and Gentoo / is on /dev/hda4.)

It sounds like you may not have selected the / mount point when you were doing the partitioning. You have to select the mount point when you are creating the partition, but it doesn't force you to do so.

As for making your website available, sign up for an account at http://www.dyndns.org/ and then run a client like ddclient on your linux server to update the IP address for your account whenever it changes. This works quite well and will do exactly what you want.

A few things to consider:

1. DSL upstream speed is usually capped at a fairly slow speed. This means your site will be fairly slow to people browsing it.

2. If you're running a standard Apache web server you have to make sure you keep up with security updates and patches; your DSL line will get port-scanned at least once ever few days, and when people find a web server they usually start poking at it.

BTW, that's a lot of swap space - I never use more than 512MB, and find that 256MB is plenty for a system with 512MB or more RAM. You'll probably never see it use more than ~200MB of swap unless you're doing something that requires HUGE amounts of RAM.

Ok, thanks everyone.

I actually tried with PM8 to move a /boot partition in before the windows one, but not only did PM screw up some MBR record as subsequently reported by disk druid, the problem still remained the same - partition table could not be allocated by disc druid although I tried to push the boot partition to the first 100MB of the disc.

I am first selecting the /boot partition then the / , then swap, all in disk druid (since automatic does not work with my chunk of ntfs of 65 GB in the middle), shouldn't that take care of things? Or do I have at one stage manually assign the / mount point before running anaconda? Seems strange...

All 4x FC2 discs are checked and accepted by anaconda.

As for swapspace i thought the rule 2x RAM was fine...???

DSL - i've got 512 down and 384 up, should be fine for my very limited purpose, i guess.
Any preferens zoneedit or dyndns?
Where can I find stepbystep instruction on ddclient?

Sandy

2x RAM for swap space is an OLD recommendation from back when 64MB was a lot. It just doesn't apply on modern systems that have 512MB or more RAM in them.

Dyndns is free and has worked well for me and others for a long time. Don't know anything about zoneedit. They may be fine. Their web site is ugly.

ddclient comes with basic install/usage instructions, including a sample conf for working with dyndns.

For your partitioning problem, I'd just start over - remove all the other partitions and make it work with Windows the way you want and then go into the FC2 installer and have it do it's thing. Maybe if you used PM8 to move the 65G user data partition to the end of the volume it would work better.

Been away for a couple of days....

I could only solve the partitioning in this way:

1. Removing the 65 GB partition for shared data, making it only 1 Win ntfs 5 gb partition , the rest free.
2. In FC2 setup using the automatic partition but changing the / (last) to 10 GB, leaving 65 GB at the end.
3. In WinXP add the last ntfs partition, so it now looks like this:'

hda1: ntfs, winxp, 5GB pri
hda2: ext3, /boot, 100MB pri (auto)
hda3: ext3, /, 10GB pri (auto, but shrunk to 10GB)
hda4: extended
hda5: swap 1000MB (auto!)
hda6: ntfs 65GB, shared data

Any views of the fact that swap and ntfs residing in one extended partition????

Anyway - I got my FC2 up and running, and what a relieve for sore windowz eyes.... I still find it strange that M$ has such a grip over the industry when there are so much good, stable, safe, secure, good looking, flexible open source stuff around. Even stranger is, imho, that hardware manufacturers are slow to develop drivers, support etc for linux... But - ok - I too are stuck with my first XP partition. And there is a certain learning curve...

Well then, configuring apache (or should I use Zope?) with dynamic IP and dyndns or zoneedit, ddclient is next. I donot know even how to get ddclient and how to install it - any hints?

Thanks, Sandy

You can download ddclient here: http://sourceforge.net/project/showf...roup_id=116817

There should be instruction on configuring and installing it in that archive.