[SOLVED] optimum partitioning for slack system

textillis · 06-07-2013, 10:04 PM

I currently have mint occupying sole primary partition of 1TB on a new computer.

I wish to reinstall:
1. Slackware
2. Arch (long-term project)

My question:
Since there is a limit to the number of primary partitions one can use,
would the following work well for a slack system:

sda2 primary Slackware with / (root)
sda3 extended: containing: sda5(logical): /home; sda6(logical): /usr; sda7(logical) /opt

Or, if there is something I could modify, suggestions greatly appreciated.

Richard Cranium · 06-07-2013, 10:34 PM

My advice would be for you to read up on LVM and start using it.

It really does solve a bunch of problems.

textillis · 06-07-2013, 10:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Richard Cranium

My advice would be for you to read up on LVM and start using it.

It really does solve a bunch of problems.

What is the LVM

Oh, got it: Logical Volume Mgt...

thanks Richard

philanc · 06-08-2013, 02:49 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by textillis

I currently have mint occupying sole primary partition of 1TB on a new computer.

I wish to reinstall:
1. Slackware
2. Arch (long-term project)

Assuming that (1) your computer is a single user desktop/laptop and (2) you want a simple solution -- and not too many things to learn upfront!,

I would forget about all these partitions for /usr, /home, /opt... I would install all the OS filesystem in a single partition. As you are running Mint, I guess you have a beefy-enough configuration (enough RAM) so I would go without swap (or a swapfile in the OS partition, just in case).

I would use 4 primary partitions:

- sda1: 50GB - boot manager + main "workhorse" OS (Slackware 14.0)
- sda2: 50GB - experimental OS, eg. Arch
- sda3: 50GB - experimental OS, eg. Slackware current
- sda4: 850GB (rest of disk) - data, eg. your personal stuff, music, etc.

50GB is more than enough for running a modern linux (you may want to adjust according to your needs)

the large data partition can be mounted in whichever OS you happen to use. If you have confidential or private stuff on this PC, you may want to set it as an encrypted partition (dm-crypt/LUKS).

HTH

Phil

Richard Cranium · 06-09-2013, 01:28 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by textillis

What is the LVM

Oh, got it: Logical Volume Mgt...

thanks Richard

Well, the beauty of it is that you don't have to allocate all of your disk space at once. If you use file systems that allow resizing while mounted, then you can add more storage to any logical volume any time you want.

There's some other goodies that LVM provides, but being able to (essentially) create partitions on the fly and make them larger on the fly are really nice features that you can use almost immediately.

I, personally, had resisted using LVM for a long time since I thought that it would be too complicated to use. When I finally started using it, I found out that it isn't difficult to use at all. (There's support for LVM in mkinitrd as well as the standard Slackware init scripts.)

You can even put your /boot partition in LVM and boot off of that!

Diantre · 06-09-2013, 02:04 AM

Another approach is to use GPT instead of MBR partitions. With GPT there's a limit of 128 partitions.

textillis · 06-09-2013, 04:08 AM

Phil, Richard, Diantre,
Thank you one and all gentlemen.

Most enlightening.

Tex

(i think i'm going to give GPT a go first, then try LVM.)