On Tuesday 07 August 2001 11:56 am, Ruel Masil wrote:
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Horatio B. Bogbindero [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]
> Sent: Monday, August 06, 2001 6:46 PM
> To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> Subject: Re: [plug] some question
>
> On Mon, Aug 06, 2001 at 05:00:24PM +0800, Ruel Masil wrote (wyy sez):
> > I have a problem with my Linux 6.2 box, my root (/) partition is 100%
>
> full.
>
> > :( What can I do about this? I have other partitions in /home and /var
>
> that
>
> > are not yet full. Pls. help me... thanks in advance.
>
> you usually try to get rid of somethings installed in the / directory.
> these are usually application programs. maybe you place in too many
> programs. if it is a server try getting rid of somethings that are not
> necessary like X-windows and all the X apps that should give you some
> room to breath-in.
>
> how big was your / anyway?
>
> I have 3gig on my root directory. Yeah, i guess have to do that. What are
> the implecations of having a zero root?
>
<snip>
You will need at the very least a minimal root for a minimal set of devices
and mount points for your file system(s). In fact, distro's typically build
up the final file systems by mounting them on a ramdisk set up as root.
Then the final reboot of the install uses the new root system on disk.
The root requirements are not large by any means. A floppy could be more
than sufficient. It depends upon what you want to do with it. I don't
believe a zero root is possible. You will need one whether it is in disk or
on ram. For instance, the Pocket Linux distro is a linux distro that will
run on a machine with a single floppy drive and a whopping 7mb of ram minimum
(swap included) with no harddrive!
What you don't want to do though is put too much disk space on root as the
temptation to load it up with programs is there, and you will encounter a
problem when your root disk fills up ;) Besides, it's generally a good idea
in my opinion not to have anything that tends to fill up disk on the root
partition if this could be helped.
In my 20 years working with IT - and still learning, I have seen that this
is a fairly common mistake that people new to unix tend to do. (I've done it
myself!) I suggest that you take the time and the effort to reinstall your
machine and re-partition the system with root being probably no larger than
300mb (to allow for /tmp). Or better yet, set-up a tmpfs /tmp partition,
using a 2.4.x kernel. BTW, this is the default in some SVR4 systems. It
(the tmpfs) will speed up your system if you have sufficient ram.
While not a hard and fast rule, I advise people new to unix to keep /usr,
/var and /home on separate partition for software install, log growth, and
personal experimentation. (Ofcourse, you could move sub-directories around
and symbolically link them back to the file system tree to the original
location of the subdirectory, as I mentioned in a previous post.)
In a linux redhat 7.1 install, with say a 4GB harddrive, to be used as a
personal workstation, you could configure your partitions as follows:
/ 200MB
/tmp as tmpfs
swap (2x your ram - recommended minimum. Again not a hard and fast rule,
but, more a rule of thumb.)
/boot 50MB (to allow for multiple experimental boot kernels)
/usr 2GB
/var 100MB (you could even make this smaller depending on how you want to
manage your logs. A firewall log with the code red worm though, and all
those other probes in the internet nowadays could fill up fairly quickly
though.)
/home +the balance of the disk
I'm sure there are many other ways, probably better, to set up your file
systems. But, this will allow you some level of freedom to install a lot of
those rpm's from the redhat cd distro, while insulating your root from log
growth, and tmp filling up. (For instance, you could also split out your
/usr/local directory into another partition.)
_
Philippine Linux Users Group. Web site and archives at http://plug.linux.org.ph
To leave: send "unsubscribe" in the body to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To subscribe to the Linux Newbies' List: send "subscribe" in the body to
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
