Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
On Sun, 27 Nov 2011 00:01:07 +0100 Alex Schuster wo...@wonkology.org wrote: pvcreate /dev/sda5 vgcreate myvg /dev/sda5 lvcreate -n usr -L 10G myvg mke2fs -j /dev/myvg/usr Of course, just using /dev/sda5 for /usr is simpler. But what if this turns out to be too small? With so many partitions I would think this is very likely to happen sooner or later. With LVM, all you'd have to do is: lvresize -L +1G /dev/myvg/usr resize2fs /dev/myvg/usr Here I do not understand from where this +1G is taken? Don't you have to make something smaller by 1G first? Robert -- Róbert Čerňanský E-mail: hslis...@zoznam.sk Jabber: h...@jabber.sk
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
Róbert Čerňanský wrote: On Sun, 27 Nov 2011 00:01:07 +0100 Alex Schusterwo...@wonkology.org wrote: pvcreate /dev/sda5 vgcreate myvg /dev/sda5 lvcreate -n usr -L 10G myvg mke2fs -j /dev/myvg/usr Of course, just using /dev/sda5 for /usr is simpler. But what if this turns out to be too small? With so many partitions I would think this is very likely to happen sooner or later. With LVM, all you'd have to do is: lvresize -L +1G /dev/myvg/usr resize2fs /dev/myvg/usr Here I do not understand from where this +1G is taken? Don't you have to make something smaller by 1G first? Robert Nope. Not if you have 1Gb of space that is not used yet. Here is a example: root@fireball / # vgdisplay --- Volume group --- VG Name data System ID Formatlvm2 Metadata Areas1 Metadata Sequence No 9 VG Access read/write VG Status resizable MAX LV0 Cur LV1 Open LV 1 Max PV0 Cur PV1 Act PV1 VG Size 698.63 GiB PE Size 4.00 MiB Total PE 178850 Alloc PE / Size 102400 / 400.00 GiB Free PE / Size 76450 / 298.63 GiB VG UUID eNF7B0-3BDb-qe1W-5FTH-4Uah-wRe1-xD7Xa8 root@fireball / # Right now there is 400Gbs of space used. I have 298Gbs of free space. If I wanted to add some space to something, lvresize -L +1G /dev/path to lv here would get it added then just resize the file system. That help? Dale :-) :-) -- I am only responsible for what I said ... Not for what you understood or how you interpreted my words!
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
On Sun, 27 Nov 2011 09:02:37 +0100 Róbert Čerňanský hslis...@zoznam.sk wrote: On Sun, 27 Nov 2011 00:01:07 +0100 Alex Schuster wo...@wonkology.org wrote: pvcreate /dev/sda5 vgcreate myvg /dev/sda5 lvcreate -n usr -L 10G myvg mke2fs -j /dev/myvg/usr Of course, just using /dev/sda5 for /usr is simpler. But what if this turns out to be too small? With so many partitions I would think this is very likely to happen sooner or later. With LVM, all you'd have to do is: lvresize -L +1G /dev/myvg/usr resize2fs /dev/myvg/usr Here I do not understand from where this +1G is taken? Don't you have to make something smaller by 1G first? The 1G is taken from the free pool of unused extents. This assumes you have free extents, if not, then you do need to free some up somwehere else first. Using LVM is a lot like using a SAN - don't allocate everything right at the beginning, rather give each lv what it needs today and grow it as space needs change. This way you always have free extents available for use. -- Alan McKinnnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
Róbert Čerňanský writes: On Sun, 27 Nov 2011 00:01:07 +0100 Alex Schuster wo...@wonkology.org wrote: pvcreate /dev/sda5 vgcreate myvg /dev/sda5 lvcreate -n usr -L 10G myvg mke2fs -j /dev/myvg/usr Of course, just using /dev/sda5 for /usr is simpler. But what if this turns out to be too small? With so many partitions I would think this is very likely to happen sooner or later. With LVM, all you'd have to do is: lvresize -L +1G /dev/myvg/usr resize2fs /dev/myvg/usr Here I do not understand from where this +1G is taken? Don't you have to make something smaller by 1G first? I assumed that /dev/sda5 is large enough and has free space that is not being used for logical volumes. The lvcreate -L 10G step creates a logical volume of 10 GB size, the rest of the volume group (that is using the physical volume /dev/sda5) is being unused. You can create other logical volumes with lvcreate, or extend existing ones, until all of that space is being used. Then, you need to make something smaller of course (which can be done), or you can extend your volume group by another partition. Which may be on the same drive, or even on another one. pvcreate /dev/sda6 vgextend myvg /dev/sda6 lvresize... Wonko
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
On Fri, 25 Nov 2011 08:30:42 -0800 Mark Knecht markkne...@gmail.com wrote: Seriously, LVM looks mighty nice, but it also looks (and is!) mighty complex. I'm exactly as you are WRT to LVM but I admired Dale for giving it a shot and I'm sorta feeling like I gotta start learn it just to be part of the group... ;-) The only reasons people find LVM complicated is that the man pages could stand some re-writing and that most of the guides out on the intartubes and writing by people equally confused. They give a bunch of examples and don't explain what all the building blocks of LVM are. Neil said earlier to spend an hour learning it - this is excellent advice. The gentoo docs were very good last time I looked at them, but that was 3+ years ago. I doubt they've changed much. -- Alan McKinnnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
On Friday 25 Nov 2011 20:08:01 Walter Dnes wrote: On Fri, Nov 25, 2011 at 11:12:42PM +0700, Pandu Poluan wrote Everytime I read some guide on LVM, my eyes becomes blurry, the room starts spinning, and I can hear wolves howling ... :D Seriously, LVM looks mighty nice, but it also looks (and is!) mighty complex. So, I want to start from something simple. Aaaanyways, after reviewing my production boxes, I decided to implement the following strategy: / == 800 MiB /boot == 20 MiB /usr == 1800 MiB /usr/portage == 2000 MiB /var == 4000 MiB /var/lib/postgresql == 1000 MiB Comments, suggestions, are welcome :) I have my own weird approach that's even weirder than my mdev setupG. I start with... * 250 megabytes for / as ext2fs (No that is not a typo) * 4 gigs for swap * the rest of the drive is /home as one huge reiserfs partition And I do *NOT* use LVM. fdisk -l shows... Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System /dev/sda12048 976773167 4883855605 Extended /dev/sda54096 516095 256000 83 Linux /dev/sda6 518144 8906751 4194304 83 Linux /dev/sda7 8908800 976773167 483932184 83 Linux df shows Filesystem 1K-blocks Used Available Use% Mounted on rootfs 247919 29315205804 13% / /dev/root 247919 29315205804 13% / devtmpfs 10240 0 10240 0% /dev rc-svcdir 102444 980 5% /lib/rc/init.d mdev 10240 0 10240 0% /dev shm1551308 0 1551308 0% /dev/shm /dev/sda7483917384 251951296 231966088 53% /home The secret is that I bindmount /opt, /var, /usr, and /tmp onto the large reiserfs partition. ### ### /dev/sda5 / ext2 noatime,nodiratime,async 0 1 /dev/sda7 /home reiserfs noatime,nodiratime,async,notail 0 1 /home/bindmounts/opt/opt auto bind0 0 /home/bindmounts/var/var auto bind0 0 /home/bindmounts/usr/usr auto bind0 0 /home/bindmounts/tmp /tmp auto bind0 0 /dev/sda6 noneswapsw 0 0 /dev/cdrom /mnt/cdrom iso9660 noauto,users,ro 0 0 /dev/cdrom1 /mnt/cdrom1 autonoauto,user,ro 0 0 /dev/sdb1 /mnt/extb auto noauto,user,noatime,async 0 0 /dev/sdc1 /mnt/extc auto noauto,user,noatime,async 0 0 # glibc 2.2 and above expects tmpfs to be mounted at /dev/shm for # POSIX shared memory (shm_open, shm_unlink). # (tmpfs is a dynamically expandable/shrinkable ramdisk, and will # use almost no memory if not populated with files) shm /dev/shmtmpfs nodev,nosuid,noexec 0 0 ### ### I recall your interesting mounting approach, but never really understood the benefit of it. Would you please explain why you use bindmount? -- Regards, Mick signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part.
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
On Nov 26, 2011 2:57 PM, Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: On Fri, 25 Nov 2011 20:53:17 +0700 Pandu Poluan pa...@poluan.info wrote: I want to build a Gentoo server box whose structure is highly-partitioned, like this: partition setups are like lovers - highly variable. And the one that suits you will suit almost no-one else. Careful, you've just raised some unholy memories there ;-) Many of the recommendations you find on-line come from an earlier time and the reason they got going is no longer valid for the most part. So do take care to evaluate the real reason why you are doing something. Valid reasons included: You want to unmount a dir structure (/boot). The fs type for a partition is different from that fs it mounts to (often /var/log but these days most often used with tmpfs). You need to mount an fs with different mount options to the fs it mounts onto (/home noexec on multi-user setups for example) The way to do this is not to search Google for recommendations, as there is no such valid thing, but to figure out for yourself why you want a mountpoint, calculate how much space *you* need, then do it. Indeed, that's what I originally asked: the numbers. Read other's experiences who use similar software as you by all means, but that will be mere hints. My own thoughts: - I can't find a good reason anymore to have a local /usr separate. It's always mounted on my systems, even in maintenance mode (there's always at least one decent tool that the distro decided to put in /usr/sbin) Mounting it ro not a good idea? - /tmp is only useful on it's own if it's a tmpfs. Mine hasn't ever filled up anywhere (despite best efforts of users). tmpfs is general is an awesome idea. Noted. - Keeping data and code separate is always a good idea. But only a few things in /var are critical like /var/log and /var/database. Everything else is usually tiny and can safely live on / Except /var/tmp, which can grow to epic proportions :-) - /boot is traditionally separate partly because long long long ago BIOSs couldn't read past 1024 cylinders which borked lilo. This is no longer true. I'm a bit scared that a buggy program or script borked the kernels I put there... Thus also the reason to mount /usr ro. And if I can make /bin /sbin /etc all ro, I want to make them ro, too... Am I being too paranoid? Rgds,
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
On Sun, Nov 27, 2011 at 01:22, Mick michaelkintz...@gmail.com wrote: On Friday 25 Nov 2011 20:08:01 Walter Dnes wrote: On Fri, Nov 25, 2011 at 11:12:42PM +0700, Pandu Poluan wrote Everytime I read some guide on LVM, my eyes becomes blurry, the room starts spinning, and I can hear wolves howling ... :D Seriously, LVM looks mighty nice, but it also looks (and is!) mighty complex. So, I want to start from something simple. Aaaanyways, after reviewing my production boxes, I decided to implement the following strategy: / == 800 MiB /boot == 20 MiB /usr == 1800 MiB /usr/portage == 2000 MiB /var == 4000 MiB /var/lib/postgresql == 1000 MiB Comments, suggestions, are welcome :) I have my own weird approach that's even weirder than my mdev setupG. I start with... * 250 megabytes for / as ext2fs (No that is not a typo) * 4 gigs for swap * the rest of the drive is /home as one huge reiserfs partition And I do *NOT* use LVM. fdisk -l shows... Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System /dev/sda1 2048 976773167 488385560 5 Extended /dev/sda5 4096 516095 256000 83 Linux /dev/sda6 518144 8906751 4194304 83 Linux /dev/sda7 8908800 976773167 483932184 83 Linux df shows Filesystem 1K-blocks Used Available Use% Mounted on rootfs 247919 29315 205804 13% / /dev/root 247919 29315 205804 13% / devtmpfs 10240 0 10240 0% /dev rc-svcdir 1024 44 980 5% /lib/rc/init.d mdev 10240 0 10240 0% /dev shm 1551308 0 1551308 0% /dev/shm /dev/sda7 483917384 251951296 231966088 53% /home The secret is that I bindmount /opt, /var, /usr, and /tmp onto the large reiserfs partition. ### ### /dev/sda5 / ext2 noatime,nodiratime,async 0 1 /dev/sda7 /home reiserfs noatime,nodiratime,async,notail 0 1 /home/bindmounts/opt /opt auto bind 0 0 /home/bindmounts/var /var auto bind 0 0 /home/bindmounts/usr /usr auto bind 0 0 /home/bindmounts/tmp /tmp auto bind 0 0 /dev/sda6 none swap sw 0 0 /dev/cdrom /mnt/cdrom iso9660 noauto,users,ro 0 0 /dev/cdrom1 /mnt/cdrom1 auto noauto,user,ro 0 0 /dev/sdb1 /mnt/extb auto noauto,user,noatime,async 0 0 /dev/sdc1 /mnt/extc auto noauto,user,noatime,async 0 0 # glibc 2.2 and above expects tmpfs to be mounted at /dev/shm for # POSIX shared memory (shm_open, shm_unlink). # (tmpfs is a dynamically expandable/shrinkable ramdisk, and will # use almost no memory if not populated with files) shm /dev/shm tmpfs nodev,nosuid,noexec 0 0 ### ### I recall your interesting mounting approach, but never really understood the benefit of it. Would you please explain why you use bindmount? Not really explaining waltdnes' interesting layout, but using bindmount (instead of symlinks) ensures that when a program tries to find a relative directory from a path, it will not attempt to do so from the symlink's target. E.g.: Say I have /lib/gzampl/, which is actually a symlink/bindmount to /mnt/gzampl/. Then theres another directory /lib/morethings. With a symlink, if a program wants to do ../morethings from within /lib/gzampl/, it might end up in /mnt/morethings if the program tries to resolve the symlink first. With a bindmount, doing ../morethings from /lib/gzampl/ will always end up in /lib/morethings. (CMIIW) That said... mentioning bindmount made me rethink things... What if I have: /mnt/.temporaries == ext4, 4GiB /mnt/.persistents == reiserfs, 2GiB then I make some directories and bindmounts: /mnt/.temporaries/tmp --bm-- /tmp /mnt/.temporaries/vartmp --bm-- /var/tmp /mnt/.temporaries/run --bm-- /run /run --bm-- /var/run /run/lock --bm-- /var/lock /mnt/.persistents/postgresql --bm-- /var/lib/postgresql /mnt/.persistents/vardb --bm-- /var/db /mnt/.persistents/varlog --bm-- /var/log /mnt/.persistents/varspool --bm-- /var/spool Ta da! The ephemeral directories can now just fight among themselves, and the important directories can be backed up in one fell swoop (via /mnt/.persistents)? Thoughts are welcome, of course :) Rgds, -- FdS Pandu E Poluan ~ IT Optimizer ~ • LOPSA Member #15248 • Blog : http://pepoluan.tumblr.com • Linked-In : http://id.linkedin.com/in/pepoluan
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
On 11/25/2011 5:53 AM, Pandu Poluan wrote: So. Care to share your partitioning strategy? I'm not a fan of building servers outta parts. If this is a proper server with a raid card, which is useful for high IO things like mail and db servers, then your favorite RAID level, /boot / swap and the rest in /var. If they are separate drives then put the OS/portage on one, Postgres on another, Postfix on one, and logging on the last for the best IO. I'd call them /mnt/postgres /mnt/postfix and /mnt/logging so the sysadmin that comes after you isn't completely confused as to what's going on. If IO isn't a huge priority I'd put the OS/Portage on one and then softraid the three drives into /data or some such and symlink Postgres, logging, and Postfix as appropriate. (And while we're at it, am I overdoing the partitioning?) Yes, though you'll do it anyway. It's cool, I was spending time on the same thing ten years ago. It's ultimately more annoying than useful and you'll simplify later. LVM is always good to know and very useful for snapshotting database backups. I find it less useful for changing partitions or adding drives. In regards to filling up partitions monitoring, cron, and logrotate are your friends. I email at 70% and page at 80%. kashani
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
On Sun, 27 Nov 2011 01:42:40 +0700 Pandu Poluan pa...@poluan.info wrote: On Nov 26, 2011 2:57 PM, Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: On Fri, 25 Nov 2011 20:53:17 +0700 Pandu Poluan pa...@poluan.info wrote: I want to build a Gentoo server box whose structure is highly-partitioned, like this: partition setups are like lovers - highly variable. And the one that suits you will suit almost no-one else. Careful, you've just raised some unholy memories there ;-) Many of the recommendations you find on-line come from an earlier time and the reason they got going is no longer valid for the most part. So do take care to evaluate the real reason why you are doing something. Valid reasons included: You want to unmount a dir structure (/boot). The fs type for a partition is different from that fs it mounts to (often /var/log but these days most often used with tmpfs). You need to mount an fs with different mount options to the fs it mounts onto (/home noexec on multi-user setups for example) The way to do this is not to search Google for recommendations, as there is no such valid thing, but to figure out for yourself why you want a mountpoint, calculate how much space *you* need, then do it. Indeed, that's what I originally asked: the numbers. Read other's experiences who use similar software as you by all means, but that will be mere hints. My own thoughts: - I can't find a good reason anymore to have a local /usr separate. It's always mounted on my systems, even in maintenance mode (there's always at least one decent tool that the distro decided to put in /usr/sbin) Mounting it ro not a good idea? Personally, I find an ro /usr a gigantic PITA. I'm the kind of guy that will forget to remount it before emerge too many times, then write a wrapper script around emerge. Thus effectively undoing the entire benefot of having it ro at all :-) I also remember the the brain-dead rpm maintainer from RedHat. rpm would happily update it's database then bail out halfway through the install() phase if /usr was mounted ro, leaving the database irreversibly corrupt. For three years this person refused to consider this a bug even though rpm could easily detect the condition in advance every single time (i.e. a classic case of verify you *can* write something before writing it). Such stories make me fearful of a local /usr mounted ro. Your needs may differ. A remote /usr mounted over NFS remotely as a terminal server - that's a different story altogether. - /tmp is only useful on it's own if it's a tmpfs. Mine hasn't ever filled up anywhere (despite best efforts of users). tmpfs is general is an awesome idea. Noted. - Keeping data and code separate is always a good idea. But only a few things in /var are critical like /var/log and /var/database. Everything else is usually tiny and can safely live on / Except /var/tmp, which can grow to epic proportions :-) As a sysadmin of a real server I would expect no less from you than a Nagios instance that mails you before the point of epicness :-) - /boot is traditionally separate partly because long long long ago BIOSs couldn't read past 1024 cylinders which borked lilo. This is no longer true. I'm a bit scared that a buggy program or script borked the kernels I put there... Thus also the reason to mount /usr ro. Following on from above, consider this: The only thing you will allow to write to /usr is emerge, right? And like most folks you don't check every bit of what it does? So the buggy scripts you are in fear of will be ebuilds. And yet, you will always allow then to be installed without prior checks. So why do you plan to have safeguards when you know in advance you will always suspend them? And if I can make /bin /sbin /etc all ro, I want to make them ro, too... Am I being too paranoid? Yes. You are causing yourself an insane amount of work for no good reason and it will drive you beserk in a week. Or you will implement workarounds. Normally only root can write to those areas. Only root can remount them. If a user gets into a position where they can overwrite things, you have already lost every last measure of protection and the game is already over. What you need is a proper backup strategy with restores that actually work. -- Alan McKinnnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
On Sun, 27 Nov 2011 02:05:57 +0700 Pandu Poluan pa...@poluan.info wrote: Not really explaining waltdnes' interesting layout, but using bindmount (instead of symlinks) ensures that when a program tries to find a relative directory from a path, it will not attempt to do so from the symlink's target. [snip] Ta da! The ephemeral directories can now just fight among themselves, and the important directories can be backed up in one fell swoop (via /mnt/.persistents)? Thoughts are welcome, of course :) Rgds, That's an interesting solution but I still don't understand the problem it solves. What actual real-world threat does this counter? Not a theoretical threat, an actual real one, and why do you think you need to stop software using relative paths? Not to rain on your parade, but it just sounds a lot like chrooting named - a huge amount of work, a real PITA for the maintainer, lots and lots of warm fuzzies for PHBs, but no real actual benefit overall. -- Alan McKinnnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
On Sun, 27 Nov 2011 01:42:40 +0700, Pandu Poluan wrote: - Keeping data and code separate is always a good idea. But only a few things in /var are critical like /var/log and /var/database. Everything else is usually tiny and can safely live on / Except /var/tmp, which can grow to epic proportions :-) Put PORTAGE_TMPDIR on its own filesystem (possibly tmpfs) and that will no longer happen. -- Neil Bothwick Q How many screws are there in a lesbians coffin? A None. It's all tongue and groove. signature.asc Description: PGP signature
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
On Fri, 25 Nov 2011 17:58:55 -0600, Dale wrote: If I were you, I would at least try to put /boot and / outside LVM then everything else on LVM. Just make sure /boot and / have PLENTY of space since they are pretty much committed at that point. I find 400MB for / (and no separate /boot) to be ample space, usually only 50% full. Everything else then goes in LVs. This is (soon to be was) one of the advantages of a small / and separate /usr, all the flexibility of LVM without the need for an initramfs. -- Neil Bothwick Save the whales. Collect the whole set. signature.asc Description: PGP signature
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
Pandu Poluan writes:
Everytime I read some guide on LVM, my eyes becomes blurry, the room
starts spinning, and I can hear wolves howling ... :D
Seriously, LVM looks mighty nice, but it also looks (and is!) mighty
complex.
I really don't think so. pvcreate partition creates a physical volume,
vgcreate vgname partition starts a volume group, and lvcreate -n
name -L size vgname creates a logical volume that you can use as
if it were a physical partition.
pvcreate /dev/sda5
vgcreate myvg /dev/sda5
lvcreate -n usr -L 10G myvg
mke2fs -j /dev/myvg/usr
So, I want to start from something simple.
Of course, just using /dev/sda5 for /usr is simpler. But what if this
turns out to be too small? With so many partitions I would think this is
very likely to happen sooner or later. With LVM, all you'd have to do is:
lvresize -L +1G /dev/myvg/usr
resize2fs /dev/myvg/usr
Takes 10 seconds plus the time you need to type this, and you have 1G of
more space. Otherwise, you'd probably have to boot from another system
and use something like parted to move stuff around. Or move stuff like
/usr/src to other partitions.
Another neat featurea are snapshots, this is nice for backups.
Comments, suggestions, are welcome :)
I also have many partitons, but I've overdone italready.
I like to have all big partitions separated in order to prevent / from
becoming full, so I have /home, /opt, /tmp, /usr and /var. I also have
/usr/{local,src}. And a big partition for /var/portage, contining tree
(sometimes on its own partition), distfiles and tmpdir. And /home. And
/data/{mp3,mpeg}. And /32 for my 32 bit chroot Gentoo. And /backup for
all sorts of backups, including a sub-directory with another partiton
for each of the partitions above. All are LUKS-encrypted, and it takes a
while during bootup until they are all opened. But then, I reboot very
seldomly.
Wonko
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
On Sun, 27 Nov 2011 00:01:07 +0100, Alex Schuster wrote: Seriously, LVM looks mighty nice, but it also looks (and is!) mighty complex. I really don't think so. pvcreate partition creates a physical volume, vgcreate vgname partition starts a volume group, and lvcreate -n name -L size vgname creates a logical volume that you can use as if it were a physical partition. The problem people have with LVM is not working with PVs, VGs and LVs, it is understanding what they are and how they fit together. Once that is clear, the system becomes as simple as you stated. -- Neil Bothwick I cna ytpe 300 wrods pre mniuet!!! signature.asc Description: PGP signature
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
On Sat, Nov 26, 2011 at 3:32 PM, Neil Bothwick n...@digimed.co.uk wrote: On Sun, 27 Nov 2011 00:01:07 +0100, Alex Schuster wrote: Seriously, LVM looks mighty nice, but it also looks (and is!) mighty complex. I really don't think so. pvcreate partition creates a physical volume, vgcreate vgname partition starts a volume group, and lvcreate -n name -L size vgname creates a logical volume that you can use as if it were a physical partition. The problem people have with LVM is not working with PVs, VGs and LVs, it is understanding what they are and how they fit together. Once that is clear, the system becomes as simple as you stated. -- Neil Bothwick I have a machine I built a couple of years ago that has a good Intel MB processor (i5-661) from that time frame, and the machine already has Gentoo on it, but the hard drives where more or less what I had hanging around at the time so it ended up with 4 smallish drives. 3 for Gentoo, 1 for Windows. Would it be a reasonable training exercise to take a new 1TB drive and do some sort of rsync copy of those 3 drives into some sort of a LVM and see how it works? - Mark
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
On Sat, 26 Nov 2011 15:43:21 -0800, Mark Knecht wrote: The problem people have with LVM is not working with PVs, VGs and LVs, it is understanding what they are and how they fit together. Once that is clear, the system becomes as simple as you stated. I have a machine I built a couple of years ago that has a good Intel MB processor (i5-661) from that time frame, and the machine already has Gentoo on it, but the hard drives where more or less what I had hanging around at the time so it ended up with 4 smallish drives. 3 for Gentoo, 1 for Windows. Would it be a reasonable training exercise to take a new 1TB drive and do some sort of rsync copy of those 3 drives into some sort of a LVM and see how it works? Yes, although you could also manage it without a new drive. It's a more challenging exercise, and probably not for an LVM novice, but you could convert the three drives into a single volume group without recourse to another drive, provided they weren't all 90% full. -- Neil Bothwick Definition of Trust: Two cannibals having oral sex. signature.asc Description: PGP signature
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
On Sat, Nov 26, 2011 at 3:50 PM, Neil Bothwick n...@digimed.co.uk wrote: On Sat, 26 Nov 2011 15:43:21 -0800, Mark Knecht wrote: The problem people have with LVM is not working with PVs, VGs and LVs, it is understanding what they are and how they fit together. Once that is clear, the system becomes as simple as you stated. I have a machine I built a couple of years ago that has a good Intel MB processor (i5-661) from that time frame, and the machine already has Gentoo on it, but the hard drives where more or less what I had hanging around at the time so it ended up with 4 smallish drives. 3 for Gentoo, 1 for Windows. Would it be a reasonable training exercise to take a new 1TB drive and do some sort of rsync copy of those 3 drives into some sort of a LVM and see how it works? Yes, although you could also manage it without a new drive. It's a more challenging exercise, and probably not for an LVM novice, but you could convert the three drives into a single volume group without recourse to another drive, provided they weren't all 90% full. -- Neil Bothwick They are all small drives (80GB or 160GB) and they are all over 90% full. They are also fairly slow and draw higher power than the 1TB drive so I figure I'll save a few bucks on electricity each month by doing it. Not sure if I'll try moving Windows to the same drive. Seems like I should as it will remove another drive from the box. - Mark
[gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
I want to build a Gentoo server box whose structure is highly-partitioned, like this: / /boot /usr /tmp /usr/portage == via NFS /var /var/lib/postgresql /var/tmp /var/log /var/spool (Not all of them will reside on the same physical disk; I have /dev/sda up to /dev/sdd) I've been searching high and low for recommended numbers... and there are as many number as search-hits. So. Care to share your partitioning strategy? (And while we're at it, am I overdoing the partitioning?) Rgds, -- FdS Pandu E Poluan ~ IT Optimizer ~ • LOPSA Member #15248 • Blog : http://pepoluan.tumblr.com • Linked-In : http://id.linkedin.com/in/pepoluan
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
On Fri, Nov 25, 2011 at 5:53 AM, Pandu Poluan pa...@poluan.info wrote: I want to build a Gentoo server box whose structure is highly-partitioned, like this: / /boot /usr /tmp /usr/portage == via NFS /var /var/lib/postgresql /var/tmp /var/log /var/spool (Not all of them will reside on the same physical disk; I have /dev/sda up to /dev/sdd) I've been searching high and low for recommended numbers... and there are as many number as search-hits. So. Care to share your partitioning strategy? (And while we're at it, am I overdoing the partitioning?) Rgds, -- FdS Pandu E Poluan ~ IT Optimizer ~ • LOPSA Member #15248 • Blog : http://pepoluan.tumblr.com • Linked-In : http://id.linkedin.com/in/pepoluan I don't use LVM but I suspect that on this list that would be the #1 recommendation to take care of the numbers question. - Mark
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
On Fri, Nov 25, 2011 at 21:35, Mark Knecht markkne...@gmail.com wrote: On Fri, Nov 25, 2011 at 5:53 AM, Pandu Poluan pa...@poluan.info wrote: I want to build a Gentoo server box whose structure is highly-partitioned, like this: - 8 snip I don't use LVM but I suspect that on this list that would be the #1 recommendation to take care of the numbers question. Everytime I read some guide on LVM, my eyes becomes blurry, the room starts spinning, and I can hear wolves howling ... :D Seriously, LVM looks mighty nice, but it also looks (and is!) mighty complex. So, I want to start from something simple. Aaaanyways, after reviewing my production boxes, I decided to implement the following strategy: / == 800 MiB /boot == 20 MiB /usr == 1800 MiB /usr/portage == 2000 MiB /var == 4000 MiB /var/lib/postgresql == 1000 MiB Comments, suggestions, are welcome :) Rgds, -- FdS Pandu E Poluan ~ IT Optimizer ~ • LOPSA Member #15248 • Blog : http://pepoluan.tumblr.com • Linked-In : http://id.linkedin.com/in/pepoluan
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
On 25-Nov-11 17:12, Pandu Poluan wrote: / == 800 MiB /boot == 20 MiB /usr == 1800 MiB /usr/portage == 2000 MiB /var == 4000 MiB /var/lib/postgresql == 1000 MiB I think it is more than wise to put /tmp on separate partition, and mount it with nodev/nosuid/noexec. Malware frequently use tmp to download compile some bad tools and run them from there, as tmp is one of not many world-writable directories... Jarry -- ___ This mailbox accepts e-mails only from selected mailing-lists! Everything else is considered to be spam and therefore deleted.
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
On Fri, Nov 25, 2011 at 8:12 AM, Pandu Poluan pa...@poluan.info wrote: On Fri, Nov 25, 2011 at 21:35, Mark Knecht markkne...@gmail.com wrote: On Fri, Nov 25, 2011 at 5:53 AM, Pandu Poluan pa...@poluan.info wrote: I want to build a Gentoo server box whose structure is highly-partitioned, like this: - 8 snip I don't use LVM but I suspect that on this list that would be the #1 recommendation to take care of the numbers question. Everytime I read some guide on LVM, my eyes becomes blurry, the room starts spinning, and I can hear wolves howling ... :D Seriously, LVM looks mighty nice, but it also looks (and is!) mighty complex. I'm exactly as you are WRT to LVM but I admired Dale for giving it a shot and I'm sorta feeling like I gotta start learn it just to be part of the group... ;-) Seriously though, I've done enough RAID (0,1,5 6) recently to at least feel comfortable setting it up. I'm much more worried about whether I'll be able to handle it when it eventually breaks down. None the less, with LVM on top of RAID I think I'd get past a lot of limitations that I run into, and you may, when I picked a certain size and 1 year down the road it turns out my needs changed. Still, I glaze over every time... :-) - Mark
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
On Friday 25 November 2011 14:53:17 Pandu Poluan wrote: I want to build a Gentoo server box whose structure is highly-partitioned, like this: / /boot /usr /tmp /usr/portage == via NFS /var /var/lib/postgresql /var/tmp /var/log /var/spool (Not all of them will reside on the same physical disk; I have /dev/sda up to /dev/sdd) I've been searching high and low for recommended numbers... and there are as many number as search-hits. So. Care to share your partitioning strategy? (And while we're at it, am I overdoing the partitioning?) Rgds I never set /usr separated from / especially on a server : if there's a bug for any reason, nothing works ! (emerge is in /usr, gcc, ssh doesn't start). But you are the one who decide ! This is my partition system : / ext3/4 /home ext3/4 /varreiserfs /tmptmpfs /tmp_portage tmpfs (specifically for emerge, so I can mount or unmount it when large compil start) /mnt/portage reiserfs (shared via nfs) /mnt/distfiles ext3/4 (shared via nfs) I am available for any explanation. For the ones who read french I have written a doc on my website concerning my choices. -- Stéphane Guedon page web : http://www.22decembre.eu/ carte de visite : http://www.22decembre.eu/downloads/Stephane-Guedon.vcf clé publique gpg : http://www.22decembre.eu/downloads/Stephane-Guedon.asc signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part.
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
On Nov 26, 2011 12:05 AM, Mark Knecht markkne...@gmail.com wrote: On Fri, Nov 25, 2011 at 8:12 AM, Pandu Poluan pa...@poluan.info wrote: On Fri, Nov 25, 2011 at 21:35, Mark Knecht markkne...@gmail.com wrote: On Fri, Nov 25, 2011 at 5:53 AM, Pandu Poluan pa...@poluan.info wrote: I want to build a Gentoo server box whose structure is highly-partitioned, like this: - 8 snip I don't use LVM but I suspect that on this list that would be the #1 recommendation to take care of the numbers question. Everytime I read some guide on LVM, my eyes becomes blurry, the room starts spinning, and I can hear wolves howling ... :D Seriously, LVM looks mighty nice, but it also looks (and is!) mighty complex. I'm exactly as you are WRT to LVM but I admired Dale for giving it a shot and I'm sorta feeling like I gotta start learn it just to be part of the group... ;-) Hey, not fair! Dale's got a headstart already with multi-partitions :-) Seriously though, I've done enough RAID (0,1,5 6) recently to at least feel comfortable setting it up. I'm much more worried about whether I'll be able to handle it when it eventually breaks down. None the less, with LVM on top of RAID I think I'd get past a lot of limitations that I run into, and you may, when I picked a certain size and 1 year down the road it turns out my needs changed. Well, if the numbers I've chosen prove to be off the mark, I'll just tarball everything and rebuild :-P In the meantime, before I have to rebuild, I'm going to learn me some LVM goodness... Rgds,
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
On Nov 26, 2011 12:06 AM, Stéphane Guedon steph...@22decembre.eu wrote: On Friday 25 November 2011 14:53:17 Pandu Poluan wrote: I want to build a Gentoo server box whose structure is highly-partitioned, like this: / /boot /usr /tmp /usr/portage == via NFS /var /var/lib/postgresql /var/tmp /var/log /var/spool - 8 snip I never set /usr separated from / especially on a server : if there's a bug for any reason, nothing works ! (emerge is in /usr, gcc, ssh doesn't start). But you are the one who decide ! Well, actually that's the reason why I want to separate /usr: I'm going to mount it ro to prevent something bad happening to the extremely important files within. This is my partition system : / ext3/4 /home ext3/4 /varreiserfs /tmptmpfs /tmp_portage tmpfs (specifically for emerge, so I can mount or unmount it when large compil start) /mnt/portage reiserfs (shared via nfs) /mnt/distfiles ext3/4 (shared via nfs) Why do you separate the distfiles from the portage tree? Rgds,
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
On Fri, Nov 25, 2011 at 9:53 AM, Pandu Poluan pa...@poluan.info wrote: SNIP /mnt/distfiles ext3/4 (shared via nfs) Why do you separate the distfiles from the portage tree? Rgds, distfiles has a tendency to grow large over the years. IIRC nothing cleans it up automatically so having it separate is just a simple safety mechanism to not run out of disk space after emerge -fDuN @world, etc. I do it also. - Mark
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
On Friday 25 November 2011 19:17:07 Mark Knecht wrote: On Fri, Nov 25, 2011 at 9:53 AM, Pandu Poluan pa...@poluan.info wrote: SNIP /mnt/distfiles ext3/4 (shared via nfs) Why do you separate the distfiles from the portage tree? Rgds, distfiles has a tendency to grow large over the years. IIRC nothing cleans it up automatically so having it separate is just a simple safety mechanism to not run out of disk space after emerge -fDuN @world, etc. I do it also. - Mark It is also because the portage tree is reiserfs and distfiles ext4. Actually, it is like it : /usr /portage- reiserfs | both shared through nfs /distfiles - ext4 | /usr /portage/distfiles | acces on an nfs When you mount a filesystem B inside an other one A and share the root A through nfs, it seems you acces (from nfs clients) to the A and the directory under which is mounted B, but not B itself. Do you understand me ? -- Stéphane Guedon page web : http://www.22decembre.eu/ carte de visite : http://www.22decembre.eu/downloads/Stephane-Guedon.vcf clé publique gpg : http://www.22decembre.eu/downloads/Stephane-Guedon.asc signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part.
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
On Fri, Nov 25, 2011 at 10:17:07AM -0800, Mark Knecht wrote On Fri, Nov 25, 2011 at 9:53 AM, Pandu Poluan pa...@poluan.info wrote: SNIP /mnt/distfiles ext3/4 (shared via nfs) Why do you separate the distfiles from the portage tree? Rgds, distfiles has a tendency to grow large over the years. IIRC nothing cleans it up automatically so having it separate is just a simple safety mechanism to not run out of disk space after emerge -fDuN @world, etc. man eclean http://gpio.ca/cgi-bin/man/man2html?1+eclean -- Walter Dnes waltd...@waltdnes.org
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
Pandu Poluan wrote: On Nov 26, 2011 12:05 AM, Mark Knecht markkne...@gmail.com mailto:markkne...@gmail.com wrote: I'm exactly as you are WRT to LVM but I admired Dale for giving it a shot and I'm sorta feeling like I gotta start learn it just to be part of the group... ;-) Hey, not fair! Dale's got a headstart already with multi-partitions :-) In the meantime, before I have to rebuild, I'm going to learn me some LVM goodness... Rgds, I have this on mine: / /boot /home /usr.portage /var /var/tmp/portage on tmpfs. Nice to have 16Gbs of ram. :-) sda1Primaryext2[boot]197.41 sda2Primaryswap [swap] 1003.49 sda3Primaryreiserfs [root]20003.89 sda5Logical ext3[blank] 5000.98 sda6Logical ext3[portage] 12000.69 sda7Logical reiserfs [home] 50001.48 sda8Logical ext3[var] 10001.95 Here is one thing to think about on LVM. If you put /usr on a separate partition, you will need the init thingy, thanks to the dev at fedora. Yea, lower case f just like lower case w for winders. Don't make me spell it the way I want. There is a lady on this list. o_O Anyway, if you are going to do /usr on a separate partition then you may as well have LVM. You are going to have the init thingy anyway. You may as well give the whole bit a try. LVM has not really been a problem other than me trying to get my sequence and commands straight. If I was going to install again, I would likely have it all on LVM except / and /boot. After all, this is sort of the way fedora does it which is what started the init thingy, in my opinion anyway. I think a Gentoo dev, a really big one, needs to poke the fedora dev in the eye, right one since most are right eye dominant. Might make his keyboard look funny for a while. :/ The init thingy, I have tried making one and booting it. It fails each and every time. I fix one thing, something else breaks. Google finds the same problems but no fixes. I can't seem to find a howto that works for me, including the Gentoo wiki one. Dang fedora ! So, LVM, works fine just have to learn it. The init thing, sucks !! I think the partitioning scheme varies on what you are doing with your box tho. For home use, /boot, /, /home and maybe /var. You can do /usr/portage if fragmentation bothers you. I have a /data thing that I started way back when I was new on Linux and using Mandrake. I really need to move that stuff to my /home directory. I was a bit green at the time. lol I put my TV shows, .iso files and other junk on there. That is on LVM since it seems to grow. Oh, here is a funny one. Imagine walking up to the computer and seeing knotify taking up 14Gbs of ram. O_O My rig was using all the ram, some cache and slow as leap year. I kill -9'd that thing. G!! Dale :-) :-) -- I am only responsible for what I said ... Not for what you understood or how you interpreted my words!
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
On Fri, Nov 25, 2011 at 11:12:42PM +0700, Pandu Poluan wrote Everytime I read some guide on LVM, my eyes becomes blurry, the room starts spinning, and I can hear wolves howling ... :D Seriously, LVM looks mighty nice, but it also looks (and is!) mighty complex. So, I want to start from something simple. Aaaanyways, after reviewing my production boxes, I decided to implement the following strategy: / == 800 MiB /boot == 20 MiB /usr == 1800 MiB /usr/portage == 2000 MiB /var == 4000 MiB /var/lib/postgresql == 1000 MiB Comments, suggestions, are welcome :) I have my own weird approach that's even weirder than my mdev setupG. I start with... * 250 megabytes for / as ext2fs (No that is not a typo) * 4 gigs for swap * the rest of the drive is /home as one huge reiserfs partition And I do *NOT* use LVM. fdisk -l shows... Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System /dev/sda12048 976773167 4883855605 Extended /dev/sda54096 516095 256000 83 Linux /dev/sda6 518144 8906751 4194304 83 Linux /dev/sda7 8908800 976773167 483932184 83 Linux df shows Filesystem 1K-blocks Used Available Use% Mounted on rootfs 247919 29315205804 13% / /dev/root 247919 29315205804 13% / devtmpfs 10240 0 10240 0% /dev rc-svcdir 102444 980 5% /lib/rc/init.d mdev 10240 0 10240 0% /dev shm1551308 0 1551308 0% /dev/shm /dev/sda7483917384 251951296 231966088 53% /home The secret is that I bindmount /opt, /var, /usr, and /tmp onto the large reiserfs partition. ## /dev/sda5 / ext2 noatime,nodiratime,async0 1 /dev/sda7 /home reiserfs noatime,nodiratime,async,notail 0 1 /home/bindmounts/opt/opt auto bind0 0 /home/bindmounts/var/var auto bind0 0 /home/bindmounts/usr/usr auto bind0 0 /home/bindmounts/tmp/tmp auto bind0 0 /dev/sda6 noneswapsw 0 0 /dev/cdrom /mnt/cdrom iso9660 noauto,users,ro 0 0 /dev/cdrom1 /mnt/cdrom1 autonoauto,user,ro 0 0 /dev/sdb1 /mnt/extb auto noauto,user,noatime,async 0 0 /dev/sdc1 /mnt/extc auto noauto,user,noatime,async 0 0 # glibc 2.2 and above expects tmpfs to be mounted at /dev/shm for # POSIX shared memory (shm_open, shm_unlink). # (tmpfs is a dynamically expandable/shrinkable ramdisk, and will # use almost no memory if not populated with files) shm /dev/shmtmpfs nodev,nosuid,noexec 0 0 ## -- Walter Dnes waltd...@waltdnes.org
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
On Fri, Nov 25, 2011 at 11:51 AM, Walter Dnes waltd...@waltdnes.org wrote: On Fri, Nov 25, 2011 at 10:17:07AM -0800, Mark Knecht wrote On Fri, Nov 25, 2011 at 9:53 AM, Pandu Poluan pa...@poluan.info wrote: SNIP /mnt/distfiles ext3/4 (shared via nfs) Why do you separate the distfiles from the portage tree? Rgds, distfiles has a tendency to grow large over the years. IIRC nothing cleans it up automatically so having it separate is just a simple safety mechanism to not run out of disk space after emerge -fDuN @world, etc. man eclean http://gpio.ca/cgi-bin/man/man2html?1+eclean -- Walter Dnes waltd...@waltdnes.org Yes, true, but all I said was that TTBOMK nothing does it automatically, not that it cannot be automated. - Mark
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
Dale wrote: Oh, here is a funny one. Imagine walking up to the computer and seeing knotify taking up 14Gbs of ram. O_O My rig was using all the ram, some cache and slow as leap year. I kill -9'd that thing. G!! Dale :-) :-) Instead of *cache*, make that *swap*. What was I thinking? Oh, still sort of pissed at fedora over the init thingy. That's it. Dale :-) :-) -- I am only responsible for what I said ... Not for what you understood or how you interpreted my words!
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
On Friday 25 November 2011 21:09:04 Mark Knecht wrote: On Fri, Nov 25, 2011 at 11:51 AM, Walter Dnes waltd...@waltdnes.org wrote: On Fri, Nov 25, 2011 at 10:17:07AM -0800, Mark Knecht wrote On Fri, Nov 25, 2011 at 9:53 AM, Pandu Poluan pa...@poluan.info wrote: SNIP /mnt/distfiles ext3/4 (shared via nfs) Why do you separate the distfiles from the portage tree? Rgds, distfiles has a tendency to grow large over the years. IIRC nothing cleans it up automatically so having it separate is just a simple safety mechanism to not run out of disk space after emerge -fDuN @world, etc. man eclean http://gpio.ca/cgi-bin/man/man2html?1+eclean -- Walter Dnes waltd...@waltdnes.org Yes, true, but all I said was that TTBOMK nothing does it automatically, not that it cannot be automated. - Mark I find something on forums.gentoo.org that is called distfiles-cleanup. it's a perl scrit to clean distfiles by release order. Search it. -- Stéphane Guedon page web : http://www.22decembre.eu/ carte de visite : http://www.22decembre.eu/downloads/Stephane-Guedon.vcf clé publique gpg : http://www.22decembre.eu/downloads/Stephane-Guedon.asc signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part.
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
On Fri, 25 Nov 2011 23:12:42 +0700, Pandu Poluan wrote: I don't use LVM but I suspect that on this list that would be the #1 recommendation to take care of the numbers question. Everytime I read some guide on LVM, my eyes becomes blurry, the room starts spinning, and I can hear wolves howling ... :D Seriously, LVM looks mighty nice, but it also looks (and is!) mighty complex. It may look it, but you only have to learn the concepts once. That many physical partitions will be extra work forever, imagine what happens when one of the middle ones is no longer big enough. Seriously, spend half an hour reading up on LVM and you'll never regret it. -- Neil Bothwick RAM disk is *not* an installation procedure. signature.asc Description: PGP signature
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
On Fri, 25 Nov 2011 14:07:48 -0600, Dale wrote: Here is one thing to think about on LVM. If you put /usr on a separate partition, you will need the init thingy, thanks to the dev at fedora. Not yet you don't. I'm happily running a separate /usr (LVM has nothing to do with it) without an initramfs. On my new box, I do have an initramfs, but that's because I have / on LVM, soon to be on an encrypted volume. -- Neil Bothwick Assassins do it from behind. signature.asc Description: PGP signature
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
On Sat, 26 Nov 2011 00:53:57 +0700, Pandu Poluan wrote: Why do you separate the distfiles from the portage tree? A better question is why put the distfiles in the middle of the portage tree? It really makes no sense, they are two very different types of data. A separate DISTDIR also makes sense when sharing it over NFS between various machines. -- Neil Bothwick If at first you don't succeed, call in an airstrike. signature.asc Description: PGP signature
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
Neil Bothwick wrote: On Fri, 25 Nov 2011 14:07:48 -0600, Dale wrote: Here is one thing to think about on LVM. If you put /usr on a separate partition, you will need the init thingy, thanks to the dev at fedora. Not yet you don't. I'm happily running a separate /usr (LVM has nothing to do with it) without an initramfs. On my new box, I do have an initramfs, but that's because I have / on LVM, soon to be on an encrypted volume. That was what I meant to say. If he has / on LVM, he needs a init thingy even now. You don't need the init thingy for a separate /usr now but we all know it is coming. I wouldn't want him to do a nice install then run into a known coming issue that throws things into a mess. Heck, even I don't want to reinstall just for the heck of it. I don't many who does. Thanks for clarifying my point tho. Maybe I do need to drink coffee when I first get up. :/ Dale :-) :-) -- I am only responsible for what I said ... Not for what you understood or how you interpreted my words!
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
Neil Bothwick wrote: On Fri, 25 Nov 2011 23:12:42 +0700, Pandu Poluan wrote: I don't use LVM but I suspect that on this list that would be the #1 recommendation to take care of the numbers question. Everytime I read some guide on LVM, my eyes becomes blurry, the room starts spinning, and I can hear wolves howling ... :D Seriously, LVM looks mighty nice, but it also looks (and is!) mighty complex. It may look it, but you only have to learn the concepts once. That many physical partitions will be extra work forever, imagine what happens when one of the middle ones is no longer big enough. Seriously, spend half an hour reading up on LVM and you'll never regret it. Besides, even I can use LVM now. I even reduced one and took a drive off, mostly to learn. Between Neil and Alan, plus others, you would have some good helpers here. Heck, read over my old threads. I even posted the commands I used to remove a drive a few days ago. There's not much better than having someone that has already done it to post the commands used. At least then you know it works. Am I going to put / on LVM, not yet. I'm still a can or two short of a six pack. I got to get the init thingy to work and work WELL first. If I were you, I would at least try to put /boot and / outside LVM then everything else on LVM. Just make sure /boot and / have PLENTY of space since they are pretty much committed at that point. This is something I am thinking of doing on my rig and one reason I removed the a drive from LVM. I needed some space to swap things around even from a CD/DVD boot. Once you learn how to use it, it really is nice. Setting it up is not bad at all. It's when you need to move data that you can't back up or afford to lose that it gets hairy. That is true for traditional partitions to tho. Dale :-) :-) -- I am only responsible for what I said ... Not for what you understood or how you interpreted my words!
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
Mark Knecht wrote: On Fri, Nov 25, 2011 at 11:51 AM, Walter Dneswaltd...@waltdnes.org wrote: On Fri, Nov 25, 2011 at 10:17:07AM -0800, Mark Knecht wrote On Fri, Nov 25, 2011 at 9:53 AM, Pandu Poluanpa...@poluan.info wrote: SNIP /mnt/distfiles ext3/4 (shared via nfs) Why do you separate the distfiles from the portage tree? Rgds, distfiles has a tendency to grow large over the years. IIRC nothing cleans it up automatically so having it separate is just a simple safety mechanism to not run out of disk space after emerge -fDuN @world, etc. man eclean http://gpio.ca/cgi-bin/man/man2html?1+eclean -- Walter Dneswaltd...@waltdnes.org Yes, true, but all I said was that TTBOMK nothing does it automatically, not that it cannot be automated. - Mark I use http-replicator and I wish it would clean distfiles from it instead of /usr/portage/distfiles. When I run repcacheman, it cleans out distfiles already. I just need to clean up http-rep's directory. Right now, I do a emerge -ef world, rm http-rep's stuff then run repcacheman again. Thing is, it cleans out all the stuff my x86 box needs that my amd64 box doesn't since I always forget to run emerge -ef world on the x86 box too. sighs Dale :-) :-) -- I am only responsible for what I said ... Not for what you understood or how you interpreted my words!
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
On Nov 26, 2011 5:05 AM, Neil Bothwick n...@digimed.co.uk wrote: On Fri, 25 Nov 2011 23:12:42 +0700, Pandu Poluan wrote: I don't use LVM but I suspect that on this list that would be the #1 recommendation to take care of the numbers question. Everytime I read some guide on LVM, my eyes becomes blurry, the room starts spinning, and I can hear wolves howling ... :D Seriously, LVM looks mighty nice, but it also looks (and is!) mighty complex. It may look it, but you only have to learn the concepts once. That many physical partitions will be extra work forever, imagine what happens when one of the middle ones is no longer big enough. Seriously, spend half an hour reading up on LVM and you'll never regret it. Oh, I certainly will. But not now. I need to get this box up, staged, and productioned ASAP. Afterwards, I'll commit myself to understanding LVM. Rgds,
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
2011/11/25 Pandu Poluan pa...@poluan.info I want to build a Gentoo server box whose structure is highly-partitioned, like this: / /boot okay /usr why? just makes your life harder. /tmp okay /usr/portage == via NFS if it makes you happy... /var okay /var/lib/postgresql ? /var/tmp okay /var/log why? /var/spool why? (Not all of them will reside on the same physical disk; I have /dev/sda up to /dev/sdd) I've been searching high and low for recommended numbers... and there are as many number as search-hits. So. Care to share your partitioning strategy? if you really have to split up /var like this, do yourself some favours and spread it over several disks. Also don't put /var and /usr on the same disk. (And while we're at it, am I overdoing the partitioning?) yes, a lot.
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
On Nov 26, 2011 9:05 AM, Volker Armin Hemmann volkerar...@googlemail.com wrote: 2011/11/25 Pandu Poluan pa...@poluan.info I want to build a Gentoo server box whose structure is highly-partitioned, like this: / /boot okay /usr why? just makes your life harder. Why will it make my life harder. /tmp okay /usr/portage == via NFS if it makes you happy... The portage tree will be shared among Gentoo boxen. /var okay /var/lib/postgresql ? I'm using PostgreSQL, and the database IMO should be safely kept in a separate partition. /var/tmp okay /var/log why? Postfix's log files are huge. /var/spool why? Postfix. (Not all of them will reside on the same physical disk; I have /dev/sda up to /dev/sdd) I've been searching high and low for recommended numbers... and there are as many number as search-hits. So. Care to share your partitioning strategy? if you really have to split up /var like this, do yourself some favours and spread it over several disks. Also don't put /var and /usr on the same disk. Indeed. (And while we're at it, am I overdoing the partitioning?) yes, a lot. :-) Rgds,
Re: [gentoo-user] Partitioning strategy...?
On Fri, 25 Nov 2011 20:53:17 +0700 Pandu Poluan pa...@poluan.info wrote: I want to build a Gentoo server box whose structure is highly-partitioned, like this: partition setups are like lovers - highly variable. And the one that suits you will suit almost no-one else. Many of the recommendations you find on-line come from an earlier time and the reason they got going is no longer valid for the most part. So do take care to evaluate the real reason why you are doing something. Valid reasons included: You want to unmount a dir structure (/boot). The fs type for a partition is different from that fs it mounts to (often /var/log but these days most often used with tmpfs). You need to mount an fs with different mount options to the fs it mounts onto (/home noexec on multi-user setups for example) The way to do this is not to search Google for recommendations, as there is no such valid thing, but to figure out for yourself why you want a mountpoint, calculate how much space *you* need, then do it. Read other's experiences who use similar software as you by all means, but that will be mere hints. My own thoughts: - I can't find a good reason anymore to have a local /usr separate. It's always mounted on my systems, even in maintenance mode (there's always at least one decent tool that the distro decided to put in /usr/sbin) - /tmp is only useful on it's own if it's a tmpfs. Mine hasn't ever filled up anywhere (despite best efforts of users). tmpfs is general is an awesome idea. - Keeping data and code separate is always a good idea. But only a few things in /var are critical like /var/log and /var/database. Everything else is usually tiny and can safely live on / - /boot is traditionally separate partly because long long long ago BIOSs couldn't read past 1024 cylinders which borked lilo. This is no longer true. / /boot /usr /tmp /usr/portage == via NFS /var /var/lib/postgresql /var/tmp /var/log /var/spool (Not all of them will reside on the same physical disk; I have /dev/sda up to /dev/sdd) I've been searching high and low for recommended numbers... and there are as many number as search-hits. So. Care to share your partitioning strategy? (And while we're at it, am I overdoing the partitioning?) Rgds, -- Alan McKinnnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com
