Very Computer

I'm installing RH7.1 on VMWare, and of course that limits me to virtual
disks (partitions) of 2GB in size. I would like to perform the install on 2
or more well-chosen partitions, and leave myself room to grow as
installations add files, etc

I plan to install all of Ximian Gnome, Borland Kylix, JBuilder, Zope,
large-ish PostgresSQL databases, etc. Mostly full installs of development
tools and their help files.

I gather that /var is a candidate for its own (2gb max) partition?
Are there any others?
/Boot only needs to be 70Mb or so, right?

Any recommendations of optimal mount points would be appreciated.

Quote:>>>>> "mnip" == nospam  <mnip> writes:

mnip>
mnip> I'm installing RH7.1 on VMWare, and of course that limits me to
mnip> virtual disks (partitions) of 2GB in size. I would like to
mnip> perform the install on 2 or more well-chosen partitions, and
mnip> leave myself room to grow as installations add files, etc

Have a look at this document:

http://linuxdoc.org/HOWTO/mini/Partition/index.html

It should provide some general advice.

May I suggest that if you are running on VMWare, you probably aren't
running a server or a machine which multiple developers will be logged
into -- in fact your host operating system may well reboot more often
than linux would need to.  You probably don't need to worry too much
about separate partitions.  Also keep in mind that you can correct
mistakes to some extent, by copying stuff around and making links to
balence things out across the partitions.

mnip> I plan to install all of Ximian Gnome, Borland Kylix, JBuilder,
mnip> Zope, large-ish PostgresSQL databases, etc. Mostly full installs
mnip> of development tools and their help files.

If you are going to be doing all that, why use VMWare ?  Why not just
put it all on one box, with one big (say 10 GB or 20 GB) disk and be
done with it ?  Is there a reason why you need to run linux and
another OS *at the same time*, as opposed to dual booting and
switching between them ?

mnip> I gather that /var is a candidate for its own (2gb max)
mnip> partition?

/var usually doesn't get that big.  It is sometimes put on a separate
partition because there are some log files in it, and it can grow a
lot, and if it fills up it's partition it may stop other things from
working if it shares the partition with them.  If you wanted solid
server-type uptimes probably droping VMWare is the first thing to do,
then worry about /var filling up.

My /var is only 75 Mb at this point, so putting it on a 2 GB partition
would waste a lot of space.  The reason to put it on it's own
partition is to isolate it, not because it needs a lot of room.

mnip> Are there any others?
mnip> /Boot only needs to be 70Mb or so, right?

On my machine /boot is taking up 7 Mb, but I have a number of kernels
in there.  25 or 50 Mb should be plenty, if you give it it's own
partition at all.  /boot is usually given it's own partition so that
the starting and ending parts of the partition will be well within the
range that bios and lilo can see; on VMWare I would be surprised if
this was a problem.

mnip> Any recommendations of optimal mount points would be
mnip> appreciated.

If your databases will really be that big, put a separate partition
for wherever they will go -- maybe /home.  Then, because you are
installing a lot of stuff, put /usr on a separate partions.  You may
fill this up and need to further put /use/local on its own partition.
Then put everything else on one partition.  Have a swap partition
because the install script likes it, and will complain if you don't.

--Rob

Quote:> If you are going to be doing all that, why use VMWare ?  Why not just
> put it all on one box, with one big (say 10 GB or 20 GB) disk and be
> done with it ?

The VMware is so I can play with linux in my spare time, I have a lot of
things I'd like to learn with on linux. I have to have my laptop configured
for .NET Windows development, but it has enough memory that VMWare runs
linux pretty well, especially as a 'server' against which to develop web
stuff. I'm skeptical of Kylix and Jbuilder working well, but for me, a
slow-ish dev platform that is around when you have some free time is better
than a fast one at a location where you can't or won't use it. A second
benefit is that if you have a virtual machine, you can move the VMware
virtual disks and profile over to another machine and it just works, or can
be cloned, versioned, a whole host of benefits.

With VMware you make a file that 'could' grow to 2Gb, and the OS sees it as
2Gb partition, but it only takes up a fraction of the space corresponsing to
the actual files stored. The tough part is the 2Gb hard limit. Thanks for
the advice on /usr, that one seems to make sense. I'm going to try out some
disk space reporters and see if that will work.

Quote:> Have a swap partition
> because the install script likes it, and will complain if you don't.

Yeah, what's up with that? I've always wanted to try RH without virtual
memory, because I tend to load up my machines with physical RAM. But the
installer never lets me get away with it. Will the lower-level fdisk let it
slide by?

Quote:>>>>> "nospam" == nospam  <mnip> writes:
nospam>
>> If you are going to be doing all that, why use VMWare ?  Why not
>> just put it all on one box, with one big (say 10 GB or 20 GB) disk
>> and be done with it ?

nospam>
nospam> The VMware is so I can play with linux in my spare time, I
nospam> have a lot of things I'd like to learn with on linux. I have
nospam> to have my laptop configured for .NET Windows development, but
nospam> it has enough memory that VMWare runs linux pretty well,
nospam> especially as a 'server' against which to develop web
nospam> stuff. I'm skeptical of Kylix and Jbuilder working well, but
nospam> for me, a slow-ish dev platform that is around when you have
nospam> some free time is better than a fast one at a location where
nospam> you can't or won't use it. A second benefit is that if you
nospam> have a virtual machine, you can move the VMware virtual disks
nospam> and profile over to another machine and it just works, or can
nospam> be cloned, versioned, a whole host of benefits.
nospam>
nospam> With VMware you make a file that 'could' grow to 2Gb, and the
nospam> OS sees it as 2Gb partition, but it only takes up a fraction
nospam> of the space corresponsing to the actual files stored. The
nospam> tough part is the 2Gb hard limit. Thanks for the advice on
nospam> /usr, that one seems to make sense. I'm going to try out some
nospam> disk space reporters and see if that will work.

Well, in that case you might as well make as many separate partitions
as you feel you might need.  

Quote:>> Have a swap partition because the install script likes it, and will
>> complain if you don't.

nospam>
nospam> Yeah, what's up with that? I've always wanted to try RH
nospam> without virtual memory, because I tend to load up my machines
nospam> with physical RAM. But the installer never lets me get away
nospam> with it. Will the lower-level fdisk let it slide by?

Yes linux will do OK without a swap partition; it is purely a matter
of the install script.  So you can install with a swap partition, and
then remove it, just edit /etc/fstab and then reclaim the partition,
and you might have to edit out a call to swapon -a somewhere in the
install scripts, the boot messages should make that clear if it is.

Since you have these growable partitions in the VMWare world, why not
just leave a swap there ?  If the virtual machine has enough RAM, then
it should never be used anyway.

--Rob