Bruce wrote: > > sda2 is not really a partition. It contains the extended partitions. > > In your case, sda5 and sda6. > > Actually an extended partition is a partition, but it has sub- > partitions. All this stuff is avoided with a GUID Partition Table > (GPT) which is a lot more sane in the world of large disk drives.
Ok, Bruce, I liked what you said about a GPT, did some research on it, and set up a new hard disk with it. Following are some results, and I'll appreciate any comments. I found a very useful article here on installing a GPT: http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/linux/library/l-gpt/index.html?ca=dgr-lnxw07GPT-Storagedth-lx&S_TACT=105AGY83&S_CMP=grlnxw07 The article gives several choices of programs to partition a disk; I chose gdisk. That's fine for me because I have Fedora 17 as a host system, and it uses both GPT and LVM to format the filesystem. Using gdisk with a brand new, fresh disk. First, do a listing: ######### [root@alan-fedora alan]# gdisk -l /dev/sda GPT fdisk (gdisk) version 0.8.4 Partition table scan: MBR: not present BSD: not present APM: not present GPT: not present Creating new GPT entries. Disk /dev/sda: 5860533168 sectors, 2.7 TiB Logical sector size: 512 bytes Disk identifier (GUID): 34ED1705-7876-4D24-A89B-155825BF7D18 Partition table holds up to 128 entries First usable sector is 34, last usable sector is 5860533134 Partitions will be aligned on 2048-sector boundaries Total free space is 5860533101 sectors (2.7 TiB) Number Start (sector) End (sector) Size Code Name ######### Now fire up gdisk and make a partition: ######### [root@alan-fedora alan]# gdisk /dev/sda GPT fdisk (gdisk) version 0.8.4 Partition table scan: MBR: not present BSD: not present APM: not present GPT: not present Creating new GPT entries. Command (? for help): ######### I set up the partitions using the disk on which Fedora 17 is installed as a guide (this filesystem is on /dev/sdb). Next print the new partition table (we're in gdisk now): ######### Command (? for help): p Disk /dev/sda: 5860533168 sectors, 2.7 TiB Logical sector size: 512 bytes Disk identifier (GUID): B46C766D-7CD1-458D-A7D4-63CC5024283D Partition table holds up to 128 entries First usable sector is 34, last usable sector is 5860533134 Partitions will be aligned on 2048-sector boundaries Total free space is 5616237421 sectors (2.6 TiB) Number Start (sector) End (sector) Size Code Name 1 2048 4095 1024.0 KiB EF02 BIOS boot partition 2 4096 1028095 500.0 MiB 0700 Microsoft basic data 3 1028096 34582527 16.0 GiB 8200 Linux swap 4 34582528 244297727 100.0 GiB 8E00 Linux LVM ######### The above link explains what the above stuff means. Lastly, write the new partition table: ######### Command (? for help): w Final checks complete. About to write GPT data. THIS WILL OVERWRITE EXISTING PARTITIONS!! Do you want to proceed? (Y/N): y OK; writing new GUID partition table (GPT) to /dev/sda. The operation has completed successfully. ######### Double-check the installation: ######### [root@alan-fedora alan]# gdisk -l /dev/sda GPT fdisk (gdisk) version 0.8.4 Partition table scan: MBR: protective BSD: not present APM: not present GPT: present Found valid GPT with protective MBR; using GPT. Disk /dev/sda: 5860533168 sectors, 2.7 TiB Logical sector size: 512 bytes Disk identifier (GUID): B46C766D-7CD1-458D-A7D4-63CC5024283D Partition table holds up to 128 entries First usable sector is 34, last usable sector is 5860533134 Partitions will be aligned on 2048-sector boundaries Total free space is 5616237421 sectors (2.6 TiB) Number Start (sector) End (sector) Size Code Name 1 2048 4095 1024.0 KiB EF02 BIOS boot partition 2 4096 1028095 500.0 MiB 0700 Microsoft basic data 3 1028096 34582527 16.0 GiB 8200 Linux swap 4 34582528 244297727 100.0 GiB 8E00 Linux LVM ######### A question remains in my mind, about which I'll have to do more research: Does any more need to be done than what I did above with respect to creating partitions? I seem to recall reading that partition 2 might be formatted as ext4, but that makes no sense to me because the above link specifically mentions that it needs to be a FAT32 partition. Now that the disk has been partitioned, I want to make an LVM filesystem. I found a very helpful article here, which I used to follow the instructions below: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/LVM First make sure the device-mapper kernel module is loaded: ######### modprobe dm-mod ######### Now create the LVM stuff: ######### [root@alan-fedora alan]# pvcreate /dev/sda4 Writing physical volume data to disk "/dev/sda4" Physical volume "/dev/sda4" successfully created ######### Display the LVM volumes. This command seems to display ALL of the LVM volumes, including the one created by Fedora 17: ######### [root@alan-fedora alan]# pvdisplay --- Physical volume --- PV Name /dev/sdb3 VG Name vg_alan-fedora PV Size 2.73 TiB / not usable 30.00 MiB Allocatable yes (but full) PE Size 32.00 MiB Total PE 89408 Free PE 0 Allocated PE 89408 PV UUID z00IIw-k1Ie-y8Uy-9ovN-pqZz-k2GR-kDItHD "/dev/sda4" is a new physical volume of "100.00 GiB" --- NEW Physical volume --- PV Name /dev/sda4 VG Name PV Size 100.00 GiB Allocatable NO PE Size 0 Total PE 0 Free PE 0 Allocated PE 0 PV UUID inre2u-eYeu-1uAH-p0Xh-50GZ-OKDQ-g2CFPf ######### Next create a volume group: ######### [root@alan-fedora alan]# vgcreate vg_alan-lfs /dev/sda4 Volume group "vg_alan-lfs" successfully created ######### Display the results: ######### [root@alan-fedora alan]# pvdisplay --- Physical volume --- PV Name /dev/sdb3 VG Name vg_alan-fedora PV Size 2.73 TiB / not usable 30.00 MiB Allocatable yes (but full) PE Size 32.00 MiB Total PE 89408 Free PE 0 Allocated PE 89408 PV UUID z00IIw-k1Ie-y8Uy-9ovN-pqZz-k2GR-kDItHD --- Physical volume --- PV Name /dev/sda4 VG Name vg_alan-lfs PV Size 100.00 GiB / not usable 4.00 MiB Allocatable yes PE Size 4.00 MiB Total PE 25599 Free PE 25599 Allocated PE 0 PV UUID inre2u-eYeu-1uAH-p0Xh-50GZ-OKDQ-g2CFPf ######### Now we have to make a logical volume. Here's what lvdisplay shows for the Fedora installation: ######### [root@alan-fedora alan]# lvdisplay --- Logical volume --- LV Path /dev/vg_alan-fedora/lv_swap LV Name lv_swap VG Name vg_alan-fedora LV UUID OjnAJ5-0moS-9cVc-zfZM-5rdt-EMFe-1xVXAC LV Write Access read/write LV Creation host, time alan-fedora.alandomain, 2012-11-04 05:44:42 -0500 LV Status available # open 2 LV Size 17.38 GiB Current LE 556 Segments 1 Allocation inherit Read ahead sectors auto - currently set to 256 Block device 253:0 --- Logical volume --- LV Path /dev/vg_alan-fedora/lv_home LV Name lv_home VG Name vg_alan-fedora LV UUID DQUoiB-bNoy-p9kb-29fq-1N67-pNLM-VQa4FE LV Write Access read/write LV Creation host, time alan-fedora.alandomain, 2012-11-04 05:44:42 -0500 LV Status available # open 1 LV Size 2.66 TiB Current LE 87252 Segments 1 Allocation inherit Read ahead sectors auto - currently set to 256 Block device 253:2 --- Logical volume --- LV Path /dev/vg_alan-fedora/lv_root LV Name lv_root VG Name vg_alan-fedora LV UUID ZvETul-E7sM-VYvf-z68s-Sl0M-EOg6-cLaYGh LV Write Access read/write LV Creation host, time alan-fedora.alandomain, 2012-11-04 05:45:02 -0500 LV Status available # open 1 LV Size 50.00 GiB Current LE 1600 Segments 1 Allocation inherit Read ahead sectors auto - currently set to 256 Block device 253:1 ######### Now create a logical volume taking up the rest of the LVM volume group on /dev/sda: ######### [root@alan-fedora alan]# lvcreate -l +100%FREE vg_alan-lfs -n lv_root Logical volume "lv_root" created ######### lvdisplay shows that this was added to the above listing: ######### --- Logical volume --- LV Path /dev/vg_alan-fedora/lv_home LV Name lv_home VG Name vg_alan-fedora LV UUID DQUoiB-bNoy-p9kb-29fq-1N67-pNLM-VQa4FE LV Write Access read/write LV Creation host, time alan-fedora.alandomain, 2012-11-04 05:44:42 -0500 LV Status available # open 1 LV Size 2.66 TiB Current LE 87252 Segments 1 Allocation inherit Read ahead sectors auto - currently set to 256 Block device 253:2 ######### Make the volume groups "available": ######### [root@alan-fedora alan]# vgscan Reading all physical volumes. This may take a while... Found volume group "vg_alan-fedora" using metadata type lvm2 Found volume group "vg_alan-lfs" using metadata type lvm2 [root@alan-fedora alan]# vgchange -ay 3 logical volume(s) in volume group "vg_alan-fedora" now active 1 logical volume(s) in volume group "vg_alan-lfs" now active [root@alan-fedora alan]# ######### Finally, make the ext4 filesystem: ######### [root@alan-fedora alan]# cd /dev/mapper [root@alan-fedora mapper]# ls control vg_alan--fedora-lv_home vg_alan--fedora-lv_root vg_alan--fedora-lv_swap vg_alan--lfs-lv_root [root@alan-fedora mapper]# ls -l total 0 crw-------. 1 root root 10, 236 Nov 5 18:53 control lrwxrwxrwx. 1 root root 7 Nov 5 20:47 vg_alan--fedora-lv_home -> ../dm-2 lrwxrwxrwx. 1 root root 7 Nov 5 20:47 vg_alan--fedora-lv_root -> ../dm-1 lrwxrwxrwx. 1 root root 7 Nov 5 20:47 vg_alan--fedora-lv_swap -> ../dm-0 lrwxrwxrwx. 1 root root 7 Nov 5 22:04 vg_alan--lfs-lv_root -> ../dm-3 [root@alan-fedora mapper]# mkfs.ext4 /dev/mapper/vg_alan--lfs-lv_root mke2fs 1.42.3 (14-May-2012) Filesystem label= OS type: Linux Block size=4096 (log=2) Fragment size=4096 (log=2) Stride=0 blocks, Stripe width=0 blocks 6553600 inodes, 26213376 blocks 1310668 blocks (5.00%) reserved for the super user First data block=0 Maximum filesystem blocks=4294967296 800 block groups 32768 blocks per group, 32768 fragments per group 8192 inodes per group Superblock backups stored on blocks: 32768, 98304, 163840, 229376, 294912, 819200, 884736, 1605632, 2654208, 4096000, 7962624, 11239424, 20480000, 23887872 Allocating group tables: done Writing inode tables: done Creating journal (32768 blocks): done Writing superblocks and filesystem accounting information: done ######### Next mount the root filesystem: ######### [root@alan-fedora mapper]# mount /dev/mapper/vg_alan--lfs-lv_root /mnt/lfs ######### That's as far as I got before I burned out and went to bed. Again, I'll appreciate any comments. Alan -- http://linuxfromscratch.org/mailman/listinfo/lfs-support FAQ: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/lfs/faq.html Unsubscribe: See the above information page
