Disk Partition Size Worksheet

[Melio]

I was wondering if Fedora has a sort of disk sizing layout for newbies.

For instance. - how large each drive should be, based on a percentage of the entire drive.

and some kinda description of each FS type - and why one should run each type.


reason I ask, I'm planning to reinstall and I don't wanna slop together partitions and I'm very unsure what to make each fs type, and how big.

I'd really like to be educated on it.

[mhelios]

Well it's a very opiniated topic. There's no one "right" layout for everybody. There are of course some useful guidelines to follow.

First with the fs type. Basically just format all partitions as ext3 (except swap partition) unless you want to try out an alternative such as reiserfs. They all have there advantages and disad's; ext3 is best supported however in FC1.

As for layout, there's two methods:
You can just create the default, basic / (root) (the rest), /boot (about 80MB) and <swap> (2x RAM).
This is what anaconda (installer) does when you select auto partition.

The other method which is more custom and can be more efficient is to create individual partitions for each file system.

Some general guidelines:
/ (root) -- around ~700MB
/boot -- 80 -100MB
/home -- at least 1G
/tmp -- at least 150MB
/usr -- should be your largest partition IMO; holds all software installs -> at least 6GB
/var -- at least 700MB
<swap> -- 2x RAM, though probably no need for more than 1G (some may say less..)
There are a couple others you may want to consider such as /opt and /usr/local

And size is relative; depends on your HDD size.

Here's some do on partitions:
http://www.redhat.com/docs/manuals/l...partsetup.html
http://www.redhat.com/docs/manuals/l...KPARTRECOMMEND

[Melio]

Originally posted by mhelios
Well it's a very opiniated topic. There's no one "right" layout for everybody. There are of course some useful guidelines to follow.

First with the fs type. Basically just format all partitions as ext3 (except swap partition) unless you want to try out an alternative such as reiserfs. They all have there advantages and disad's; ext3 is best supported however in FC1.

As for layout, there's two methods:
You can just create the default, basic / (root) (the rest), /boot (about 80MB) and <swap> (2x RAM).
This is what anaconda (installer) does when you select auto partition.

The other method which is more custom and can be more efficient is to create individual partitions for each file system.

Some general guidelines:
/ (root) -- around ~700MB
/boot -- 80 -100MB
/home -- at least 1G
/tmp -- at least 150MB
/usr -- should be your largest partition IMO; holds all software installs -> at least 6GB
/var -- at least 700MB
<swap> -- 2x RAM, though probably no need for more than 1G (some may say less..)
There are a couple others you may want to consider such as /opt and /usr/local

And size is relative; depends on your HDD size.

Here's some do on partitions:
http://www.redhat.com/docs/manuals/l...partsetup.html
http://www.redhat.com/docs/manuals/l...KPARTRECOMMEND

would there be some kind of calculator that calculates the sizes required if you enter in your intended use, hd size and what you plan on utilizing for fedora or linux in general?

[mhelios]

Not that I know of..
So, what is the size and your intended use?
Basically, make at least a third of the disk /usr, another large chunk for /home and then just whatever you feel like (greater than the sizes I posted above) for the rest, with /var 3rd biggest etc.

If you don't want to go through this just select auto partition. Although I do recommend the separate partitions...
Have fun!

[Melio]

Right now, I have a temp 40gig hd.

It will be sold soon.

I'm planning on getting a much larger harddrive for this desktop box.

with hd prices being low I'm not really sure what I want. but it will probably be a 200gig.

how would one partition a 200gig drive for fedora?

two users, desktop use only - no, minor file storage.

excessive drive space . isnt it?

[mhelios]

one scheme (others can post there recommendation):

/usr - 85G
/home - 100G ( with such a large disk, you can make this part the bigget to store all music/movies etc.)
/var - 5G
/tmp - 5G
/boot - 100M
/ - 4G
swap - 2x RAM

Or something like that ..

[Ug]

I can't argue with mhelios there.

[Jman]

Originally posted by Melio

excessive drive space . isnt it?

You can never have too much disk space. Especially if you have Internet access. Got to save room for future Fedora releases.

If you are still unsure, the default auto partition is fine.

[crackers]

Partitions:
/home = duh
/opt = non-RPM related development stuff (e.g. Java, Eclipse, WebLogic, JBoss, Ant)
/windows = CrossOver and Wine "C" drives (separate directories)
/games = another duh (this also lets me install most games as non-root)
/share = NFS mount from my wife's computer for, well, shared stuff like MP3s and docs (she somehow ended up with the bigger hard-drive)

This allows me to not only upgrade, but also do completely fresh installs without losing data and preferences. Heck, I've spent YEARS tweaking KDE to my liking and I'm not about to go through and do it all again!

[mhelios]

Those are some good mount point ideas from crackers. It all depends on intended use. If you're a big game player, a /game is a great idea. Otherwise /usr/share/games would do.
If you're going to use the services of NFS a lot /share would be a good idea. (good idea anyway. as you can control exactly what you want to put in that shared partition)
/windows is good if you're have WIndows on a dual-boot or other hard drive that you will access a lot.
Some more:
/www - if you want to run aweb server
/sys - for kernel 2.6
/media - for kernel 2.6
/ftp etc.

If you're thinking of setting up any servers, specific partitions for them would be ideal.

The file system standards:
http://www.pathname.com/fhs/pub/fhs-2.3.html