Partitioning Your System
If you chose Automatic Partitioning, please skip ahead to the section called Network Configuration.
If you chose Manually partition with fdisk, please skip ahead to the section called Partitioning with fdisk.
At this point, you must tell the installation program where to install Red Hat Linux. This is done by defining mount points for one or more disk partitions in which Red Hat Linux will be installed. You may also need to create and/or delete partitions at this time (refer to Figure 4-6).
 | Note |
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If you have not yet planned how you will set up your partitions, refer to the partitioning appendix in the Official Red Hat Linux Reference Guide. At a bare minimum, you will need a /boot partition, a swap partition, and an appropriately-sized root (/) partition. |
| Partitionless Installations are Not Officially Supported |
|---|---|
Partitionless installations on Alpha machines are not officially supported by Red Hat. |
The partitioning tool used in Red Hat Linux 7.1 is Disk Druid. With the exception of certain esoteric situations, Disk Druid can handle the partitioning requirements for a typical Red Hat Linux installation.
SRM has two special partitioning requirements: the use of BSD disk labels and that unallocated space is left at the beginning of the hard drive. Disk Druid is aware of these requirements and will partition your system accordingly — unless your hard drive has a valid MS-DOS partition table. Disk Druid will not convert a hard drive with a valid MS-DOS partition table to use BSD disk labels. To remove the MS-DOS partition table, you will need to use fdisk to delete all the partitions and write the partition table to the hard drive. After removing the MS-DOS partition table, you can then partition your hard drives using BSD disk labels.
Partition Fields
Each line in the Partitions section represents a disk partition. Each line in this section has five different fields:
Mount Point: A mount point is the location within the directory hierarchy at which a volume exists; the volume is "mounted" at this location. This field indicates where the partition will be mounted. If a partition exists, but is not set, then you need to define its mount point. Double-click on the partition or click the Edit button.
Device: This field displays the partition's device name.
Requested: This field shows the partition's original size. To redefine the size of a partition, you must delete the current partition and recreate it using the Add button.
Actual: This field shows the space currently allocated to the partition.
Type: This field shows the partition's type (for example, Linux Native or DOS).
Recommended Partitioning Scheme
You need to create at least three partitions (or more if you chose to put /usr or /var in a separate partition) We recommend the following partitions as a minimum:
A /boot partition — the partition mounted on /boot will be the SRM boot partition and will contain aboot, the boot loader which will load Red Hat Linux. It is strongly recommended that the /boot partition be on the first 2 gigabytes of the hard drive to make sure aboot can read it. In Disk Druid, the partition field for /boot should look similar to:
/boot sda2 34M 39M Linux native
A swap partition — swap partitions are used to support virtual memory. In other words, data is written to a swap partition when there is not enough RAM to store the data your system is processing. If you are unsure about what size swap partition to create, make it twice the amount of RAM on your machine. In Disk Druid, the partition field for swap should look similar to the following:
<Swap> sda1 992M 996M Linux swap
A root Linux partition — where "/" (the root directory) is located. In this setup, all files (except those stored in /boot) are on the root partition. You may wish to have more than one Linux partition. For example, if you would like to have /usr on its own disk partition, you will need to create the /usr partition now. In Disk Druid, the partition field for / should look similar to:
/ sda3 1M 3294M Linux native
Problems When Adding a Partition
If you attempt to add a partition and Disk Druid cannot handle your request, you will see a dialog box listing partitions that are currently unallocated, along with the reason they could not be allocated. Unallocated partition(s) are also displayed on Disk Druid's main screen (though you may have to scroll through the Partitions section to see them).
As you scroll through the Partitions section, you might see an Unallocated Requested Partition message in red text, followed by one or more partitions. A common reason for this is a lack of sufficient free space for the partition. In any case, the reason the partition remains unallocated will be displayed after the partition's requested mount point.
To fix an unallocated requested partition, you must move the partition to another drive which has the available space, resize the partition to fit on the current drive, or delete the partition entirely. Make changes using the Edit button or by double-clicking on the partition.
Drive Summaries
Each line in the Drive Summaries section represents a hard disk on your system. Each line has the following fields:
Drive: This field shows the hard disk's device name.
Geom [C/H/S]: This field shows the hard disk's geometry. The geometry consists of three numbers representing the number of cylinders, heads, and sectors as reported by the hard disk.
Total: This field shows the total available space on the hard disk in megabytes.
Free: This field shows how much of the hard disk's space is still unallocated, in megabytes.
Used: These fields show how much of the hard disk's space is currently allocated to partitions, in megabytes and percentage.
The Drive Summaries section is displayed only to indicate your computer's disk configuration. It is not meant to be used as a means of specifying the target hard drive for a given partition; to do that, use the Allowable Drives field in the section called Adding Partitions.
Disk Druid's Buttons
These buttons control Disk Druid's actions. They are used to add and delete partitions, and to change partition attributes. Buttons on this screen are also used to accept the changes you have made, or to exit Disk Druid. For further explanation, take a look at each button in order.
Add: Used to request a new partition. When selected, a dialog box will appear containing fields (such as mount point and size) that must be filled in.
Edit: Used to modify attributes of the partition currently selected in the Partitions section. Selecting Edit will open up a dialog box. Some or all of the fields can be edited, depending on whether the partition information has already been written to disk.
Delete: Used to remove the partition currently highlighted in the Current Disk Partitions section. You will be asked to confirm the deletion of any partition.
Reset: Used to restore Disk Druid to its original state. All changes made will be lost if you Reset the partitions.
Make RAID Device: Make RAID Device can be used if you want to provide redundancy to any or all disk partitions. It should only be used if you have experience using RAID. To read more about RAID, please refer to RAID (Redundant Array of Independent Disks) in the Official Red Hat Linux Reference Guide.
Adding Partitions
To add a new partition, select the Add button. A dialog box will appear.
| Note |
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You will need to dedicate at least one partition to Red Hat Linux, and optionally more. This is discussed more completely in An Introduction to Disk Partitions in the Official Red Hat Linux Reference Guide. |
Mount Point: Highlight and enter the partition's mount point. For example, if this partition should be the root partition, enter /; enter /boot for the /boot partition, and so on. You can also use the pulldown menu to choose the correct mount point for your partition.
Size (Megs): Enter the size (in megabytes) of the partition. Note this field starts with a "1" in it; unless changed you will end up with a 1 MB partition.
Use remaining space: This checkbox indicates whether the size you entered in the previous field is to be considered the partition's exact size, or its minimum size. When selected, the partition will grow to fill all available space on the hard disk. The partition's size will increase and decrease as other partitions are modified. You can make multiple partitions growable; if you do, the additional free space will be shared among all growable partitions.
Partition Type: This field contains a list of different partition types (such as Linux Native or DOS). Select the appropriate partition type by using the mouse.
Allowable Drives: This field contains a list of the hard disks installed on your system. If a hard disk's box is highlighted, then a desired partition can be created on that hard disk. If the box is not checked, then the partition will never be created on that hard disk. By using different checkbox settings, you can have Disk Druid place partitions as you see fit, or let Disk Druid decide where partitions should go.
Ok: Select Ok once you are satisfied with the settings and wish to create the partition.
Cancel: Select Cancel if you do not want to create the partition.
Editing Partitions
To edit a partition, select the Edit button or double-click on the existing partition.
| Note |
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If the partition already existed on your hard disk, you will only be able to change the partition's mount point. If you want to make any other changes, you will need to delete the partition and recreate it. |
Deleting a Partition
To delete a partition, highlight it in the Partitions section and click the Delete button. You will be asked to confirm the deletion.
Skip to the section called Formatting Partitions for further installation instructions.