Hi, everybody . . .
The time has come to say goodbye to Ubuntu once and for all. The spyware, security updates being held hostage, and inescapable attachment to the proprietary snap packages were bad enough. The new version of ProtonVPN doesn't work on Ubuntu 20.04, the last marginally acceptable version. So Debian looms.
I'm trying to make it easier by replacing the mess of hard drives with a single 16-tb Toshiba enterprise drive. The plan is to install Debian on it, then copy /home, etc., to it. The old drives will then be backups. (I also have a 10-tb drive devitoted to pictures; that drive, too, will go into the backup safe.)
The last time I did anything like this, a few years ago, it involved a peculiar recipe that, fortunately, doesn't apply now. And I realize that I've never done a straight install of a big drive to an EFI system.
So.
First, I'm trying to remember how to do a fill low-level check of the drive, to knock out any bad sectors, etc. I don't think GParted does it.
Second, I'm trying to figure out how to best partition the thing, to get it to boot properly. I know there needs to be a dinky FAT32 partition someplace. What I don't know is where it should be and what size it should be. After that I'll have a non-home partition and a /home partition, as well as /swap. Is there any new thought as to the ideal size of the swap partition? Machine has 32 gigs of memory, and I do not keep a huge number of applications open at once, but I will have a lot of drive space. Any settled preference as to the location of the swap partition?
(I remember that in OS/2 the rule was the most-used partition of the least-used drive. Speaking of which, there's a small walk down OS/2 memory lane here: https://ofb.biz/safari/article/1240.html )
It would be pretty straightforward but for the wad of stuff up top re. EFI, big drive, etc., with which I have next-to-no experience. Advice?
dep composed on 2024-09-02 20:50 (UTC):
Advice?
ESP (Efi System Partition) must be at least 32MB. Windows' minimum is 100MB. With a 4k sector drive of more than 16TB, minimum is 260MB.
Using Grub for booting in Debian 12, 32MB would be far more than adequate. Using systemd-boot instead of Grub, the ESP must be magnitudes larger, probably at least 1000MB, because when using systemd-boot the kernels and initrds live on the ESP in /boot/efi/ instead of in /boot/ directly.
I use only Grub. All my ESPs are 320MB on multiboot PCs, with less than 10% of space in use on each of them. The file (normal boot) or files (secure boot) used by Grub live on the ESP and are loaded by the UEFI by their filename(s) on the FAT32 ESP filesystem.
Thanks. So /boot should be the first partition?
dep Pictures: http://www.ipernity.com/doc/depscribe/album Column: https://ofb.biz/author/dep/
-------- Original Message -------- On 9/2/24 17:18, Felix Miata via tde-users users@trinitydesktop.org wrote:
dep composed on 2024-09-02 20:50 (UTC):
Advice?
ESP (Efi System Partition) must be at least 32MB. Windows' minimum is 100MB. With a 4k sector drive of more than 16TB, minimum is 260MB.
Using Grub for booting in Debian 12, 32MB would be far more than adequate. Using systemd-boot instead of Grub, the ESP must be magnitudes larger, probably at least 1000MB, because when using systemd-boot the kernels and initrds live on the ESP in /boot/efi/ instead of in /boot/ directly.
I use only Grub. All my ESPs are 320MB on multiboot PCs, with less than 10% of space in use on each of them. The file (normal boot) or files (secure boot) used by Grub live on the ESP and are loaded by the UEFI by their filename(s) on the FAT32 ESP filesystem. -- Evolution as taught in public schools is, like religion, based on faith, not based on science.
Team OS/2 ** Reg. Linux User #211409 ** a11y rocks!
Felix Miata ____________________________________________________ tde-users mailing list -- users@trinitydesktop.org To unsubscribe send an email to users-leave@trinitydesktop.org Web mail archive available at https://mail.trinitydesktop.org/mailman3/hyperkitty/list/users@trinitydeskto...
dep composed on 2024-09-02 21:23 (UTC):
So /boot should be the first partition?
A separate boot filesystem is usually only used with RAID and/or LVM configurations. The ESP must not be confused with a Linux /boot/ filesystem. /boot/ will be a native filesystem, either integral with the root filesystem, or a separate small native one. The placement of any partition, at least in theory, really doesn't matter on GPT disks.
Regardless whether /boot/ is a separate filesystem or not, the ESP is a discrete FAT32 filesystem that mounts to /boot/efi/.
On Mon September 2 2024 13:50:37 dep via tde-users wrote:
First, I'm trying to remember how to do a fill low-level check of the drive, to knock out any bad sectors, etc. I don't think GParted does it.
Thirty years ago I used SpinRite but these days I just run badblocks over the whole drive in read-write mode. The drive itself hides bad sectors and replaces them with spare sectors.
Second, I'm trying to figure out how to best partition the thing, to get it to boot properly. I know there needs to be a dinky FAT32 partition someplace. What I don't know is where it should be and what size it should be. After that I'll have a non-home partition and a /home partition, as well as /swap. Is there any new thought as to the ideal size of the swap partition? Machine has 32 gigs of memory, and I do not keep a huge number of applications open at once, but I will have a lot of drive space. Any settled preference as to the location of the swap partition?
I use LVM wherever possible.
Not only can you resize logical volumes when your needs change, but if you split the drive up into 8 or 10 physical volumes then when a new disk error arises you can easily migrate the data out of the affected physical volume and then use badblocks on just that physical volume to cause the drive to hide and replace the bad sector, and then return the repaired physical volume to your logical volume.
At the front of the drive before the LVM physical volumes/partitions my laptop has a 260M EFI partition - it probably came that way with Windows from Lenovo - and it's currently 12% full.
--Mike
Hello all,
On Monday 02 September 2024 23:23:04 Mike Bird via tde-users wrote:
I use LVM wherever possible.
:-) After a disk crash involving LVM, I am now in camp no-LVM :-) Maybe now it is better, or something, but I also learned that simpler is more robust, and besides with current size of HDD I have more space than I need, so LVM would do nothing for me.
I also don't use swap (and this is approach for 20 years I guess), if some program has to crash because of OOM, it better crash fast, than involve reading and writing like crazy on the disk.
In my case I now use such setup: * small boot partition * system partition (50-60GB) * second system partition * home partition
For my home computer (this one) I use also data partition, for "experimental" computer I add another home partition.
Why two system, and two home partitions? To install another system, new version of it, etc. I don't ever upgrade the system directly (the one I use).
Hope it helps a bit :-).
Kind regards,
Anno domini 2024 Tue, 3 Sep 15:39:54 +0200 Maciej Pilichowski via tde-users scripsit:
Hello all,
On Monday 02 September 2024 23:23:04 Mike Bird via tde-users wrote:
I use LVM wherever possible.
:-) After a disk crash involving LVM, I am now in camp no-LVM :-)
LOL ... i bite my tongue to not point out the obvious LVM problem :)
Nowadays with SSDs it's quite pointless to use extensive partitioning schemes - that is, if you are not on OpenBSD.
Nik
Maybe now it is better, or something, but I also learned that simpler is more robust, and besides with current size of HDD I have more space than I need, so LVM would do nothing for me.
I also don't use swap (and this is approach for 20 years I guess), if some program has to crash because of OOM, it better crash fast, than involve reading and writing like crazy on the disk.
In my case I now use such setup:
- small boot partition
- system partition (50-60GB)
- second system partition
- home partition
For my home computer (this one) I use also data partition, for "experimental" computer I add another home partition.
Why two system, and two home partitions? To install another system, new version of it, etc. I don't ever upgrade the system directly (the one I use).
Hope it helps a bit :-).
Kind regards,
-- Please do not email me anything that you are not comfortable also sharing with the NSA, CIA ...
said Dr. Nikolaus Klepp via tde-users:
| LOL ... i bite my tongue to not point out the obvious LVM problem :) | | Nowadays with SSDs it's quite pointless to use extensive partitioning | schemes - that is, if you are not on OpenBSD.
I'll not be using a LVM. I'm sure that LVMs are of use in some circumstance, and I'm happy for those who aresatisfied with them.
Maybe I was unclear in my question. No, I'm sure I was. I'm installing a 16tb spinning disk drive. it will be the only hard drive in the machine. It is the only boot drive of that size I've ever installed. Due to its size, I apparently need to set it up in a way that I've not had to deal with before.
As I understand it, due to UEFI being necessary for a drive of this size, there are some necessary partitioning tricks. It might be that the Debian install handles this without any intervention on my part. Or it could be that I'll need to set it up ahead of time.
So my question was and is: what partitions will I need, must they come in any particular order and/or format, and if so, what should that be? This is before I get to partitioning the drive for the usual things.
I realize that this is entirely OT, but this list has a history of being a wealth of knowledge and people willing to share that knowledge. My plan is to change nothing but the Linux distribution and the drive underneath it.
Thanks.
Anno domini 2024 Tue, 03 Sep 15:20:44 +0000 dep via tde-users scripsit:
said Dr. Nikolaus Klepp via tde-users:
| LOL ... i bite my tongue to not point out the obvious LVM problem :) | | Nowadays with SSDs it's quite pointless to use extensive partitioning | schemes - that is, if you are not on OpenBSD.
I'll not be using a LVM. I'm sure that LVMs are of use in some circumstance, and I'm happy for those who aresatisfied with them.
Maybe I was unclear in my question. No, I'm sure I was. I'm installing a 16tb spinning disk drive. it will be the only hard drive in the machine. It is the only boot drive of that size I've ever installed. Due to its size, I apparently need to set it up in a way that I've not had to deal with before.
As I understand it, due to UEFI being necessary for a drive of this size, there are some necessary partitioning tricks. It might be that the Debian install handles this without any intervention on my part. Or it could be that I'll need to set it up ahead of time.
So my question was and is: what partitions will I need, must they come in any particular order and/or format, and if so, what should that be? This is before I get to partitioning the drive for the usual things.
I realize that this is entirely OT, but this list has a history of being a wealth of knowledge and people willing to share that knowledge. My plan is to change nothing but the Linux distribution and the drive underneath it.
Thanks.
As somebody mentioned earlier for (U)EFI you'd need one "EFI System" partition, for the 16TB you need GPT partion table and that's about it. The rest is just what you usually do - either all in one partition or seperate /home/ or whatever you like.
Nik
-- Please do not email me anything that you are not comfortable also sharing with the NSA, CIA ...
said Dr. Nikolaus Klepp via tde-users:
| As somebody mentioned earlier for (U)EFI you'd need one "EFI System" | partition, for the 16TB you need GPT partion table and that's about it. | The rest is just what you usually do - either all in one partition or | seperate /home/ or whatever you like.
Thanks. Need it be in any particular place on the drive? Is this something a standard Linux installation program takes care of?
dep composed on 2024-09-03 11:20 (UTC-0400):
As I understand it, due to UEFI being necessary for a drive of this size,
It's not UEFI that requires it. It's too big for the old partition table scheme developed last century. The new scheme is called GPT, for GUID Partition Table.
there are some necessary partitioning tricks. It might be that the Debian install handles this without any intervention on my part. Or it could be that I'll need to set it up ahead of time.
Most Linux installers, including that of Debian, are capable of doing all partitioning required, usually proposing a scheme suitable for use with the disk space provided, but allowing alterations to that scheme, or letting you create your own. They will also allow you do simply specify which partitions you may have already created in advance to use for what purpose.
So my question was and is: what partitions will I need,
Need is quite simple: one for FAT32 formatted ESP, another for everything else formatted in a Linux native format, such as EXT4.
Desire may include a partition for swap, and one or more for user data, such as one for mounting to /home/, which is where each user account is situated.
must they come in any particular order and/or format, and if so, what should that be? This is before I get to partitioning the drive for the usual things.
What would be "the usual things"? Order on GPT doesn't matter, but the convention is ESP first, then everything else.
said Felix Miata via tde-users:
| It's not UEFI that requires it. It's too big for the old partition table | scheme developed last century. The new scheme is called GPT, for GUID | Partition Table.
Thanks for this. There were a lot of acronyms that erupted during the period between the last two drive installs here. And the last drive install was probably five years ago. It being nontrivial and seldom done, I committed none of it to memory.
| Most Linux installers, including that of Debian, are capable of doing | all partitioning required, usually proposing a scheme suitable for use | with the disk space provided, but allowing alterations to that scheme, | or letting you create your own. They will also allow you do simply | specify which partitions you may have already created in advance to use | for what purpose.
My chief concern was the FAT32 partition. Looking at my current drive with gparted, I see the attached, and the placement of the partitions puzzled me. But this was during an experiment to boot from a small SSD in pursuit of speed. (Which worked briefly but then didn't; the SSD was SDC.) I'm now interested not so much in having a drag racer as a reliable car to get to town and back. The partitions in the screenshot are not in any order in which I would normally place them, which added to my confusion.
| Desire may include a partition for swap, and one or more for user data, | such as one for mounting to /home/, which is where each user account is | situated.
Right; got that. Will make a swapfile simply because it is good practice, like putting TDE in /opt, which hasn't really been essential since the days when I was recompiling KDE a couple times a week, and when things went south it was easier to deal with if it was kept in a cage. Now it is probably habit, but also one less variable if things went pear-shaped.
| What would be "the usual things"? Order on GPT doesn't matter, but the | convention is ESP first, then everything else.
The usual things are as shown in the screenshot; you mentioned that ESP should come first, but as you can see, it somehow ended up as sda4, and I was not sure if this was bookkeeping or the physical location on the drive.
I think you've told me what I need, and I thank you.
On Tue September 3 2024 06:51:37 Dr. Nikolaus Klepp via tde-users wrote:
Anno domini 2024 Tue, 3 Sep 15:39:54 +0200 Maciej Pilichowski via tde-users scripsit:
On Monday 02 September 2024 23:23:04 Mike Bird via tde-users wrote:
I use LVM wherever possible.
:-) After a disk crash involving LVM, I am now in camp no-LVM :-)
LOL ... i bite my tongue to not point out the obvious LVM problem :)
I've run Linux since 1995, starting with Slackware, old Redhat, and then Fedora.
I've used LVM since roughly 2001, including on laptops and workstations, on the servers for what was then a regional ISP, on the servers for an entire school district, and back in the day I used to manage high traffic NNTP servers for some of the smaller national ISPs.
I have LVM on spinning rust, on SSD, and on various virtual/SAN/cloud layers. For some volumes I interpose a layer of mdadm software RAID-1.
Among other things I currently run a public mail server and the primary TDE mirror which feeds all the other TDE mirrors as well as serving a portion of user traffic. Both of these systems handle a lot of disk IO and both use LVM.
I always upgrade in place - after extensive testing - rather than wipe and reinstall. Our systems have also been cross-graded in-place from Ubuntu to Debian to Devuan to Debian, and have been cross-arched from i386 to amd64 when the motherboards were upgraded.
LVM has saved me several times from bad sectors which would have required a wipe and reinstall without LVM.
LVM backup configuration has also magically saved me once from my own error when I mistakenly deleted the wrong logical volume.
I have never experienced any errors attributable to LVM.
YMMV.
Nevertheless, forewarned is forarmed, so I would like to hear more of the problems you have encountered with LVM. All that I have read over the years of LVM data loss has been mostly theoretical.
TIA,
--Mike
said Mike Bird via tde-users:
| I've used LVM since roughly 2001, including on laptops and workstations, | on the servers for what was then a regional ISP, on the servers for an | entire school district, and back in the day I used to manage high | traffic NNTP servers for some of the smaller national ISPs. [much deleted]
Because I accidentally started this, I think I should respond, albeit slightly.
Clearly you have found LVMs highly useful. I confess a prejudice: IBM tried something similar in the waning days of OS/2. Some people appeared to like it, but it made an inescapable mess of my hard drive, ultimately causing me to give up running OS/2 on my second machine at all. Linux isn't OS/2, of course, but it is like the food that once you've been made sick by it poorly prepared you're not likely to try it again, even if the recipe has been refined.
Additionally, the many uses and advantages you mention are mostly not things I'll ever encounter. So when I said I have no use for LVMs, it was a comment on my computer, not a critism of LVMs.
Thanks for your reply.
On Tue September 3 2024 10:10:12 dep via tde-users wrote:
Clearly you have found LVMs highly useful. I confess a prejudice: IBM tried something similar in the waning days of OS/2. Some people appeared to like it, but it made an inescapable mess of my hard drive, ultimately causing me to give up running OS/2 on my second machine at all. Linux isn't OS/2, of course, but it is like the food that once you've been made sick by it poorly prepared you're not likely to try it again, even if the recipe has been refined.
I was involved a bit in OS/2 networking - as a contractor to migrate IBM's build farm from six servers I'm not allowed to name to a single OS/2 server which built faster than the old farm of six. This mostly involved primitive shell scripts and several hundred lines of sed script to find the sources lying around on developer PCs and automatically rewrite and consolidate all the makefiles to a form that OS/2 could understand. The OS/2 server could then perform a full rebuild every night.
I was told that the original OS/2 mandate was that a dentist would be able to go into a store and buy a box of OS/2, and install it on every PC in their office, and it would just work.
Then feature creep happened.
Eventually most of the OS/2 networking devs could not configure OS/2 networking - they understood their areas but not the whole thing.
After that I've never dared to use OS/2 for anything serious, so I wasn't bitten by the problem you encountered.
--Mike
Anno domini 2024 Tue, 3 Sep 08:54:52 -0700 Mike Bird via tde-users scripsit:
[...] Nevertheless, forewarned is forarmed, so I would like to hear more of the problems you have encountered with LVM. All that I have read over the years of LVM data loss has been mostly theoretical.
I don't know how you use LVM exactly, but the usual RAID problems apply: without redundancy a single dying drive kills your filesystem. The only sane form of redundancy is a mirror with read and write verification over all drives, MD does not do this, nor does any of these snakeoil "hardware RAID controllers". That's where ZFS comes in and shines. That's where linux looses big to FreeBSD: no ZFS OOTB for linux - there are projects that care less for license issues, but you are on your own. So ... either ZFS on linux with traditinal mirrored boot/root and "manually" compiled zfs or FreeBSD for storage. That said, I don't use ZFS on linix: it bite me quite hard on my test setups when kernel got updated and the ZFS module did not compile - guess the fun not beeing able to accees my data.
Nik
TIA,
--Mike ____________________________________________________ tde-users mailing list -- users@trinitydesktop.org To unsubscribe send an email to users-leave@trinitydesktop.org Web mail archive available at https://mail.trinitydesktop.org/mailman3/hyperkitty/list/users@trinitydeskto...
-- Please do not email me anything that you are not comfortable also sharing with the NSA, CIA ...
Hello all,
On Tue September 3 2024 06:51:37 Dr. Nikolaus Klepp via tde-users
wrote:
Anno domini 2024 Tue, 3 Sep 15:39:54 +0200
Maciej Pilichowski via tde-users scripsit:
On Monday 02 September 2024 23:23:04 Mike Bird via tde-users
wrote:
I use LVM wherever possible.
:-) After a disk crash involving LVM, I am now in camp no-LVM : :-)
LOL ... i bite my tongue to not point out the obvious LVM problem :)
Nevertheless, forewarned is forarmed, so I would like to hear more of the problems you have encountered with LVM. All that I have read over the years of LVM data loss has been mostly theoretical.
Please note, that I didn't dive deep into the problem, or something like, basically I was mere user.
I had two disks, for which I applied LVM. After disk crash I ended up with data corrupted not only from the disk which was crashed, but also at surving disk as well (I knew this by size of the intact files, and the size of the files I lost due to corruption).
Maybe it was me who misconfigured something, but maybe LVM (at the time) spanned files across partitions (in theory it should not do this). I didn't investigate it futher, after that I stopped using LVM and in time the need for it decreased (because HDD were getting bigger).
Kind regards,
-
dep -
Dr. Nikolaus Klepp -
Felix Miata -
Maciej Pilichowski -
Mike Bird