From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Wed Aug 4 17:39:19 2004 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.FreeBSD.org (mx1.freebsd.org [216.136.204.125]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 2E24116A4CF for ; Wed, 4 Aug 2004 17:39:19 +0000 (GMT) Received: from internet.potentialtech.com (h-66-167-251-6.phlapafg.covad.net [66.167.251.6]) by mx1.FreeBSD.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id BFCAD43D5E for ; Wed, 4 Aug 2004 17:39:18 +0000 (GMT) (envelope-from wmoran@potentialtech.com) Received: from working.potentialtech.com (pa-plum-cmts1e-68-68-113-64.pittpa.adelphia.net [68.68.113.64]) by internet.potentialtech.com (Postfix) with ESMTP id C58C269A71; Wed, 4 Aug 2004 13:39:17 -0400 (EDT) Date: Wed, 4 Aug 2004 13:39:16 -0400 From: Bill Moran To: Comrade Burnout Message-Id: <20040804133916.75af051d.wmoran@potentialtech.com> In-Reply-To: <41111967.7060100@comradeburnout.com> References: <41111967.7060100@comradeburnout.com> Organization: Potential Technologies X-Mailer: Sylpheed version 0.9.12 (GTK+ 1.2.10; i386-portbld-freebsd4.9) Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit cc: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Subject: Re: softupdates, adding space to partitions, etc X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.1 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Wed, 04 Aug 2004 17:39:19 -0000 Comrade Burnout wrote: > I just noticed that I didn't create *quite* enough space in my /var > partition for accepting somewhat larger email attachments/ messages. > > i thought softupdates was the way to go, but on reading the handbook > online, that's not quite what i thought it was .... No. Softupdates is a method of improving performance by optimizing writes to the disk ... has no real relation to the space involved. > is there any way with 5.2.1 to move around disc space between partitions > "on the fly" ? Definately not "on the fly". You _can_ use growfs to increase the size of a filesystem, but you must have unused space on the hard drive to grow your partition first. The more traditional way of solving the problem is to symlink the directory that needs the space to a partition with more space. For example, if you're running out of space in /var/spool, and you've got tons of space in /usr, the following procedure will work: 1) Stop any/all programs that might access /var/spool (best thing to do is "shutdown now" to go to single user mode) 2) mkdir /usr/spool 3) Compare /usr/spool to /var/spool to ensure that the permissions are identical. Change as needed. 4) cp -Rp /var/spool/* /usr/spool/. 5) mv /var/spool /var/spool.old 6) ln -s /usr/spool /var/spool 7) Reboot or restart any programs that will access /var/spool 8) After a sufficient amount of time to ensure that everything worked OK, you can delete /var/spool.old IMHO, the best way to avoid/deal with this problem is to do the following the next time you install: 1) Make the entire disk one big Vinum partition 2) Make Vinum subdisks for the different partitions you want. Size them accordingly, and _leave_any_unneeded_space_unused_! 3) Later if you find you messed up, Vinum gives you the power to join unused space to an existing subdisk, and you can then use growfs to increase the filesystem size. Hell, you can even add new disks if you fill up the entire disk! HTH -- Bill Moran Potential Technologies http://www.potentialtech.com