[Sderby] Poser

[Tim Retout]

On Sun, 2007-05-27 at 19:01 +0100, Steve Tickle wrote:
> I've got a bit of a poser. I think there was a bit of a decimal point 
> error when a HD was first configured with the result being that / 
> (/dev/hda2) is about 1.9G in size and /home (/dev/hda4) is about 28G. 
> I'd like to even this mismatch up a bit but I'm not sure how to go about 
> it. The box is acting as a web server and I don't really want to have to 
> completely rebuild the system. LVM isn't installed (more's the pity).

The difficulty depends upon the filesystem being used on each partition.
For instance, ext3 filesystems generally need to be unmounted to be
resized (unless you're using recent versions of Linux and e2fsprogs, and
are feeling lucky). It is possible to grow XFS filesystems while
mounted, but you cannot shrink them at all.

The general procedure would be to boot from a live CD, and resize the
unmounted filesystems/partitions using 'parted'. The live CD would be
necessary because you would be resizing (and hence unmounting) the root
filesystem. Take backups first.

> Can LVM be installed after the event and thus allow me to do the 
> jiggerypokery I need without too much pain?

While it is possible to install LVM after the event, it probably
requires just as much jiggerypokery to migrate to it. It would be worth
it only if you were expecting to change things about again at some point
in the future.

The simplest solution is probably to pay £19.99 for the cheapest HDD on
ebuyer. You can then install a nice new Debian 4.0 system on it (setting
up LVM in the installer), copy over the website data, and swap the new
disk for the existing one. No resizing required.

-- 
Tim Retout <tim at retout.co.uk>