<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN"> <HTML ><HEAD ><TITLE >Introduction</TITLE ><META NAME="GENERATOR" CONTENT="Modular DocBook HTML Stylesheet Version 1.7"><LINK REL="HOME" TITLE="Linux Partition HOWTO" HREF="index.html"><LINK REL="PREVIOUS" TITLE="Linux Partition HOWTO" HREF="index.html"><LINK REL="NEXT" TITLE="Devices" HREF="devices.html"></HEAD ><BODY CLASS="sect1" BGCOLOR="#FFFFFF" TEXT="#000000" LINK="#0000FF" VLINK="#840084" ALINK="#0000FF" ><DIV CLASS="NAVHEADER" ><TABLE SUMMARY="Header navigation table" WIDTH="100%" BORDER="0" CELLPADDING="0" CELLSPACING="0" ><TR ><TH COLSPAN="3" ALIGN="center" >Linux Partition HOWTO</TH ></TR ><TR ><TD WIDTH="10%" ALIGN="left" VALIGN="bottom" ><A HREF="index.html" ACCESSKEY="P" >Prev</A ></TD ><TD WIDTH="80%" ALIGN="center" VALIGN="bottom" ></TD ><TD WIDTH="10%" ALIGN="right" VALIGN="bottom" ><A HREF="devices.html" ACCESSKEY="N" >Next</A ></TD ></TR ></TABLE ><HR ALIGN="LEFT" WIDTH="100%"></DIV ><DIV CLASS="sect1" ><H1 CLASS="sect1" ><A NAME="intro" ></A >1. Introduction</H1 ><DIV CLASS="sect2" ><H2 CLASS="sect2" ><A NAME="explanation" ></A >1.1. What is a partition?</H2 ><P > Partitioning is a means to divide a single hard drive into many logical drives. A partition is a contiguous set of blocks on a drive that are treated as an independant disk. A partition table (the creation of which is the topic of this HOWTO) is an index that relates sections of the hard drive to partitions. </P ><P > Why have multiple partitions? <P ></P ><UL ><LI ><P > Encapsulate your data. Since file system corruption is local to a partition, you stand to lose only some of your data if an accident occurs. </P ></LI ><LI ><P > Increase disk space efficiency. You can format partitions with varying block sizes, depending on your usage. If your data is in a large number of small files (less than 1k) and your partition uses 4k sized blocks, you are wasting 3k for every file. In general, you waste on average one half of a block for every file, so matching block size to the average size of your files is important if you have many files. </P ></LI ><LI ><P > Limit data growth. Runaway processes or maniacal users can consume so much disk space that the operating system no longer has room on the hard drive for its bookkeeping operations. This will lead to disaster. By segregating space, you ensure that things other than the operating system die when allocated disk space is exhausted. </P ></LI ></UL > </P ></DIV ><DIV CLASS="sect2" ><H2 CLASS="sect2" ><A NAME="AEN57" ></A >1.2. Other Partitioning Software:</H2 ><P > <P ></P ><UL ><LI ><P ><B CLASS="command" >sfdisk</B >: a command-line version of fdisk</P ></LI ><LI ><P ><B CLASS="command" >cfdisk</B >: a curses-based version of fdisk</P ></LI ><LI ><P ><A HREF="http://www.gnu.org/software/parted/parted.html" TARGET="_top" ><B CLASS="command" >parted</B ></A >: Gnu partition editor</P ></LI ><LI ><P ><A HREF="http://www.powerquest.com/partitionmagic/index.html" TARGET="_top" ><SPAN CLASS="productname" >Partition Magic</SPAN ></A >: a commercial utility to create, resize, merge and convert partitions, without destroying data. </P ></LI ><LI ><P ><A HREF="http://www.linux-mandrake.com/diskdrake" TARGET="_top" ><SPAN CLASS="productname" >Disk Drake</SPAN ></A >: a Perl/Gtk program to create, rsize, and delete partitions</P ></LI ></UL > </P ></DIV ><DIV CLASS="sect2" ><H2 CLASS="sect2" ><A NAME="howtos" ></A >1.3. Related HOWTOs</H2 ><P > <DIV CLASS="table" ><A NAME="AEN82" ></A ><P ><B >Table 1. Related HOWTOs</B ></P ><TABLE BORDER="1" CLASS="CALSTABLE" ><THEAD ><TR ><TH WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="LEFT" VALIGN="MIDDLE" >Title</TH ><TH WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="LEFT" VALIGN="MIDDLE" >Author</TH ><TH WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="LEFT" VALIGN="MIDDLE" >Description</TH ></TR ></THEAD ><TBODY ><TR ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="LEFT" VALIGN="MIDDLE" ><A HREF="http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/Install-Strategies" TARGET="_top" > Dual boot install strategies</A > </TD ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="LEFT" VALIGN="MIDDLE" > <A HREF="mailto:tobbyb@usa.net" TARGET="_top" >Gjoen Stein</A > </TD ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="LEFT" VALIGN="MIDDLE" > How to estimate the various size and speed requirements for different parts of the filesystem. </TD ></TR ><TR ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="LEFT" VALIGN="MIDDLE" ><A HREF="http://www.nyx.net/~sgjoen/disk.html" TARGET="_top" >Linux Multiple Disk System Tuning</A ></TD ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="LEFT" VALIGN="MIDDLE" ><A HREF="mailto:sgjoen@mail.nyx.net" TARGET="_top" >Gjoen Stein</A ></TD ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="LEFT" VALIGN="MIDDLE" >How to estimate the various size and speed requirements for different parts of the filesystem.</TD ></TR ><TR ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="LEFT" VALIGN="MIDDLE" > <A HREF="http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/Large-Disk-HOWTO.html" TARGET="_top" > Linux Large Disk </A > </TD ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="LEFT" VALIGN="MIDDLE" > <A HREF="mailto:aeb@cwi.nl" TARGET="_top" > Andries Brouwer </A > </TD ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="LEFT" VALIGN="MIDDLE" > Instructions and considerations regarding disks with more than 1024 cylinders </TD ></TR ><TR ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="LEFT" VALIGN="MIDDLE" > <A HREF="http://metalab.unc.edu/mdw/HOWTO/mini/Quota.html" TARGET="_top" > Linux Quota </A > </TD ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="LEFT" VALIGN="MIDDLE" > <A HREF="mailto:mailto:r.vdooren@snow.nl" TARGET="_top" > Ralf van Dooren </A > </TD ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="LEFT" VALIGN="MIDDLE" > Instructions on limiting disk space usage per user (quotas) </TD ></TR ><TR ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="LEFT" VALIGN="MIDDLE" > <A HREF="http://www.linuxdocs.org/HOWTOs/mini/Partition-Rescue.html" TARGET="_top" > Partition-Rescue mini-HOWTO </A > </TD ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="LEFT" VALIGN="MIDDLE" > <A HREF="mailto:jdanield@dodin.net" TARGET="_top" > Jean-Daniel Dodin </A > </TD ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="LEFT" VALIGN="MIDDLE" > How to restore linux partitions after they have been deleted by a Windows install. Does not appear to preserve data. </TD ></TR ><TR ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="LEFT" VALIGN="MIDDLE" > <A HREF="http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/ADSM-Backup.html" TARGET="_top" > Linux ADSM Backup </A > </TD ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="LEFT" VALIGN="MIDDLE" > <A HREF="mailto:Thomas.Koenig@ciw.uni-karlsruhe.de" TARGET="_top" > Thomas Koenig </A > </TD ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="LEFT" VALIGN="MIDDLE" > Instructions on integrating Linux into an IBM ADSM backup environment. </TD ></TR ><TR ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="LEFT" VALIGN="MIDDLE" > <A HREF="http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/Linux/docs/HOWTO/other-formats/html_single/Backup-With-MSDOS.html" TARGET="_top" > Linux Backup with MSDOS </A > </TD ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="LEFT" VALIGN="MIDDLE" > <A HREF="mailto:neufeld@physics.utoronto.ca" TARGET="_top" > Christopher Neufeld </A > </TD ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="LEFT" VALIGN="MIDDLE" > Information about MS-DOS driven Linux backups. </TD ></TR ><TR ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="LEFT" VALIGN="MIDDLE" > Linux HOWTO Index</TD ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="LEFT" VALIGN="MIDDLE" ><A HREF="mailto:linux-howto@sunsite.unc.edu" TARGET="_top" >Tim Bynum</A ></TD ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="LEFT" VALIGN="MIDDLE" >Instructions on writing and submitting a HOWTO document</TD ></TR ></TBODY ></TABLE ></DIV > </P ></DIV ><DIV CLASS="sect2" ><H2 CLASS="sect2" ><A NAME="AEN141" ></A >1.4. Additional information on your system:</H2 ><P > <P ></P ><UL ><LI ><P > <A HREF="file:/usr/src/linux/Documentation" TARGET="_top" ><TT CLASS="filename" >/usr/src/linux/Documentation</TT ></A > <P ></P ><UL ><LI ><P > <A HREF="file:/usr/src/linux/Documentation/ide.txt" TARGET="_top" > <TT CLASS="filename" >ide.txt</TT ></A >: Info about your IDE drivers </P ></LI ><LI ><P > <A HREF="file:/usr/src/linux/Documentation/scsi.txt" TARGET="_top" ><TT CLASS="filename" >scsi.txt</TT ></A >: Info about your SCSI drivers </P ></LI ></UL > </P ></LI ></UL > </P ></DIV ></DIV ><DIV CLASS="NAVFOOTER" ><HR ALIGN="LEFT" WIDTH="100%"><TABLE SUMMARY="Footer navigation table" WIDTH="100%" BORDER="0" CELLPADDING="0" CELLSPACING="0" ><TR ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top" ><A HREF="index.html" ACCESSKEY="P" >Prev</A ></TD ><TD WIDTH="34%" ALIGN="center" VALIGN="top" ><A HREF="index.html" ACCESSKEY="H" >Home</A ></TD ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top" ><A HREF="devices.html" ACCESSKEY="N" >Next</A ></TD ></TR ><TR ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top" >Linux Partition HOWTO</TD ><TD WIDTH="34%" ALIGN="center" VALIGN="top" > </TD ><TD WIDTH="33%" ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top" >Devices</TD ></TR ></TABLE ></DIV ></BODY ></HTML >