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Date:      Thu, 24 Oct 2002 21:05:57 +0100
From:      Matthew Seaman <m.seaman@infracaninophile.co.uk>
To:        freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG
Subject:   Re: how to add space
Message-ID:  <20021024200557.GA1424@happy-idiot-talk.infracaninophi>
In-Reply-To: <5.1.0.14.2.20021024125901.00aad960@pop51.bellnet.ca>
References:  <5.1.0.14.2.20021024093139.00a8df48@mail.host45.com> <5.1.0.14.2.20021024093139.00a8df48@mail.host45.com> <5.1.0.14.2.20021024125901.00aad960@pop51.bellnet.ca>

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On Thu, Oct 24, 2002 at 01:16:33PM -0400, pippo@bellnet.ca wrote:
> At 03:21 PM 10/24/2002 +0100, you wrote:
> 
> >The easiest thing to do is probably to use some or all of the
> >available 4Gb as a new filesystem mounted under /usr.  For instance,
> >/usr/local might be a good choice.  You need to copy the current
> >contents of /usr/local onto the new partition, move the old /usr/local
> >aside somewhere and mount the new one in it's place:
> >
> >Assuming the disk partition where you have space is /dev/da2s2
> >something like the following (in single user mode):
> 
> I'm a little foggy about "single user mode" - I'm really the only user on 
> all my Unix machines, so there is not much of a security or user conflict 
> problem.

The point of single user mode is not that there's just the one user
but that absolutely the minimum amount of stuff is running to be able
to work at the console: no network, no system daemons, most of the
filesystems not mounted.  It's a safety thing really.  Processes that
aren't running won't get upset by you doing drastic things to the
machine, neither will they end up writing things in unexpected places
or block you from unmounting filesystems or that sort of thing.

> I just updated 2 different machines to FBSD 4.7 and vi (in single user 
> mode) brought up by mergemaster was just plain horrible. So, I'm a little 
> skeptical on the single user mode. Can you explain a little?
> And I am wondering why vi would not work right? ---- more at bottom

vi isn't my favourite editor either, but it's well worth persevering
with it to the extent that you can make simple edits without too much
difficulty.  Either that or be careful to always set the EDITOR
environment variable.  In single user you'll probably also need to:

    TERM=cons25 ; export TERM

for most full screen editors.

> Now, this is a little confusing. The original /usr slice would have more 
> space, but there would be a new /usr/local on another slice... hmmm? ... I 
> can't quite visualize how that works as that would seem to leave 2 /usr 
> slices or directories.... What if I were to create another /usr/local 
> directory on the original /usr?

Under unix you can mount a disk or a network share at any point in the
filesystem.  So as you change directory from /usr to /usr/local you're
moving from one disk partition to the other.  There's only one /usr
partition, ie. a partition mounted at /usr.  The filesystem itself
hides all of underlying arrangements: to the user it all looks as if
it's just one unified space.

> I do admit to feeling a little stupid on this... :((
> And how would that affect the files & programs in the /usr/local directory?

After going through this whole exercise, all the stuff in /usr/local
should work exactly as they did before.  If you had some other users
and you could make this change without their knowledge, they probably
wouldn't notice the next time they logged in.

> This whole exercise is to give OpenOffice the 4gb it is asking for for 
> installation (Wow! I thought Microsoft was a SpaceHog)

OpenOffice only takes 4Gb to compile in the worst case --- you might
well be able to get away with 2.5Gb.  You'll just have to try it and
see what happens. Since compiling OpenOffice is your aim, then you
might find it more worthwhile to move /usr/ports to the new partition
rather than /usr/local.

	Cheers,

	Matthew

-- 
Dr Matthew J Seaman MA, D.Phil.                       26 The Paddocks
                                                      Savill Way
                                                      Marlow
Tel: +44 1628 476614                                  Bucks., SL7 1TH UK

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