Date: Wed, 7 Aug 1996 04:25:11 -0700 (MST) From: Don Yuniskis <dgy@rtd.com> To: khetan@iafrica.com (Khetan Gajjar) Cc: DARBY1@X400.telkom400.inca.za, questions@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: Dummies guide to freebsd ? Message-ID: <199608071125.EAA17019@seagull.rtd.com> In-Reply-To: <Pine.BSI.3.95.960807105520.4574B-100000@copernicus.iafrica.com> from "Khetan Gajjar" at Aug 7, 96 10:58:33 am
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Greetings! > > I finally managed to get BSD installed. I had /usr too small and / too > > big. Is /usr mentioned in the install the directory /usr as a subdirectory > > of / on the disk? And is the / in the install /root on the disk? > > / and /usr are (usually) seperate partitions. The sizes depend entirely on > the amount of disk space you have. On my 1 gig drive, I've given / 45 mb, > /var 45 mv, used 150mb as swap and the rest for /usr. AVOID the temptation to create a single partition (/) and stuff everything onto it. Sooner or later, you'll pay for this (i.e. when things go bump in the night and you have to rebuild *everything* from scratch). Note that partitions (except for swap partitions) hold filesystems. Also, that partitions are not the same as disks! (a disk can hold several partitions) A small / partition is advised. I like 50MB. It should contain most of the basics and little else. In general, you want to try to have / pretend it is read-only. If you can limit the amount of changes to the superblock (i.e. avoid writing to anything on /), you greatly improve your chances of surviving a crash (since / should survive intact). The / partition should hold /dev, /bin, /etc, /stand, /sbin, /root, /proc -- as well as the mount points for other partitions (like /tmp, /var, /home, /mnt, etc.) The goal of the / partition should be to support the minimum stuff needed to get a system up and running. If you trash another partition (e.g., /usr), you want to be able to *confidently* operate from / while you are restoring it (i.e. boot single user and ONLY mount / while you rebuild the broken partition). I mount /var on its own partition since /var sees *lots* of writes for mail, news. logs, etc. (so, a crash can potentially result in corrupting parts of the /var filesystem). Also, this allows me to make sure that news,mail, etc. don't get out of control and start gobbling up *all* of my disk space. Likewise, I mount /home on its own partition and, by convention, put all user home directories therein (i.e. ~/user == /home/user). Since users tend to write to their $HOME at will, this isolates their activities onto a separate filesystem. It also allows me to setup quotas for users on /home without bothering the rest of my system. The /usr partition tends to be pretty big so it gets it's own partition (otherwise, it would end up on / and I want to keep that small). I have also toyed with the idea of creating a separate /usr/local partition. And, you could opt for separate /usr/src and /usr/ports partitions if you want to get fanatical! If you have a particularly *fast* drive, you might want to put /tmp on it (or, use it for swap!). Inspired by a suggestion from Peter da Silva (sp?), I create minimal /var, /tmp, /usr, etc. *directories* on my root partition (note that a directory is not the same as a filesystem which is not the same as a partition which is not the same as a rubber chicken!). When I mount the *real* /var, /tmp, /usr, etc. partitions, they mount "on top of" these directories (so, the contents of the directories are lost/hidden/overlaid). This allows me to use things from my minimalist root (/) partition that may expect/require certain things in /var (like /var/log) or /usr, /tmp, etc. Clever, eh? (Thanks Peter!) > > Also, I get a WARNING : / NOT PROPERLY DISMOUNTED when I boot. I logout > > and then turn off. I am running on a standalone PC. Am I doing something > > wrong to get out of it? > > DO NOT just shut down the PC. You stand the chance of losing everything in > memory i.e. since the last controlled shutdown. You need to login as root > and type shutdown, or halt, or reboot -r now. Hmmm... I'm not sure "halt" will automatically go through all of the steps shutdown imposes. I always thought: shutdown sync; sync (hopelessly paranoid) halt to be safest. > Why are you continually shutting down the PC though ? It's so much easier to just leave it run. Also, cron jobs that occur at odd hours of the night won't get run if you're always shutting down, etc. (for example, I run a cron job that routinely cleans all *old* /../cat/cat* in $MANPATH) > > Also, is there perhaps a FAQ or giude to BSD on the internet that is > > intended for total begginers such as myself? I am battling along in a > > small desert town with nothing but Win95 for 500Km around me! HEADLINE: "Win95 lost in desert" Oh, I wish... :> --don
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