Server Swapping

[James Wilkinson]

Mallia Cedric wrote:
> I just realised that one of our servers (with 1G of RAM) has no swap
> enabled. Can anyone help as to how I can enable swap without
> reformatting or reinstalling ?

Gene Heskett replied:
> However, if the partition scheme you setup doesn't include a swap 
> partition, then it may be best to get another small drive and shut it 
> down long enough to install it as /dev/hdc or /dev/hdd, keeping it 
> off the same cable the main drive is on.  Then fdisk it to setup 
> enough of it as swap, some as /var and the rest as a backup storage 
> area like I did.  Put it in the /etc/fstab, and do the swapon.  
> Another 2 to 3GB should be enough, and as its on a seperate drive, it 
> will be faster than thrashing the main drive.

This is good advice when setting up a new server.

However, given that the server has apparently been running for some time
with no swap at all, I suspect that this is overkill: the swap will be
little more than a fallback position.

Of course, it's Mallia's decision...

James.

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