[K12OSN] K12LTSP 6 server requirement

[Rob Owens]

I usually put /var on a separate partition, for exactly the reason you
state.  But on my smallish systems, it's usually 1 to 5 GB in size.  And my
/ is usually 5 to 10 GB (my partition sizes have been growing lately,
since large disks are so cheap).

I also make a point of creating one or more empty paritions.  Typically
I use one of them for / on my next distro installation.  That way I
don't have to overwrite a known good installation with one that might
not work right away.

-Rob

On Mon, Jun 11, 2007 at 02:04:53PM -0400, James P. Kinney III wrote:
> Because:
> 
> 1. 40GB for / give me oodles of room for adding tons of stuff later in
> places like /opt and /usr/local.
> 
> 2.a. 60GB for /var is great for keeping around all the yum downloaded
> files for later reuse. Plus I don't have to worry about /var ever
> filling up and locking the system up hard (if /var fills the mandatory
> lock files can't be written and BAD THINGS (tm) happen). Also since /var
> is where all the log files get locally written I have the space to turn
> up the logging level when ever I need to debug something and need more
> details.
> 
> 2.b. /var is also where database data and web files are now stored in
> RedHat variant systems. Now I think that's not the correct place
> (/usr/local/data make MUCH more sense but I'm not on the Linux
> Filesystem Standards Board) but it's easier to accommodate than ignore.
> 
> 3. I have the space! Hard drives are dirt cheap compared to my time to
> add a new one and migrate data and modify /etc/fstab and remount new
> drives, etc. Moving around something like / or /var is not something I
> can do remotely (at least easily) as both of those partitions require
> runlevel 1 (so no networking or any service running). I _can_ do it
> remotely with a remote console (KVPIP or console over serial port with a
> modem) but it is easier and often less expensive to make sure I have
> ample space on those two critical partitions to begin with.
> 
> 
> Now a better question is: 
> 
> Why have /var in a separate partition to begin with? 
> 
> Answer: Because _IF_ a process blows up and spews log file data from
> hell (I've seen this happen) and /var is on the same partition as /,
> when  / fills up the system hard locks and dies and can't be reopened
> even in runlevel 1 (even root must be able to write to the drive just a
> single byte in RL 1). To recover from this requires putting the drive
> into another system and cleaning up the mess enough for a bit of free
> space. Then putting the drive back in the original box and cleaning up
> the mess completely. While this is doable it is not pleasant when tech
> support is a long way away (air flight distance) and the local "hands
> on" support is not comfortable doing surgery on a server with phone
> conferencing for instructions. I have seen many situations where /var
> always was granted it's own _entire_drive_ (BIG systems with many
> hundreds of users). 
> > 
> > -Rob
> > 
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> -- 
> James P. Kinney III          
> CEO & Director of Engineering 
> Local Net Solutions,LLC        
> 770-493-8244                    
> http://www.localnetsolutions.com
> 
> GPG ID: 829C6CA7 James P. Kinney III (M.S. Physics)
> <jkinney at localnetsolutions.com>
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