Help with Partitioning Scheme

[ajaxmike]

Newb to Amahi here and an almost newb to Linux.

I will have 2 x 1TB drives. One drive will be internal to the Amahi server. The other drive is an external with USB and eSATA ports, used for backup of the server. I want to be able to remove the external drive to a separate area of the house for theft and fire protection. The server will backup disk images of user machines and store shared files, including a collection of audio files for streaming.

How do I partition the drives to support the following:

• In the event that the internal drive fails, I would like to be able plug the external drive in and boot.
  I want to be able to spin down the drive when the server is not in use.
  I would like to be able to plug the backup drive into a USB port on a Windows machine and read files from there.

I am guessing that I need to partition the disk into one or more Linux partitions for OS, swap, and applications (ext2, ext3, or xfs), and Windows (NTFS) for data. So, what partitions/size/format should I use?

[cpg]

hi, apologies for the lack of response. your's is a complex question.

partitioning is really your choice.

In the event that the internal drive fails, I would like to be able plug the external drive in and boot.

that is a long shot. you would have to install twice, swap and then sync. complex unless you are a linux ubergenius that understands UUIDs for drives. it's a nice idea.

I want to be able to spin down the drive when the server is not in use.

this is done by default. you can make it more aggressive with hdparm (use with extreme caution).

I would like to be able to plug the backup drive into a USB port on a Windows machine and read files from there.

that's another tough one. the file system should be ext3 if you want the first item to even be close. there are ways to mount ext3 disks on windows. have not used one in a long while.

http://www.google.com/search?q=ext3+mou ... =firefox-a

alternatively, you could use a partition in ntfs that is easier to move around in linux and windows.

i believe you cannot boot linux from ntfs, i think. well, maybe it's within the realm of the possible.

[moredruid]

just to chime in a little:

You can make the uuid part easier by using labels. However you still may need to modify a few files for it to work if you want to a drop in replacement for a broken disk. Basically that's what RAID arrays are built for, and they're not cheap for a reason (well at least the good ones, not the integrated onboard &^%$ that's on most mainboards these days, those are not built for proper rebuildable RAID 5). However, you can also choose to mirror the drives, just not 1 external disk in a caddy (or maybe it would work using eSATA, not sure how the RAID controller interprets such a thing).

On the part of filesystem to use for sharing between Windows/Linux. Your best bet would be FAT. No it doesn't support permissions, long filenames, has plenty of other limitations but is the only thing moderately guaranteed to work in both Windows and Linux.
Ext3 for Windows: I've tried a few tools a short while ago and they all don't work (properly or not at all).
NTFS for Linux: read/write support is still not stable and turned on by default (unless you use Ubuntu). That's probably for a reason. I've only had headaches with NTFS disks in Linux, but it's been quite a while since I've tried it.

[ajaxmike]

Thanks for your responses cpg and moredruid.

I have been reading the amahi forums and googling for linux/fedora partitioning info. I am thinking of the folllowing:

/boot ext3 100MB (default)
/swap swap 1GB (512MB memory installed)
/ ext3 8GB
/var/hda ntfs 800GB (got this idea from a post by cpg)
unallocated 20%

The F9 install guide recommends 4GB for the OS and applications. Amahi wants another 3GB. Add 1GB for any other apps and 8GB should do. ext3 is obvious. As i understand it, I can easily increase the partition size later as long as I have some unallocated space.

I also understand that amahi stores all data files in /var/hda, so if I put this on a separate partition in ntfs, I can upgrade the OS without affecting data. In the event the system is DOA, I can pull the drive and read the data partition on a Vista or XP system. Even though ntfs is not a native linux fs, it shouldn't bother F9 much because it's data not OS. I was surprised at disksruid's comments re:ntfs, as I thought that ntfs-3g solved all of those old problems with ntfs on linux. There many testimonials to how well ntfs-3g works and it is includedin the F9 distro. As an alternative, i could format /var/hda in ext3 and use ext2fs.

Once I have all of above set up, there must be some software to create a disk image? Wouldn't that disk be bootable? Perhaps a reason not to do it is that it would be much slower than an incremental backup.

is this making sense?

[cpg]

The F9 install guide recommends 4GB for the OS and applications. Amahi wants another 3GB.

the amahi quote included fedora - 5 or 6 is enough for both.

/var/hda ntfs 800GB (got this idea from a post by cpg)

i think /var/hda/files is much much better. if that disk breaks, it can be replaced without much issue. if /var/hda breaks, it's pretty much a reinstall, since there is code there.

amahi stores all data files in /var/hda, so if I put this on a separate partition in ntfs, I can upgrade the OS without affecting data.

i'm 90% sure that will not work. again, maybe it's within the realm of the possible, just probably not straightforward.

however, /var/hda/files may work as ntfs better.

it is making sense. we know what you are getting at: keeping it all safe.

in my impression, you are coming up with something that more complex and is well out of the beaten path.

this may make your setup more likely to encounter issues (which, if amahi related, we'll be happy to try and support, as we're trying to support storage better).

i just "surf" disks, periodically backing things up.

[ajaxmike]

Sorry, I meant to write /var/hda/files. Thanks cpg.

[ajaxmike]

I eventually gave up on the idea of trying to boot Fedora from USB. After way too many hours, I just decided to buy a new PC with a SATA controller built in (Shuttle KPC45).

Decided on the following partitioning scheme:

/boot 200MB
/ 10GB (decided to install the desktop since the new machine has a 2.2GHz dual core and 2GB of 667 MHz 4-4-4-10 memory)
/swap 2GB
/windows 1GB vFAT
/var/hda/files 800GB ext3
free 150GB

I will figure out how to clone the main drive to a backup over eSATA (any suggestions?). I have Ext2IFS installed on my Vista laptop, and that should be able to read the /var/hda/files partition from the backup drive. I will also install the Ext2IFS in the /windows partition which will provide a source to install the driver on any other Windows machine.