On Fri, Jan 28, 2005 at 10:05:40AM +1100, Lucas Chan wrote:
> I recently signed up with a super-cheap dedicated server company
....
> Some of the partitions they set up on it are ridiculously small. I
> contacted them saying: "I'm quickly running out of space on a couple
> of partitions and need them to be resized.
...
> ... They responded saying: "We cannot resize the
> partitions without reformatting/reimaging the drive." Am I missing
> something obvious?
Perhaps..
There are two obvious issues.
1)
The super-cheep part tells me that they do a disk oriented very
simple backup. My guess is that they have one DLT tape
for each box and just image the drive on each box....
i.e. the backup is image oriented and would break if you
did manage to fiddle this and that.
2)
Partitons have a beginning and an end. If you grow one you have to
push back and or shrink another. The beginning of each filesystem
(superblock) must be located in a standard location in each
partion. If you move the start of a partion then the superblock
will not be found and the data is effectively lost for most mortals.
3)
stuff that grows is 'volatile' over and above Fedora base and
perfect for symbolic links from the 'small' partion to the 'large'.
(Keep good notes....).
So....
Ask them lots of question study the FAQ...
Ask how backup and recovery work.
Ask if two drives (the old and a new) is a possible temp
configuration. If so then specify how the new disk is to be
partitioned and loaded (Keep It Simple). Then when the system boots
from the new disk mount the old partions and move data as needed. In
some case they might place the new as a second disk and you will have
to partion, load it and tell them when it is to be moved to the #1
slot. Another trick is to have a 'temporary' loaner box. Set it up
with the new improved partition sizes. It will not be free but with
the two boxes on line for about week you can move things from Old to
New. Most shops keep a hot spare box...
While talking with them discover what style of backup service
they provide you and other stuff. Since it is super-cheep
the service list will be short... That is OK ... you
will know what to plan for.
Lastly tidy up.
You may simply be keeping cruft that you do not need.
yum clean
up2date --> cruft in /var/spool/up2date
multiple old kernels (keep current + one).
and so on.
--
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