> 20MB may be too small for boot -- kernel updates can accumulate. > > I recommend making /home on a separate partition -- that way, > if you want to > reinstall, upgrade in a very clean way, or even switch > distros, you can blow > away the system partition and leave your user data alone. > (Generally, this > means a / of 4-8GB and the rest as /home.) > I agree with this recommendation, although, if I have a decent sized disk, I use a 12 gig / partition so that there is lots of room in /tmp and /var. Some people recommend a separate partition for /boot and one for /var and one for /tmp. There are pros and cons for this arrangement. Cons include external fragmentation. I could be out of space on some partitions while others lie empty. Pro's include the fact that if /tmp, /var, and / all share the same partition, you could fill up /tmp and stop the system. In either case, keeping your data separate from the system data is always a good idea. If you back up /home and /etc, you can rebuild from a disk crash in pretty short order. A backup of etc is handy for referece unless you have memorized what goes in all the obscure files under /etc. I suppose memorization is a form of backup. :-) Robert Styma
