On 8/8/05, Sean Reiser <sean@seanreiser.com> wrote:

Fernando Meira wrote:

> I have:
> # df -h
> Filesystem            Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
> /dev/hda4             4.6G  3.8G  803M  83% /
> udev                  252M  808K  252M   1% /dev
> /dev/hda5              23G   20G  3.3G  86% /mnt/share
> /dev/hda1             9.8G  8.0G  1.8G  82% /mnt/windows
> none                  252M     0  252M   0% /dev/shm
>
> Options:
>  - erase hda1 (win$) and merge with with hda4.
>  - somehow rearrange hda5 (which is FAT) and split it 2, and merge a
> part to hda4.

The question is...can you live without the windows partition?

Well, maybe. The problem is that sometimes I need to use something that works only under windows (or better under windows). Besides that I only use windows for video-conference (I haven't found the time to look for a linux replacement, assuming that my webcam works under linux).

if you don't need it I would look at this:

1) Merge hda1 and hda4. Assuming this is desktop box that should be
plenty of space for the system and applications

Yes, that would be the best I could do. But, assuming that I can't remove entirely windows from my laptop, what about reduce it to it's minimum (windows + apps that I really need) and run it by VMware, always under Gentoo? The spare space from unused apps would merge it with gentoo's partition.. I estimate it of about 4Gb. What do you say about this?

2) Create a /boot partition (assuming you don't currently have one on
your box that wasn't mounted when you did the df). This way if your
system crashes at least /boot will not be corrupted.

My /boot is inside gentoo's partition. I understand the point of having it outside.. I should think of changing it!! Good point!

3) Convert hda5 to ext3|reiserfs|jfs|mature non-fat fs of choice. Mount
it as /home.

The reason it is FAT32 is to windows be able to access it. With windows away, I could do that.
>From this partition (hda5) I may be able to free some space and "move" it to gentoo's partition.

4) Consider creating a swap partition. Even if you have plenty of RAM,
in my experience Linux just runs better with a swap partition mounted.

I have. 512mb swap. df shows it slitted into 2 other: udev and none....

I would strongly suggest that you do a full backup before doing any of
this. I know there are partition resizing and reformatting utilities
but they I wouldn't trust them without a backup.

Yes, of course!
Thanks for suggestions.
Fernando.