[vox-tech] Partition resizing

[Shawn P. Neugebauer]

On Thursday 16 May 2002 10:57 pm, you wrote:
> begin Ryan <ryan@mother.com>
>
> > On Thursday 16 May 2002 10:32 pm, Matt Roper wrote:
> > > You might also want to look at GNU Parted
> > > (http://www.gnu.org/software/parted/).  I've only used it once, but I
> > > was quite impressed by it.  It also supports lots of different
> > > filesystems, not just ext2/3 like resize2fs.
> >
> > While we're on the subject of partitions....
> >
> > My new '/' partition was mistakenly created as ext2 instead of ext3,
> > what's the easiest way to convert it?
>
> it's no big deal at all.
>
> simply boot up with a rescue disk and type:
>
> tune2fs -j /dev/{h,s}drootpartition
>
> then change /etc/fdisk and your root filesystem is now journalized.

a few things.  nearly all of this is in the ext3 FAQ, e.g. 
http://people.spoiled.org/jha/ext3-faq.html

first, you don't *need* to boot with a rescue disk--when
you run tune2fs (as root, of course) on a mounted filesystem,
it creates a .journal file on the partition that's visible until you 
re-mount as ext3.  so, probably easier to create it on an
unmounted filesystem--which you don't have to do with a
rescue disk--because it's always invisible.

second, for redhat 7.0/1, there's one more step required for the root
filesystem.  i had to use mkinitrd to create a boot image that preloaded
jbd and ext3 (in that order), and modify lilo accordingly, so that root
would mount as ext3.  two ways to know if root is actually mounted
as ext3:  cat /proc/mounts, or look closely at the boot messages to
see specifically that root is using the journal (i missed this several
times).  anyone know if this problem does not exist if one creates
the journal on an unmounted root filesystem (e.g., by using a rescue
disk)??

third, one does not need to check the filesystem so much using ext3.
tune2fs allows one to modify the check interval.  for example,
"tune2fs -i 30d -c 0 /dev/hdaX" changes the interval between checks
to 30 days, and ignores the mount-count.

shawn.