[Novalug] Upgrading with LVM

Charles R. Head CharlesRHead@Netscape.Net
Mon Aug 18 20:04:59 EDT 2014


*Ted,*

I hope I'm not missing something simple, but here's my take on your 
situation.  I used to use Ubuntu (before Unity) and now I use Linux 
Mint.  With both of them, there is a step in the installation process 
where you can tell the installer that you'd like to set up the 
partitions yourself.  I make that choice.  When the partition editor 
opens within the installer, I've always seen the partitions I've been 
using up to that point (I use /root, /home & swap).  I just tell the 
partition editor to use the old /root partition as the new /root 
partition and to reformat that partition.  I also choose to use the old 
/swap partition as the new /swap partition.  For /home, I do the same 
thing (use it as the new /home) -- with one big exception.  I make sure 
that reformat is *_NOT_* selected.  Then I finish the install.

By using this process, your new OS gets installed in /root and in the 
process of installing it makes connections to your old (and now new) 
/home partition.  No need to copy /home stuff around or manually connect 
stuff.

I'm sure this same process will work for at least a few other distros 
I've tried out at one time or another.
*
**Charlie Head*

*************************************************************
On 8/18/2014 6:06 PM, Theodore Ruegsegger via Novalug wrote:
> I've been reading and rereading LVM documentation and it all seems to
> be about much more complex problems than mine; perhaps someone can
> supply the missing clue.
>
> My objective:
>
> Whenever I upgrade my machines to a new release, I try to leave my
> /home partition untouched and just install the new version fresh. Once
> everything's upgraded, I'll replace the newly-created, empty /home
> directory with a mount point for my old /home partition. Without LVM,
> this means I have to estimate how much space to allocate to / for the
> OS and installed software in the foreseeable future. Typically I guess
> just a bit too little and have to wipe the whole disk, repartition,
> install, then restore /home from backup.
>
> I could just make one big / partition, but then I can't overwrite it
> without blowing away /home.
>
> Where I am now:
>
> I used the Kubuntu installer and selected the LVM option for the disk.
> Now I want to upgrade to the next release.
>
> What's Confusing me:
>
> With LVM, I won't run out of space in / but it's beginning to look
> like the Kubuntu installer's idea of using LVM is equivalent to making
> one big / partition, except that it's one big / logical volume. Is
> that indeed what I've done? If so, am I again going to have to blow it
> all away and then restore /home from backup?
>
> Or has LVM spared me this pain in some clever way that I'm not seeing?
> Is there perhaps a way to split off a separate volume for /home from
> the existing one for / and then tell the installer to lay off that
> /home volume?
>
> Ted
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