Looking for partitioning advice
by bennypr0fane from LinuxQuestions.org on (#5GX7G)
So, another one of those partitioning threads... Since how you do that is a very personal, use-case related matter, and what I've already found here is also pretty old - best practice changes all the time, and its been years since I last customized my partition table away from Linux installer defaults. So here goes my request for partitioning advice in 2021:
1. I have two SSDs in my laptop, one with 1 TB, and one with 500 GB
2. I'd like to start using Timeshift, and I read that some people store Timeshift backups on a separate partition: I'm guessing that would be to protect against hardware failure - and in that light it would only make sense on a separate drive, not just a different partition on the same drive. What are other reasons, if any, to put Timeshift backups on a separate partition?
3. Some people also have /home in an extra partition. I've tried it once, it was a huge hassle and I didn't quite see the advantage, so I went back to leaving /home right there with the other brothers. But that was years ago. Again, what are other good reasons for doing that, besides... I don't know, one step less when your system won't boot and you have to re-install? Which brings me to:
4. I have a habit of leaving a smaller partition free, sufficient for a second Linux, on any system, mostly for desaster recovery (unbootable main distro, need to recovery files from /home), maybe checking out a new distro every now and then. On the other hand, you can always use a live bootable flash drive for that (at least I haven't run into a situation where that wouldn't cut it for some reason - maybe booting to an installed system is just more convenient. And if you happen not to have a live medium handy, you can't use your unbootable OS to create one).
5. Recently I first heard about sharing /home between multiple OSs, which makes sense if a) you *do* actually install more than one Linux on a system, and b) you want to share disk space c) what are other reasons to do that (or not). Is it a lot of trouble, risque, difficult?
6. All normal desktop use for programming, productivity.. no server use (except development servers).
I'm also glad if you just wanna suggest a concrete partitioning scheme, like "do it so-and-so", no reasons given.
Thanks for reading!
1. I have two SSDs in my laptop, one with 1 TB, and one with 500 GB
2. I'd like to start using Timeshift, and I read that some people store Timeshift backups on a separate partition: I'm guessing that would be to protect against hardware failure - and in that light it would only make sense on a separate drive, not just a different partition on the same drive. What are other reasons, if any, to put Timeshift backups on a separate partition?
3. Some people also have /home in an extra partition. I've tried it once, it was a huge hassle and I didn't quite see the advantage, so I went back to leaving /home right there with the other brothers. But that was years ago. Again, what are other good reasons for doing that, besides... I don't know, one step less when your system won't boot and you have to re-install? Which brings me to:
4. I have a habit of leaving a smaller partition free, sufficient for a second Linux, on any system, mostly for desaster recovery (unbootable main distro, need to recovery files from /home), maybe checking out a new distro every now and then. On the other hand, you can always use a live bootable flash drive for that (at least I haven't run into a situation where that wouldn't cut it for some reason - maybe booting to an installed system is just more convenient. And if you happen not to have a live medium handy, you can't use your unbootable OS to create one).
5. Recently I first heard about sharing /home between multiple OSs, which makes sense if a) you *do* actually install more than one Linux on a system, and b) you want to share disk space c) what are other reasons to do that (or not). Is it a lot of trouble, risque, difficult?
6. All normal desktop use for programming, productivity.. no server use (except development servers).
I'm also glad if you just wanna suggest a concrete partitioning scheme, like "do it so-and-so", no reasons given.
Thanks for reading!