One single partition for Linux versus using a partition table? - eviltoast

Heya folks, some people online told me I was doing partitions wrong, but I’ve been doing it this way for years. Since I’ve been doing it for years, I could be doing it in an outdated way, so I thought I should ask.

I have separate partitions for EFI, /, swap, and /home. Am I doing it wrong? Here’s how my partition table looks like:

  • FAT32: EFI
  • BTRFS: /
  • Swap: Swap
  • Ext4: /home

I set it up this way so that if I need to reinstall Linux, I can just overwrite / while preserving /home and just keep working after a new install with very few hiccups. Someone told me there’s no reason to use multiple partitions, but several times I have needed to reinstall the OS (Linux Mint) while preserving /home so this advice makes zero sense for me. But maybe it was just explained to me wrong and I really am doing it in an outdated way. I’d like to read what you say about this though.

  • Mambabasa@slrpnk.netOPEnglish
    1·
    1 year ago

    In my next reinstall, can I combine the / and swap partitions (they’re next to each other so I can do this) and will swap files just be automatically created instead?

    • lemmyvore@feddit.nlEnglish
      3·
      1 year ago

      They won’t be automatically created but you can create your own swap file on /, no need for a dedicated partition:

      • Use dd to create a file filled with zeros of appropriate size.
      • Format the file with mkswap.
      • Activate the swap file instantly with swapon.
      • Add it to /etc/fstab so it will be automatically used on reboot.

      Appropriate size will vary but I suggest starting with something like 100 MB and check once in a while to see how much is actually used. If it fills up you can replace it with a larger swap file or you can simply create another one and use it alongside the first.