Re: partition table - too many swap partitions and how big should extended partition be?

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- Work out what swap partition linux actually uses so I don't delete the one it needs

There's usually an entry in /etc/fstab for each one. You can find them with

  grep swap /etc/fstab

alternatively, you might try

  swapon -s

to print the current swap areas.

If you get more than one result, you likely have more than one in use which Linux certainly allows. You can edit your fstab to point at whichever one(s) you want to keep. You don't even *have* to reboot as long as everything you're running fits in memory without swapping. You should be able to use (from my reading of "man swapon")

  swapoff -a
  edit /etc/fstab
  swapon -a

If you don't have enough memory, you might be able to create a swap-*file* using "dd", include that in your swap-pool, then disable your swaps on the partitions in question, edit your fstab, start swapping on your desired partition(s), and then disable swapping from the file.

- Delete the unneeded swap partitions

using fdisk or cfdisk you can nuke these

- Resize my linux partition to get the most space possible?

I'm less experienced with this one. I'll let other experts speak to that one.

Also there is a 10 gb extended space or something partition on my disk. It is 10 gb, so how big should this be? Is it required and what is it for?

Without a dump of your partition table, it's hard to tell what you're seeing. My best guess from what you're describing is that you have some logical partitions (either active or available). Some terminology helps: physical partitions, logical partitions, and extended partitions. Most hard-drives only allow for 4 physical partitions (this is changing with the advent of recent HD technology, but very slowly). To get around this limitation, one or more of those 4 physical partitions can be designated as an "extended" partition, which can hold more logical partitions. So if you wanted to have more than 4 partitions, you'd have to designate at least one extended partition, and then put your logical partitions inside that.

With that terminology in mind, it might help make more sense of what you're seeing in your output, or might help you pose the question in such a way that folks can be more helpful.

I thought a linux install only needed a swap partition and a linux partition for the actual install and files. (and if people then choose to have /home on another partition then that is different, but I just said all files in one partition.)

Linux can be installed in merely a single partition (swap is somewhat optional, though may take away the ability for the machine to hibernate), but as you note, more are possible (on my production machines, I like to have partitions for / /var /tmp /home /usr and one for swap so there is protection from them filling up and preventing other bits from functioning. On my home machine(s), I usually just stick to three partitions: / /home and swap.

Hope this gives you some ideas and help,

-tim




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