I recently installed debian 12 using debian-12.2.0-arm64-netinst.iso. It is the only OS installed and I used the whole 500GB disk.

I selected something like guided partitioning with separate /home/ using LVM and encryption. Now that I am using my system a bit, I realize that I don’t think it ever asked me how big to make the / partition and it is very small. Only 27GB.

Will this be a problem?

Or, is the LVM going to allow the partition to be resized or otherwise take up as much of the space as it requires?

# lsblk
NAME                    MAJ:MIN RM   SIZE RO TYPE  MOUNTPOINTS
sda                       8:0    0 476.9G  0 disk  
├─sda1                    8:1    0   512M  0 part  /boot/efi
├─sda2                    8:2    0   488M  0 part  /boot
└─sda3                    8:3    0   476G  0 part  
  └─sda3_crypt          253:0    0 475.9G  0 crypt 
    ├─mycomputer--vg-root     253:1    0  27.9G  0 lvm   /
    ├─mycomputer--vg-swap_1   253:2    0   976M  0 lvm   [SWAP]
    └─mycomputer--vg-home     253:3    0   447G  0 lvm   /home

I tried booting into a live usb to resize the partition using gparted but I couldn’t seem to do so.

If I need to reinstall and change something I’d rather do it now than later.

  • mhz@lemm.ee
    4·
    11 months ago

    LVM gives you the ability to downsize and resize without having to worry about partitions boundaries. So, if you find yourself in need for storage you can downsize the home partition and grow the root.

    That said, I have debian/i3 INSTALLED ON A 16GB USB with a couple of docker containers and vscodium and it is around 10/14gb usage.

    • Cwilliams@beehaw.org
      2·
      11 months ago

      I’m totally going to try that now! I wonder if I could use this to avoid Windows on the terrible computers at my school. Does it boot just like installation media or something?

      • mhz@lemm.ee
        1·
        11 months ago

        That is why I’m actually doing it, we have a couple of old workstation with Win7 we almost never use at my workplace. I use my portable debian on these machines to practice bash scripting, python and recently docker.

        I few thing to consider:

        • use the fastest usb drive you can get, you will be held back by its access/write speed
        • Install the boot loader on the usb drive.
        • Cwilliams@beehaw.org
          1·
          11 months ago

          Thanks for the explanation! I looked into it, and it’s actually not possible to boot from a USB drive on my school’s computers without an admin password 😢. But thanks anyway!