vimwiki

Manage Linux drive

 Be carefull when working on drive  When a storage device is plugged, it appear as its own file in /dev/deviceName

See the device connected and partition with lsblk or sudo fdisk -l.
The device have standard name like so:

Drive: sd(a|b|c…), ex: sde Partition: sd(a|b|c…)(1|2|3…) ex: sde4 Tips: run those cmd before and after connecting a device to easily see which one it is.

sde <- devicedisk ├─sde1 <- partition 1 └─sde2 <- partition 2

Target either a entire drive or a partition with their respective name:

ls -l /dev/sde

ls -l /dev/sde4

Using fdisk

In terminal, enter sudo fdisk /dev/sde

key	action
m	help
p	print drive info
n	create new partition

Create a partition with fdisk

1. sudo fdisk /dev/sde
2. type p to print info on the disk and see if there is partition already existing
3. press n to create a new partition
4. select the number, for example 1 would give sde4
5. for first sector, press enter unless you have reason to change it
6. for last sector, either press enter to take the whole disk or specify a last to give it a certain amount of space. (type +100G for a 100gb partition, can be used with K,B,M,G…)
7. press w to write the change (!! if the change are overwriting data, it take effect once this step is entered)

The partition should be created. But not mounted nor formatted so not usable. (keep reading)

Format partition with mkfs

1. sudo mkfs.<filesystem> /dev/sde4

   ex for Linux sudo mkfs.ext4 /dev/sde4

Mount a drive or partition manually

Assign a given location to access a drive. Mount either in:

• /media/: for temporary devices (usb key…)
• /mnt/: for more permanent devices (second ssd…)

  You can mount in any location but those two are conventional.

1. Open a terminal
2. Make a dir for mounting the drive, for exemple: sudo mkdir /mnt/disk1
3. Find the disk or partition with lsblk
4. Mount it: sudo mount /dev/sde4 /mnt/disk1

Unmount a drive or partition

Use umount and the location where the drive/partition is mounted.
 it is umount and not unmount, no n after the u.

sudo umount /mnt/disk1

Mount a drive automatically

 Be extra carefull with fstab 

/etc/fstab is a file used by the Linux system to automatically mount drive at startup.
It is best to separate your entry lines from the one already existing with a line break.

To mount a partition add this line:

- Device UUID: Unique identifier for the partition/device.Can be find with `sudo blkid` - Location: The location where to mount the drive, generally you'll choose a directory in either `/mnt` or `/media` (` `make sure the dir is created) - File system: The file system used by the partition (find with `sudo blkid`) - Option: can be set to defaults (`with an s!`) - Dump: just put `0`, it is old stuff. - File check: number that determine the order this drive is checked in case of failure, putting `0` is probably best. >ex: `UUID=e2a5fbf2-2f01-4d78-bfbd-7223874d89ea /mnt/dirName ext4 defaults 0 0` ### Step: 1. `sudo nvim /etc/fstab` 2. add the line for the corresponding device > `/dev/sde4 /mnt/dirName ext4 defaults 0 0` 3. Save the file It is best to test: 1. Unmount the drive if it has been manually mounted with `umount /mnt/dirName` 2. run `sudo mount -a` it is gonna mount everything in the fstab file if not already mounted. 3. Check if the device is mounted with `mount | grep sde4` (if it has duplicate it's alright) ## Check space usage with ncdu Install ncdu: `sudo apt install ncdu` Run: `sudo ncdu` or `sudo ncdu /` Add `-x` to exclude mounted drive. [source](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Z6ouBYfZr8) [source fstab](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A7xH74o6kY0)