[SGVLUG] Newbie question

[Emerson, Tom]

> -----Original Message-----
> K. Zachary Abbott
> 
> I've been tasked with setting up Linux box for the primary 
> purpose of running an app called PHPList.  This requires: *A 
> Linux Server
> * Apache Webserver
> * PHP version 4.3.x (or higher)
> * Mysql database server (version 3.23 or up)

I'm going to say "stop right there and check out LAMPsig" -- this is a
group /dedicated/ to exactly that setup (LAMP = <L>inux, <A>pache,
<M>ysql, and a scripting language beginning with <P>, typically PHP or
Perl) [though sometimes "Mysql" is replaced by "Postgresql", but you get
the idea...]

Local meetings were held at "Caltek" [note the spelling], but it appears
they are now at the Tom Bradley Youth center -- details can be found
here:

   www.lampsig.org

Now, on yo your real question:

> My question is: with one 3GB SCSI drive and one 18GB SCSI 
> drive, and knowing what I want to do, what partitions would 
> you recommend I create and what sizes would you recommend for 
> those partitions?

Initially, I'd recommend a crash-and-burn configuration -- nearly
everything in "/" (referred to as "root", but not to be confused with
"/root")  with a suitable sized partition for "swap" as mentioned
elsewhere in this thread.  Work with this for a while and review the
sizes of various directories to get a feel for "actual growth/usage",
then plan your live system accordingly.

Since you have two drives, you would very likely load the system (/) on
the 3gb drive and set the "mount point" for the 18gb drive as either
"/home" [user directories] or a directory reserved for your "webserver"
(I think redhat in particular puts the webserver's documents in
"/var/www", I know SuSE creates "/srv/www" for this purpose)  this would
allow you to change out the OS without losing any web pages & related
data you may have collected over time.

You could also split the 18GB drive into two partitions, one for your
webserver as I mentioned, and the other as "/backup" or similar -- then
you can copy /<webserver_files> to /backup/<whatever> to make a
"snapshot" of your website & work files.