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Partitioning CentOS for software Raid...

I

InlineFive

Diamond Member
Hey all,

I am in the process of creating a RAID0 array on my VMware server to speed up the VMs a little bit.

I have two 80GBS and they are partitioned as such.

/hda
2048MB - ext3 OS partition
Remainder - ext3 RAID0
/hdb
2048 - SWAP
Remainder - ext3 RAID0

Both of the RAID0 partitions have been combined to one drive and are mapped to the /usr directory. Where is where VMware installs and I have placed the VMs.

My question is this, yesterday I had some trouble where the machine locked up and would spew out lots of info when trying to log in. And then VMware crashed and I could not get it restarted.

Is this the correct way to format RAID on Linux?

Thanks!

I5
 
You didn't specify how you setup the array so how can anyone tell you if you did it right? If you're asking if using partitions in an array is fine, then yes there's no problems doing that.
 
Okay, so I presume that if the RAID array is mapped to /usr, /usr and all subdirectories are stored on the RAID array?
 
Okay, so I presume that if the RAID array is mapped to /usr, /usr and all subdirectories are stored on the RAID array?
Click to expand...

Unless you have some other directory below /usr mounted to another device. But putting databases on /usr isn't a very good idea, /usr is supposed to be static data and really only touched by the package manager.
 
Originally posted by: Nothinman
Okay, so I presume that if the RAID array is mapped to /usr, /usr and all subdirectories are stored on the RAID array?
Click to expand...

Unless you have some other directory below /usr mounted to another device. But putting databases on /usr isn't a very good idea, /usr is supposed to be static data and really only touched by the package manager.
Click to expand...

Okay, coming from a Windows world I presumed that /usr is like Documents and Settings. I'll see if I can create a /vmware and mount it to that during the CentOS install.

Thanks!
 
Did you install vmware from the rpm? If so, vmware will by default put it's virtual machine files in "/var/lib/vmware/Virtual Machines" so you should mount your raid array there.

Are you setting this array up during the CentOS install?
 
Okay, coming from a Windows world I presumed that /usr is like Documents and Settings. I'll see if I can create a /vmware and mount it to that during the CentOS install.
Click to expand...

If anything /home is like Documents and Settings, /usr would be more like Program Files. But making analogies between those two worlds is bound to end in pain since Windows lumps so much crap into a few directories where unix systems spread things out categorically.

Did you install vmware from the rpm? If so, vmware will by default put it's virtual machine files in "/var/lib/vmware/Virtual Machines" so you should mount your raid array there.
Click to expand...

Personally I would prefer /vmware over /var/lib/vmware/Virtual Machines, it's easier to type and remember and there's no dealing with spaces in the path names. But I also hate putting things right off the root so I'd probably put it under /mnt, so /mnt/vmware.
 
Personally I would prefer /vmware over /var/lib/vmware/Virtual Machines, it's easier to type and remember and there's no dealing with spaces in the path names. But I also hate putting things right off the root so I'd probably put it under /mnt, so /mnt/vmware.
Click to expand...
Personally, I prefer to leave stuff where it is expected to be, and symlink to it.
 
Originally posted by: InlineFive
I am in the process of creating a RAID0 array on my VMware server to speed up the VMs a little bit.
Click to expand...
What kind of speed are you hoping to achieve with this configuration? The only part that RAID0 would help with is loading/suspending/resuming the VM, because that's the only part where you're dealing with single large files that push your STR. (Unless, of course, your VM's are working internally with very large files). RAID0 is not going to improve your access times, so your VM's will not feel any "snappier". And in the process you're doubling your chances of failure.

I can envision situations where a RAID0 configuration is a good idea, but it's not clear to me that this is one of them.

 
Originally posted by: Brazen
Personally, I prefer to leave stuff where it is expected to be, and symlink to it.
Click to expand...
Generally, yeah. But with VMWare it doesn't seem to matter much. The package is pretty much a stand-alone deal, so you don't have to worry about other things linking to it. And the configure scripts remember your path choices between runs in case you need to rerun them to rebuild kernel modules after a kernel upgrade.

I put my VM's in /var/lib/vmware/vms, just in order to avoid spaces in the path name. FHS-wise, either that or putting them under /srv/vmware is probably the "correct" choice.

 
Personally, I prefer to leave stuff where it is expected to be, and symlink to it.
Click to expand...

If VMWare would break from moving them I would agree, but it's an easily moved and configured thing so, as cleverhandle said, in this case it really doesn't matter. It's at most 1 extra step to browse to another directory to open up the config file.

And the configure scripts remember your path choices between runs in case you need to rerun them to rebuild kernel modules after a kernel upgrade.
Click to expand...

Actually I don't think the configure script has anything to do with that, it's all in the UI so it's probably somewhere in your user's .vmware directory and the paths to the disks and stuff are stored in each VM's config file.
 
Originally posted by: Nothinman
Actually I don't think the configure script has anything to do with that, it's all in the UI so it's probably somewhere in your user's .vmware directory and the paths to the disks and stuff are stored in each VM's config file.
Click to expand...
You're referring to something different, I think. I mean that if, when you first install VMWare, you choose to have binaries in /usr/local/bin rather than /usr/bin, this choice is recorded (in /etc/vmware/locations, now that I'm looking...). If you need to rebuild kernel modules later, you can do it (have to do it? not sure) by running vmware-config.pl. That script prompts you for all the locations again, but uses your old choices as defaults. Only point being that you don't have to worry about remembering the correct location if you used non-standard paths when you first installed.

 
You're referring to something different, I think. I mean that if, when you first install VMWare, you choose to have binaries in /usr/local/bin rather than /usr/bin, this choice is recorded (in /etc/vmware/locations, now that I'm looking...). If you need to rebuild kernel modules later, you can do it (have to do it? not sure) by running vmware-config.pl. That script prompts you for all the locations again, but uses your old choices as defaults. Only point being that you don't have to worry about remembering the correct location if you used non-standard paths when you first installed.
Click to expand...

Yea, that part is does remember but that's completely orthogonal to the placement of the VMs themselves.
 
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