Red Hat ENTERPRISE LINUX 5 - DEPLOYMENT Deployment Manual page 100

Chapter 6. Managing Disk Storage
6.1.2.1. Making the Partition
From the partition table, determine the start and end points of the new partition and what partition type
it should be. You can only have four primary partitions (with no extended partition) on a device. If you
need more than four partitions, you can have three primary partitions, one extended partition, and
multiple logical partitions within the extended. For an overview of disk partitions, refer to the appendix
An Introduction to Disk Partitions in the Red Hat Enterprise Linux Installation Guide.
For example, to create a primary partition with an ext3 file system from 1024 megabytes until 2048
megabytes on a hard drive type the following command:
mkpart primary ext3 1024 2048
Tip
If you use the mkpartfs command instead, the file system is created after the partition
is created. However, parted does not support creating an ext3 file system. Thus, if you
wish to create an ext3 file system, use mkpart and create the file system with the mkfs
command as described later.
The changes start taking place as soon as you press Enter, so review the command before
executing to it.
After creating the partition, use the print command to confirm that it is in the partition table with the
correct partition type, file system type, and size. Also remember the minor number of the new partition
so that you can label it. You should also view the output of
cat /proc/partitions
to make sure the kernel recognizes the new partition.
6.1.2.2. Formating the Partition
The partition still does not have a file system. Create the file system:
/sbin/mkfs -t ext3 /dev/sda6
Warning
Formatting the partition permanently destroys any data that currently exists on the
partition.
6.1.2.3. Labeling the Partition
Next, give the partition a label. For example, if the new partition is /dev/sda6 and you want to label it
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