Partitioning and Formatting a Disk Drive in Linux

Blocks and partitions

Before diving into the details of creating partitions and formatting them, let's kick things
off with a review of blocks and partitions.

Blocks

Blocks are a layer of storage devices that allow individual access to each independently.
They allow programs to access storage without worrying about whether the underlying
hardware device is a hard drive, solid state drive, flash drive, etc.

In Linux, you can view block devices and file systems attached to your system using
the lsblk command. This command gathers information about all devices attached to
the system, and prints them out using a tree-like structure. To view the devices attached
to your VM, use the lsblk command.

Lsblk

NAME MAJ:MIN RM SIZE RO TYPE MOUNTPOINT

sda 8:0 0 10G 0 disk
|-sda1 8:1 0 4.9G 0 part
|-sda2 8:2 0 16M 0 part
|-sda3 8:3 0 2G 0 part
|-sda4 8:4 0 16M 0 part
|-sda5 8:5 0 2G 0 part
|-sda6 8:6 0 512B 0 part
|-sda7 8:7 0 512B 0 part
|-sda8 8:8 0 16M 0 part
|-sda9 8:9 0 512B 0 part
|-sda10 8:10 0 512B 0 part
|-sda11 8:11 0 8M 0 part
`-sda12 8:12 0 32M 0 part
sdb 8:16 0 10G 0 disk
|-sdb1 8:17 0 5.9G 0 part /etc/hosts
|-sdb2 8:18 0 16M 0 part
|-sdb3 8:19 0 2G 0 part
| `-vroot 253:0 0 2G 1 dm
|-sdb4 8:20 0 16M 0 part
|-sdb5 8:21 0 2G 0 part
|-sdb6 8:22 0 512B 0 part
|-sdb7 8:23 0 512B 0 part
|-sdb8 8:24 0 16M 0 part
|-sdb9 8:25 0 512B 0 part
|-sdb10 8:26 0 512B 0 part
|-sdb11 8:27 0 8M 0 part
`-sdb12 8:28 0 32M 0 part
You'll see that your instance has two block devices attached to it (disks). Each of them
is 10GB in size. The column MOUNTPOINT shows where a block device is mounted. It's
from this location that files on the disk can be accessed. In this case, the MOUNTPOINT
is displaying "/etc/hosts" against sdb, which means the second disk (sdb) is mounted at
the root of the Linux file system tree. Thus, the files you're seeing on your system right
now are from this disk.

A first disk, sda, is also available, but it's not mounted. In this lab, you'll divide this disk
into two partitions. You'll then mount one of these partitions onto the file system, so you
can start accessing files from it.

Note: These may be swapped for you, and your VM may be mounted on sda instead of sdb. This
will change the commands used in the lab, so when you see \[MOUNT DRIVE\] replace it with
your mount drive (sda or sdb) and when you see \[SECOND DRIVE\] replace it with the other
one. If your VM is mounted on sda, the screenshots will also be flipped from what you will see.
Optionally, you can view disks mounted on the system using the df command. This
command is normally used to display the amount of space available on the file system.
It lists all block devices with the available space on them. Use the -h option to display
file sizes in human readable format.

df -h

Filesystem Size Used Avail Use% Mounted on

overlay 5.7G 809M 4.9G 14% /
tmpfs 64M 0 64M 0% /dev
tmpfs 290M 0 290M 0% /sys/fs/cgroup
shm 64M 0 64M 0% /dev/shm
/dev/sdb1 5.7G 809M 4.9G 14% /etc/hosts

Partitions

Instead of using a storage block as a whole, it's common practice to divide a storage
block into different partitions. Partitions can be different sizes, and formatted to
different filesystems. This allows you to use a single storage device for different
purposes.
You can display partition information using the fdisk command. You can also use the -l
option to list partitions in the block. You can pass a device name to the fdisk command
to list the partitions contained in that device.

To list all partitions, use fdisk -l

sudo fdisk -l

GPT PMBR size mismatch (18874524 != 20971519) will be corrected by write.

The backup GPT table is not on the end of the device. This problem will be
corrected by write.
Disk /dev/sda: 10 GiB, 10737418240 bytes, 20971520 sectors
Disk model: PersistentDisk
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 4096 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 4096 bytes / 4096 bytes
Disklabel type: gpt
Disk identifier: FDF53EEC-3010-3049-B247-42C11C16F682
Device Start End Sectors Size Type
/dev/sda1 8704000 18874476 10170477 4.9G Linux filesystem
/dev/sda2 20480 53247 32768 16M ChromeOS kernel
/dev/sda3 4509696 8703999 4194304 2G ChromeOS root fs
/dev/sda4 53248 86015 32768 16M ChromeOS kernel
/dev/sda5 315392 4509695 4194304 2G ChromeOS root fs
/dev/sda6 16448 16448 1 512B ChromeOS kernel
/dev/sda7 16449 16449 1 512B ChromeOS root fs
/dev/sda8 86016 118783 32768 16M Linux filesystem
/dev/sda9 16450 16450 1 512B ChromeOS reserved
/dev/sda10 16451 16451 1 512B ChromeOS reserved
/dev/sda11 64 16447 16384 8M BIOS boot
/dev/sda12 249856 315391 65536 32M EFI System
Partition 7 does not start on physical sector boundary.
Partition 9 does not start on physical sector boundary.
Partition 10 does not start on physical sector boundary.
Partition table entries are not in disk order.
Disk /dev/sdb: 10 GiB, 10737418240 bytes, 20971520 sectors
Disk model: PersistentDisk
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 4096 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 4096 bytes / 4096 bytes
To list partitions contained in /dev/sdb, pass /dev/sdb to the fdisk command.

sudo fdisk -l /dev/sdb

Disk /dev/sdb: 10 GiB, 10737418240 bytes, 20971520 sectors

Disk model: PersistentDisk
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 4096 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 4096 bytes / 4096 bytes
Disklabel type: gpt
Disk identifier: FDF53EEC-3010-3049-B247-42C11C16F682
Device Start End Sectors Size Type
/dev/sdb1 8704000 20971486 12267487 5.9G Linux filesystem
/dev/sdb2 20480 53247 32768 16M ChromeOS kernel
/dev/sdb3 4509696 8703999 4194304 2G ChromeOS root fs
/dev/sdb4 53248 86015 32768 16M ChromeOS kernel
/dev/sdb5 315392 4509695 4194304 2G ChromeOS root fs
/dev/sdb6 16448 16448 1 512B ChromeOS kernel
/dev/sdb7 16449 16449 1 512B ChromeOS root fs
/dev/sdb8 86016 118783 32768 16M Linux filesystem
/dev/sdb9 16450 16450 1 512B ChromeOS reserved
/dev/sdb10 16451 16451 1 512B ChromeOS reserved
/dev/sdb11 64 16447 16384 8M BIOS boot
/dev/sdb12 249856 315391 65536 32M EFI System
Partition 7 does not start on physical sector boundary.
Partition 9 does not start on physical sector boundary.
Partition 10 does not start on physical sector boundary.
Partition table entries are not in disk order.
fdisk displays information contained in the partition table, where information about
partitions is stored.

Disk partitioning with fdisk

When the fdisk command is used without options, it provides a menu-driven

environment for creating and deleting partitions.

Caution!: Modifying partitions is destructive, and can lead to loss of data. Not good! Remember
to always backup your data before modifying partitions on a live system.
Mount and umount
Mounting and unmounting mean making devices available or unavailable on a Linux file
system. This is accomplished by the commands mount and umount. Before modifying a
disk, you should first unmount it from the system, using the umount command. When
modifications on the disk are done, you should mount it back onto the system. For this
exercise, since the device we're partitioning isn't initially mounted, you can proceed with
partitioning.

Go ahead and start fdisk in interactive mode by passing the name of the disk you want
to partition. In this lab, we'll partition /dev/sda

Note: We will partition the disk that's not currently mounted. You should select dev/sdb if
/dev/sda is where the operating system is mounted, and /dev/sda otherwise. You can still
partition the disk even when the operating system is running from it, but a reboot will be required
in order for the partition changes you make to take place.
Start fdisk by passing the disk you want to partition as the parameter.

sudo fdisk /dev/[SECOND DRIVE]

Welcome to fdisk (util-linux 2.33.1).

Changes will remain in memory only, until you decide to write them.
Be careful before using the write command.
GPT PMBR size mismatch (18874524 != 20971519) will be corrected by write.
The backup GPT table is not on the end of the device. This problem will be
corrected by write.
Command (m for help):
fdisk will start in interactive mode. You can use m to use help provided by the
command.

Command (m for help): m

Help:
GPT
 M enter protective/hybrid MBR
Generic
d delete a partition
F list free unpartitioned space
l list known partition types
n add a new partition
p print the partition table
t change a partition type
v verify the partition table
i print information about a partition
Misc
m print this menu
x extra functionality (experts only)
Script
I load disk layout from sfdisk script file
O dump disk layout to sfdisk script file
Save & Exit
w write table to disk and exit
q quit without saving changes
Create a new label
g create a new empty GPT partition table
G create a new empty SGI (IRIX) partition table
o create a new empty DOS partition table
s create a new empty Sun partition table
Command (m for help):
You can use p to show details about partitions on the disk.

Command (m for help): p

Disk /dev/sda: 10 GiB, 10737418240 bytes, 20971520 sectors
Disk model: PersistentDisk
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 4096 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 4096 bytes / 4096 bytes
Disklabel type: gpt
Disk identifier: FDF53EEC-3010-3049-B247-42C11C16F682
Device Start End Sectors Size Type
/dev/sda1 8704000 18874476 10170477 4.9G Linux filesystem
/dev/sda2 20480 53247 32768 16M ChromeOS kernel
/dev/sda3 4509696 8703999 4194304 2G ChromeOS root fs
/dev/sda4 53248 86015 32768 16M ChromeOS kernel
/dev/sda5 315392 4509695 4194304 2G ChromeOS root fs
/dev/sda6 16448 16448 1 512B ChromeOS kernel
/dev/sda7 16449 16449 1 512B ChromeOS root fs
/dev/sda8 86016 118783 32768 16M Linux filesystem
/dev/sda9 16450 16450 1 512B ChromeOS reserved
/dev/sda10 16451 16451 1 512B ChromeOS reserved
/dev/sda11 64 16447 16384 8M BIOS boot
/dev/sda12 249856 315391 65536 32M EFI System
Partition 7 does not start on physical sector boundary.
Partition 9 does not start on physical sector boundary.
Partition 10 does not start on physical sector boundary.
Partition table entries are not in disk order.
Command (m for help):
Enter q to exit interactive mode when you are finished exploring.

Creating Partitions
You'll now create new partitions using fdisk. You'll partition the second drive into two
partitions: one swap partition of size 1GB, and another of size 9GB. The file system type
on the second partition will be ext4.

Open fdisk in interactive mode to do the partitioning:

sudo fdisk /dev/[SECOND DRIVE]

Welcome to fdisk (util-linux 2.33.1).

Changes will remain in memory only, until you decide to write them.
Be careful before using the write command.
GPT PMBR size mismatch (18874524 != 20971519) will be corrected by write.
The backup GPT table is not on the end of the device. This problem will be
corrected by write.
Command (m for help):
To create a new partition, the command control n is used. However, since all the space
on the disk is currently allocated, you'll need to first free up space by deleting the default
partitions.

Use the d command control to delete the default partitions. When you issue
the d command control, fdisk asks you to enter the number of partitions you want to
delete. Since you have twelve partitions, fdisk automatically selects the last partition by
default, and pressing Enter deletes the last partition. Repeat this process until you
delete all the twelve partitions.

Command (m for help): d

Partition number (1-12, default 12):
Partition 12 has been deleted.
Command (m for help): d
Partition number (1-11, default 11):
Partition 11 has been deleted.
Command (m for help): d
Partition number (1-10, default 10):
Partition 10 has been deleted.
Command (m for help): d
Partition number (1-9, default 9):
Partition 9 has been deleted.
Command (m for help): d
Partition number (1-8, default 8):
Partition 8 has been deleted.
Command (m for help): d
Partition number (1-7, default 7):
Partition 7 has been deleted.
Command (m for help): d
Partition number (1-6, default 6):
Partition 6 has been deleted.
Command (m for help): d
Partition number (1-5, default 5):
Partition 5 has been deleted.
Command (m for help): d
Partition number (1-4, default 4):
Partition 4 has been deleted.
Command (m for help): d
Partition number (1-3, default 3):
Partition 3 has been deleted.
Command (m for help): d
Partition number (1,2, default 2):
Partition 2 has been deleted.
Command (m for help): d
Selected partition 1
Partition 1 has been deleted.
Command (m for help):
You're now able to create your new partitions. Enter the command control for creating a
new partition, n.

You'll then need to provide the starting sector (memory location) of the new partition,
from where you want to allocate. Here, press Enter to select the default value 2048.

Command (m for help): n

Partition number (1-128, default 1):
First sector (34-20971486, default 2048):
Last sector, +/-sectors or +/-size{K,M,G,T,P} (2048-20971486, default
20971486):
Provide the last sector of the new partition, up to where you want to allocate. The
difference between the first and last sectors makes up the total size of the partition.
Disk sector represents units used to measure the size on disks. Each sector stores a
fixed amount of data. In lots of hard disks, for example, a sector stores 512 bytes. To
create the first 1GB partition, enter 2097200 (divide the original partition by 10).

Command (m for help): n

Partition number (1-128, default 1):
First sector (34-20971486, default 2048):
Last sector, +/-sectors or +/-size{K,M,G,T,P} (2048-20971486, default
20971486): 2097200
Created a new partition 1 of type 'Linux filesystem' and of size 1023 MiB.
Command (m for help):
Two important things happen here: the partition size is set to 1GB, and the partition type
is set to Linux filesystem. (You'll see how to change partition types in the next section.)
Voila! One partition is now created. You'll now move on to the second one.

Use the command control n again for a new partition.

Command (m for help): n

Partition number (2-128, default 2):
Select partition number 2 to issue partition numbers in sequence.

Command (m for help): n

Partition number (2-128, default 2):
First sector (2097201-20971486, default 2099200):
Select the default partition starting sector, which is the next sector from the last
partition you allocated.

Command (m for help): n

Partition number (2-128, default 2):
First sector (2097201-20971486, default 2099200):
Last sector, +/-sectors or +/-size{K,M,G,T,P} (2099200-20971486, default
20971486):
Also select the default last sector, which will be the last sector of the remaining disk
space.

Command (m for help): n

Partition number (2-128, default 2):
First sector (2097201-20971486, default 2099200):
Last sector, +/-sectors or +/-size{K,M,G,T,P} (2099200-20971486, default
20971486):
Created a new partition 2 of type 'Linux filesystem' and of size 9 GiB.
Command (m for help):
The second partition is now created. Sweet!

Before committing your changes, you'll change the second partition to a different
partition type. You'll change the first partition type to a Linux swap type. Enter command
control t to change the partition type, and select the first partition.

Command (m for help): t

Partition number (1,2, default 2): 1
Partition type (type L to list all types):
You can use the command control L to view a list of all partition types.

Command (m for help): t

Partition number (1,2, default 2): 1
Partition type (type L to list all types): L
1 EFI System C12A7328-F81F-11D2-BA4B-00A0C93EC93B
2 MBR partition scheme 024DEE41-33E7-11D3-9D69-0008C781F39F
3 Intel Fast Flash D3BFE2DE-3DAF-11DF-BA40-E3A556D89593
4 BIOS boot 21686148-6449-6E6F-744E-656564454649
5 Sony boot partition F4019732-066E-4E12-8273-346C5641494F
6 Lenovo boot partition BFBFAFE7-A34F-448A-9A5B-6213EB736C22
7 PowerPC PReP boot 9E1A2D38-C612-4316-AA26-8B49521E5A8B
8 ONIE boot 7412F7D5-A156-4B13-81DC-867174929325
9 ONIE config D4E6E2CD-4469-46F3-B5CB-1BFF57AFC149
10 Microsoft reserved E3C9E316-0B5C-4DB8-817D-F92DF00215AE
11 Microsoft basic data EBD0A0A2-B9E5-4433-87C0-68B6B72699C7
12 Microsoft LDM metadata 5808C8AA-7E8F-42E0-85D2-E1E90434CFB3
13 Microsoft LDM data AF9B60A0-1431-4F62-BC68-3311714A69AD
14 Windows recovery environment DE94BBA4-06D1-4D40-A16A-BFD50179D6AC
15 IBM General Parallel Fs 37AFFC90-EF7D-4E96-91C3-2D7AE055B174
16 Microsoft Storage Spaces E75CAF8F-F680-4CEE-AFA3-B001E56EFC2D
17 HP-UX data 75894C1E-3AEB-11D3-B7C1-7B03A0000000
18 HP-UX service E2A1E728-32E3-11D6-A682-7B03A0000000
19 Linux swap 0657FD6D-A4AB-43C4-84E5-0933C84B4F4F
20 Linux filesystem 0FC63DAF-8483-4772-8E79-3D69D8477DE4
21 Linux server data 3B8F8425-20E0-4F3B-907F-1A25A76F98E8
22 Linux root (x86) 44479540-F297-41B2-9AF7-D131D5F0458A
Enter 19 to change the partition type to ‘Linux swap', and press Enter.

Head's up: Some of the characters in the partition type name Linux swap are truncated.

Partition type (type L to list all types): 19

Changed type of partition 'Linux filesystem' to 'Linux swap'.
Command (m for help):
The partition type will be changed to match the selection.

Up to this point, you've just been editing the partition table in memory. You can use
the q command here to quit fdisk without committing changes to the disk. You can also
update your partitions by using the d and n commands to remove and add new
partitions.

You can also use the v command here to verify your changes before proceeding.

Command (m for help): v

No errors detected.
Header version: 1.0
Using 2 out of 128 partitions.
A total of 4013 free sectors is available in 2 segments (the largest is
1007 KiB).
If you're satisfied with the changes you've made so far, you can commit them to the disk
by using the w command.

Command (m for help): w

The partition table has been altered.
Calling ioctl() to re-read partition table.
Syncing disks.
Congrats! You've successfully partitioned the second disk using fdisk.

The second disk device is now made up of two partitions of 1GB and 9GB, respectively.

Formatting partitions using mkfs

Next, you'll create different file systems in the partitions you just created. You'll do this
by using the command mkfs in Linux. Multiple filesystem types exist, and it's important
to know all of them, along with the functions they're best suited for. In this lab, you'll
format the second partition into ext4, the most widely used Linux filesystem type.

To do this, use lsblk again to find the disk you want to create the file system type in.

Lsblk

NAME MAJ:MIN RM SIZE RO TYPE MOUNTPOINT

sda 8:0 0 10G 0 disk
|-sda1 8:1 0 1023M 0 part
`-sda2 8:2 0 9G 0 part
sdb 8:16 0 10G 0 disk
|-sdb1 8:17 0 5.9G 0 part /etc/hosts
|-sdb2 8:18 0 16M 0 part
|-sdb3 8:19 0 2G 0 part
| `-vroot 253:0 0 2G 1 dm
|-sdb4 8:20 0 16M 0 part
|-sdb5 8:21 0 2G 0 part
|-sdb6 8:22 0 512B 0 part
|-sdb7 8:23 0 512B 0 part
|-sdb8 8:24 0 16M 0 part
|-sdb9 8:25 0 512B 0 part
|-sdb10 8:26 0 512B 0 part
|-sdb11 8:27 0 8M 0 part
`-sdb12 8:28 0 32M 0 part
Format the second partition in your unmounted drive (sdb2 or sda2) to ext4 using this
command:

sudo mkfs -t ext4 /dev/[SECOND DRIVE]2

.5 (15-Dec-2018)
Discarding device blocks: done
Creating filesystem with 2359035 4k blocks and 589824 inodes
Filesystem UUID: 3e68d65f-3029-4232-8f45-b924de3862bd
Superblock backups stored on blocks:
32768, 98304, 163840, 229376, 294912, 819200, 884736, 1605632
Allocating group tables: done
Writing inode tables: done
Creating journal (16384 blocks): done
Writing superblocks and filesystem accounting information: done

You can now mount /dev/sda2 to a location on the file system to start accessing files
on it. Mount it on the directory /home/my_drive.

sudo mount /dev/[SECOND DRIVE]2 /home/my_drive

You can verify the file systems and block devices attached to your system
using lsblk command.

Lsblk

NAME MAJ:MIN RM SIZE RO TYPE MOUNTPOINT

sda 8:0 0 10G 0 disk
|-sda1 8:1 0 1023M 0 part
`-sda2 8:2 0 9G 0 part /home/my_drive
sdb 8:16 0 10G 0 disk
|-sdb1 8:17 0 5.9G 0 part /etc/hosts
|-sdb2 8:18 0 16M 0 part
|-sdb3 8:19 0 2G 0 part
| `-vroot 253:0 0 2G 1 dm
|-sdb4 8:20 0 16M 0 part
|-sdb5 8:21 0 2G 0 part
|-sdb6 8:22 0 512B 0 part
|-sdb7 8:23 0 512B 0 part
|-sdb8 8:24 0 16M 0 part
|-sdb9 8:25 0 512B 0 part
|-sdb10 8:26 0 512B 0 part
|-sdb11 8:27 0 8M 0 part
`-sdb12 8:28 0 32M 0 part
From now on, accessing "/home/my_drive" will be accessing files on the disk.

That's it! You've successfully partitioned and formatted a disk in Linux.