Bug 147245

Summary: Yast partitioner insists on deleting unused partitions
Product: [openSUSE] SUSE Linux 10.1 Reporter: Juergen Weigert <jw>
Component: YaST2Assignee: Thomas Fehr <fehr>
Status: RESOLVED INVALID QA Contact: Klaus Kämpf <kkaempf>
Severity: Normal    
Priority: P5 - None CC: suse-beta
Version: Beta 3   
Target Milestone: ---   
Hardware: Other   
OS: Other   
Whiteboard:
Found By: Other Services Priority:
Business Priority: Blocker: ---
Marketing QA Status: --- IT Deployment: ---
Attachments: y2logs from that installation.

Description Juergen Weigert 2006-02-01 13:17:23 UTC
Upon a new installation of SUSE10.1 Beta3 (also happens in Beta1 and 2) yast makes a propsal which partitions to use. On my machine this reads:

Delete partition /dev/hda3 (29.9 GB)
Delete partition /dev/hda5 (20.0 GB)
Create root partition /dev/hda3 (29.9 GB) with reiserfs
Create partition /dev/hda9 (19.0 GB)
Use /dev/hda1 as swap

None of the normal or expert dialogs helps to convince the machine that /edv/hda5 shall survice. 
I'd expect that a partition is no longer marked for deletion by specifying 'don't Format' and 'no mountpoint' in the Edit Menu.

Workaround: 
  Partitioning -> Expert -> Reread Partition Table
  Then starting from scratch.
Comment 1 Martin Lasarsch 2006-02-01 16:26:43 UTC
Jürgen: please attach /var/log/YaST2/* and fdisk -l

Thomas: i guess this is for you?
Comment 2 Thomas Fehr 2006-02-01 16:31:50 UTC
Your expectations are wrong, if you accept the proposal you have no possibility
to make one of the partitons not deleted any more (since the expert partitioner
is WYSIWYG these partition are simpy vanished). 

If you are not happy with the partitions the proposal wants to remove, you need 
to discard the proposal not accept it or modify it.
Comment 3 Juergen Weigert 2006-02-01 17:52:47 UTC
I do not believe that I expect too much.

'reread partition table' is definitily an extremly non-obvious way to save one's home partition. I do not understand a non-expert user must accept that some partition gets deleted.
Comment 4 Juergen Weigert 2006-02-01 17:54:16 UTC
Created attachment 66063 [details]
y2logs from that installation.

# fdisk -l    

Disk /dev/hda: 122.9 GB, 122942324736 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 14946 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

   Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System
/dev/hda1               1          96      771088+  82  Linux swap / Solaris
/dev/hda2              97        1402    10490445   83  Linux
/dev/hda3   *        1403        5318    31455270   83  Linux
/dev/hda4            5319       14946    77336910    f  W95 Ext'd (LBA)
/dev/hda5            5319        7929    20972826   83  Linux
/dev/hda6            7930        9888    15735636   83  Linux
/dev/hda7            9889       11847    15735636   83  Linux
/dev/hda8           11848       13806    15735636   83  Linux
/dev/hda9           13807       14946     9157018+  83  Linux
#
Comment 5 Thomas Fehr 2006-02-01 17:59:22 UTC
The partitions get only deleted if you either accept the proposal or use it as a
base for further modifications. Of course one should take this decision 
consciously and not by wildly clicking at a random button ;-) 

If one is not happy with the proposal, he should definitely select
"Custom partition setup" instead.

BTW: 'reread partition table' is not the only way to get the original proposal
back. This is also possible with "Reset to defaults" in proposal screen.
Comment 6 Juergen Weigert 2006-02-01 18:32:33 UTC
I'll redo now.

It starts again with:
 Delete partition /dev/hda3 (29.9 GB)
 Delete partition /dev/hda5 (20.0 GB)
 Create root partition /dev/hda3 (29.9 GB) with reiserfs
 Create partition /dev/hda9 (19.0 GB)
 Use /dev/hda1 as swap

I select 'Custom partition setup', then select my /dev/hda, then partition 7.
It then reads

 Delete partition /dev/hda8 (15.0 GB)
 Create partition /dev/hda9 (9.0 GB) for /home with reiserfs
 Create root partition /dev/hda10 (6.9 GB) with reiserfs

That leaves me confused. Who mentioned partition hda8 and hda10?
Sorry. reopening...
Comment 7 Thomas Fehr 2006-02-01 22:46:43 UTC
I still see no bug, from what I can see here, all is exactly as it should.
Since this endless CLOSE/OPENING is not very productive, maybe we can discuss
this face to face tomorrow.
Comment 8 Thomas Fehr 2006-02-02 11:48:13 UTC
Ok, finally could resolve the misunderstandings.
Comment 9 Juergen Weigert 2006-02-02 13:14:12 UTC
For the records.
I now learned the following concepts:
- 'Create Custom Partition Setup' implies a two partition layout unless
  one also chooses 'Custom Partitioning (for experts)' on the next screen.
- Deleting an extended partition renumbers all following extended partitions.
- The hotkey numbers in 'Preparing Hard Disk -- Step 2' do not necessarily
  correspond to partition numbers, but often do so.

Thanks for the explanations!