Datasheet

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Chapter 1 ✦ Installing SUSE 10
By default, creating this partition will automatically use the remaining unallocated
space on the hard drive, which is fine for our example. However, if you need to cre-
ate another partition —
/home, for example — you specify the size of the partition
explicitly as you did with the swap space. See the next section, “Data Partitions,”
for an overview of why you may want to create additional partitions.
The default type of filesystem used in SUSE is the Reiser filesystem, often referred to
as the ReiserFS. It was one of the first available journaling filesystems for Linux, and
a lot of the work was funded by both SUSE and mp3.com. A journaling filesystem
dedicates a specific part of the filesystem for use as a cache of pending writes to the
filesystem; this ensures that filesystem updates occur in a clean, atomic fashion; and
allows a fast recovery if the system is not cleanly shut down. Ordinarily, when a Linux
system is shut down, it ensures that all pending writes to each filesystem have com-
pleted, and then detaches the filesystems (known as unmounting them) to guarantee
that all system data is consistent before the system is turned off. Using a journaling
filesystem does not mean it is safer to just power off the machine, as data loss can
still occur when data is not completely written to the disk.
After the root partition has been created, you can review your changes (see Fig-
ure 1-14) and proceed with the software installation by clicking Finish. If you want
to create additional filesystems during the installation process, read the next sec-
tion before clicking Finish.
Figure 1-14: Reviewing changes to the partition scheme
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