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Store data in a secondary disk
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Bonus Section
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Store data in a secondary disk

If you want to use a different disk to store data (blockchain and other databases) independently of the disk of the system, you can follow these instructions.

{% hint style="success" %} Difficulty: Easy {% endhint %}

Case 1: during the Ubuntu server guided installation

When you arrive at the "Guided storage configuration" (step 8) on the Ubuntu server installation, follow the next steps:

8.2. Pay attention to checking "Custom storage layout" instead of Use an entire disk, select [Done] and press enter

📝 Under AVAILABLE DEVICES you will see both drives you installed on the PC, identify each one by drive model name and storage

{% hint style="info" %} It is recommended to choose the smallest size drive for the system and the bigger size drive for the data storage /data (blockchain, databases, etc) {% endhint %}

8.2.1. Select the section where appeared the MODEL of the primary disk between "[]" and press enter -> Select "Use As Boot Device" and press enter again

{% hint style="info" %} This will select this storage as the boot disk and create automatically a new partition for the "BIOS grub spacer" on it. {% endhint %}

8.2.2. Select the "free space" section of the same device, and select "Add GPT Partition". Ensure the format is selected as "ext4", select "/" in the dropdown as mount point, select "Create" and press enter

8.2.3. Now select the "free space" of the secondary disk on "AVAILABLE DEVICES" section -> Add GPT partition. Ensure the format is selected as "ext4", select "Other" in the dropdown, type /data to assign to the new "/data" folder, select [Create] and press enter

9. Select [Done] and press enter. Confirm destructive action warning banner hitting [Continue]

{% hint style="danger" %} This will delete all existing data on the disks, including existing partitions! {% endhint %}

{% hint style="info" %} The GIF above is a recreation of a scenario made with a virtual machine -> VBOX_HARDDISK_VB4... would be the primary disk, and -> VBOX_HARDDISK_VB5... would be the secondary disk. In your case, this probably will not match exactly {% endhint %}

Continue with the guide

{% hint style="success" %} That's it: when you finish the Operating system section, your PC will boot the system from the primary disk while the data directory /data will be located on the secondary disk. {% endhint %}

-> Now you can continue with step 10 of the Ubuntu Server installation

Case 2: build it after system installation (by command line)

Attach the secondary disk to the MiniBolt node

Format secondary disk

  • List all block devices with additional information
lsblk -o NAME,MOUNTPOINT,UUID,FSTYPE,SIZE,LABEL,MODEL

Example of expected output without existing partitions:

NAME          MOUNTPOINT UUID       FSTYPE   SIZE    LABEL  MODEL
sdb                                          931.5G         Samsung SSD 870

Example of expected output with existing partitions:

NAME          MOUNTPOINT UUID              FSTYPE   SIZE    LABEL  MODEL
sdb                                                 931.5G         Samsung SSD 870
sdb1                     2219-782E         ext4     931.5G

{% hint style="info" %} Here we will see if the new disk has been detected by the system and what unit name has been assigned to it. Normally sda is the name assigned for the primary disk and sdb for the secondary disk, but your case could be different, pay attention to the "MODEL" column to identify each one, e.g: Samsung SSD 870" {% endhint %}

Delete the existing partition & create a new one

  • Type this command to use the "fdisk" utility and manage the secondary disk
sudo fdisk /dev/sdb
  • Now we select the option wished pressing the option letter and enter
    • Press "n" to create a new partition and then enter. Press enter until the prompt show (Command (m for help)) again

Case 1: if you had existing partition/s, the prompt will show you "All space for primary partitions is in use", you will need to type d and press enter until the prompt shows you "Partition X has been deleted", if not, press enter until the prompt shows you "Created a new partition X of type 'Linux filesystem'" and...

Case 2: if you had existing partition/s, the prompt will show you "Partition #1 contains an ext4 signature" "Do you want to remove the signature? [Y]es/[N]o", type Y and press enter until the prompt shows you "The signature will be removed by a write command", if not, press enter until the prompt shows you "Created a new partition X of type 'Linux filesystem'" and...

  • Finally, don't forget, to type w to automatically write on disk and exit

{% hint style="info" %} This will create a new partition called probably "sdb1" {% endhint %}

  • Finally, format the new partition to "Ext4" and obtain the UUID
sudo mkfs.ext4 /dev/[NAME_P]

Example of expected output:

mke2fs 1.46.5 (30-Dec-2021)
Creating filesystem with 1572608 4k blocks and 393216 inodes
Filesystem UUID: dafc3c67-c6e5-4eaa-8840-adaf604c85db
Superblock backups stored on blocks:
        32768, 98304, 163840, 229376, 294912, 819200, 884736

{% hint style="info" %} Take note of your UUID e.g dafc3c67-c6e5-4eaa-8840-adaf604c85db and the partition name of your secondary disk (normally "sdb1") {% endhint %}

Mount the secondary disk

The secondary disk is then attached to the file system and becomes available as a regular folder (this is called “mounting”).

  • List the block devices once more and copy the new partitions UUID into a text editor on your main machine
lsblk -o NAME,MOUNTPOINT,UUID,FSTYPE,SIZE,LABEL,MODEL

Example of expected output:

NAME        MOUNTPOINT UUID                                 FSTYPE   SIZE LABEL  MODEL
sdb                                                                931.5G        Samsung SSD 870
└─sdb1                 3aab0952-3ed4-4652-b203-d994c4fdff20 ext4   931.5G
  • Edit the "fstab" file and add the following as a new line at the end, replacing <yourUUID> with your own UUID
sudo nano /etc/fstab
UUID=<yourUUID> /data ext4 defaults 0 2
  • Create the data directory as a mount point
sudo mkdir /data
  • Assign as the owner to the admin user
sudo chown admin:admin /data
  • Mount all disks and check the file system
sudo mount -a
  • Is “/data” listed?
df -h /data

Example expected output:

Filesystem      Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
/dev/sdb1       938G   77M  891G   1% /data
  • Check measure the speed of your secondary drive with
sudo hdparm -t --direct /dev/sdb

{% hint style="success" %} If the measured speeds are more than 150 MB/s, you're good {% endhint %}

{% hint style="info" %} Now you can continue with the Security section of the guide, press here {% endhint %}