From: aragorn@chatfactory.invalid   
      
   J.O. Aho wrote:   
      
   > Aragorn wrote:   
   >   
   >> Thus, I turn to you, the longstanding Gentoo gurus  (:p), with a   
   >> couple of questions...:   
   >>   
   >>         (1) How much diskspace would I need to allocate for...   
   >   
   > This is alwyas a bit tricky to answer, as much depends on what you will be   
   > installing.   
      
   Well, that's what I asked it here for. ;-)  Different people may have   
   different installs, and it gives me a good idea on what to expect. :-)   
      
   >>                 - /usr   
   >   
   > 3-4G should be enough, but if you would bloat with Gnome2, I think you   
   > need to add a gig or two more.   
      
   Okay, noted. :-)   
      
   >>                 - /usr/src   
   >   
   > A normal kernel source + compiled objects and kernel will take around   
   > 290-400M, just multiply with the number of kernels you will be keeping.   
      
   But don't certain other headers go there as well?  I know that Mandrake used   
   to like to put the Apache headers there too.   
      
   > Myself I have set the portage build directory to resident inside /usr/src   
   > too, mine is a bit bloated in size, 5G, but some packages like OpenOffice   
   > needs quite a lot of space to be built.   
      
   That's why I'm keeping */var/tmp/portage* on a /tmpfs.../ ;-)  Once the   
   build is complete and the packages installed, you don't need those files in   
   there anymore anyway. :-)   
      
   >>                 - /usr/portage   
   >   
   > Today portage is 3.7G, but that will grow with the number of new packages   
   > that will be included in future and shrink depending on which packages are   
   > dropped.   
      
   Okay, so that one's bigger than I already thought it'd be.  Thanks for the   
   "heads up". ;-)   
      
   >>                 - /usr/local   
   >   
   > 1M, really I have 164K worth of files in this directory and it's on an   
   > installation that is soon 4 years old.   
      
   Okay. :-)   
      
   >>                 - /srv   
   > 0M   
      
   Well, I guess I should have said that I would be using the /srvdir/ USE   
   flag, which most people won't use as it's rather exotic.  If I understand   
   correctly, then with /srvdir,/ many applications that normally install   
   themselves in */var* would put their files in */srv.*   
      
   */srv* itself is part of the FHS, although the standard does say that there   
   is no actual description of what should go there or how it should be   
   organized, other than that it's shareable data.   
      
   >>                 - /opt   
   >   
   > This depends much on what pre-compiled packages you emerge, I have a   
   > number of different JDKs installed, Acrobat, nero, staroffice, realplayer,   
   > skype and it uses 1.2G.   
      
   I intend to compile as much as possible.  I don't like pre-compiled stuff   
   (or proprietary software) and the ability to customize as much as possible   
   in a relatively easy manner is the very reason I choose Gentoo. :-)   
      
   > For me the main difference on the server and the desktops are X11, and   
   > some 3rd party pre-compiled files, I may not need all of the files, but   
   > sometimes I need to do some work remotely and then it's easy to have all   
   > my needed tools on the server and at the same time it's good to have a lot   
   > of the server stuff on the desktops, so you can experiment in a test   
   > environment before using it on the server.   
      
   I agree.   
      
   >>         (2) As of 2.6.23, the Linux kernel includes Xen support, but is   
   >>         this only for unprivileged guests or for privileged guests as   
   >>         well?  In other words, will I still need to patch the kernel   
   >>         tree?   
   >   
   > Can't say I can find Xen in the kernel source, KVM has been included for a   
   > while.   
      
   There should be a couple of *./xen* directories if you unpack the tarball   
   though, among others under the top-level *./include* directory.  Xen itself   
   - i.e. the hypervisor code - is _not_ part of the Linux source tree, but as   
   of 2.6.23, Linux does come with Xen support built-in.  However, I don't   
   know whether this is only for use as an unprivileged guest or whether the   
   vanilla tree also allows for use as a privileged guest without patching.   
   Hence my question.   
      
   > There is a Xen patched kernel included in Gentoo, but that is   
   > version 2.6.20, while those pre-compiled ones at Xen Community are built   
   > on 2.6.18. Looking at kernel.org, I can't see anything mentioning that Xen   
   > would have been merged.   
      
   Well, it's there, trust me, but not the whole of Xen.  It's just a way to   
   make Linux be able to work with Xen.  The Xen hypervisor itself is still a   
   separate project and is not part of the Linux sources tarball.   
      
   Much obliged for your input, though. :-)   
      
   --   
   Aragorn   
   (registered GNU/Linux user #223157)   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)