FIGURE 1.3 What do you want to do with your hard drive?
NOTE
More complex partitioning schemes might be useful for more complex
systems, such as servers, especially when multiple hard drives are
available. Read Chapter 10, “Command-Line Beginner’s Class,” for a quick
discussion of the parts of the Linux file system to get an idea of parts of the
file system that could benefit from residing on their own (or even multiple!)
partitions or disks.
NOTE
Adding, formatting, and partitioning a hard drive can be done at any time,
not only during installation. You should not try to modify a drive you are
currently using, such as the one on which you have installed Ubuntu,
because doing so could make the computer unusable, and you would have
to start over. However, if you are adding a second drive or if you want to
reformat a flash drive, partitioning the drive you’re using is a useful skill to
know. In any case, this is an instance where the standard warning applies:
Pay attention to what you are doing and know why you are doing it because
this powerful tool both is useful and has the potential to cause you serious
problems and data loss if used incorrectly.
The easiest and simplest method is to use GParted, which is a graphical
partition manager. GParted is not installed by default, but it is available in
the Ubuntu software repositories; see Chapter 9, “Managing Software,” if
you need help installing it.