Linux+ Filesystem and Storage Management Flashcards

A system has /dev/sda1 through /dev/sda4 as primary partitions. An administrator needs to add more partitions. What must be done?

Answer: Delete one primary and create an extended partition

MBR supports only 4 primary partitions; to add more, one primary must be converted to an extended partition that can hold multiple logical partitions.

Which command mounts all filesystems listed in /etc/fstab that are not currently mounted?

Answer: mount -a

mount -a reads /etc/fstab and mounts all filesystems listed there that are not yet mounted, skipping entries marked 'noauto'.

What does the 'e2label' command do?

Answer: Sets or displays the label of an ext2/3/4 filesystem

e2label sets or displays the volume label of an ext2, ext3, or ext4 filesystem, which can then be used in /etc/fstab as LABEL=.

An LVM snapshot is created for backup purposes. What happens if the original logical volume fills the snapshot's allocated space?

Answer: The snapshot becomes invalid

If a snapshot's allocated space fills up before the backup completes, the snapshot becomes invalid (corrupted) and can no longer be used.

Which command would permanently remove a physical volume from an LVM volume group?

Answer: vgreduce vg0 /dev/sdb

vgreduce removes a physical volume from a volume group; pvremove then removes the LVM metadata from the device entirely.

What is the purpose of the 'relatime' mount option?

Answer: Updates atime only if atime is older than mtime or ctime

relatime is a compromise between atime and noatime — it updates the access time only when it's older than the modification or change time, reducing unnecessary writes.

Which command displays a tree-like view of the block device hierarchy including partitions and their mount points?

Answer: lsblk

lsblk lists block devices in a tree format showing parent disks, their partitions, and the mount points where each is mounted.