Red Hat Knowledgebase

Red Hat Enterprise Linux version 3 ships with Logical Volume Managment (LVM) support.

LVM enables dynamic resizing of partitions on a disk and even spanning physical disks. For example, you can add a new physical hard disk to a system, and then dynamically extend an existing partition onto that disk.

With LVM you can only dynamically resize partitions that were created using LVM. It is not possible to use LVM retroactively to dynamically resize partitions that were not initially configured using LVM. Therefore if you wish to use the dynamic resizing capabilities of LVM you need to configure your partitions using LVM first.

Please note also that with LVM at present the resizing must be done off-line, that is with the partition unmounted.

Note: Resizing your root partition can have unknown consequences. Take the proper precautions like performing data backups and conducting system planning to create partition sizes for anticipated use of the system and the created partitions.