Customising a Logical Volume After Enlarging an SSD in Ubuntu/Debian (Cloud Server)

In this article, we'll show you how to adjust the Logical Volume after increasing the size of your SSD in Ubuntu/Debian.

On cloud servers, the Logical Volume Manager (LVM) is used to manage storage space. The Logical Volume Manager puts a logical layer between the file system and the partitions of the data storage used. This makes it possible to create a file system that spans multiple partitions and/or disks. In this way, the storage space of several partitions or disks can be combined. In addition, the Logical Volume Manager gives you the option to increase a logical volume on the fly.

After you have increased the size of your cloud server's SSD, you must manually adjust the size of the Logical Volume.

• If you have the distribution Ubuntu 18.04, Ubuntu 20.04 or Ubuntu 22.04 installed on your server, the growpart program is already installed by default. If you have the distribution Debian 10 or Debian 11 installed on your server, you need to install the growpart program. If this program is not installed on your server, you can install it using the commands below. After entering the appropriate command, follow the instructions displayed.
  
  Debian 10 and Debian 11

  [root@localhost ~]# apt-get install cloud-utils

  Ubuntu 18.04, Ubuntu 20.04 and Ubuntu 22.04

  [root@localhost ~]# apt-get install cloud-guest-utils

• To check the available space of the logical volume, enter the following command:

  [root@localhost ~]# df -h

  After entering the command, the following partitioning is displayed, for example:

  Filesystem             Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
  udev                   963M     0  963M   0% /dev
  tmpfs                  198M  772K  197M   1% /run
  /dev/mapper/vg00-lv01   77G  1.6G   72G   3% /
  tmpfs                  986M     0  986M   0% /dev/shm
  tmpfs                  5.0M     0  5.0M   0% /run/lock
  tmpfs                  986M     0  986M   0% /sys/fs/cgroup
  /dev/sda1              464M   60M  377M  14% /boot
  tmpfs                  197M     0  197M   0% /run/user/0

• Note the logical volume that is to be expanded. This is mounted under /. In the above example, the logical volume is /dev/mapper/vg00-lv01.

• To view the partitioning of the Logical Volume, type the command below.
  

  [root@localhost ~]# fdisk -l

  After entering the command, the file system structure is displayed:

  root@localhost:~# fdisk -l
  Disk /dev/sda: 100 GiB, 107374182400 bytes, 209715200 sectors
  Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
  Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
  I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
  Disklabel type: dos
  Disk identifier: 0xe68dc2ef
  
  Device     Boot  Start       End   Sectors  Size Id Type
  /dev/sda1  *      2048    999423    997376  487M 83 Linux
  /dev/sda2       999424 167772159 166772736 79.5G 8e Linux LVM
  
  Disk /dev/mapper/vg00-lv01: 77.6 GiB, 83336626176 bytes, 162766848 sectors
  Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
  Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
  I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
  
  Disk /dev/mapper/vg00-lv00: 1.9 GiB, 2046820352 bytes, 3997696 sectors
  Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
  Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
  I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes

  In this example the partition sda2 is to be adjusted manually.

• To determine the file system, enter the following command:

  [root@localhost ~]# df -Th | grep "^/dev"

  In the following example, the logical volume /dev/mapper/vg00-lv01 uses the ext4 file system:

  root@localhost:~# df -Th | grep "^/dev"
  /dev/mapper/vg00-lv01 ext4       77G  2.5G   71G   4% /
  /dev/sda1             ext4      456M  147M  276M  35% /boot

• To display the detailed information about the physical volumes, enter the following command:

  [root@localhost ~]# pvdisplay

  After entering the command, the following information is displayed, for example:

  root@localhost:~# pvdisplay
    --- Physical volume ---
    PV Name               /dev/sda2
    VG Name               vg00
    PV Size               79.52 GiB / not usable 3.00 MiB
    Allocatable           yes (but full)
    PE Size               4.00 MiB
    Total PE              20357
    Free PE               0
    Allocated PE          20357
    PV UUID               NseCRU-3JHj-Hwcq-BNpX-coVV-jBSy-l0EKWu

• To increase the physical volume, enter the following command:

  [root@localhost ~]# pvresize /dev/sda2

  After entering the command, the following information is displayed:

  [root@localhost ~]# pvresize /dev/sda2
    Physical volume "/dev/sda2" changed
    1 physical volume(s) resized or updated / 0 physical volume(s) not resized

• To check the status of the logical volumes, type the following command:

  root@localhost:~# lvdisplay
    --- Logical volume ---
    LV Path                /dev/vg00/lv00
    LV Name                lv00
    VG Name                vg00
    LV UUID                2DoZKM-A912-o9z8-2R1U-HbII-gNRF-lIKM1m
    LV Write Access        read/write
    LV Creation host, time somehost, 2019-03-07 16:43:12 +0000
    LV Status              available
    # open                 2
    LV Size                <1.91 GiB
    Current LE             488
    Segments               1
    Allocation             inherit
    Read ahead sectors     auto
    - currently set to     256
    Block device           253:1
  
    --- Logical volume ---
    LV Path                /dev/vg00/lv01
    LV Name                lv01
    VG Name                vg00
    LV UUID                dB1lWB-1TBC-Sl6S-g09N-v2lk-kXOv-yFYuFf
    LV Write Access        read/write
    LV Creation host, time somehost, 2019-03-07 16:43:12 +0000
    LV Status              available
    # open                 1
    LV Size                77.61 GiB
    Current LE             19869
    Segments               1
    Allocation             inherit
    Read ahead sectors     auto
    - currently set to     256
    Block device           253:0

• Note the path of the logical volume that you want to enlarge. In this example, the path is /dev/vg00/lv01.

• To increase the size of the logical volume with the lvresize program, type the lvresize command in the following format:

  [root@localhost ~]# lvresize -l +100%FREE [PATH OF LOGICAL VOLUME]

  Example:

  [root@localhost ~]# lvresize -l+100%FREE /dev/vg00/lv01
    Size of logical volume vg00/lv01 changed from 77.61 GiB (19869 extents) to 97.61 GiB (24989 extents).
    Logical volume vg00/lv01 successfully resized.

• Resize the file system to use the new space. To resize the file system to the new size using resize2fs, enter the resize2fs command in the following format:

  [root@localhost ~]# resize2fs [PATH OF LOGICAL VOLUME]

  Example:

  root@localhost:~# resize2fs /dev/vg00/lv01
  resize2fs 1.44.1 (24-Mar-2018)
  Filesystem at /dev/vg00/lv01 is mounted on /; on-line resizing required
  old_desc_blocks = 10, new_desc_blocks = 13
  The filesystem on /dev/vg00/lv01 is now 25588736 (4k) blocks long.

  If the partition uses file system xfs, enter the following command to resize it to the new size:

  [root@localhost ~]# xfs_growfs [PATH OF LOGICAL VOLUME]

  Example:

  [root@localhost ~]# xfs_growfs /dev/vg00/lv01

• To check if the file system has been adjusted, enter the following command:

  [root@localhost ~]# df -h