fixup! New post on copying the drive on a running machine.

Copy a drive on a running machine

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:date: 2024-06-08

:summary: Copying to a new drive while the machine is running

:summary: Copying from an old drive to a new drive while the machine is running

I was close to running out of disk space the homelab machine I use for running

services with personal data that I run in my home (I feel more comfortable

having physical control). I was too lazy to connect the machine to a monitor

and keyboard and rebooting from a thumbdrive so I tried to copy the old drive

to a new drive while the machine was running. Here's what I did:

I was close to running out of disk space on the homelab machine I use for

running services with personal data that I run in my home (I feel more

comfortable having physical control). I was too lazy to connect the machine to

a monitor and keyboard and reboot from a thumbdrive so I tried to copy the old

drive to a new drive while the machine was running. Here's what I did:

#. Stop running processes that have open files. For me it was stopping Docker

   containers, some services (I have most services running in containers so I

   have few services).

   containers, some services (I have most things running in containers so most

   of the services are ones that come with a standard OS installation).

   .. code:: shell

#. :code:`cd` to a directory on a different drive to avoid keeping the path

   open :code:`cd /tmp`. Remount all partitions as read-only: :code:`sudo mount

   open (:code:`cd /tmp`). Remount all partitions as read-only: :code:`sudo mount

   --all -o remount,ro -t vfat,btrfs,ext4`. This may fail and you will see an

   error with a path that couldn't be remounted due to open files. Run

   :code:`lsof /path/that/has/open/files`, find the processes that still have

#. Once the copy is complete, run :code:`sudo sync` again and :code:`echo 1 |

   sudo tee /sys/block/nvme0n1/device/rescan`. Now we need to resize the data

   partition, `sudo parted /dev/nvme0n1 --script resizepart 3 100%` (in my case

   the data partition was the 3rd partition after the EFI and root partitions).

   Open the encrypted partition :code:`sudo cryptsetup open /dev/nvme0n1p3

   _dev_nvme0n1p2` and resize the encrypted partition :code:`sudo cryptsetup

   resize _dev_nvme0n1p3`. Last resize is the filesystem in the encrypted

   partition, we mount it :code:`sudo mount /dev/mapper/_dev_nvme0n1p3 /mnt`

   and resize it :code:`sudo btrfs filesystem resize max /mnt`. Umount the data

   partition :code:`sudo umount /mnt`.

   partition, :code:`sudo parted /dev/nvme0n1 --script resizepart 3 100%` (in

   my case the data partition was the 3rd partition after the EFI and root

   partitions). Open the encrypted partition :code:`sudo cryptsetup open

   /dev/nvme0n1p3 _dev_nvme0n1p2` and resize the encrypted partition

   :code:`sudo cryptsetup resize _dev_nvme0n1p3`. Last resize is the filesystem

   in the encrypted partition, we mount it :code:`sudo mount

   /dev/mapper/_dev_nvme0n1p3 /mnt` and resize it :code:`sudo btrfs filesystem

   resize max /mnt`. Umount the data partition :code:`sudo umount /mnt`.

#. Let's reinstall the boot loader.