Extend an LVM volume on your linux server

What:

Linux: Red Hat, Centos

Problem:

Your Linux box is running out of space.

Solution:

To extend space on your lvm volume you will need to:

1. Add new disk to your system
2 .My new device has been detected as /dev/sdb

If your new disk is not detected you can reboot the system or send a rescan request using command below:

echo "- - -" > /sys/class/scsi_host/host0/scan

You can use entire disk as a phisical volume in an LVM volume group, but it's recommended in "RHEL6 Logical Volume Manager Administration LVM Administrator Guide" and LVM howto "11.1. Initializing disks or disk partitions" that you create a partition.

3. Create new partition and set type to 8e which is Linux LVM

fdisk /dev/sdb

or

cfdisk /dev/sdb

4. Create phisical volume

pvcreate /dev/sdb1

5. Find volume group name, which you want to extend

vgdisplay or pvs or df

6. Add your new disk to the volume group

vgextend vg_name /dev/sdb1

7. Confirm new free size with one of the following commands

pvs or vgdisplay or pvscan

Your volume group has now some free space, which you can allocate to logical volume/s

8. List your volumes

lvdisplay

9. Extend space on your volume by adding 10GB

lvextend -L +10G /dev/mapper/vg_name-LogVol

optionally allocate all available space

lvextend -l +100%FREE /dev/mapper/vg_name-LogVol

10. Resize file system

resize2fs /dev/mapper/vg_name-LogVol

Check your free space with df