#5113 Cannot create partition
(I actually use Version 1.881, but there is no option to select this)
I have a brandnew disk (nothing on it, not even partitioned), which is correctly shown in 'Partitions on Local Disks'. After clicking it, the 'Edit Disk Partitions' page correctly says: 'Disk size: 1.86 TB | Make and model: ATA ST2000VM003-1CT1 | Cylinders: 243201 | Partition format: UNKNOWN. This disk has no partitions yet'. After clicking the top-right plus sign to 'create a primary partition', I get a pagewith a 'create' button. After clicking with 'Linux Ext' selected, I get the the error message 'Failed to save partition : parted -s /dev/sdc unit cyl mkpart primary 0 243201 failed : Error: /dev/sdc: unrecognised disk label '.
What you really have to do is to "Wipe Partitions" first. This creates a partition, yet responds with 'Disk size: 1.86 TB | Make and model: ATA ST2000VM003-1CT1 | Cylinders: 243201 | Partition format: MSDOS. This disk has no partitions yet.'
Now you can use the +-button to format the partition.
I think there is multiple incorrect wording: The only thing the 'Wipe Partitions' button can NOT do is to wipe the partiotion, it only can 'Make or ChangePartition'.
The +-button does NOT 'Add primary partition' at all, it formats a partition, which must exist already.
After wiping of a partiion, the answer is correct that the Partition format is MS-DOS. It is incorrect that this just specified partition does not exist. What not exists is the format of that existing partition!
The +-button, which does the FORMATTING, should not be selectable as long as a partition to be formatted does not exist.
correction: after steps above still no formatted filesystem, only Linux type partition. I misinterpreted fdisk.
But still adds to the confusion.
It sounds like you needed to add a disklabel, which is an empty partition table. This is unusual as most new hard disks already come with one, allowing you to add a partition right away.
Not being an expert on disks and their structure, but I think the Disk Label error message is erroneous; the problem is elsewhere.
And part of the problem is an inadequate use of the terms 'partition' and 'partition table'. On Ubuntu 16.04 the program gnome-disks also mixes the two terms, while gparted uses them correctly.
Having run out of brandnew harddrives ;-) I took an old sata disk. Using gnome-disks I first applied 'No partitioning (empty)' to the disk. So the disk has neither any partitions nor even a partition-table.
Relocating the disk to my new server, and webmin finds it as a disk with zero partitions on it. Correct.
Clicking on the disk the 'Edit Disk Partitions' page tells me: 'Partition format: UNKNOWN. This disk has no partitions yet.' Also correct. Though what it sould mention is that there is not even a partition table!
At this point it should dis-allow to use the +-button to 'add primary partition', because that button does NOT create a partition-table, instead it attempts to define a type of partition (e.g. 83 for a Linuy type) to an entry of the partition table, which however fails, because the table does not exist. The error message 'Error: /dev/sdd: unrecognised disk label ' has nothing to do with the real error. (I don't even know if you can theoretically give a disk label to a disk without a partition-table?)
What you have to do is to click is 'Wipe Pratitions', which is misleading, because wiping partitions is the only thing you cannot do. You can replace an exiting partition-table, with a diffrent one, or if none exist create one.
Another misleading thing is that on the 'WipePartitions' page the button text says 'Wipe and Re-label'. At this point a label has not been defined. Is this the origin of the missing label error message referrred to above?
In my case I click the 'Wipe and Re-label' button with the MSDOS partition-table and get this message back: 'Disk size: 152.62 GB | Make and model: ATA SAMSUNG HD160JJ | Cylinders: 19457 | Partition format: MSDOS This disk has no partitions yet.'
Again, misleading: the 'Partition format: MSDOS' should be the 'Partition-Table format: MSDOS', while it is correct in that the partitions have not been defined.
Now I can click the +-button and define the primary partition as e.g. a Linux partition.
Now the back-message is again 'Partition format: MSDOS' (wrong, it is a table!) while in the table is says the type is 'Linux EXT' (correct).
And now I can click on 'Linux EXT', and here set a 'Filesystem label' (for the first time the option to set a label), plus create a Filesystem, plus mount it. Which works.
(A question here: why is the default filesystem ext3 and not ext4?)
I think all is there but a hell of confusing because of misleading or even incorrect wording.
Agreed, the messages are confusing - I will fix this in the next Webmin release.
Please, consider this as well:
I took another disk, wiped the partition table externally, created MSDOS partition table within webmin, and continued adding partitions in all 4 slots. All fine.
At this point the button 'Add Primary Partition' is still available. So it allowed me to attempt to create a 5th partition. (see attachment). Of course this fails for 2 reasons: no cylinders left in my arangement, and even if there were, the partition-table has no 5th entry.
I think the button should be made inactive here.
Of course, there are more partition-table types than just MS-DOS, and it may not be justified to mimic gparted in a web interface? But then the limits of this webmin tool should be explained (in a help link perhaps).
Thanks, I'll fix that up too.