Resizing VG qubes_dom0 - or lack thereof

User Support General
1

I’d love to revamp my qubes setup a bit so that all temporary LVM volumes are created in a different volume group.
However there is no way to shrink LVM volume groups. I have a 2TB ssd, and qubes_dom0 takes up 1.8TB of that. I am left with 200GB that I could mess around with, but I think thats not cutting it :frowning:

Is there a way to adjust this during the installation or is my only option to add another disk for the time being?

My goal would be to have a second LVM VG that I encrypt with a random key during boot, and then I make all my Qube’s use that for their temporary volumes - so if I start an AppVM, then /home would be in qubes_dom0 but root would be in qubes_random_crypt or so.

Is that somehow possible?

2

Okay - lets say your wish gets granted and you have your separated pools …

what for?

3

you can luks encrypt the second pool with a random key on boot of qubes os and use it for stuff like /dev/my-pool/vm-bla-volatile. This way everything you write in there is foresnics-safe after a reboot, as in the only data written in clear text to disk is the “browser appvm image”, but not the data the browser writes in a dispvm.

4

I think you’re looking for the ephemeral volume config property. qvm-volume – Qubes volume and block device management — Qubes Admin client mm_b8a948d9-0-gb8a948d documentation

E.g.

qvm-volume config disp-whonix:volatile ephemeral True
5

answered in edit above, thank you!

6

It is possible to shrink the volume groups in Qubes, just as you would
in any OS.
Just follow the standard procedures. (I’ve done this before using a live
USB to access the VG)
There are many potential disasters waiting for you but if you take
steps and validate as you go, then it can be done.
Make sure you have backup (I’m sure you have).
fsck the volume, resize2fsand runlvreduce- that should give you free space in the VG. Once you have shrunk the PVs you can reduce the size of your encrypted device withcryptsetup`, and then create a
new VG in the free space.
Plan out exactly what you want to do and check at every stage. Keep
those backups safe.

During the install you can select manual installation and specify how
much space should be used by the Qubes install. That allows you to
easily allocate the remainder as you will in your installed Qubes.

Look at the options in Global Configs

I never presume to speak for the Qubes team.
When I comment in the Forum I speak for myself.