Hi again, I’m installing leap 16 on another computer and found a strange behaviour.
In short: Agama tells me that an already existing sda10 (252 gb) used as /home will be labeled as /dev/sda8 in the installation process and probably afterwards. I didn’t have this behaviour on the previous leap16 installation.
On the computer is an windows ntfs partitions etc. So I first go to the menu where I can choose “Custom” and press “do not modify” for nearly all existing partitions. Only swap and / should be deleted
following background:
sda 1 to 7 are other partitions
sda8 swap with 2 gb
sda9 / btrfs with 80 gb sda10 /home XFS with 252GB ← shouldn’t be modified
Back to the agama storage overview. Under result it says
“There are 2 destroying actions planned, which affect openSuse Leap” partion /dev/sda9 (80 gb) will be deleted partion /dev/sda8 (2 gb) will be deleted
partion /dev/sda9 (37 gb) will be created as / with btrfs partion /dev/sda10 (2 gb) will be created as swap<-mysterious partion /dev/sda8 (252 gb) will be mounted as /home<-mysterious
Below in the table is the same, there is the /home (252 gb) also sda8
I’m now afraid something could go wrong. Because the sda10 from before (/Home) is now /sda8
Is that all right and all the data from the /sda10 (252 gb) will not be modified as specified or should I be concerned because it says the /sda10 will be created as swap?
Generally speaking block identifiers like /dev/sdxy are not unique or even fixed and depend on the order in which the firmware (aka BIOS) enumerates said partitions.
So they are not even guaranteed to stay fixed from one boot to another.
When you need a fixed reference to a block device, better point at it via UUID (which is unique to any practical extent) or Label.
That said, when you delete the 80 GB btrfs and the 2GB swap there are 8 partitions remaining on the disk and the installer likely enumerates them sda1…sda8 with the last one being the 252 GB XFS.
Then the installer creates a new 80 GB btrfs as sda9 and a new 2GB swap as sda10.
Maybe there is an option to “reuse and format” rather than “delete” the existing /root and swap but cannot check at the moment.
I might be able to check later today if it is important to you.
Well, the partition enumeration is token from the partition table and thus is fixed (when the table is not changed). The device letter can indeed differ from boot to boot. Mostly because a device is removed/added, but spontanious changes can happen.
In this case it is Agama that uses device names and not UUIDs, thus what can the OP do about that? Not much I assume.
In the OPs case it is about partitions, thus we can assume fixed numbers.
Also, while @OrsoBruno mentions it already, I am not sure if the difference of “deleting” a partition and leaving it as it is, but re-using it for some other purpose is clear to the OP.
I never used Agama. But in principle there is no problem of
using a Swap partition for a new installation without any change, just point to it (in the fstab);
using an existing partition for a new file system, just create the file system of choice on it.
There is no need however to “delete” the partition (I assume that that means removing the entry of it in the partition table, either creating free space at the end, or somewhere in the middle of the device) when one does not want to have different partitioning of the device.
Well, the option to reuse existing partitions is deeply buried in the menus. Also, there are several versions of Agama on the net, so the following is from the original Leap 16.0 installer from October 2025; newer versions should be better, not worse, but who knows…
Once you startup the installer you end up in a page with a default config.
Hit “Storage” on the menu at the left.
Likely you should see “Use disk sda (xx GB) to install and boot”
Hit the dropdown reading “New partitions will be created for / and swap”
There are two lines with details for the default / and swap, each with an edit icon and a delete icon.
Hitting the edit icon should show a partition configuration option page, where you can choose, among other options:
Mount point: / >>> Using an existing partition >>> sda9 (80 GB) btrfs partition
File system: >>> Destroy current data and format partition as >>> Btrfs with snapshots
Then hit Accept and do the same for swap.
Then back at the “Storage” page, hit “Partitions will be used and created for swap and /” and you will be able to “Add or use partition” to reuse /home to your liking.
When you see it it is more easily done than written.
Your last post, OrsoBruno, beginning with “Well, the option to reuse…” was very good! I could follow your instructions. It’s working now.
Unfortenately I didn’t do this on my previous installation on the other computer, but thats ok.