manually partitioning for dual boot debian9 and linuxmint19

[harig]

I am trying to dual boot debian 9 and linux mint 19
I need help in manually partitioning the hard drive
suppose i will divide the hdd in half, one half for each os, then:

1. how to partition the hdd to have 2 lvm encrypted root partitions and having the swap partition inside the root partition? or should this be a swap file created after the fact instead?
2. should there be 2 boot partitions, one each for every os?
3. where is grub to be installed? in sda or in each boot partition?

Your help is very much appreciated.

[GarryRicketson]

Try doing some searches, there are several questions here, and there are answers to each one available when one searches for them.
Example:
manually partitioning for dual boot debian9 and linuxmint19
This: https://www.debian.org/releases/jessie/ ... 05.html.en
goes into great detail.
===========
http://linuxbsdos.com/2012/04/25/manual ... nt-debian/

====
Example 2 :
how to partition the hdd to have 2 lvm encrypted root partitions
===
and so on , same process for each question.

[harig]

thank you for your reply
the links you mention do not have any information, maybe you have never tried it

keep your peace

[arzgi]

thank you for your reply
the links you mention do not have any information, maybe you have never tried it

keep your peace

Did you even read those? They have a lot of info.

If you dont't know what you are doing, better sit and study.

Many of us have partiotioned hdd's, I have not done any dualt boots or Mint installations, Two linux distros should be very easy.

[GarryRicketson]

thank you for your reply
the links you mention do not have any information, maybe you have never tried it

keep your peace

Your Welcome,
Well, if the links that I showed don't have the information you need, then try doing some searches your self, and use the keywords that apply to your situation,
"maybe you have never tried it" Tried what ? "it" ?
If you mean partitioning a HD so it is split into 2 equal sized partitions, for a dual boot system, yes, I have not only tried, but have successfully done that many times,
some times I have had as many as 5 or 6 different OS's, on different partitions, all boot-able , multi boot systems are nothing new to me.
I found all the information I needed to learn :

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how to set-up a multi boot system 

If you add "lvm" as a keyword, you might find results more directly related to using lvm partitions. If you are only going to have 2 Os, as dual boot, you do not really need to use lvm, if you want more the 4, then you will need to go that route.
https://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/Partition/fd ... oning.html
Try also :

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man fdisk

The linux manual for fdisk, does not have much in it, this has some more
details: https://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/Partition/fd ... oning.html

If you prefer and have "gparted"

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man gparted

Two linux distros should be very easy.

It is relatively easy, but one does need to read some tutorials or the manuals to get started, and sometimes it takes a few tries to figure it out.
If the OP could not find anything useful in any of those links, then it is not likely they will find anything useful in a long explanation/tutorial written here.
Another good source of information, details:
https://debian-handbook.info/browse/sta ... steps.html

Figure 4.8. Disk to use for guided partitioning
Guided partitioning can also set up LVM logical volumes instead of partitions (see below). Since the remainder of the operation is the same, we will not go over the option “Guided - use entire disk and set up LVM” (encrypted or not).
In other cases, when Linux must work alongside other already existing partitions, you need to choose manual partitioning.
4.2.13.1. Guided partitioning
The guided partitioning tool offers three partitioning methods, which correspond to different usages.

To fully understand what is being shown here, one must read the entire page,
NO, I am not going to copy/paste it all here, and NO I am not going to write a step by step guide, in a post here.

[GarryRicketson]

Part of the problem is there are several questions being asked here, all of which can be answered by reading the information all ready available to every one online. I just touched on the first question, in hope the OP would figure out how
to find the answers to the other questions,

The second question:

2. should there be 2 boot partitions, one each for every os?

Logic here, yes you need to make each partition bootable, for each OS, no matter if it is even more then 2 , or even just 1 , it needs to be flagged as a boot partition, and bootable. Both 'fdisk' and Gparted have options to mark (flag) the partitions as boo table.

3. where is grub to be installed? in sda or in each boot partition?

This depends, on your preferences, I generally use the sda, and /boot partition.
On a linux dual boot system where is grub to be installed? in sda or in each boot partition?
There is not enough information on the OP's system or systems to give a clear answer to this, Is the UEFI or EFI ? And is it really "Grub" or "Grub2" that will be used,... ?
What OS does the OP currently have installed ?
Maybe try reading this : https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/GRUB2

Installing the boot loader

Installing GRUB2 as the system's boot loader depends on how the system is meant to boot (through BIOS or UEFI) and how the disk on which the boot loader should be installed is partitioned (using MBR or GPT partition layout).

If the OP is not going to use grub2, but really means the old legacy "grub", that is fine, but we would need to know that for sure. The current stable version of Debian uses "grub2",...I don't know about Linux Mint, nor really care or have the interest to look.

-- snip ---having the swap partition inside the root partition? or should this be a swap file created after the fact instead?

The Debian installer will create a swap partition, Linux Mint, I am not sure, maybe better to ask them on one of their forums,.. Read some documentation on swap partitions, and understand what they are for, one usually does not even need one.

from: https://www.makeuseof.com/tag/swap-partition/
A Linux system can perform perfectly well without a SWAP partition. ... have SWAP, then you can still create a partition using the same sizing guidelines outline

There are disadvantages to using swap partitions as well as advantages:

Disadvantages:

Takes up space on your hard drive as SWAP partitions do not resize dynamically
Can increase wear and tear to your hard drive
Does not necessarily improve performance (see below)

You can create swap partitions later, as needed, if needed.
On the swap partition, try : Gudlines for creating a swap partition for a linux system