AppData location

[jwcolby54]

When I built my server it was not designed for Unraid but for Windows 10 or Linux, bare metal.  As a result I purchased a 1 tb nvme to boot off of.  Obviously, with the server running Unraid and booting off of a thumb drive, I have 1 tb of fast storage sitting around.  What I did was made that "unassigned". then formatted it and am using it as the store for Docker.  Later I will point my VM image storage there as well.  Just an aside, I also had a 500gb Samsung SSD which I made my cache, so I do not need or want my 1 tb nvme drive to be used for that.

 

I am not yet "Linux Literate" though I am working on getting there.  When I add the Unraid Gui on top I am pretty much totally lost.  I know the GUI does its job but it just seems that settings are scattered around. 

 

Take for example mounts and directories.  I understand the concept of a mount point, but it seems that even directories can be mounted?  Maybe?  Anyway, I have an AppData "Thing" which I haven't a clue where it physically resides.  I think that I should be migrating that from wherever it currently is, to a matching location on my "unassigned" nvme drive.  I want my docker containers stored there.  I want my VM images stored there.  Anything that would benefit from very high speed access.  But where are these things?  What tool do I use to actually find these objects.  On Windows it is file explorer.  Ignoring the issue of where a program goes to find stuff, I can just drag and drop to move things.  

 

So in nubee friendly attitude / language:

1) Do I even want to be doing this?

2) If so, how do I discover where stuff currently physically is (what tool?)

3) How do I move stuff from wherever it currently is to the NVME

4) And finally how do I hook up apps to the new location.

 

Taking my AppData example, if I am doing Docker, and I manage to store the docker container on the NVME, how do I create its AppData on my Unassigned NVME drive?

 

I am quite sure that someday soon this stuff will just click and I will understand it.  That hasn't happened yet.

 

BTW I have been in computers since the 70s (US Navy), built my own SBC computers from chips and a soldering iron, installed and ran CPM on them etc.  I built this Unraid server from Newegg parts.  I am not inexperienced, just uneducated in this stuff.

 

Any nubee friendly help is much appreciated. 

 

jwc

Edited December 25, 2018 by jwcolby54
spelling

[trurl]

Array data disks are at /mnt/disk1, /mnt/disk2, ...

Cache is at /mnt/cache

Unassigned Devices are at /mnt/disks/whatever-you-mount-it-as

User Shares are at /mnt/user/whatever-the-share-name-is

 

User Shares are probably what you had in mind with this:

3 hours ago, jwcolby54 said:

it seems that even directories can be mounted?

That isn't exactly correct. The User Shares as a whole are "mounted" but the individual shares are not, they are just subfolders under /mnt/user.

 

A User Share is simply the aggregate across cache and array drives of all top level folders with the same name.

 

When you create a User Share, a top level folder is created on array or cache as needed with the same name as the User Share. Conversely, if you have a top level folder on array or cache it is a User Share with the same name as the folder. A User Share has default settings until you change them.

 

When moving/copying files, you must never mix user shares and disks (array, cache) that are included in user shares or you can lose the data since linux won't know that source and destination are actually the same path. Only move/copy disk to disk or user share to user share. Since Unassigned Devices aren't included in User Shares, they don't have this restriction.

 

When moving cache to array or array to cache you can let mover do the work for you by simply making the appropriate use-cache setting for the user share. But since you want to move to Unassigned Device you will have to do it manually. I usually use mc (Midnight Commander, google it) for this purpose. Others methods include command line and Krusader docker.

 

Here is the wiki on User Shares for a "high-level" concept:

https://wiki.unraid.net/UnRAID_6/Overview#User_Shares

 

Assuming you have installed Community Applications (you should), you can get to the support thread for any plugin or docker by clicking on its Support link in CA. So use that method to get to the support thread for Unassigned Devices for more about that.

[jwcolby54]

Very good.  I just checked and my PlexMediaServer AppData Config path is: /mnt/disks/NVME_SSD/PlexMediaServer.  Which means that is on the fast storage.😎