Re-Partitioning without Rebooting?

[Toby Kelsey]

James Gray wrote:

> Is the drive unmounted when you're repartitioning??  If not, then then it 
> will be in use (by the kernel).  You can repartition stuff without 
> rebooting *but* the drive needs to _unmounted_ first.

This is inaccurate unless you mean *partition* instead of (disk) drive.  It should be possible to, 
for example, repartition hda4 while booted of hda1.  I believe you have unintentionally misled Andreas.

Andreas wrote:

 > WARNING: Re-reading the partition table failed with error 16: Device or resource busy.
 > The kernel still uses the old table.
 > The new table will be used at the next reboot.
 > Syncing disks.

This implies you need to reboot to see your changes.  However, see 'man partprobe' for another solution.

Toby