# /var removal to /usr/var



## jaymax (Nov 15, 2013)

FreeBSD 9.0: I am repositioning my /var directory from the root level to /usr/var and resetting them (/var and /tmp) to soft links at the root level. This, in order to avoid frequent disk full conditions.

The /var directory is currently empty except for the .sujournal file and the run/ directory which contains the automounter.and.mnt sub-directory which is empty. Attempts to remove these have failed.

Both `rmdir automounter.and.mnt` and `rm -rf automounter.and.mnt` returns a 'device busy' message, attempts to change permissions from dr-xr-xr-x (555) to 755 or 777 fail with a read-only file system message. 

It does not seem to matter whether I am in multi or single user mode.

Similarly, .sujournal, permissions could be reset, but removal attempts returns an "Operation not permitted" message.

Suggested solution welcomed.


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## junovitch@ (Nov 15, 2013)

Well, FreeBSD 9.0 is no longer supported so the best permanent solution would probably to re-install as part of an upgrade and fix the partition sizing during the process.  Or use the default single partition during a re-install and not have to worry about it.  Shuffling stuff around rather than fixing the application that are filling it up or fixing how it was setup is just a band-aid.

If you intend to keep going with your plan, the .sujournal is part of UFS SU+J so you can disable journaling by dropping to single user, running `tunefs -j disable /dev/<partition>` and `reboot`.  You should be able to remove the file after rebooting.  I can't answer the automount part, I would think stopping the automount daemon would let you remove that file but that doesn't appear to be the case.


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## jaymax (Nov 16, 2013)

I'll go ahead with the upgrade, but in single user mode `tunefs -j disable /dev/ada1p5` was followed by a 
	
	



```
tunefs: soft updates journaling remains unchanged as disabled
```
 message

`rmdir /var` resulted in 
	
	



```
rmdir: /var: Read-only file system
```

Just wanted to know how it was to be accomplished if faced with a similar dilemma.

Thanks again!


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## junovitch@ (Nov 22, 2013)

Sorry I didn't reply sooner.

`ls -alo /` will show you that chlags are set on .sujournal to prevent unlinking it.  That would be why you couldn't just remove it.

`tunefs -j disable /dev/ada1p5` showing it as disabled can be confirmed with `tunefs -p /dev/ada1p5` to print out all the properties of that file system.  Chances are it was disabled at some point.

`rmdir /var` failing was probably just the result of it being mounted.  Remove it from your /etc/fstab and `umount /var` probably would have done the trick.


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