DEV Community: WeLees

How to create VG with Visual LVM - Manage LVM with Visual LVM, from 0 to (5)

WeLees — Sat, 28 Mar 2026 17:50:08 +0000

The Volume Group is gather of Physical Volume & Logical Volume. It organizes Physical Volume(s) and Logical Volume(s) for using. The Physical Volume is its body to store data actually, and the Logical Volume is its organization to describe the feature of storage instance belongs to Logical Volume, such as format and position/size.
The system detects LVM system by Volume Group.

Section 3.1 Create Volume Group
To create Volume Group, you need to select at least one Physical Volume not belongs to any Volume Group and select VG Operation -> Create in navgating bar to start creating wizard, of course you can select Volume Group after wizard started.

Create to start creating Volume Group wizard" width="800" height="484">Select

Selecting desired partitions -- Multiple selecting is acceptable & Be careful do not select partition with valid data.
To create Volume Group, user need to specify name of Volume Group and the Extent size.
The name of Volume Group must be in 'a'-'z','A'-'Z','0'-'9','-','_'.
And you can press Advance... button to change default settings of Volume Group.

Usually user need not to change the default advance settings of Volume Group.
Here we can set followed parameters:

Tag of Volume Group : The characters of tag must be in 'a'-'z','A'-'Z','0'-'9','-','_'. Using comma to separate tags.
Meta Area size : This section is reserved for Volume Group meta information. The LVM identity Volume Group information via its meta information.
Max Physical Volume count in Volume Group : The count of Physical Volume can be added into current Volume Group.
Max Logical Volume count in Volume Group : The count of Logical Volume can be created in current Volume Group.
Metadata Copies : The Copies of Meta Area in Volume Group. Usually there is a meta area in every Physical Volume, and the Volume Group setting should be writed into every meta area, but for huge Volume Group, it spares time very much, so user can modify this parameter to let LVM manager writes less copies for performance.
System ID : To protect Volume Group, a Volume Group without system ID can be accessed by any user, but only autherized user can access Volume Group with system ID.

When all settings finished, press Done button on Creating Volume Group wizard to perform operation.
After operation finished, Visual LVM shows follow dialog to inform user that Volume Group has been created.

How to modify settings of PV with Visual LVM - Manage LVM with Visual LVM, from 0 to (4)

WeLees — Sat, 21 Mar 2026 14:10:30 +0000

Section 2 : The Physical Volume operations
The Physical volume is the base of LVM, all structures and components are stored into Physica volume. To use LVM we need to create at least one Physical volume.

Section 2.3 Change Physical Volume
To change settings of Physical Volume, select a Physical Volume and select PV Operation -> Change in navgating bar to start changing wizard, of course you can select partition after wizard started.

Chnage to start change Physical Volume setting wizard" width="800" height="484">

Selecting desired partition. Some setting can not be change for Physical Volume not belongs to Volume Group.
Here we can change followed parameters:

Existing tag : Select the tag(s) for removing -- Multiple selecting is acceptable.
Add new tag : The characters of tag must be in 'a'-'z','A'-'Z','0'-'9','-','_'. Using comma to separate tags. You can not add tag to a Physical Volume not belongs to Volume Group.
Volume Size : The range is from last Logical Volume instance in Physical Volume to size of Physical Volume sub both Meta Area and Boot Area.
Ignore Metadata : To let LVM ignore current Physical Volume during modifing meta data.
Change UUID : To change UUID of current Physical Volume, It is only available for Physical Volume not belongs to Volume Group.

When all setting(s) modified, press Done button on perform changing Physical Volume setting operation.
After operation finished, Visual LVM shows follow dialog to inform user that setting of Physical Volume has been changed.

How to delete PV with Visual LVM - Manage LVM with Visual LVM, from 0 to (3)

WeLees — Thu, 12 Mar 2026 17:50:02 +0000

The Physical volume is the base of LVM, all structures and components are stored into Physica volume. To use LVM we need to create at least one Physical volume.

Section 2.2 Delete Physical Volume
To delete Physical Volume, we need to select a Physical Volume not belongs to any Volume Group and select PV Operation -> Delete in navgating bar to start deleting wizard, of course you can select Physical Volume after wizard started.

Delete to start delete Physical Volume wizard" width="800" height="484">

Selecting desired Physical Volumes -- Multiple selecting is acceptable.

When Physical Volume(s) selected, press Done button on deleting Physical Volume wizard to perform operation.
After operation finished, Visual LVM shows follow dialog to inform user that Physical Volume has been deleted.

How to create PV with Visual LVM - Manage LVM with Visual LVM, from 0 to (2)

WeLees — Thu, 26 Feb 2026 17:10:00 +0000

Section 2 : The Physical Volume operations

The Physical volume is the base of LVM, all structures and components are stored into Physica volume. To use LVM we need to create at least one Physical volume.

Section 2.1 Create Physical Volume
To create Physical Volume, we need to select a normal partition and select PV Operation -> Create in navgating bar to start creating wizard, of course you can select partition after wizard started.
Create to start create Physical Volume wizard" width="800" height="484">

Selecting desired partitions -- Multiple selecting is acceptable & Be careful do not select partition with valid data.
And you can press Advance... button to change default settings of Physical Volume.

Usually user do not change the default advance settings of Physical Volume.
Here we can set followed parameters:

Boot Area size : This section is reserved for OS boot loader. The default value is 0MB.
Meta Area size : This section is reserved for Volume Group meta information. The LVM identity Volume Group information via its meta information.
Volume Size : The available size of Physical Volume. The range is 0MB to size of Physical Volume sub both Meta Area and Boot Area.
Metadata Copies : The Copies of Meta Area. Available value is 0(means no Meta Area)/1/2.
Clear Header : Clear header of Physical Volume during create Physical Volume.
Ignore Metadata : To let LVM ignore current Physical Volume during modifing meta data.
Specify UUID : The UUID of Physical Volume should be generated by LVM library, of course user specified is acceptable. Note : The Volume Size & Specify UUID item will be forbidden when selected multiple partitions.

When all settings finished, press Done button on Creating Physical Volume wizard to perform operation.
After operation finished, Visual LVM shows follow dialog to inform user that Physical Volume has been created.

The introduce of Visual LVM - How to manage LVM with Visual LVM, from 0 to (1)

WeLees — Sat, 21 Feb 2026 17:05:09 +0000

Section 1 : The introduce

The Visual LVM is GUI LVM manager provided by Welees .,Ltd. Comparing with other GUI LVM managers, There are followed advantages of Visual LVM.

High Security. The kernel service of Visual LVM is based on lvm component. It will not destroy your data due to bugs in the program.
View cleanly and directly. Visual LVM displays detailed information about all storage devices, such as the layout of components on its host device, and the use of different colors to represent the raid type of the volume. The LVM administrator can get it easily.
Easy and comfortable to use. The Visual LVM regards the physical layout and predigests settings, UI designed concise and elegant. The LVM administrator can use it very easily. Of course the LVM administrator can change all settings of LVM too.
Support multiple distributions. The Visual LVM is 3rd party software. It is not belongs any Linux distribution or package, and can run in multiple Linux distributions.
Less dependence. The front port of Visual LVM is based on Webkit. It depends only one or two component except LVM2.
Support the newest LVM features.

The main panel of Visual LVM is combined by 8 parts.

The main panel of Visual LVM

Menu bar : To peform all operations, get help and close application.
Window control shortcut : To modify application window.
Storage view : It shows volumes/components base information via its layout in host disk.
Disk view : It shows information in one disk. Such as the disk geometry, partitions, and Physical/Logical Volumes.
Logical volume component : It shows different color to identity volume type, and shows the name of host Volume group & Logical volume. The mouse is hover on current component, so all components belongs to current Logical volume are high light.
Logical volume component : The component was not belongs to high light volume. It shows normally.
Navgate bar : To navgate all LVM managing operations.
Detail information bar : Show detail information of component that mouse hover on it.

The layout of Visual is neatness and clearness. The LVM administrator can get information his wanted very easily.

Farewell to Command Line Maze: WeLees Visual LVM Defines a New Paradigm for Linux Storage Management

WeLees — Sun, 15 Feb 2026 14:37:57 +0000

二月 11, 2026

In the field of Linux system operation and maintenance, Logical Volume Management (LVM) has always been a core link. However, due to complex command-line operations and obscure parameter configurations, it has become an "efficiency pain point" for countless administrators. Since 2018, WeLees Studio, which focuses on storage field research, has launched Visual LVM, a cross-multi-Linux platform GUI LVM management tool, with the mission of "simplifying professional operations and releasing core productivity". It completely breaks the technical barriers of traditional storage management, making efficient operation and maintenance within reach.

Professional Genes: Technical Precipitation in the Storage Field

WeLees' core team consists of senior storage technology experts who have deeply engaged in Linux storage architecture and operation and maintenance practices for many years. They deeply understand the core demands of enterprises and administrators in LVM configuration: not only to ensure the professionalism and stability of operations, but also to get rid of the learning costs and operational risks brought by the command line. Based on this insight, Visual LVM came into being—it is not a simple visualization of the command line, but a in-depth reconstruction of the core logic of LVM. It transforms complex operations such as volume creation, deletion, expansion, and reduction into intuitive graphical interactions, turning storage management from a "professional threshold" into "accessible to everyone".

Core Advantages: Reshaping Operation and Maintenance Efficiency in Three Dimensions

Visual Operation, Farewell to Command Memory: Visual LVM innovatively integrates disk layout and logical volume display, making all storage resources clear at a glance. Administrators do not need to memorize cumbersome commands, and can complete the whole process through dragging and clicking—from physical volume initialization, volume group creation to dynamic adjustment of logical volumes. Each step has intuitive guidance, and the operation accuracy and efficiency are improved several times.
Cross-Platform Adaptation, Covering All-Scenario Needs: As a professional tool compatible with multiple Linux distributions, Visual LVM perfectly adapts to mainstream operating systems. Whether it is enterprise server deployment or personal developer test environment, it can provide a consistent and stable operation experience, without the need for separate adaptation schemes for different platforms.
Lightweight Design, Balancing Performance and Security: Relying on WeLees' technical accumulation in the field of storage optimization, Visual LVM adopts a lightweight architecture with extremely low resource occupation during operation, which does not affect the operation of core server businesses; at the same time, it has a built-in operation verification mechanism to avoid data loss caused by misoperations, adding "double protection" for storage management.

Value Return: Focusing Operation and Maintenance Efforts on Core Tasks

For enterprise IT teams, the core goal of storage management is to ensure data security and system stability, rather than consuming a lot of energy on command line debugging. Through the design concept of "popularizing professional functions", Visual LVM frees administrators from repetitive and complex mechanical operations—no longer need to spend a long time troubleshooting parameter errors, no longer need to work overtime for volume expansion. They only need to quickly complete the configuration through the graphical interface, allowing operation and maintenance personnel to focus more energy on core work such as business optimization and risk prediction, and truly realize "technology serves efficiency".

A Trusted Choice: Recognized by Global Users' Practices

Since its release, Visual LVM has become the preferred storage management tool for many Linux users around the world. Whether it is server operation and maintenance for small and medium-sized enterprises or storage architecture construction for large institutions, it has won industry recognition with its simple operation logic and stable operation performance. WeLees has always adhered to the core of "user needs", continuously iterated and optimized products, injected new momentum into the storage management field through technological innovation, and allowed every administrator to enjoy the convenience and efficiency brought by professional tools.

Walk with WeLees to Unlock New Possibilities in Linux Storage Management

In today's accelerating digital transformation, efficiency and stability are the core competitiveness of enterprise operation and maintenance. With Visual LVM as the carrier, WeLees breaks the barriers of storage management with professional technology and reshapes the operation and maintenance experience with innovative design. Whether you are an enterprise IT administrator pursuing efficiency or a developer deep in technology, Visual LVM will become your "capable assistant" in Linux storage management.

Visit WeLees official website (www.welees.com) to explore more core functions of Visual LVM, simplify complex storage operations, and make professional operation and maintenance work more valuable—WeLees, go to a new journey of efficient operation and maintenance with you!

The Review of GUI LVM Tools

WeLees — Fri, 13 Feb 2026 12:31:27 +0000

The LVM is a powerful storage management module which is included in all the distributions of Linux now. It provides users with a variety of valuable features to fit different requirements. The management tools that come with LVM are based on the command line interface, which is very powerful and suitable for automated/batch operations. But LVM’s operations and configuration are quite complex because of its own complexity. So many software companies including Red Hat have launched some GUI-based LVM tools to help users manage LVM more easily. Let’s review them here to see the similarities and differences between individual tools.

Visual LVM
Provider:welees
The Visual LVM is a GUI LVM management software developed by weLees. Visual LVM pays more attention to the details of LVM than other GUI LVM managers, allowing users to set and view more LVM configuration information.

The newest Visual LVM supports remote administration. This is an advantage that none of the above software has.

Visual LVM is commerce software. It is easy to install, download the installation package, unzip, and run the installation script. It supports all Linux platforms just like KVPM.

The layout of Visual LVM is combined with two parts. The menu bar on the left and the disk/LVM hybrid view on the top right show disk/VG information in a logical layout.

The lower right part is the detailed information of the object the mouse hover on. The Visual LVM shows information very detailed, from the storage layout to related configuration information, and even the logical relationships between objects, which are hidden by other GUI LVM managers.

The main panel of Visual LVM

For administrative operations, the Visual LVM operations wizard is similar to PQmagic in that it is very user-friendly, especially with object selection and resizing, while also allowing users to configure more details.

Create PV with Visual LVM

Supported operations
PV Operations

Create PV
Delete PV
Resize PV

VG Operations

Create VG
Append PV to VG/Remove PV from VG
Delete VG
Rename VG
Modify VG settings
Backup/Restore VG settings

LV Operations

Create LV (support Linear/Stripe/Mirror/StripeMirror/RAID4/RAID5/RAID10 with advance settings)
Delete LV
Resize LV
Rename LV
Modify LV settings

system-config-lvm (alternate name LVM GUI)
Provider: Red Hat

The system-config-lvm is the first GUI LVM tool which was originally released as part of Red Hat Linux. It is also called LVM GUI because it is the first one. Later, Red Hat also created an installation package for it. So system-config-lvm is able to be used in other Linux distributions. The installation package includes RPM packages and DEB packages.

The main panel of system-config-lvm

The system-config-lvm only supports lvm-related operations. Its user interface is divided into three parts. The left part is tree view of disk devices and LVM devices (VGs); the middle part is the main view which shows VG usage, divided into LV and PV columns.

There are zoom in/zoom out buttons in the main view to control display ratio, but it is not enough for displaying complex LVM information.The right part displays details of the selected related objects (PV/LV/VG).

The different versions of system-config-lvm are not completely consistent in the organized way of devices. Some of them show both LVM devices and non-lvm devices (disk), the others show LVM devices only. I have tried two versions, one shows LVM devices existing in the system, namely PV/VG/LV only, no other devices; The other can display non-lvm disks and PV can be removed in disk view.

The version which shows non-lvm disks

Supported operations
PV Operations

Delete PV
Migrate PV

VG Operations

Create VG
Append PV to VG/Remove PV from VG
Delete VG (Delete last PV in VG)

LV Operations

Create LV (support three formats: Linear, Stripe and Mirror). Users can specify how many PVs should be used for LV to stripe type, but users neither cannot specify certain PVs nor cannot specify region in the PV.
Delete LV

The setting of create LV

Blivet-gui
Provider: Red Hat

The Red Hat has stopped to upgrade system-config-lvm, and there is no such package in CentOS 7/RHEL 7, Its replacement is blivet-gui.

The blivet is a disk management library developed by python, and blivet-gui is its GUI version. Since blivet itself is a disk management library, the blivet-gui supports not only LVM operations, but also ordinary disk operations.

The layout of blivet-gui is divided into two parts. The left side is device view, which shows all storage devices in the system; the right side is device usage view, which displays detailed information of the device which was selected by the user.

The right part of system-config-lvm is removed in the blivet-gui and only appears as a pop-up window when the user clicks the button.

The main panel of blivet-gui (LV view)

The device usage view displays user selected VG information. LV and PV information are displayed in two separate tabs.

The main panel of blivet-gui (PV view)

As mentioned before, the blivet-gui supports disk operations such as initialize disks, create, delete, and format partitions.

Initialize disk

Create partition

Supported operations
PV Operations

Create PV (Format partition as PV)
Delete PV (Format PV as other format)

VG Operations

Create VG
Append PV to VG/Remove PV from VG
Delete VG

LV Operations

Create LV (support Linear/Pool only)
Delete LV
Create LV

Create LV

Unfortunately, there is no DEB package for blivet-gui, so Debian users have to wait.

gparted
Homepage of GParted

Gparted is the GUI version of the popular partition management tool parted, which also supports a few LVM features.

Gparted only displays one hard disk once a time. Although it is a powerful tool for partitioning, it only supports PV operations for LVM. There is no display or operation associated with VG and LV at all.

The main panel of GParted

Supported operations
PV Operations

Create PV
Delete PV

YaST Partitioner
Provider:SUSE
YaST Partitioner is a built-in partition manager which is integrated in OpenSUSE. It supports normal partitions, RAID and LVM. And it only supports OpenSUSE now.

YaST, the system manager panel of OpenSUSE

The UI of YaST partitioner is divided into two parts. The left part is the device tree view, which is used to select the device to be inquired/operated. The right part displays information about the selected device (current computer/disk /RAID/LVM).

The main panel of YaST partitioner

In the YaST Partitioner, the VG is a child node of Volume Management node in the device tree. Once PV is established on the disk, users can click Volume Management on the left to execute the LVM Management command. As a storage manager, YaST partitioner can also perform partition management operations, this function requires the user to select the disk to be operated on.

And in the YaST partitioner, a VG has three individual views: Overview, LV view, and PV view.

Overview shows some basic information about the entire VG.

The LV view displays basic information about logical volumes and a bar chart shows the sizes of each logical volume. But the view is not very friendly to small volumes or too many LVs, and the information in detail view on below is limited.

The PV view only lists the size and device name of the PV, not even including the usage.

VG view of YaST partitioner

Supported operations
PV Operations

Create PV
Delete PV
Resize PV

VG Operations

Create VG (User can select multiple PVs)
Append PV to VG/Remove PV from VG
Delete VG

LV Operations

Create LV (support Linear/Pool only)
Delete LV
Resize LV

KVPM
KVPM is provided by a 3rd party.

You can run ‘apt-get install kvpm’ on the Ubuntu platform. Though I tried several times, it was finally installed successfully. For non-Debian systems, users may need to run ‘yum install kvpm’.

The Kvpm layout has 3 parts : top, bottom left, bottom right. The upper part shows the overall usage of the device with color blocks. The lower left part is the main view, which shows the usage of normal disk and VG. The lower right part shows details of the selected device.

The main panel of KVPM

Like blivet-gui and YaST partitioner, Kvpm is an integrated manager that supports disk management as well as LVM management. And KVPM can configure more parameters when performing LVM operations.

Managing disk with KVPM

Advance setting of create LV with KVPM

Supported operations
PV Operations

Create PV
Delete PV
Resize PV
Migrate PV

VG Operations

Create VG
Append PV to VG/Remove PV from VG
Delete VG

LV Operations

Create LV (support Linear/Mirror/RAID4/RAID5 with some advance settings)
Delete LV
Resize LV
Rename LV
Modify LV tags
Create Snapshot

Conclusions
All the GUI LVM management tools that we previously mentioned are available on Linux platforms for now, they provide great convenience for users to manage LVM devices. To users who are not familiar with LVM commands or need to view LVM information quickly, these tools would be more understandable and usable. Of course, gparted is different. It is primarily a disk tool.