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After creating your instance, you will most likely want to create and attach a data volume to store all your data on. We also encourage running all your analyses on the data volume, so that you are not using up your root volume space on your instance.

Create and attach a volume

Log in to the Nimbus dashboard.
Navigate to Volumes > Volumes, then click the + Create Volume button.

You may see an existing volume already there, with a name like 91bd1e23-ce06-41e0-aeb5-41382df48170. It is most likely the root volume for your instance, and you can ignore it.
On the Create Volume dialog window, enter a volume name and choose a size of your choice in gigabytes, then click the Create Volume button.
On the Volumes page, click the drop-down arrow next to Edit Volume and select Manage Attachments.
Select the instance you want to attach this volume to.
Click the Attach Volume button.

Format and mount a filesystem

Once you have attached the volume as above, confirm that the volume is properly attached.

You may see the /dev/vda device when working with volumes and filesystems, e.g. with the df command. This is the root volume, mounted at / (known as slash or root), where the operating system and system files are stored. You will not be performing any format or mount commands on this device.

Use ssh to log in to your instance from a terminal.

Check that you have properly attached the volume:

$ sudo fdisk -l /dev/vdc

You should see this returned:

Disk /dev/vdc: 20 GiB, 21474836480 bytes, 41943040 sectors
Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes

(Only new volumes) Format the volume:

Do this step only for new volumes. Do NOT do this step for existing volumes, as it will wipe any existing data on it.
```
$ sudo mkfs.ext4 /dev/vdc
```
Mount the volume to a new directory called /data:
```
$ sudo mkdir /data
$ sudo mount /dev/vdc /data
```
Check your new /data volume:
```
$ df -h | grep vdc
```
Check that you can write files to your new volume:
```
cd /data
touch test.txt
```
If you see an error about 'permission denied', you most likely need to change the owner of the volume to ububtu (that's you!) with the following command
```
sudo chown ubuntu /data
```

You have now successfully attached and mounted your data volume.

You need only create and attach a volume to your instance once, and should only format the filesystem once.

If your instance is rebooted for any reason, you will need to mount your volume again.

Resize a Volume

It is possible to resize an existing data volume to make it larger, if additional space is required in an instance. This option is dependent on a few things:

You need to have sufficient volume storage quota in your project. Go to the "Overview" page on the Nimbus dashboard to see how much volume storage is available.
You cannot resize a root volume of an instance (the volume mounted as /dev/vda1 inside the instance). If you require a larger root volume, your only option is to delete the instance and re-create it with a larger root volume on the "Source" section during instance creation.
You cannot shrink an existing volume. The new volume size must be larger than the old size.

Provided it meets all these requirements, you can resize a volume by the following steps:

Log on to the instance, and make sure that any file systems on that volume are unmounted (use "umount" if it is mounted):
```
$ df -h
$ sudo umount /data
```
Leaving your instance login active, log on to the Nimbus dashboard, go to the "Volumes" page, and select "Manage Attachments" from the drop-down menu to the right of the volume
Click on "Detach Volume", and confirm
Once detached, select "Extend Volume" from the drop-down menu to the right of the volume
Enter the new size in GB (it must be larger than the current size), then click on "Extend Volume"
To re-attach the volume, select "Manage Attachments" from the drop-down menu to the right of the volume
Select the instance you want to attach it to, make a note of the value of the "Device Name" field (usually /dev/vdc), then click on "Attach Volume"
Go back to your active instance login from step 2, and make sure that the operating system can see the attached volume:
```
$ sudo fdisk -l /dev/vdc
```
Run a file system check on the patition first (assuming that the partition is /dev/vdc, fdisk will tell you if the partition has a different name like /dev/vdc1):
```
$ sudo e2fsck -f /dev/vdc
```
Resize the partition to use the additional space added to the volume:
```
$ sudo resize2fs /dev/vdc
```
You can now mount the volume again (replace /data with the mount point you normally use for the volume):
```
$ sudo mount /dev/vdc /data
```

Back to:

Access and Use Your Nimbus Instance

Attach a Data Volume

Create and attach a volume

Format and mount a filesystem

Resize a Volume