This article describes the issue of being unable to partition the hard disk of an SRX device with the snapshot command.

Partitioning the hard disk of an SRX device with the snapshot command is not supported when you have something already mounted on the /dev directory. The flash drive can only be partitioned using the snapshot command.

The error message is as follows:

root@to50mr01-fwlf002p> request system snapshot media hard-disk partition
node0:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
error: cannot partition ad2: /dev/ad2s1f is mounted on /var <<< Notice it says cannot partition because ad2 is mounted on /var; 'ad2' means 'hard disk'.

node1:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
error: cannot partition ad2: /dev/ad2s1f is mounted on /var


root@to50mr01-fwlf002p> show system storage no-forwarding

Filesystem Size Used Avail Capacity Mounted on
/dev/ad0s1a 891M 396M 423M 48% /
devfs 1.0K 1.0K 0B 100% /dev
/dev/md0 464M 464M 0B 100% /junos
/cf 891M 396M 423M 48% /junos/cf
devfs 1.0K 1.0K 0B 100% /junos/dev/
procfs 4.0K 4.0K 0B 100% /proc
/dev/ad0s1e 99M 24K 91M 0% /config
/dev/ad2s1f 12G 240M 11G 2% /var <<< Note that the partition is mounted on the /var directory.
/dev/md1 1006M 418K 925M 0% /mfs
/var/jail 12G 240M 11G 2% /jail/var
/var/log 12G 240M 11G 2% /jail/var/log
devfs 1.0K 1.0K 0B 100% /jail/dev

Use the following command to partition the hard disk, it should work:

root@SRX3600> request system partition ?
Possible completions:
abort            Abort previously scheduled partition operation
hard-disk        Schedule partition of hard disk at next reboot