Some Linux related questions

[c0utta]

I'm running 2.0 on a HP Microserver with 8GB of RAM to host MythTV (kvm) and 3 other containers for my home network. All has been running well for 6 months.

Last night I noticed that MythTV wasn't running correctly and saw that "HD space (root)" was full (3.45GB/3.45GB). I did some reading, and found that there were some Samba logs and archives that I could delete. Back to 2.45GB/3.45GB.

Then my load averages started to increase, although my environment was still responsive - figures between 8-25 (example: 25.01 18.04 16.23). I checked top and noticed that there were many processes running, such as bounce and error with postfix as the user. I then shutdown the SMTP service and load averages went back to normal.

Firstly, I don't need SMTP running because I don't send/receive e-mails so I don't really care that the service is stopped.

My questions:
- a safe way to manage "HD space (root)"
- what would have been the cause of the "load average" problem

Thanks,

c0utta

 

[c0utta]

No answers, so either my question was too basic or too complex (probably too basic).

I checked my syslog and it was filling up with postfix messages - possibly because there is no defined e-mail address. Stopping the SMTP server has stopped this from occurring again:

Therefore, can I ask - how can I ensure a service doesn't start at boot (I want to disable the SMTP service)

Thanks,

c0utta