I have seen various guides and recommendations on web about how best to do this but nothing that clearly explains the best way and why. So I understand there is a need for part of Debian during install to be un-encrypted on its own partition to allow it to boot. Most info I have seen is call this /boot and set the boot flag. Next I believe the best approach is to create another partition out of all the rest of the disk space, encrypt this, then on top of that create a LVM and then within the LVM create my various partitions , name them , select size, and file system type. Can I include /swap in the encrypted LVM part ? Is this approach sound? If so what are the partitions I should use (this is going to be a minimal server install with a view to install as and when what I need for a dev server)? Finally how does the installer know what to put in each partition I define ?
I appreciate there are more than one question but any help and suggestions would be appreciated. If further clarification is needed please mention in the comments .
EDIT : 16/3/2010
After Richard Holloways reply I thought it relevant to add this info:
The reasons why I want to do this are to explore maximising security on any server install and set up, due to interest in the area of Computer Security and Forensics. Also I am trying to peform the task as if it being performed in an enterprise situation.
On a technical matter, once set up and configured with minimal packages and ssh this server will not physically be easy to access so I will only be entering via ssh. (Yes I know why encrypt something no one will ever be able to get their hands on? Because I can and I want to is the simple answer, but see above too).
