Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
Andy Goth wrote: Well, I'm no programmer, but it must not be terribly difficult as I have a couple of programs that do similar things. But Partition Magic is still the best, and comes with more than just the partition creator and resizer. I have Partition Magic 4.0 which has a Windows and DOS version, and works on ex2fs. Through creative searching, I did not pay for it (shhh), but it is hard to find. There are shareware or freeware programs like Partition manager and FIPS which will also create and resize partitions, but you don't get the nice GUI and there is some knowledge that goes into it. Anything that you want or need can be found online if you are willing put the time in. FIPS, eh? Yeah, I read that it could resize partitions as well. Does anyone have any success stories? Any reports of failures? Since I'll have to reformat the disk to the BIOS format instead of the Ontrack Proprietary Format, I'm going to lose my data anyway. lightbulb First, I think I'll empty the C: (which is a compressed partition ala DoubleSpace). Then I'll move all the important DOS/Windows files onto it. Next, I'll reformat and repartition the big hard disk. I can reinstall everything I want onto it, and I can recover the important data and hard-to-find programs from the C:. After that, I can redo the old hard disk so that it has two partitions (one msdos and one ext2). This plan will reduce the need for floppy backups (except for backing up my Linux stuff--which I don't have much of yet). Still, I wait for a Windows 95 CD... well, you could try the new (beta) DiskDrake partition resizer, since you won't have anything to lose. It's on the Mandrake site.
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
Richard Myers wrote: On Tue, 27 Jul 1999, Richard Myers wrote: Neat stuff, huh? This is Unix. best wishes, richard myers On Tue, 27 Jul 1999, darkknight wrote: : ) Ever thought about teaching? We, I taught an online college-level Intro to Unix course for several years. Gave it up because (1) the college didn't support it well enough, and (2) I make ten times as much money working for Lucent Technologies. I always had trouble grasping the diferrence between hard links and soft (symbolic) links, untill now. And I was'nt even the poster of the message. cool , thanks alot, you really have patients and should consider teaching as a career. Great stuff indeed, Unix has always facinated me but I thought it too hard for me to grasp. More lessons like that and there might be hope for me yet. I shure am glad I make it a habbit to at least skim through each and every post. Thanks alot, John Love [EMAIL PROTECTED] Hmmm. Glad it helped. Maybe we should do some quickie Unix-command-line intro lessons online. QUESTION: should it be on this list, or would it be better to start a new, separate maillist? Or should we just try a few easy lessons, and see how it goes, with the option to move elsewhere later? What say, everyone? best wishes, richard myers it sounds like a pretty good idea
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
On Tue, 27 Jul 1999, Andy Goth wrote: I was about to make that statement earlier, but I then thought it wasn't tre since everything that has been said indicated that hard links point to a single file and when all hard links die the file does as well (and that kinda invalidated what I thought). It's a good thing this isn't the case! It's waaay too complicated and unwieldly. Imagine making a hard link and changing your mind about it... if this was true, I couldn't delete it! The truth is much better. Yeah, that is a good idea about deletion protection. If I want to make sure that some data cannot be deleted, I can keep a hard link. I think that you misunderstand. A hard link is the way that you access a file. BUT, there is only one file. Suppose that we have a file named... well, lets create a file: $ echo put this in a file hardlink_1 $ We have created a file the "quick" way, and we gave it the name hardlink_1. And then we "cat" the file, which shows what is in the file. $ cat hardlink_1 put this in a file $ Hardlink_1 is a text file which has the contents, "put this in a file". OK, lets say it a different way. The echo command sends (we say it re-directs) "put this in a file" into the contents of a file named hardlink_1. The "" character is the nifty command that does this redirection. Lets look at the long display of this file: $ ls -l total 2 -rw-rw-r-- 1 rtm 465 19 Jul 27 02:09 hardlink_1 $ OK, notice that it has a file size of 19 (just before the date). Count the characters in the "string" of characters: 123456789012345678 put this in a file 18. One extra byte to store this string gives us the 19. Now we will add another hard link: $ ln hardlink_1 hardlink_2 $ ...and if we look at our directory again: $ ls -l total 4 -rw-rw-r-- 2 rtm 465 19 Jul 27 02:09 hardlink_1 -rw-rw-r-- 2 rtm 465 19 Jul 27 02:09 hardlink_2 $ Both filenames point to the same file. We can display the contents of both files: $ cat * put this in a file put this in a file $ Well, actually, we displayed the contents of ONE file twice. Once using each filename. The * is a wildcard that matches all filenames in the directory. OK, now for the test. We are going to redirect "nothing" to the first hardlink. $ hardlink_1 $ We have replaced the contents of hardlink_1 with "nothing". Since there is nothing in front of the "", nothing is put into the file, replacing whatever had been there. Notice that we don't even need the echo command to do this. And, ls -l tells the story: $ ls -l total 0 -rw-rw-r-- 2 rtm 4650 Jul 27 02:22 hardlink_1 -rw-rw-r-- 2 rtm 4650 Jul 27 02:22 hardlink_2 $ For further proof, try to cat the contents of the two files (or more accurately, the contents of our ONE file twice): $ cat * $ Nothing there. Soo, a second hard link doesn't "protect" the contents of a file. It only offers another way to access the contents of a file. If we use either hard link to change that file, then the contents are changed. Period. Now, lets create a soft link and put something back into the file: $ ln -s hardlink_1 softlink_1 $ The -s "switch" to the link command ln makes this a symbolic, or "soft" link, instead of a hard link. $ ls -l total 2 -rw-rw-r-- 2 rtm465 0 Jul 27 02:22 hardlink_1 -rw-rw-r-- 2 rtm465 0 Jul 27 02:22
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
On Tue, 27 Jul 1999, Richard Myers wrote: On Tue, 27 Jul 1999, Andy Goth wrote: I was about to make that statement earlier, but I then thought it wasn't tre since everything that has been said indicated that hard links point to a single file and when all hard links die the file does as well (and that kinda invalidated what I thought). It's a good thing this isn't the case! It's waaay too complicated and unwieldly. Imagine making a hard link and changing your mind about it... if this was true, I couldn't delete it! The truth is much better. Yeah, that is a good idea about deletion protection. If I want to make sure that some data cannot be deleted, I can keep a hard link. I think that you misunderstand. A hard link is the way that you access a file. BUT, there is only one file. Suppose that we have a file named... well, lets create a file: $ echo put this in a file hardlink_1 $ We have created a file the "quick" way, and we gave it the name hardlink_1. And then we "cat" the file, which shows what is in the file. $ cat hardlink_1 put this in a file $ Hardlink_1 is a text file which has the contents, "put this in a file". OK, lets say it a different way. The echo command sends (we say it re-directs) "put this in a file" into the contents of a file named hardlink_1. The "" character is the nifty command that does this redirection. Lets look at the long display of this file: $ ls -l total 2 -rw-rw-r-- 1 rtm 465 19 Jul 27 02:09 hardlink_1 $ OK, notice that it has a file size of 19 (just before the date). Count the characters in the "string" of characters: 123456789012345678 put this in a file 18. One extra byte to store this string gives us the 19. Now we will add another hard link: $ ln hardlink_1 hardlink_2 $ ...and if we look at our directory again: $ ls -l total 4 -rw-rw-r-- 2 rtm 465 19 Jul 27 02:09 hardlink_1 -rw-rw-r-- 2 rtm 465 19 Jul 27 02:09 hardlink_2 $ Both filenames point to the same file. We can display the contents of both files: $ cat * put this in a file put this in a file $ Well, actually, we displayed the contents of ONE file twice. Once using each filename. The * is a wildcard that matches all filenames in the directory. OK, now for the test. We are going to redirect "nothing" to the first hardlink. $ hardlink_1 $ We have replaced the contents of hardlink_1 with "nothing". Since there is nothing in front of the "", nothing is put into the file, replacing whatever had been there. Notice that we don't even need the echo command to do this. And, ls -l tells the story: $ ls -l total 0 -rw-rw-r-- 2 rtm 4650 Jul 27 02:22 hardlink_1 -rw-rw-r-- 2 rtm 4650 Jul 27 02:22 hardlink_2 $ For further proof, try to cat the contents of the two files (or more accurately, the contents of our ONE file twice): $ cat * $ Nothing there. Soo, a second hard link doesn't "protect" the contents of a file. It only offers another way to access the contents of a file. If we use either hard link to change that file, then the contents are changed. Period. Now, lets create a soft link and put something back into the file: $ ln -s hardlink_1 softlink_1 $ The -s "switch" to the link command ln makes this a symbolic, or "soft" link, instead of a hard link. $ ls -l total 2
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
Congrats for this wonderful explanation of hard/symlinks. Patrick On Tue, 27 Jul 1999, you wrote: On Tue, 27 Jul 1999, Richard Myers wrote: On Tue, 27 Jul 1999, Andy Goth wrote: I was about to make that statement earlier, but I then thought it wasn't tre since everything that has been said indicated that hard links point to a single file and when all hard links die the file does as well (and that kinda invalidated what I thought). It's a good thing this isn't the case! It's waaay too complicated and unwieldly. Imagine making a hard link and changing your mind about it... if this was true, I couldn't delete it! The truth is much better. Yeah, that is a good idea about deletion protection. If I want to make sure that some data cannot be deleted, I can keep a hard link. I think that you misunderstand. A hard link is the way that you access a file. BUT, there is only one file. Suppose that we have a file named... well, lets create a file: $ echo put this in a file hardlink_1 $ We have created a file the "quick" way, and we gave it the name hardlink_1. And then we "cat" the file, which shows what is in the file. $ cat hardlink_1 put this in a file $ Hardlink_1 is a text file which has the contents, "put this in a file". OK, lets say it a different way. The echo command sends (we say it re-directs) "put this in a file" into the contents of a file named hardlink_1. The "" character is the nifty command that does this redirection. Lets look at the long display of this file: $ ls -l total 2 -rw-rw-r-- 1 rtm 465 19 Jul 27 02:09 hardlink_1 $ OK, notice that it has a file size of 19 (just before the date). Count the characters in the "string" of characters: 123456789012345678 put this in a file 18. One extra byte to store this string gives us the 19. Now we will add another hard link: $ ln hardlink_1 hardlink_2 $ ...and if we look at our directory again: $ ls -l total 4 -rw-rw-r-- 2 rtm 465 19 Jul 27 02:09 hardlink_1 -rw-rw-r-- 2 rtm 465 19 Jul 27 02:09 hardlink_2 $ Both filenames point to the same file. We can display the contents of both files: $ cat * put this in a file put this in a file $ Well, actually, we displayed the contents of ONE file twice. Once using each filename. The * is a wildcard that matches all filenames in the directory. OK, now for the test. We are going to redirect "nothing" to the first hardlink. $ hardlink_1 $ We have replaced the contents of hardlink_1 with "nothing". Since there is nothing in front of the "", nothing is put into the file, replacing whatever had been there. Notice that we don't even need the echo command to do this. And, ls -l tells the story: $ ls -l total 0 -rw-rw-r-- 2 rtm 4650 Jul 27 02:22 hardlink_1 -rw-rw-r-- 2 rtm 4650 Jul 27 02:22 hardlink_2 $ For further proof, try to cat the contents of the two files (or more accurately, the contents of our ONE file twice): $ cat * $ Nothing there. Soo, a second hard link doesn't "protect" the contents of a file. It only offers another way to access the contents of a file. If we use either hard link to change that file, then the contents are changed. Period. Now, lets create a soft link and put something back into the file: $ ln -s hardlink_1 softlink_1 $ The -s
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
On Tue, 27 Jul 1999, Richard Myers wrote: Neat stuff, huh? This is Unix. best wishes, richard myers On Tue, 27 Jul 1999, darkknight wrote: : ) Ever thought about teaching? We, I taught an online college-level Intro to Unix course for several years. Gave it up because (1) the college didn't support it well enough, and (2) I make ten times as much money working for Lucent Technologies. I always had trouble grasping the diferrence between hard links and soft (symbolic) links, untill now. And I was'nt even the poster of the message. cool , thanks alot, you really have patients and should consider teaching as a career. Great stuff indeed, Unix has always facinated me but I thought it too hard for me to grasp. More lessons like that and there might be hope for me yet. I shure am glad I make it a habbit to at least skim through each and every post. Thanks alot, John Love [EMAIL PROTECTED] Hmmm. Glad it helped. Maybe we should do some quickie Unix-command-line intro lessons online. QUESTION: should it be on this list, or would it be better to start a new, separate maillist? Or should we just try a few easy lessons, and see how it goes, with the option to move elsewhere later? What say, everyone? best wishes, richard myers
RE: [newbie] Oh, yeah
I'm game for a few online "quickies" Regards, Joseph Gardner Senior Designer / Technical Support Kirby Company -Original Message- From: Richard Myers [SMTP:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Sent: Tuesday, July 27, 1999 11:42 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah On Tue, 27 Jul 1999, Richard Myers wrote: Neat stuff, huh? This is Unix. best wishes, richard myers On Tue, 27 Jul 1999, darkknight wrote: : ) Ever thought about teaching? We, I taught an online college-level Intro to Unix course for several years. Gave it up because (1) the college didn't support it well enough, and (2) I make ten times as much money working for Lucent Technologies. I always had trouble grasping the diferrence between hard links and soft (symbolic) links, untill now. And I was'nt even the poster of the message. cool , thanks alot, you really have patients and should consider teaching as a career. Great stuff indeed, Unix has always facinated me but I thought it too hard for me to grasp. More lessons like that and there might be hope for me yet. I shure am glad I make it a habbit to at least skim through each and every post. Thanks alot, John Love [EMAIL PROTECTED] Hmmm. Glad it helped. Maybe we should do some quickie Unix-command-line intro lessons online. QUESTION: should it be on this list, or would it be better to start a new, separate maillist? Or should we just try a few easy lessons, and see how it goes, with the option to move elsewhere later? What say, everyone? best wishes, richard myers application/ms-tnef
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
On Tue, 27 Jul 1999, you wrote: Hmmm. Glad it helped. Maybe we should do some quickie Unix-command-line intro lessons online. QUESTION: should it be on this list, or would it be better to start a new, separate maillist? Or should we just try a few easy lessons, and see how it goes, with the option to move elsewhere later? I'd vote for start here and move elsewhere as needed. :-) Just my 2 cents' worth.
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
I was about to make that statement earlier, but I then thought it wasn't tre since everything that has been said indicated that hard links point to a single file and when all hard links die the file does as well (and that kinda invalidated what I thought). It's a good thing this isn't the case! It's waaay too complicated and unwieldly. Imagine making a hard link and changing your mind about it... if this was true, I couldn't delete it! The truth is much better. Yeah, that is a good idea about deletion protection. If I want to make sure that some data cannot be deleted, I can keep a hard link. I think that you misunderstand. Remember? I was showing the cause of my misundestanding. I was confused that there were *files* and separate *hard links* to those *files*. I do understand now. Filenames are hard links to the data. Making several hard links to data makes more filenames that point to the same data. A hard link is the way that you access a file. BUT, there is only one file. Suppose that we have a file named... well, lets create a file: $ echo put this in a file hardlink_1 $ We have created a file the "quick" way, and we gave it the name hardlink_1. And then we "cat" the file, which shows what is in the file. $ cat hardlink_1 put this in a file $ Hardlink_1 is a text file which has the contents, "put this in a file". OK, lets say it a different way. The echo command sends (we say it re-directs) "put this in a file" into the contents of a file named hardlink_1. The "" character is the nifty command that does this redirection. I know. is good for appending, too. Lets look at the long display of this file: $ ls -l total 2 -rw-rw-r-- 1 rtm 465 19 Jul 27 02:09 hardlink_1 $ OK, notice that it has a file size of 19 (just before the date). Count the characters in the "string" of characters: 123456789012345678 put this in a file 18. One extra byte to store this string gives us the 19. The extra byte... a character to signal the end-of-file? Now we will add another hard link: $ ln hardlink_1 hardlink_2 $ ...and if we look at our directory again: $ ls -l total 4 -rw-rw-r-- 2 rtm 465 19 Jul 27 02:09 hardlink_1 -rw-rw-r-- 2 rtm 465 19 Jul 27 02:09 hardlink_2 $ Both filenames point to the same file. We can display the contents of both files: $ cat * put this in a file put this in a file $ Well, actually, we displayed the contents of ONE file twice. Once using each filename. The * is a wildcard that matches all filenames in the directory. OK, now for the test. We are going to redirect "nothing" to the first hardlink. $ hardlink_1 $ We have replaced the contents of hardlink_1 with "nothing". Since there is nothing in front of the "", nothing is put into the file, replacing whatever had been there. Notice that we don't even need the echo command to do this. And, ls -l tells the story: $ ls -l total 0 -rw-rw-r-- 2 rtm 4650 Jul 27 02:22 hardlink_1 -rw-rw-r-- 2 rtm 4650 Jul 27 02:22 hardlink_2 $ For further proof, try to cat the contents of the two files (or more accurately, the contents of our ONE file twice): $ cat * $ Nothing there. Soo, a second hard link doesn't "protect" the contents of a file. It only offers another way to access the contents of a file. It protects it from *deletion*, which is what I was talking about. Of course, since deletion is only one way to wreck a file, it's not that important. If we use either hard link to change that file, then the contents are changed. Period. I understand already! I guess I didn't explain myself very well. Now, lets create a soft link and put something back into the file: $ ln -s hardlink_1 softlink_1 $ The -s "switch" to the link command ln makes this a symbolic, or "soft" link, instead of a hard link. $ ls -l total 2 -rw-rw-r-- 2 rtm465 0 Jul 27 02:22 hardlink_1 -rw-rw-r-- 2 rtm465 0 Jul 27 02:22 hardlink_2 lrwxrwxrwx 1 rtm465 10 Jul 27 02:35 softlink_1 - hardlink_1 Whoa! Notice that our soft link is created with WORLD WRITE permissions (the 3rd "w" in the group of "rwx's" in the line above). Doesn't matter, the symlink REALLY inherits the permissions of whatever it points to. Also notice that the symlink has 10 bytes. Why is that? Now we will put something into the file that the symlink points to: $ echo another string softlink_1 $ So, what happens if we cat the contents of all the files in the directory? $ cat * another string another string another string $ $ ls -l total 6 -rw-rw-r-- 2 rtm 465 15 Jul 27 02:35 hardlink_1 -rw-rw-r-- 2 rtm 465 15 Jul 27 02:35 hardlink_2 lrwxrwxrwx 1 rtm 465 10 Jul 27 02:35 softlink_1 - hardlink_1 $ All of our files now contain 15 bytes-- 14 for the string,
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
I would be interested in short tutorials, geared to the time I take to scan my incoming e-mail and mail lists. I am reading Teach Yourself Unix in 24 Hours at the moment. The discussion on hard links was esoteric for my present state of Linux, but I didn't know what a CD-rom was a few years ago,]. Art Hmmm. Glad it helped. Maybe we should do some quickie Unix-command-line intro lessons online. QUESTION: should it be on this list, or would it be better to start a new, separate maillist? Or should we just try a few easy lessons, and see how it goes, with the option to move elsewhere later? What say, everyone? best wishes, richard myers
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
Anything you can do to help us command-line idiots would be greatly appreciated! Richard Myers wrote: On Tue, 27 Jul 1999, Richard Myers wrote: Neat stuff, huh? This is Unix. best wishes, richard myers On Tue, 27 Jul 1999, darkknight wrote: : ) Ever thought about teaching? We, I taught an online college-level Intro to Unix course for several years. Gave it up because (1) the college didn't support it well enough, and (2) I make ten times as much money working for Lucent Technologies. I always had trouble grasping the diferrence between hard links and soft (symbolic) links, untill now. And I was'nt even the poster of the message. cool , thanks alot, you really have patients and should consider teaching as a career. Great stuff indeed, Unix has always facinated me but I thought it too hard for me to grasp. More lessons like that and there might be hope for me yet. I shure am glad I make it a habbit to at least skim through each and every post. Thanks alot, John Love [EMAIL PROTECTED] Hmmm. Glad it helped. Maybe we should do some quickie Unix-command-line intro lessons online. QUESTION: should it be on this list, or would it be better to start a new, separate maillist? Or should we just try a few easy lessons, and see how it goes, with the option to move elsewhere later? What say, everyone? best wishes, richard myers
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
On Sun, 25 Jul 1999, Andy Goth wrote: Then what are hard links good for? There are two applications which do something similar. Call them xyzzy and plugh. xyzzy gives you a help menu, but plugh is for expert users who don't need (and don't want) a menu. I write a better application-- better than both of them, but it incorporates the features of both. Everyone starts using my application instead of the two old ones. And I include a flag that you can set-- either menu, or no menu. But my users get tired of always having to turn that darn menu on or off. Soo, I come up with this great idea. I create two names (make that two *file* names) for the new application, xyzzy, and plugh. These are hard links to the same file. They both do the same thing-- launch my program. Well, they do one thing different. They place different values into one special variable made available to my program, which keeps track of what filename was used to launch my program. And those two different values are: xyzzy, and plugh. In my application I test whether it was called with the command xyzzy. If so, I make it act like xyzzy, menu and all. If my application was called by the name plugh, I know this must be an expert user-- she's calling it by the name of the old program she used to use-- and so for her my application automatically provides no menu to take up screen space and get in the way. Hard links make both my user groups happy. (Honesty in posting-- I didn't come up with any of these ideas, but I think they are nifty. ;-) Trivia-- xyzzy and plugh are actually magic words from the 70's computer game "advent". best wishes, richard myers
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
Sounds like bzip2. Except that bzip2 uses symlinks, instead. I believe
that "bunzip2" and "bzcat" are both _symlinks_ to "bzip2."
Although, I imagine that if you're paranoid about deleting files, you
might use hard links as a "backup." As was stated earlier, all regular
files are hard links to the file data. When all hard links are gone
("rm"ed) then the data is inaccessable, and may be overwritten. Thus, you
might have a backup folder full of hard links to all your important files.
If, for some reason one of these gets deleted, you can re-link it, because
the data is still there- hard linked from the backup folder. This way,
you keep backups to guard against deletion (but not corruption!) of files
without actually keeping a second copy of the file in question.
-Matt
On Mon, 26 Jul 1999, Richard Myers wrote:
On Sun, 25 Jul 1999, Andy Goth wrote:
Then what are hard links good for?
There are two applications which do something similar. Call them xyzzy and
plugh. xyzzy gives you a help menu, but plugh is for expert users who
don't need (and don't want) a menu.
I write a better application-- better than both of them, but it
incorporates the features of both. Everyone starts using my application
instead of the two old ones.
And I include a flag that you can set-- either menu, or no menu. But my
users get tired of always having to turn that darn menu on or off.
Soo, I come up with this great idea. I create two names (make that two
*file* names) for the new application, xyzzy, and plugh. These are hard
links to the same file. They both do the same thing-- launch my program.
Well, they do one thing different. They place different values into one
special variable made available to my program, which keeps track of what
filename was used to launch my program. And those two different values
are: xyzzy, and plugh.
In my application I test whether it was called with the command xyzzy. If
so, I make it act like xyzzy, menu and all.
If my application was called by the name plugh, I know this must be an
expert user-- she's calling it by the name of the old program she used to
use-- and so for her my application automatically provides no menu to take
up screen space and get in the way.
Hard links make both my user groups happy.
(Honesty in posting-- I didn't come up with any of these ideas, but I
think they are nifty. ;-)
Trivia-- xyzzy and plugh are actually magic words from the 70's computer
game "advent".
best wishes,
richard myers
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
What if all the hard links are deleted but the original file remains? Or will it just disappear? Each file has at least one hard link. If you delete all the hard links, you just deleted the file. So, each file name is like a hard link to the data?
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
From: Andy Goth [EMAIL PROTECTED] So, each file name is like a hard link to the data? Yes, precisely.
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
So, each file name is like a hard link to the data? Yes, precisely. I was about to make that statement earlier, but I then thought it wasn't tre since everything that has been said indicated that hard links point to a single file and when all hard links die the file does as well (and that kinda invalidated what I thought). It's a good thing this isn't the case! It's waaay too complicated and unwieldly. Imagine making a hard link and changing your mind about it... if this was true, I couldn't delete it! The truth is much better. Yeah, that is a good idea about deletion protection. If I want to make sure that some data cannot be deleted, I can keep a hard link.
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
On 25-Jul-99 Andy Goth wrote: FIPS, eh? Yeah, I read that it could resize partitions as well. Does anyone have any success stories? Any reports of failures? Fips basically performs one function: It takes a DOS partition, and splits it into two smaller partitions. It cannot resize Linux partitions, and it cannot (as far as I know..) make DOS partitions larger, it can only make a DOS partition smaller. So it is perfect for the typical user who has Windows on one partition that takes up their entire HD, and wants to make some space to install Linux without wiping Windows. I used it myself for that and it worked fine. Thanks. I'll keep that in mind. Since I'll have to reformat the disk to the BIOS format instead of the Ontrack Proprietary Format, I'm going to lose my data anyway. lightbulb First, I think I'll empty the C: (which is a compressed partition ala DoubleSpace). Then I'll move all the important DOS/Windows files onto it. Next, I'll reformat and repartition the big hard disk. I can reinstall everything I want onto it, and I can recover the important data and hard-to-find programs from the C:. After that, I can redo the old hard disk so that it has two partitions (one msdos and one ext2). This plan will reduce the need for floppy backups (except for backing up my Linux stuff--which I don't have much of yet). Things will be a little easier on you if you make at least TWO Linux partitions, a / partition and a /home partition. Either I forget to mention that or I forget to mention my swap partition (or both!). Don't worry. I am planning out (on paper, no less) my partition structure so that it works great in Linux *and* in DOS (with the drive letter names I want). I will have a total of four Linux-related partitions: /, /home, swap, and backup. I'm not quite sure how to mount the backup into things yet... I think I should make a /backup directory (is there anything wrong with adding straight to the root directory?). I would like to assign each user a folder on the backup disk, but that's not too hard. What I *really* would like would be if each user had a ~/backup directory. I guess I can do that with symlinks and an enhanced adduser script. Nope, nothing wrong with adding to the root directory. By the way, what's the difference between symbolic and hard links? A symlink is basically just a pointer to another file, and a hard link is like actually having two copies of the file except that they take up the same space on the disk (so it doesn't take up twice as much space). I can't think of any advantages of one over the other off the top of my head, but personally I prefer to use symlinks since with a symlink it's obvious that it's a link when you use ls with the -l option. (A symlink will show up as link - file and a hard link will look like any other file.) Most of your user-specific configuration files go in your home directory, and you can toss anything else you might want to hold onto there too (I keep all the tar.gz and rpm files I download there, so I can reinstall them conveniently later without redownloading). /home/download or /home/package would work. I use ~/dl but those are good too. :) Then if you reinstall Linux, choose to reformat / but NOT to reformat /home, and you will keep everything that's in your home directory. Good. Now that that's settled... is there anything wrong with making a /backup directory and mounting the secondary hard disk to it? Nope, nothing at all, in fact coincidentally I have my second hard drive mounted in /backup as well. :) -Tom
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
- Original Message - From: Andy Goth [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Saturday, July 24, 1999 2:46 AM Subject: Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah Basically what Partition Magic does that fdisk doesn't, is resize existing partitions without requiring you to first destroy them (and everything on them) and recreate them. I guess that's convenient but -I- wouldn't pay $70 for it. :) So it's a nondestructive partition resizer? That doesn't sound exceedingly hard to write. I mean, shouldn't fdisk be able to do this? I understand that it's still *much* easier to reformat everything, but moving data... The snag is that it'll take direct writes. It shouldn't be too hard to grab one block of data and move it over some on disk. If they overlap, start from the other direction. Use memory, too, when the overlapping gets to be too much. What more is there? Well, I'm no programmer, but it must not be terribly difficult as I have a couple of programs that do similar things. But Partition Magic is still the best, and comes with more than just the partition creator and resizer. I have Partition Magic 4.0 which has a Windows and DOS version, and works on ex2fs. Through creative searching, I did not pay for it (shhh), but it is hard to find. There are shareware or freeware programs like Partition manager and FIPS which will also create and resize partitions, but you don't get the nice GUI and there is some knowledge that goes into it. Anything that you want or need can be found online if you are willing put the time in. Manny Styles [EMAIL PROTECTED] --- NetZero - We believe in a FREE Internet. Shouldn't you? Get your FREE Internet Access and Email at http://www.netzero.net/download/index.html
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
On Sat, 24 Jul 1999, you wrote: Basically what Partition Magic does that fdisk doesn't, is resize existing partitions without requiring you to first destroy them (and everything on them) and recreate them. I guess that's convenient but -I- wouldn't pay $70 for it. :) So it's a nondestructive partition resizer? That doesn't sound exceedingly hard to write. I mean, shouldn't fdisk be able to do this? I understand that it's still *much* easier to reformat everything, but moving data... The snag is that it'll take direct writes. It shouldn't be too hard to grab one block of data and move it over some on disk. If they overlap, start from the other direction. Use memory, too, when the overlapping gets to be too much. What more is there? you can also use 'fips" which is another FREE partition resizer.It's probably on your Mandrake disk. But be sure to READ THE DOCS FIRST!! -- Lloyd Osten [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
FIPS, eh? Yeah, I read that it could resize partitions as well. Does anyone have any success stories? Any reports of failures? Fips basically performs one function: It takes a DOS partition, and splits it into two smaller partitions. It cannot resize Linux partitions, and it cannot (as far as I know..) make DOS partitions larger, it can only make a DOS partition smaller. So it is perfect for the typical user who has Windows on one partition that takes up their entire HD, and wants to make some space to install Linux without wiping Windows. I used it myself for that and it worked fine. Thanks. I'll keep that in mind. Since I'll have to reformat the disk to the BIOS format instead of the Ontrack Proprietary Format, I'm going to lose my data anyway. lightbulb First, I think I'll empty the C: (which is a compressed partition ala DoubleSpace). Then I'll move all the important DOS/Windows files onto it. Next, I'll reformat and repartition the big hard disk. I can reinstall everything I want onto it, and I can recover the important data and hard-to-find programs from the C:. After that, I can redo the old hard disk so that it has two partitions (one msdos and one ext2). This plan will reduce the need for floppy backups (except for backing up my Linux stuff--which I don't have much of yet). Things will be a little easier on you if you make at least TWO Linux partitions, a / partition and a /home partition. Either I forget to mention that or I forget to mention my swap partition (or both!). Don't worry. I am planning out (on paper, no less) my partition structure so that it works great in Linux *and* in DOS (with the drive letter names I want). I will have a total of four Linux-related partitions: /, /home, swap, and backup. I'm not quite sure how to mount the backup into things yet... I think I should make a /backup directory (is there anything wrong with adding straight to the root directory?). I would like to assign each user a folder on the backup disk, but that's not too hard. What I *really* would like would be if each user had a ~/backup directory. I guess I can do that with symlinks and an enhanced adduser script. By the way, what's the difference between symbolic and hard links? Most of your user-specific configuration files go in your home directory, and you can toss anything else you might want to hold onto there too (I keep all the tar.gz and rpm files I download there, so I can reinstall them conveniently later without redownloading). /home/download or /home/package would work. Then if you reinstall Linux, choose to reformat / but NOT to reformat /home, and you will keep everything that's in your home directory. Good. Now that that's settled... is there anything wrong with making a /backup directory and mounting the secondary hard disk to it?
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
On Fri, 23 Jul 1999, Andy Goth wrote: I've spent long sleepless nights before fixing the system.ini file after moving programs from C:\Program Files to D:\Prog. Luckily, I had a utility to rename most references that went to my CD-ROM drive after it changed letters. In Linux, such a thing isn't necessary since drives are referred to by their real names, not by arbitrary letters. I think that the problem is not the "arbitrary letters", but the fact that these letter designations get "bumped" when new hardware is added. rant There is a user interface analysis website (ask me for the link, if interested) that strongly suggests Microsoft has used graphic designers to create their interfaces so that they look pretty, even when this renders them semi- or non-functional. Shouldn't be any surprise. If your CDROM could just stay as your D: drive, and your next hard drive could become E:, the upgrade problems would be fewer. Of course then installation software would have to query each storage device, "are you a hard drive or CDROM?" I think this identification process is common sense now, but when the drive scheme was set up, Microsoft's simplification of the Windows installation procedure was probably more important to them than any provision for upgrading. "What, have a CDROM in between non-consecutive hard drive letters? That's not pretty enough for our customers!" /rant best wishes, richard myers
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
On Thu, 22 Jul 1999, Andy Goth wrote: Probably for the same reason DOS can only use 640kB RAM. I can hear it now... "Nobody will ever have a drive larger than 2GB!" Correction: Nobody will ever BE ABLE TO have a drive larger than 2GB! That is, with DOS. I like learning about the internals of my computer. I try to learn all I can about everything I use. What is Linux's answer to the FAT? Linux's answer to the FAT is: Trim it :) John Love [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
On Thu, 22 Jul 1999, you wrote: Probably for the same reason DOS can only use 640kB RAM. I can hear it now... "Nobody will ever have a drive larger than 2GB!" Correction: Nobody will ever BE ABLE TO have a drive larger than 2GB! That is, with DOS. I like learning about the internals of my computer. I try to learn all I can about everything I use. What is Linux's answer to the FAT? as far as I know, it's EXT2, which is far superior to FAT. -- Lloyd Osten [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
On Thu, 22 Jul 1999, you wrote: I broke my disk up in 3 partitions. 2 Gig or so for "/root", 64M for "swap", and the balance (6Gig) for "/home". This allows me to reinstall (reformat :-0 ) the /root and swap and not touch any home (user) files What about /usr and all those other directories I am forgetting? So, what if I install some great package and then have to reformat and reinstall the OS? How can I salvage that great package? just copy the package to a partition you aren't going to format. You can copy it back later. -- Lloyd Osten [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
On Thu, 22 Jul 1999, Andy Goth wrote: Probably for the same reason DOS can only use 640kB RAM. I can hear it now... "Nobody will ever have a drive larger than 2GB!" I'm sure somebodys got that one on tape too ;) Correction: Nobody will ever BE ABLE TO have a drive larger than 2GB! That is, with DOS. I like learning about the internals of my computer. I try to learn all I can about everything I use. What is Linux's answer to the FAT? Erase it
RE: [newbie] Oh, yeah
On Thu, 22 Jul 1999, you wrote: I broke my disk up in 3 partitions. 2 Gig or so for "/root", 64M for "swap", and the balance (6Gig) for "/home". This allows me to reinstall (reformat :-0 ) the /root and swap and not touch any home (user) files What about /usr and all those other directories I am forgetting? So, what if I install some great package and then have to reformat and reinstall the OS? How can I salvage that great package? just copy the package to a partition you aren't going to format. You can copy it back later. -- Lloyd Osten [EMAIL PROTECTED] I added a /apps partition that doesn't get reformatted. I haven't installed any apps to it yet so I don't know if I'll loose any settings, etc. Joe Gardner [EMAIL PROTECTED] application/ms-tnef
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
On Fri, 23 Jul 1999, Lloyd Osten wrote: On Fri, 23 Jul 1999, you wrote: On Fri, 23 Jul 1999, Andy Goth wrote: I've spent long sleepless nights before fixing the system.ini file after moving programs from C:\Program Files to D:\Prog. Luckily, I had a utility to rename most references that went to my CD-ROM drive after it changed letters. In Linux, such a thing isn't necessary since drives are referred to by their real names, not by arbitrary letters. I think that the problem is not the "arbitrary letters", but the fact that these letter designations get "bumped" when new hardware is added. rant There is a user interface analysis website (ask me for the link, if interested) that strongly suggests Microsoft has used graphic designers to create their interfaces so that they look pretty, even when this renders them semi- or non-functional. Shouldn't be any surprise. If your CDROM could just stay as your D: drive, and your next hard drive could become E:, the upgrade problems would be fewer. Of course then installation software would have to query each storage device, "are you a hard drive or CDROM?" I think this identification process is common sense now, but when the drive scheme was set up, Microsoft's simplification of the Windows installation procedure was probably more important to them than any provision for upgrading. "What, have a CDROM in between non-consecutive hard drive letters? That's not pretty enough for our customers!" /rant best wishes, richard myers I think in win95/98 you can select which drive letter you want the cdrom to be. It will always be after your hard drive, though -- Lloyd Osten [EMAIL PROTECTED] Yep, you can assign a drive letter to it on a permanent basis, in fact that way you could still put a hard drive on afterwards and have the cd/rom before it. At least in Win 95, not sure about Win 98. I think the place to do that is in My Computer, I don't have Windoze on my machine anymore so I can't verrify that right now, but I know I did do that once. I had it at E: for a long time, even after putting on another drive behind it that was assigned F: as it's drive letter. John Love [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
Linux's answer to the FAT is: Trim it :) Are you just joking, or do you mean that the file allocation table (I think it's called an I-Node table... correct me) grows as necessary?
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
You could use Partition Magic (the $70 is worth it if you can't find "other" means of aquiring it). It comes with an additional program called Magic Mover which can place a complete program and all of it's folder contents in a new directory, even on another drive. And there will be no problem running it because it corrects system and .dll files to point to the new directory. I use it often and never have had a problem with it. I think it's time for a complete reinstallation of Windows 95. Isn't that the usual method of fixing problems with it?
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
On Fri, 23 Jul 1999, you wrote: You could use Partition Magic (the $70 is worth it if you can't find "other" means of aquiring it). It comes with an additional program called Magic Mover which can place a complete program and all of it's folder contents in a new directory, even on another drive. And there will be no problem running it because it corrects system and .dll files to point to the new directory. I use it often and never have had a problem with it. I think it's time for a complete reinstallation of Windows 95. Isn't that the usual method of fixing problems with it? the BEST method is just to delete it permanently...:-) -- Lloyd Osten [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
On Fri, 23 Jul 1999, you wrote: On Fri, 23 Jul 1999, you wrote: You could use Partition Magic (the $70 is worth it if you can't find "other" means of acquiring it). Search around the net for a copy of partition magic 3.0. It will work with win98 and create you partitions. For linux users the only real difference I see is that the boot loader won't work. Partition magic 4.0 does have an excellent boot loader. By the way before spending $70 bucks I'd buy caldera's 2.2 for $30 send in the $10 rebate and install that. Caldera comes with a stripped down version of partition magic. Rick -- "I don't want to swim in a roped off sea" JB
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
On 24-Jul-99 Andy Goth wrote: Search around the net for a copy of partition magic 3.0. It will work with win98 and create you partitions. I don't have (or want) Windows 98. What's wrong with (c)fdisk? What more do I need? Remember. I'm reinstalling Windows, so I don't need to update any links. Basically what Partition Magic does that fdisk doesn't, is resize existing partitions without requiring you to first destroy them (and everything on them) and recreate them. I guess that's convenient but -I- wouldn't pay $70 for it. :) -Tom
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
Some products are worth paying for, but sometimes I don't really need them that badly. That PartitionMagic thing... I don't even know why I need it. And then I don't see a point to use it more than once. If it was free, then I would just download it. Since it isn't, ... you know. I'll have to make do. To each his own. I have to deal with Windows, and with multiple boots. Partition Magic is a trusted tool which I use fairly often. In its full-blown version, it can resize ext2 partitions, too. The 3.0 release had a text mode only version which was handier in some ways, as it ran from a DOS boot.
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
Basically what Partition Magic does that fdisk doesn't, is resize existing partitions without requiring you to first destroy them (and everything on them) and recreate them. I guess that's convenient but -I- wouldn't pay $70 for it. :) It also does a good job of cleaning up after other people's messes. It is usually available for $50 or less, especially in bundles with other tools. If I had only one machine, I probably would not have it. With 5 machines, and with a variety of unpluggable drives in support of various environments, I find it to be a lifesaver when it is needed at all.
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
The 3.0 version is the one that I am familiar with. It works great. I bought mine for $15 with a $15 rebate. I also have calder'a 2.2 but I can't get partition magic's bootloader to see my mandrake partitions. 3.0 was great, but didn't know from ext2 William Meyer
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
Basically what Partition Magic does that fdisk doesn't, is resize existing partitions without requiring you to first destroy them (and everything on them) and recreate them. I guess that's convenient but -I- wouldn't pay $70 for it. :) So it's a nondestructive partition resizer? That doesn't sound exceedingly hard to write. I mean, shouldn't fdisk be able to do this? I understand that it's still *much* easier to reformat everything, but moving data... The snag is that it'll take direct writes. It shouldn't be too hard to grab one block of data and move it over some on disk. If they overlap, start from the other direction. Use memory, too, when the overlapping gets to be too much. What more is there?
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
On Thu, 22 Jul 1999, you wrote: I heard that I should have two Linux partitions. Can anyone give me more information on this? You need a bare minimum of two partitions for Linux. One will be your root partition and the other partition will be your swap partition. It is HIGHLY RECOMMENDED that you use a swap partition. -- Lloyd Osten [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
On Thu, 22 Jul 1999, you wrote: Andy Goth wrote: mind. If only I could map "\Program Files" to be on a different partition... Of course, such things are trivially easy in Linux... Wonder why Microsoft chose such a half-assed method of drive management... Because they're Microsoft and want to make things as easy as possible for the computer illiterate. Just another reason we use something superior. We basically have total control over where stuff goes. I personally don't put my programs in there. -- Lloyd Osten [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
I heard that I should have two Linux partitions. Can anyone give me more information on this? Sure. You should have one partition for files, and another for swapping. Of course, you can distribute your file system between several partitions- I have /home on a separate partition so that when I format / to install Mandrake 6.1, I won't lose all my personal files. On a side note, would it be possible to selectively install 6.1 RPMs on my 6.0 system? So that I don't have to re-format / anyway? mind. If only I could map "\Program Files" to be on a different partition... Of course, such things are trivially easy in Linux... Wonder why Microsoft chose such a half-assed method of drive management... Probably for the same reason DOS can only use 640kB RAM. I can hear it now... "Nobody will ever have a drive larger than 2GB!" -Matt
RE: [newbie] Oh, yeah
Dan wrote: Andy Goth wrote: mind. If only I could map "\Program Files" to be on a different partition... Of course, such things are trivially easy in Linux... Wonder why Microsoft chose such a half-assed method of drive management... -- Dan Brown, KE6MKS, [EMAIL PROTECTED] Meddle not in the affairs of dragons, for you are crunchy and taste good with ketchup. Bad drive management / bad corporate management, hmm, could there be a connection??? Joe application/ms-tnef
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
Andy Goth wrote: mind. If only I could map "\Program Files" to be on a different partition... I don't put things there, unless forced. It is a path embedded in so many install tools, though, that you have to be vigilant when you install, and some programs will give you no choice. There is a tool called Magic Mover, which comes with Partition Magic. It does a great job of moving Windows apps and repairing registry entries. It can't handle the special cases which occur in connection with \Program Files, however. William Meyer Hoping life under Linux will be easier than under Windows
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
On Thu, 22 Jul 1999, you wrote: Lloyd Osten wrote: On Thu, 22 Jul 1999, you wrote: Andy Goth wrote: mind. If only I could map "\Program Files" to be on a different partition... Of course, such things are trivially easy in Linux... Wonder why Microsoft chose such a half-assed method of drive management... Because they're Microsoft and want to make things as easy as possible for the computer illiterate. Just another reason we use something superior. We basically have total control over where stuff goes. I personally don't put my programs in there. -- Lloyd Osten [EMAIL PROTECTED] Yeah but that's also why the average person will keep buying microsoft,a lot of people I've run into consider a windows installation as being a challenging experience.and as long as windows is easier to set up,and run,people will continue to put money in bill's pocket. merc. I didn't have any problem at all installing Mandrake. I thought it was at least as easy as Windows. Getting it to boot was a whole different story. With some help from thislist, I eventually narrowed it down to quirky hardware. A small change with vi and it's been good since, except for one Kmail thing. - Lloyd Osten [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
Lloyd Osten wrote: On Thu, 22 Jul 1999, you wrote: Lloyd Osten wrote: On Thu, 22 Jul 1999, you wrote: Andy Goth wrote: mind. If only I could map "\Program Files" to be on a different partition... Of course, such things are trivially easy in Linux... Wonder why Microsoft chose such a half-assed method of drive management... Because they're Microsoft and want to make things as easy as possible for the computer illiterate. Just another reason we use something superior. We basically have total control over where stuff goes. I personally don't put my programs in there. -- Lloyd Osten [EMAIL PROTECTED] Yeah but that's also why the average person will keep buying microsoft,a lot of people I've run into consider a windows installation as being a challenging experience.and as long as windows is easier to set up,and run,people will continue to put money in bill's pocket. merc. I didn't have any problem at all installing Mandrake. I thought it was at least as easy as Windows. Getting it to boot was a whole different story. With some help from thislist, I eventually narrowed it down to quirky hardware. A small change with vi and it's been good since, except for one Kmail thing. - Lloyd Osten [EMAIL PROTECTED] Mine went together alright,but the board is kind of flaky,It's working fine now. After a bit of tweaking with everything! I've run linux before,back in 95-97,but the system I was using then was a compaq deskpro,and there was a lot of stuff that I couldn't get to work right,(X primarily), and I had to boot off of a floppy,because of the way the computer itself was set up. merc
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
I broke my disk up in 3 partitions. 2 Gig or so for "/root", 64M for "swap", and the balance (6Gig) for "/home". This allows me to reinstall (reformat :-0 ) the /root and swap and not touch any home (user) files What about /usr and all those other directories I am forgetting? So, what if I install some great package and then have to reformat and reinstall the OS? How can I salvage that great package?
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
Installing Mandrake is pretty easy since it uses all those cool Red Hat configurator programs. I'm sure Bill would like to discredit it by saying, "But that's text mode! Windows has the edge since it uses graphics." Edge? I really like text mode. Text mode graphics is fun to do since it's challenging and looks very smart when done right. Hmm. If a machine is named HTINT3, and the company is called HTI, can that mean that it's the third NT server? That would explain a lot about the trouble my dad has with dialing into work.
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
Probably for the same reason DOS can only use 640kB RAM. I can hear it now... "Nobody will ever have a drive larger than 2GB!" Correction: Nobody will ever BE ABLE TO have a drive larger than 2GB! That is, with DOS. I like learning about the internals of my computer. I try to learn all I can about everything I use. What is Linux's answer to the FAT?
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
mind. If only I could map "\Program Files" to be on a different partition... Of course, such things are trivially easy in Linux... Wonder why Microsoft chose such a half-assed method of drive management... Because they're Microsoft and want to make things as easy as possible for the computer illiterate. Just another reason we use something superior. We basically have total control over where stuff goes. I personally don't put my programs in there. I prefer D:\prog (since the C: is a cramped compressed volume and "prog" is much easier to type than "program files"). Unfortunately, some programs insist. Office was really bad. I did all I could to put it on the D:, but either most or all of it stuck in the C:. There probably should be some registry hack that allows the "Program Files" directory to be D:\prog or something similar. Does anyone know more? I want the OS partition for the OS and nothing more!
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
I heard that I should have two Linux partitions. Can anyone give me more information on this? You need a bare minimum of two partitions for Linux. One will be your root partition and the other partition will be your swap partition. It is HIGHLY RECOMMENDED that you use a swap partition. I forgot about the swap partition. I always make one, but I just never mentioned it. That'll be a total of five partitions on one hard disk. I can't do that without extended partitions. Luckily only one has to be bootable (the one with LILO). Maybe the answer to this question has already been sent, but I have many emails to read before I might find it. Can I install LILO so that it always runs at boot time without putting it in the MBR?
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
Then run Linux . . . ;) Ty Original Message On 7/22/99, 8:39:38 PM, Andy Goth [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote regarding Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah: mind. If only I could map "\Program Files" to be on a different partition... Of course, such things are trivially easy in Linux... Wonder why Microsoft chose such a half-assed method of drive management... Because they're Microsoft and want to make things as easy as possible for the computer illiterate. Just another reason we use something superior. We basically have total control over where stuff goes. I personally don't put my programs in there. I prefer D:\prog (since the C: is a cramped compressed volume and "prog" is much easier to type than "program files"). Unfortunately, some programs insist. Office was really bad. I did all I could to put it on the D:, but either most or all of it stuck in the C:. There probably should be some registry hack that allows the "Program Files" directory to be D:\prog or something similar. Does anyone know more? I want the OS partition for the OS and nothing more!
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
- Original Message - From: Andy Goth [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, July 22, 1999 11:39 PM Subject: Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah mind. If only I could map "\Program Files" to be on a different partition... Of course, such things are trivially easy in Linux... Wonder why Microsoft chose such a half-assed method of drive management... Because they're Microsoft and want to make things as easy as possible for the computer illiterate. Just another reason we use something superior. We basically have total control over where stuff goes. I personally don't put my programs in there. I prefer D:\prog (since the C: is a cramped compressed volume and "prog" is much easier to type than "program files"). Unfortunately, some programs insist. Office was really bad. I did all I could to put it on the D:, but either most or all of it stuck in the C:. There probably should be some registry hack that allows the "Program Files" directory to be D:\prog or something similar. Does anyone know more? I want the OS partition for the OS and nothing more! I used to copy mine to E:\, then run a program called "Registry Search Replace" and replace all instances of c:\program files with e:\program files. Reboot and then delete c:\program files. Never a problem. If some poorly written program insisted on c:\, I would let it install, then repeat the above steps. Oh . . . you do need to manually edit a few lines in either syste,.ini or win.ini to change the directories. Hoyt
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
Then run Linux . . . ;) I am not the only user of the computer--I have to share it. My dad uses Office on it, and everyone uses DOS games. Just so you know, X runs very, very slowly, so don't bother suggesting using a X Window Office workalike. I read that Das Boot document, and I learned a lot from it. How about I make the core Linux partition the "active" partition and put LILO on it? My goal is to allow DOS and Windows to play with its partition boot sector as they see fit without jeopardizing LILO. I'll make LILO default to DOS so I won't risk having my brother turn on the computer, accidentally go to Linux, and turn off the computer to "fix" the problem (I know he would do that). It's starting to sound like I am ready to do this now. I'm not forgetting anything, am I? Before I start, I have some backing up to do. I also need a Windows 95 CD and Microsoft Office. I don't have those, so maybe I can dupe a friend into letting me borrow his.
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
I used to copy mine to E:\, then run a program called "Registry Search Replace" and replace all instances of c:\program files with e:\program files. Reboot and then delete c:\program files. Never a problem. If some poorly written program insisted on c:\, I would let it install, then repeat the above steps. Oh . . . you do need to manually edit a few lines in either syste,.ini or win.ini to change the directories. I've spent long sleepless nights before fixing the system.ini file after moving programs from C:\Program Files to D:\Prog. Luckily, I had a utility to rename most references that went to my CD-ROM drive after it changed letters. In Linux, such a thing isn't necessary since drives are referred to by their real names, not by arbitrary letters. Still, if I switch my master and slave drives, Linux might get confused since what was /dev/hda is now /dev/hdb. This should never actually happen in the course of running Linux (only when trying to make an optimal installation). Guys, I'm sorry if I'm deluging your mailboxes with my letters, but I have many letters to reply to. You can always delete them if you're not interested.
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
On 23-Jul-99 Andy Goth wrote: I broke my disk up in 3 partitions. 2 Gig or so for "/root", 64M for "swap", and the balance (6Gig) for "/home". This allows me to reinstall (reformat :-0 ) the /root and swap and not touch any home (user) files What about /usr and all those other directories I am forgetting? If you made the partitions suggested above (i.e. /, /home, and a swap partition) then basically any directory that's not under /home would be under /, so the /usr directory would be in the / partition. So, what if I install some great package and then have to reformat and reinstall the OS? How can I salvage that great package? Well, there are a couple ways you could deal with that. One would be to keep all of the packages you download in a directory under your home directory, assuming you have a separate /home partition as suggested above. Then when you reinstall, choose not to reformat /home, then you will have 1) all the packages still there in your home directory ready to be reinstalled and 2) the configuration files for most of your programs, so that when you reinstall they probably won't have to be reconfigured. Another way you could do it, if you don't want to even have to reinstall the program, is to make a /usr/local partition (most programs that aren't part of the distribution install in /usr/local by default), and put all the extra programs you install there. Then, as with /home, choose not to reformat /usr/local when you reinstall. -Tom
Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah
I understand - my g/f would kill me if I didn't let her have the 8gb hd for WinNT. BTW, if you have a burner, I have 98 (don't use it) and Office2k (nice). Ty Original Message On 7/22/99, 10:35:09 PM, Andy Goth [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote regarding Re: [newbie] Oh, yeah: Then run Linux . . . ;) I am not the only user of the computer--I have to share it. My dad uses Office on it, and everyone uses DOS games. Just so you know, X runs very, very slowly, so don't bother suggesting using a X Window Office workalike. I read that Das Boot document, and I learned a lot from it. How about I make the core Linux partition the "active" partition and put LILO on it? My goal is to allow DOS and Windows to play with its partition boot sector as they see fit without jeopardizing LILO. I'll make LILO default to DOS so I won't risk having my brother turn on the computer, accidentally go to Linux, and turn off the computer to "fix" the problem (I know he would do that). It's starting to sound like I am ready to do this now. I'm not forgetting anything, am I? Before I start, I have some backing up to do. I also need a Windows 95 CD and Microsoft Office. I don't have those, so maybe I can dupe a friend into letting me borrow his.
