• installing Mageia 7 on new system

    From santo@2:250/1 to All on Fri Jan 29 06:18:34 2021
    My very old computer is giving up...
    serious motherboard problem re. the screen
    Planning to Install dual boot...
    am not at all a high end user, no big games
    no huge amount of data save for few fotos and movies...

    100GB Widows
    100GB data
    280 MAgeia

    Intel i3 10100 Processor
    Gigabyte GA H4 10M-H Motherboard
    Crucial 4GB DDR-2666 Desktop RAM
    Crucial BX500 480GB SSD
    Corsair CV45W SMPS
    SIlvestone Casing
    Windows 10

    I am not sure what to do or how regard the /boot/UFI ,
    size etc...also not sure anymore how big /, /swap, should be and all the rest in /home
    ( In my old system I was also putting /usr on a different partition )
    Also which UID number should give to /root 1000? 500?

    they might seem obvious questions to many
    of you but to me is where I am always
    blocked wandering what to do...
    ANy help suggestion is welcomed.
    Also I hope to be able to read some
    of your suggestions before the screen
    gives up fully, otherwise I am going to be in trouble...
    TIA

    Santo

    --
    Running Mageia release 7 (Official) for x86_64 using Kernel=5.7.19-desktop-3.mga7 on x86_64 DM=sddm DE= ST=tty
    Card:ATI Radeon HD 5000 to HD 6300 (radeon/fglrx): Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD/ATI]|Kabini [Radeon HD 8400 / R3 Series] [DISPLAY_VGA]

    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: Aioe.org NNTP Server (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From santo@2:250/1 to All on Fri Jan 29 06:22:16 2021
    On Fri, 29 Jan 2021 06:18:34 +0000, santo wrote:

    also my supplier just told me
    that Data partition will be formatted
    exfat and will need to install
    FUSE exFAT in Linux
    I know nothing of this stuff, will have to check it out...




    --
    Running Mageia release 7 (Official) for x86_64 using Kernel=5.7.19-desktop-3.mga7 on x86_64 DM=sddm DE= ST=tty
    Card:ATI Radeon HD 5000 to HD 6300 (radeon/fglrx): Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD/ATI]|Kabini [Radeon HD 8400 / R3 Series] [DISPLAY_VGA]

    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: Aioe.org NNTP Server (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From William Unruh@2:250/1 to All on Fri Jan 29 08:25:40 2021
    On 2021-01-29, santo <santo@auroville.org.in> wrote:
    My very old computer is giving up...
    serious motherboard problem re. the screen
    Planning to Install dual boot...
    am not at all a high end user, no big games
    no huge amount of data save for few fotos and movies...

    Is the below the old system, or your plans for the new system?

    100GB Widows
    Why 100 GB Windows
    100GB data

    What data? for Linux or for Windows?
    280 MAgeia
    Is that GB?

    Yes, you will need a small boot partition.

    Note that hard drive sizes are in decimal. Ie 480 x10^9 bytes, not
    480 x2^30 bytes, And usually on filesystems the 2^30 is used. so your
    480GB file systems will not fit on a 480GB drive.
    (480 10^9= 441 GB)




    Is this the old system or the new one?
    Intel i3 10100 Processor
    Gigabyte GA H4 10M-H Motherboard
    Crucial 4GB DDR-2666 Desktop RAM
    Crucial BX500 480GB SSD
    Corsair CV45W SMPS
    SIlvestone Casing
    Windows 10

    I am not sure what to do or how regard the /boot/UFI ,
    size etc...also not sure anymore how big /, /swap, should be and all the rest in /home
    ( In my old system I was also putting /usr on a different partition )
    Also which UID number should give to /root 1000? 500?

    I make / about 30 GB, /swap a bit bigger than the amount of memeory you
    have (ie a bit bigger that 4GB since if you want to hibernate the
    system, you need to fit the memory into swap)
    I put /usr onto / but /usr/local is a link to a directory of another
    partition, which I call /local Ie, stuff you want to specially put onto
    the disk should be on a partition that you will not erase when you
    reinstall the OS.

    root is always UID 0. /root is root's home directory and should always
    be UID 0. Your users should start with somethink like 1500 because
    mageia keeps upping the number of system uids it wants.


    they might seem obvious questions to many
    of you but to me is where I am always
    blocked wandering what to do...
    ANy help suggestion is welcomed.
    Also I hope to be able to read some
    of your suggestions before the screen
    gives up fully, otherwise I am going to be in trouble...

    You have a backup I hope.
    TIA

    Santo


    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From William Unruh@2:250/1 to All on Fri Jan 29 08:27:16 2021
    On 2021-01-29, santo <santo@auroville.org.in> wrote:
    On Fri, 29 Jan 2021 06:18:34 +0000, santo wrote:

    also my supplier just told me
    that Data partition will be formatted
    exfat and will need to install
    FUSE exFAT in Linux

    You do not need fuse anymore for exfat, as I recall. exfat should
    already be there in the OS.
    But what is the data partition for?

    I know nothing of this stuff, will have to check it out...





    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From William Unruh@2:250/1 to All on Fri Jan 29 09:39:33 2021
    On 2021-01-29, William Unruh <unruh@invalid.ca> wrote:
    On 2021-01-29, santo <santo@auroville.org.in> wrote:
    My very old computer is giving up...
    serious motherboard problem re. the screen
    Planning to Install dual boot...
    am not at all a high end user, no big games
    no huge amount of data save for few fotos and movies...

    Is the below the old system, or your plans for the new system?

    100GB Widows
    Why 100 GB Windows
    100GB data

    What data? for Linux or for Windows?
    280 MAgeia
    Is that GB?

    Yes, you will need a small boot partition.

    Note that hard drive sizes are in decimal. Ie 480 x10^9 bytes, not
    480 x2^30 bytes, And usually on filesystems the 2^30 is used. so your
    480GB file systems will not fit on a 480GB drive.
    (480 10^9= 441 GB)




    Is this the old system or the new one?
    Intel i3 10100 Processor
    Gigabyte GA H4 10M-H Motherboard
    Crucial 4GB DDR-2666 Desktop RAM
    Crucial BX500 480GB SSD
    Corsair CV45W SMPS
    SIlvestone Casing
    Windows 10

    I am not sure what to do or how regard the /boot/UFI ,
    size etc...also not sure anymore how big /, /swap, should be and all the rest in /home
    ( In my old system I was also putting /usr on a different partition )
    Also which UID number should give to /root 1000? 500?

    I make / about 30 GB, /swap a bit bigger than the amount of memeory you
    have (ie a bit bigger that 4GB since if you want to hibernate the
    system, you need to fit the memory into swap)
    I put /usr onto / but /usr/local is a link to a directory of another partition, which I call /local Ie, stuff you want to specially put onto
    the disk should be on a partition that you will not erase when you
    reinstall the OS.

    root is always UID 0. /root is root's home directory and should always
    be UID 0. Your users should start with somethink like 1500 because
    mageia keeps upping the number of system uids it wants.

    Just to be clear, to really give you good advice you need to tell us
    what you want to do with the machine (not what you do not want to do.

    Things to keep in mind: You will want to install updates in the future.
    There are two possible ways to go. One is just to upgrade the old OS to
    the new one. That is of course not possible if yuo change distributions.
    Some people also worry that that can cause more problems than the second possibility.

    The second is to install the new updated distro version from scratch.
    This has the advantage that you will get a new installation with nothing
    left over from the old installation to possibley cause problems. It has
    teh disadvantage that you have to reinstall or specify all of the
    configuration options you spent time setting up in the old version.

    In the second case it helps to have two root partitions. One for the new installation and one with the old. I would put in at least 30GB for
    each. When you update it also leaves the old version installed so that
    if something goes disasterously wrong with the installation, you can
    still boot up the old version, and fix stuff.So a minimum partitioning
    would be something like:
    A 500MB exfat /boot partition for your UFI. If Windows is already
    installed it should have already made one of these.
    a 30 GB partition for the Mageia installation, containing /usr, but with /usr/local a link to a subdirectory in another partition, eg /local
    A 30GB partition which is a spare for your installation of an update in
    the future.
    A 6GB swap partition.
    The rest of the Mageia stuff, including /usr/local and /home in
    directories of that partition, say /local
    So it has
    /local/usrlocal
    /local/home
    with links from /usr/local and /home.

    This puts programs which you installed and data you want into a
    partition (/local) which is isolated from the partition you will install
    This puts programs which you installed and data you want into a
    partition (/local) which is isolated from the partition you will install
    the OS onto or update

    Some people like to also have a separate partition for /var. I have
    never understood that, but it can save your bacon if something fills up /var/log ( which under my setup would also fill the / partition which is
    the where /var would be) and results even in your ability to log on
    since even root can no longer put anything into /.
    Up to you.



    they might seem obvious questions to many
    of you but to me is where I am always
    blocked wandering what to do...
    ANy help suggestion is welcomed.
    Also I hope to be able to read some
    of your suggestions before the screen
    gives up fully, otherwise I am going to be in trouble...

    You have a backup I hope.
    TIA

    Santo


    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From santo@2:250/1 to All on Fri Jan 29 11:01:28 2021
    On Fri, 29 Jan 2021 08:25:40 +0000, William Unruh wrote:

    On 2021-01-29, santo <santo@auroville.org.in> wrote:


    100GB Widows
    Why 100 GB Windows

    I purchased a GoGame program which run
    under Windows and want to continue using it.
    Also I like to make small video clip of me
    playing guitar and have not found any
    software which I could run under Mageia/Linux

    100GB was a minimum to install Windows
    I was told in case of updates etc...


    100GB data

    What data? for Linux or for Windows?

    Given that Windows is going to be installed
    I thought is a good idea to have a shared data partition.
    I have a data partition in my old system as well

    280 MAgeia

    Is that GB?
    yes...
    100 Windows
    100 Data
    280 Linux Mageia ( the hd is 480GB )

    Yes, you will need a small boot partition.

    this is where I am not sure...
    previously I also used to put /boot
    in a different partition,
    if I understand now I should not do it
    instead I have to give /boot/UFI its own
    partition but not sure about the size

    Note that hard drive sizes are in decimal. Ie 480 x10^9 bytes, not
    480 x2^30 bytes, And usually on filesystems the 2^30 is used. so your
    480GB file systems will not fit on a 480GB drive.
    (480 10^9= 441 GB)


    noted ...

    Is this the old system or the new one?
    Intel i3 10100 Processor
    Gigabyte GA H4 10M-H Motherboard
    Crucial 4GB DDR-2666 Desktop RAM
    Crucial BX500 480GB SSD
    Corsair CV45W SMPS
    SIlvestone Casing
    Windows 10


    yes, this is the new system...


    I am not sure what to do or how regard the /boot/UFI ,
    size etc...also not sure anymore how big /, /swap, should be and all the rest in /home
    ( In my old system I was also putting /usr on a different partition )
    Also which UID number should give to /root 1000? 500?

    I make / about 30 GB, /swap a bit bigger than the amount of memeory you
    have (ie a bit bigger that 4GB since if you want to hibernate the
    system, you need to fit the memory into swap)

    e.g. /swap 6GB?

    I put /usr onto / but /usr/local is a link to a directory of another partition, which I call /local Ie, stuff you want to specially put onto
    the disk should be on a partition that you will not erase when you
    reinstall the OS.

    I used to put /usr in a separate partition because
    I did not want to
    erase stuff in case of a reinstall...

    I always saw members referring to /usr/local or /local
    but never really understood where they get them from or why they are there
    as during partitioning I never seen those option .
    I guess if I go that way I have to name them myself?

    root is always UID 0. /root is root's home directory and should always
    be UID 0. Your users should start with somethink like 1500 because
    mageia keeps upping the number of system uids it wants.

    Yes sorry that was a slip...of course was my UID ...I think I will mak e it 1500...

    they might seem obvious questions to many
    of you but to me is where I am always
    blocked wandering what to do...
    ANy help suggestion is welcomed.
    Also I hope to be able to read some
    of your suggestions before the screen
    gives up fully, otherwise I am going to be in trouble...

    You have a backup I hope.

    yes I do...thanks for the info and suggestions
    I may have more before I start
    with the installation...I should get the new system
    sometime tomorrow so I expect to install Mageia on Sunday...

    So far I have in mind :

    / 30GB
    /boot/UFI ??
    /swap 6GB
    /usr 15GB

    /home remaining GB...



    --
    Running Mageia release 7 (Official) for x86_64 using Kernel=5.7.19-desktop-3.mga7 on x86_64 DM=sddm DE= ST=tty
    Card:ATI Radeon HD 5000 to HD 6300 (radeon/fglrx): Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.
    [AMD/ATI]|Kabini [Radeon HD 8400 / R3 Series] [DISPLAY_VGA]

    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: Aioe.org NNTP Server (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From santo@2:250/1 to All on Fri Jan 29 11:17:04 2021
    On Fri, 29 Jan 2021 09:39:33 +0000, William Unruh wrote:


    Just to be clear, to really give you good advice you need to tell us
    what you want to do with the machine (not what you do not want to do.

    OOps I saw this post after I replied to your previous one...

    I am not a high hand user .

    I use the PC for Internet browsing
    some small games, data storage, work related stuff and private matters etc...

    Things to keep in mind: You will want to install updates in the future.
    There are two possible ways to go. One is just to upgrade the old OS to
    the new one. That is of course not possible if yuo change distributions. Some people also worry that that can cause more problems than the second possibility.

    I always do clean install

    The second is to install the new updated distro version from scratch.
    This has the advantage that you will get a new installation with nothing
    left over from the old installation to possibley cause problems. It has
    teh disadvantage that you have to reinstall or specify all of the configuration options you spent time setting up in the old version.

    Given that it is a completely new system it will be a totally new installation.

    A 500MB exfat /boot partition for your UFI. If Windows is already
    installed it should have already made one of these.
    a 30 GB partition for the Mageia installation, containing /usr, but with /usr/local a link to a subdirectory in another partition, eg /local
    A 30GB partition which is a spare for your installation of an update in
    the future.

    the fact is I do not understand/know how to do this stuff...

    Is /usr/local and /local created by me during installation ?
    how should my partition table look like after install?


    what are the sizes? how to link them?
    I really do know how to do this stuff /sigh!/

    A 6GB swap partition.
    The rest of the Mageia stuff, including /usr/local and /home in
    directories of that partition, say /local
    So it has
    /local/usrlocal
    /local/home
    with links from /usr/local and /home.

    see above my difficulty...


    never put /var in a separate partiton and I do not see the use for me to do it...




    --
    Running Mageia release 7 (Official) for x86_64 using Kernel=5.7.19-desktop-3.mga7 on x86_64 DM=sddm DE= ST=tty
    Card:ATI Radeon HD 5000 to HD 6300 (radeon/fglrx):
    Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD/ATI]|Kabini [Radeon HD 8400 / R3 Series] [DISPLAY_VGA]

    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: Aioe.org NNTP Server (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From Jim Beard@2:250/1 to All on Fri Jan 29 14:49:32 2021
    On Fri, 29 Jan 2021 11:17:04 +0000, santo wrote:

    On Fri, 29 Jan 2021 09:39:33 +0000, William Unruh wrote:


    Just to be clear, to really give you good advice you need to tell us
    what you want to do with the machine (not what you do not want to do.

    OOps I saw this post after I replied to your previous one...

    I am not a high hand user .

    I use the PC for Internet browsing some small games, data storage, work related stuff and private matters etc...

    Things to keep in mind: You will want to install updates in the future.
    There are two possible ways to go. One is just to upgrade the old OS to
    the new one. That is of course not possible if yuo change
    distributions.
    Some people also worry that that can cause more problems than the
    second possibility.

    I always do clean install

    The second is to install the new updated distro version from scratch.
    This has the advantage that you will get a new installation with
    nothing left over from the old installation to possibley cause
    problems. It has teh disadvantage that you have to reinstall or specify
    all of the configuration options you spent time setting up in the old
    version.

    Given that it is a completely new system it will be a totally new installation.

    A 500MB exfat /boot partition for your UFI. If Windows is already
    installed it should have already made one of these.
    a 30 GB partition for the Mageia installation, containing /usr, but
    with /usr/local a link to a subdirectory in another partition, eg
    /local A 30GB partition which is a spare for your installation of an
    update in the future.

    the fact is I do not understand/know how to do this stuff...

    Is /usr/local and /local created by me during installation ?
    how should my partition table look like after install?


    what are the sizes? how to link them?
    I really do know how to do this stuff /sigh!/

    A 6GB swap partition.
    The rest of the Mageia stuff, including /usr/local and /home in
    directories of that partition, say /local So it has /local/usrlocal
    /local/home with links from /usr/local and /home.

    see above my difficulty...


    never put /var in a separate partiton and I do not see the use for me to
    do it...

    In some respects, I know only a little more than you do, but I may be
    able to clarify a few things. Please wait a bit and see if others
    provide corrections, in case I botch something.

    If the new system has Win 10 on it, it will have the small partition
    needed for UEFI. When you install mageia, that will be recognized, and
    your UEFI boot software will be put there, with additional boot software
    going into /boot as it currently does. That small partition should be at least 50MB and could be as large as 300MB or even 500MB.

    You will need to shrink the Win 10 partition to the 100GB recommended.
    There is Windows software that will do that, but you may need to search
    on the 'Net for instructions. I think Win 10 systems have a partition
    for recovery software, and that will take up some of your SSD space.

    If you want to access your data from both Win 10 and Mageia, it should be
    on its own partition and have a file system that both can read. That is
    the reason your supplier recommended an exFat partition. Size is your
    choice.

    Mageia / partition should be at least 30GB, and I would recommend 40GB or (even better) 50GB. This allows downloading all the rpm packages needed
    to upgrade from e.g. Mageia 7 to Mageia 8 and installing all of it all at once. FWIW, Mageia 8 should be available in weeks ahead. If possible,
    you might want to wait for it, or maybe install the run candidate version
    and then update from that to the regular version.

    Mageia has instructions (on its wiki?) for installing from Cauldron if
    you decide to install the run candidate.

    SWAP will go on its own partition, and should be as large as your RAM in
    the system. You specified 4GB RAM. I would recommend 6GB or 8GB, but
    that does cost more.

    I would allow the Mageia installer to create /usr, /bin, /sbin, /opt or /usr/opt, /local or /usr/local and /var as part of the file system on /
    (the root partition). I would not create a separate partition for them.
    ext4 is probably the best format for that file partition.

    The remainder of your SSD can be used to create a partition (ext4) for
    /home/ and any user home directories under it.

    Do you wish to have a separate partition on your SSD for backup? If you
    have lots of disk space available, that might be a good idea, but backup
    to a WD Passport or other detachable drive might be better. Hot backup
    to a partition on the SSD plus a WD Passport for more secure backup is
    another possibility, but I am not sure you need both.

    Cheers!

    jim b.

    --
    UNIX is not user-unfriendly, it merely expects users to be computer-
    friendly.

    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From Bit Twister@2:250/1 to All on Fri Jan 29 14:52:41 2021
    On Fri, 29 Jan 2021 06:18:34 +0000 (UTC), santo wrote:
    My very old computer is giving up...
    serious motherboard problem re. the screen
    Planning to Install dual boot...
    am not at all a high end user, no big games
    no huge amount of data save for few fotos and movies...

    100GB Widows
    100GB data
    280 MAgeia

    Intel i3 10100 Processor
    Gigabyte GA H4 10M-H Motherboard
    Crucial 4GB DDR-2666 Desktop RAM
    Crucial BX500 480GB SSD
    Corsair CV45W SMPS
    SIlvestone Casing
    Windows 10

    I am not sure what to do or how regard the /boot/UFI ,
    size etc...also not sure anymore how big /, /swap, should be and all the rest in /home

    Swap should be at least the size of ram.
    Putting
    linux hibernate swap size
    in the first box at
    https://www.google.com/advanced_search
    gets me
    About 681,000 results (0.53 seconds)

    Just reading first screen suggests 2xRam for swap size on your system.

    ( In my old system I was also putting /usr on a different partition )

    Depends on you OS Release upgrade methodology. If doing clean installs,
    then /usr needs to in / for each install.

    Also which UID number should give to /root 1000? 500?

    root should be 0, For users, I started at 1500 just to give extra user
    id headroom/space just in case systemd grows past 999. :(

    I do clean installs in separate partitions.

    I use the Classic Install iso, select all package groups, and use Xfce
    as my Desktop Environment.
    $ df -h /
    Filesystem Size Used Avail Use% Mounted on
    /dev/sda3 41G 5.8G 33G 16% /

    I then add on a bunch of apps and games taking Used to
    $ df -h /
    Filesystem Size Used Avail Use% Mounted on
    /dev/sda3 41G 15G 24G 39% /

    Run "df -h /" and I suggest double of Used is your minimum partition size.
    My extra space is to have room for a huge update download, and a bit
    of extra space for new applications install.

    I do not recommend a shared/separated /home partition if doing clean
    installs and booting between installs.

    I have /home in /, and links to /accounts/$USER for directories/files
    shared between installs. Examples:
    .bash_profile -> /accounts/bittwister/.bash_profile
    bkup -> /accounts/bittwister/bkup
    Desktop -> /accounts/bittwister/Desktop
    Documents -> /accounts/bittwister/Documents
    mail -> /accounts/bittwister/mail
    .thunderbird -> /accounts/bittwister/.thunderbird

    I have an "install_links" script which reads /accounts/$USER/
    and creates links in /home/$USER.

    I have separate partitions for non-user specific storage like movies,
    pictures and whatnot.

    Makes backups/restores much easier.

    $ lsblk -o NAME,TYPE,FSTYPE,MOUNTPOINT,SIZE,FSAVAIL,FSUSED,LABEL,PARTLABEL
    NAME TYPE FSTYPE MOUNTPOINT SIZE FSAVAIL FSUSED LABEL PARTLABEL
    sda disk 931.5G
    ├─sda1 part ext4 41G mga6 mga6 ├─sda2 part ext4 41G mga7 mga7 ├─sda3 part ext4 / 41G 23.5G 14.5G mga8 mga8 ├─sda4 part ext4 41G cauldron cauldron ├─sda5 part ext4 /local 20G 17.9G 616.7M local local ├─sda6 part ext4 /accounts 20.9G 16.6G 2.8G accounts accounts ├─sda7 part ext4 /misc 29.1G 6.1G 20.9G misc misc ├─sda8 part ext4 /spare 382.3G 295.7G 60.5G spare spare └─sda9 part 1M bios_grub sdb disk 931.5G
    ├─sdb1 part swap [SWAP] 5.6G swap swap ├─sdb2 part ext4 31.5G bk_up bk_up ├─sdb3 part ext4 41.1G hotbu hotbu ├─sdb4 part ext4 41G cauldron_bkup cauldron_bkup
    ├─sdb5 part ext4 /myth 115.4G 103.5G 4.1G myth myth ├─sdb6 part ext4 /vmguest 230G 204.8G 9.9G vmguest vmguest └─sdb7 part ext4 467G net_ins net_ins sr0 rom 1024M

    Since you indicated SSD drive, You need to pay attention as to where each partition starts/stops.

    Sorry I can not help there since I use spinning hard drives.

    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From santo@2:250/1 to All on Fri Jan 29 16:52:20 2021
    On Fri, 29 Jan 2021 08:52:41 -0600, Bit Twister wrote:


    Swap should be at least the size of ram.
    Putting
    linux hibernate swap size
    in the first box at
    https://www.google.com/advanced_search
    gets me
    About 681,000 results (0.53 seconds)

    Just reading first screen suggests 2xRam for swap size on your system.


    Lots of info...thanks,
    :-)
    printed, will read carefully and
    will keep by my side will before starting the install...
    I have to keep this system on all the time because
    if I shud down I will not be able to get the
    screen working again...
    If Murphy does not interfere I am sure it will be OK...
    Tomorrow will gtet the new one and will Install on Sunday

    Santo


    --
    Running Mageia release 7 (Official) for x86_64 using Kernel=5.7.19-desktop-3.mga7 on x86_64 DM=sddm DE= ST=tty
    Card:ATI Radeon HD 5000 to HD 6300 (radeon/fglrx):
    Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. [AMD/ATI]|Kabini [Radeon HD 8400 / R3 Series] [DISPLAY_VGA]

    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: Aioe.org NNTP Server (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From santo@2:250/1 to All on Fri Jan 29 16:56:41 2021
    On Fri, 29 Jan 2021 14:49:32 +0000, Jim Beard wrote:

    On Fri, 29 Jan 2021 11:17:04 +0000, santo wrote:


    In some respects, I know only a little more than you do,

    This is not true, you know much more...I read your posts...
    :-)

    anyway thank you for your suggestions printed
    as I did with Bitwister post, and will go through it.
    Some important points have already been clarified by both

    Then will install...
    thanks again


    --
    Running Mageia release 7 (Official) for x86_64 using Kernel=5.7.19-desktop-3.mga7 on x86_64 DM=sddm DE= ST=tty
    Card:ATI Radeon HD 5000 to HD 6300 (radeon/fglrx): Advanced Micro Devices, Inc.
    [AMD/ATI]|Kabini [Radeon HD 8400 / R3 Series] [DISPLAY_VGA]

    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: Aioe.org NNTP Server (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From William Unruh@2:250/1 to All on Fri Jan 29 18:00:46 2021
    On 2021-01-29, santo <santo@auroville.org.in> wrote:
    On Fri, 29 Jan 2021 09:39:33 +0000, William Unruh wrote:


    Just to be clear, to really give you good advice you need to tell us
    what you want to do with the machine (not what you do not want to do.

    OOps I saw this post after I replied to your previous one...

    I am not a high hand user .

    I use the PC for Internet browsing
    some small games, data storage, work related stuff and private matters etc...



    Things to keep in mind: You will want to install updates in the future.
    There are two possible ways to go. One is just to upgrade the old OS to
    the new one. That is of course not possible if yuo change distributions.
    Some people also worry that that can cause more problems than the second
    possibility.

    I always do clean install

    OK, then my advice of making 2 30GB or 40GB partitions is good. They are
    for / in the current booting version and a spare for the where you will
    install the next operating system version. (call is /spareroot)


    The second is to install the new updated distro version from scratch.
    This has the advantage that you will get a new installation with nothing
    left over from the old installation to possibley cause problems. It has
    teh disadvantage that you have to reinstall or specify all of the
    configuration options you spent time setting up in the old version.

    Given that it is a completely new system it will be a totally new installation.

    A 500MB exfat /boot partition for your UFI. If Windows is already
    installed it should have already made one of these.
    a 30 GB partition for the Mageia installation, containing /usr, but with
    /usr/local a link to a subdirectory in another partition, eg /local
    A 30GB partition which is a spare for your installation of an update in
    the future.

    the fact is I do not understand/know how to do this stuff...

    When you set up the disk, which you apparently do know how to do since
    you have installed before, make your four partitions. swap , /, /spare
    (each of say 30GB) and /local
    Install .

    After you have installed and booted into the new installation and logged
    on as root,

    mkdir /local/home
    mv /home /local/home
    ln -s /local/home /home

    That puts the home directory storage onto /local/home
    mv /usr/local /local/usrlocal
    ln -s /local/usrlocal /usr/local

    (When you reinstall, you can simply again set up links (ln) for these
    two and preserve all the stuff you so lovingly put into /usr/local or
    /home



    Is /usr/local and /local created by me during installation ?

    /local is created by you.
    how should my partition table look like after install?

    The partitions will be / and /spare and /local and the swap.



    what are the sizes? how to link them?

    I told you the sizes.

    I really do know how to do this stuff /sigh!/

    A 6GB swap partition.
    The rest of the Mageia stuff, including /usr/local and /home in
    directories of that partition, say /local
    So it has
    /local/usrlocal
    /local/home
    with links from /usr/local and /home.

    see above my difficulty...


    never put /var in a separate partiton and I do not see the use for me to do it...

    That is fine. It is up to you.





    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From William Unruh@2:250/1 to All on Fri Jan 29 18:10:54 2021
    On 2021-01-29, Jim Beard <jim.beard@verizon.net> wrote:
    On Fri, 29 Jan 2021 11:17:04 +0000, santo wrote:

    On Fri, 29 Jan 2021 09:39:33 +0000, William Unruh wrote:


    Just to be clear, to really give you good advice you need to tell us
    what you want to do with the machine (not what you do not want to do.

    OOps I saw this post after I replied to your previous one...

    I am not a high hand user .

    I use the PC for Internet browsing some small games, data storage, work
    related stuff and private matters etc...

    Things to keep in mind: You will want to install updates in the future.
    There are two possible ways to go. One is just to upgrade the old OS to
    the new one. That is of course not possible if yuo change
    distributions.
    Some people also worry that that can cause more problems than the
    second possibility.

    I always do clean install

    The second is to install the new updated distro version from scratch.
    This has the advantage that you will get a new installation with
    nothing left over from the old installation to possibley cause
    problems. It has teh disadvantage that you have to reinstall or specify
    all of the configuration options you spent time setting up in the old
    version.

    Given that it is a completely new system it will be a totally new
    installation.

    A 500MB exfat /boot partition for your UFI. If Windows is already
    installed it should have already made one of these.
    a 30 GB partition for the Mageia installation, containing /usr, but
    with /usr/local a link to a subdirectory in another partition, eg
    /local A 30GB partition which is a spare for your installation of an
    update in the future.

    the fact is I do not understand/know how to do this stuff...

    Is /usr/local and /local created by me during installation ?
    how should my partition table look like after install?


    what are the sizes? how to link them?
    I really do know how to do this stuff /sigh!/

    A 6GB swap partition.
    The rest of the Mageia stuff, including /usr/local and /home in
    directories of that partition, say /local So it has /local/usrlocal
    /local/home with links from /usr/local and /home.

    see above my difficulty...


    never put /var in a separate partiton and I do not see the use for me to
    do it...

    In some respects, I know only a little more than you do, but I may be
    able to clarify a few things. Please wait a bit and see if others
    provide corrections, in case I botch something.

    If the new system has Win 10 on it, it will have the small partition
    needed for UEFI. When you install mageia, that will be recognized, and
    your UEFI boot software will be put there, with additional boot software going into /boot as it currently does. That small partition should be at least 50MB and could be as large as 300MB or even 500MB.

    You will need to shrink the Win 10 partition to the 100GB recommended. There is Windows software that will do that, but you may need to search
    on the 'Net for instructions. I think Win 10 systems have a partition
    for recovery software, and that will take up some of your SSD space.

    If you want to access your data from both Win 10 and Mageia, it should be
    on its own partition and have a file system that both can read. That is
    the reason your supplier recommended an exFat partition. Size is your choice.

    Mageia / partition should be at least 30GB, and I would recommend 40GB or (even better) 50GB. This allows downloading all the rpm packages needed
    to upgrade from e.g. Mageia 7 to Mageia 8 and installing all of it all at once. FWIW, Mageia 8 should be available in weeks ahead. If possible,
    you might want to wait for it, or maybe install the run candidate version and then update from that to the regular version.

    Mageia has instructions (on its wiki?) for installing from Cauldron if
    you decide to install the run candidate.

    SWAP will go on its own partition, and should be as large as your RAM in
    the system. You specified 4GB RAM. I would recommend 6GB or 8GB, but
    that does cost more.

    I would allow the Mageia installer to create /usr, /bin, /sbin, /opt or /usr/opt, /local or /usr/local and /var as part of the file system on /
    (the root partition). I would not create a separate partition for them. ext4 is probably the best format for that file partition.

    Whether you allow it or not, it will create them. As I said I recommend changing it so /usr/local points to something on a different partition.
    It is the place for outside programs and libraries that you install
    outside of the official Mageia set of program. You could also do the
    same for /opt, and stick that into /local with a link from /opt to say, /local/opt. The reason for these is that when you reinstall, you will essentially wipe the / partition. If /usr/local/ or /opt in in the /
    partition, you will have to recreate all that stuff that you put into
    /opt and /usr/local.


    The remainder of your SSD can be used to create a partition (ext4) for /home/ and any user home directories under it.

    What you call that large partition for changing stuff does not matter.
    You could call it /home, and put a /home/usrlocal and /home/opt into it
    instead of /local.


    Do you wish to have a separate partition on your SSD for backup? If you

    Bad idea. Backup is for when something happens to your disk. It is a bad
    idea to put the backup on that same disk that is the reason for needing
    a backup.
    At least, as you suggest, buy a cheap hard drive (not SSD) put it in, and put your backup
    on that instead. Or buy a 1TB usb drive and put your backup on that.


    have lots of disk space available, that might be a good idea, but backup
    to a WD Passport or other detachable drive might be better. Hot backup
    to a partition on the SSD plus a WD Passport for more secure backup is another possibility, but I am not sure you need both.

    Cheers!

    jim b.


    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From Bit Twister@2:250/1 to All on Fri Jan 29 19:31:18 2021
    On Fri, 29 Jan 2021 16:52:20 +0000 (UTC), santo wrote:
    On Fri, 29 Jan 2021 08:52:41 -0600, Bit Twister wrote:


    Swap should be at least the size of ram.
    Putting
    linux hibernate swap size
    in the first box at
    https://www.google.com/advanced_search
    gets me
    About 681,000 results (0.53 seconds)

    Just reading first screen suggests 2xRam for swap size on your system.


    Lots of info...thanks,
    :-)
    printed, will read carefully and
    will keep by my side will before starting the install...

    I would suggest downloading a rescue cd, either burning it to cd or to
    usb per instructions on site. I use it to create/modify partitions.
    Latest Release is 2020-11-22 https://www.system-rescue.org/Download/

    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From santo@2:250/1 to All on Fri Feb 5 11:14:41 2021
    On Fri, 29 Jan 2021 18:00:46 +0000, William Unruh wrote:


    OK, then my advice of making 2 30GB or 40GB partitions is good. They are
    for / in the current booting version and a spare for the where you will install the next operating system version. (call is /spareroot)

    OK...Mageia7.1 installed.

    I had no idea how to create a usb bootable drive and the explanation I
    found on the Mageia site and elsewhere were too difficult for me to
    understand so I shifted the cdrom from the old system to this new one and installed from DVD.
    I really wanted to create 2 / partition and call the second one
    /spareroot ...I liked the idea that when Mageia8 was released I could use
    that one but nowhere I was given the chance to create another / and
    'call' it like that.
    After creating the first / partition I was never given the option to
    create another one.
    I left 30GB free space maybe I will be able to use that space as / when installing Mageia8?

    same for the /local or usr/local...I wonder when and how are you guys
    creating and naming them that way...

    The second is to install the new updated distro version from scratch.
    This has the advantage that you will get a new installation with
    nothing left over from the old installation to possibley cause
    problems. It has teh disadvantage that you have to reinstall or
    specify all of the configuration options you spent time setting up in
    the old version.

    exactly...

    Given that it is a completely new system it will be a totally new
    installation.

    A 500MB exfat /boot partition for your UFI. If Windows is already
    installed it should have already made one of these.

    yes it had one already but only 100MB did not tamper with it even if I
    had the chance...

    the fact is I do not understand/know how to do this stuff...

    When you set up the disk, which you apparently do know how to do since
    you have installed before, make your four partitions. swap , /, /spare
    (each of say 30GB) and /local Install .

    OK...this is what confuses me...is this passage when I select the free
    spaces during Custom disk partition or is sometime before installing ?
    because as I said before during custom disk partitioning I was not able
    to do it...

    Thanks anyway for your help...
    Santo

    this is what it looks like now...
    /usr and /opt /home are on a separate partition...
    Filesystem Size Used Avail Use% Mounted on
    devtmpfs 1.9G 0 1.9G 0% /dev
    tmpfs 1.9G 0 1.9G 0% /dev/shm
    tmpfs 1.9G 1.1M 1.9G 1% /run
    /dev/sda6 29G 100M 28G 1% /
    /dev/sda8 20G 3.5G 15G 20% /usr
    tmpfs 1.9G 0 1.9G 0% /sys/fs/cgroup
    tmpfs 1.9G 8.0K 1.9G 1% /tmp
    /dev/sda1 96M 27M 70M 28% /boot/EFI
    /dev/sda11 25G 51M 25G 1% /home
    /dev/sda10 153G 139M 145G 1% /var
    /dev/sda9 9.6G 37M 9.1G 1% /opt
    /dev/sda3 98G 24G 74G 25% /media/windows
    tmpfs 381M 24K 381M 1% /run/user/1000
    /dev/sr0 4.2G 4.2G 0 100% /run/media/santo/Mageia-7.1-x86_64 [santo@localhost ~]$


    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: Aioe.org NNTP Server (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From Bit Twister@2:250/1 to All on Fri Feb 5 13:36:27 2021
    On Fri, 5 Feb 2021 11:14:41 +0000 (UTC), santo wrote:
    On Fri, 29 Jan 2021 18:00:46 +0000, William Unruh wrote:


    OK, then my advice of making 2 30GB or 40GB partitions is good. They are
    for / in the current booting version and a spare for the where you will
    install the next operating system version. (call is /spareroot)

    OK...Mageia7.1 installed.

    I had no idea how to create a usb bootable drive and the explanation I
    found on the Mageia site and elsewhere were too difficult for me to understand so I shifted the cdrom from the old system to this new one and installed from DVD.
    I really wanted to create 2 / partition and call the second one
    /spareroot ...I liked the idea that when Mageia8 was released I could use that one but nowhere I was given the chance to create another / and
    'call' it like that.

    Those kinds of install restrictions are why I use a rescue cd/usb to
    run gparted to create/format/label all desired partitions.
    I can recommend https://www.system-rescue.org/Download/
    Web page has easy instructions to burn to usb.

    After creating the first / partition I was never given the option to
    create another one.
    I left 30GB free space maybe I will be able to use that space as / when installing Mageia8?

    same for the /local or usr/local...I wonder when and how are you guys creating and naming them that way...

    For me, either using a rescue cd's gparted or the gparted rpm I always
    install. gparted will not let you resize an active/mounted partition.


    When you set up the disk, which you apparently do know how to do since
    you have installed before, make your four partitions. swap , /, /spare
    (each of say 30GB) and /local Install .

    OK...this is what confuses me...is this passage when I select the free
    spaces during Custom disk partition or is sometime before installing ? because as I said before during custom disk partitioning I was not able
    to do it...

    Thanks anyway for your help...
    Santo

    this is what it looks like now...
    /usr and /opt /home are on a separate partition...
    Filesystem Size Used Avail Use% Mounted on
    /dev/sda1 96M 27M 70M 28% /boot/EFI
    /dev/sda3 98G 24G 74G 25% /media/windows
    /dev/sda6 29G 100M 28G 1% /
    /dev/sda8 20G 3.5G 15G 20% /usr
    /dev/sda9 9.6G 37M 9.1G 1% /opt
    /dev/sda11 25G 51M 25G 1% /home
    /dev/sda10 153G 139M 145G 1% /var


    You have ignored advice to not have separate /usr, /var, /home partitions
    if you want to multi-boot linux installs.

    Your current setup is very wasteful. Take /var for example.
    You are only using 139M yet you allocated 153G of your drive space. :(

    /usr is also a waste. The suggested / size took into account the space
    used by /usr and /var.

    Note: you can only fix this setup using a rescue cd.
    You will have to use gpated for partition work
    rsync to move /usr, and /var
    editor to fix /etc/fstab

    Or use rescue gparted to re-partition, then reinstall Mageia using
    custom partitioning to pick where to install.

    In my stupid opinion, you could create 3 30g partitions to have a
    previous, current, next Linux installs.

    Sharing /home between installs is a good way to screw up user login.
    I have /accounts for my /home files that are shared between
    previous, current, next installs.




    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From santo@2:250/1 to All on Fri Feb 5 15:05:16 2021
    On Fri, 05 Feb 2021 07:36:27 -0600, Bit Twister wrote:


    You have ignored advice to not have separate /usr, /var, /home
    partitions if you want to multi-boot linux installs.

    I am shocked...I have no idea how all this came about...!!!

    I do not remember creating a separate partition for /var I would never do
    that I have no idea how it come to have 145 G...
    Long ago I remeber I was given the suggestion to have a separate
    partition for /usr so that progrms etc installed there remain in case of
    a new install...I always did and there was never any issue with it...



    In my stupid opinion, you could create 3 30g partitions to have a
    previous, current, next Linux installs.

    tried but as I wrote I do not seem to be able to
    do it when selecting Custom Partition so I really do not know how to
    create 2 even less 3...

    Sharing /home between installs is a good way to screw up user login.

    It has happened with one of my previous installation and you helped me
    solve that screw up

    I have /accounts for my /home files that are shared between previous, current, next installs.

    you have /account many here have /local or /usr/local or /spareroot
    etc... I always wondered how and from where they were coming from......

    sorry I am repeating myself

    I will reinstall...


    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: Aioe.org NNTP Server (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From Bit Twister@2:250/1 to All on Fri Feb 5 15:45:05 2021
    On Fri, 5 Feb 2021 15:05:16 +0000 (UTC), santo wrote:
    On Fri, 05 Feb 2021 07:36:27 -0600, Bit Twister wrote:


    You have ignored advice to not have separate /usr, /var, /home
    partitions if you want to multi-boot linux installs.

    I am shocked...I have no idea how all this came about...!!!

    I do not remember creating a separate partition for /var I would never do that I have no idea how it come to have 145 G...
    Long ago I remeber I was given the suggestion to have a separate
    partition for /usr so that progrms etc installed there remain in case of
    a new install...I always did and there was never any issue with it...



    In my stupid opinion, you could create 3 30g partitions to have a
    previous, current, next Linux installs.

    tried but as I wrote I do not seem to be able to
    do it when selecting Custom Partition so I really do not know how to
    create 2 even less 3...

    Sharing /home between installs is a good way to screw up user login.

    It has happened with one of my previous installation and you helped me
    solve that screw up

    I have /accounts for my /home files that are shared between previous,
    current, next installs.

    you have /account many here have /local or /usr/local or /spareroot
    etc... I always wondered how and from where they were coming from......

    Everyone has /usr/local. It is a default.
    I created/use /local for sharing stuff between releases.

    $ ls /local
    bin cron icons log opt ppp tmp
    config doc lock lost+found phone sounds


    I will reinstall...

    Download/burn rescue cd
    Decide what partitions and size to create and label.
    Boot rescue cd, bottom left should have an icon to launch gparted.
    create a partition, format ext4, set media label, set partition label
    and click Apply.
    Do same for each new partition, then boot your OS install cd/dvd.

    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From Bit Twister@2:250/1 to All on Fri Feb 5 15:47:54 2021
    On Fri, 5 Feb 2021 09:45:05 -0600, Bit Twister wrote:
    On Fri, 5 Feb 2021 15:05:16 +0000 (UTC), santo wrote:
    On Fri, 05 Feb 2021 07:36:27 -0600, Bit Twister wrote:


    You have ignored advice to not have separate /usr, /var, /home
    partitions if you want to multi-boot linux installs.

    I am shocked...I have no idea how all this came about...!!!

    I do not remember creating a separate partition for /var I would never do
    that I have no idea how it come to have 145 G...
    Long ago I remeber I was given the suggestion to have a separate
    partition for /usr so that progrms etc installed there remain in case of
    a new install...I always did and there was never any issue with it...



    In my stupid opinion, you could create 3 30g partitions to have a
    previous, current, next Linux installs.

    tried but as I wrote I do not seem to be able to
    do it when selecting Custom Partition so I really do not know how to
    create 2 even less 3...

    Sharing /home between installs is a good way to screw up user login.

    It has happened with one of my previous installation and you helped me
    solve that screw up

    I have /accounts for my /home files that are shared between previous,
    current, next installs.

    you have /account many here have /local or /usr/local or /spareroot
    etc... I always wondered how and from where they were coming from......

    Everyone has /usr/local. It is a default.
    I created/use /local for sharing stuff between releases.

    $ ls /local
    bin cron icons log opt ppp tmp
    config doc lock lost+found phone sounds


    I will reinstall...

    Download/burn rescue cd
    Decide what partitions and size to create and label.
    Boot rescue cd, bottom left should have an icon to launch gparted.
    create a partition, format ext4, set media label, set partition label
    and click Apply.
    Do same for each new partition, then boot your OS install cd/dvd.

    Forgot, You need to pick custom during partitioning phase/step.

    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From Jim Beard@2:250/1 to All on Fri Feb 5 16:40:00 2021
    On Fri, 05 Feb 2021 11:14:41 +0000, santo wrote:
    On Fri, 29 Jan 2021 18:00:46 +0000, William Unruh wrote:
    OK, then my advice of making 2 30GB or 40GB partitions is good. They are
    for / in the current booting version and a spare for the where you will install the next operating system version. (call is /spareroot)

    OK...Mageia7.1 installed.

    I had no idea how to create a usb bootable drive and the explanation I
    found on the Mageia site and elsewhere were too difficult for me to
    understand so I shifted the cdrom from the old system to this new one and installed from DVD.

    I really wanted to create 2 / partition and call the second one
    /spareroot ...I liked the idea that when Mageia8 was released I could use
    that one but nowhere I was given the chance to create another / and
    'call' it like that.

    One name for a partition is contained in firmware on the motherboard.
    That name should never be duplicated in that firmware. Most system
    software will not allow you to duplicate that name in that firmware.
    I think you somehow created name "/" for a partition in that firmware.

    It is completely independent of the / name that your operating sees
    and shows as the "name" of the root partition. That name / is
    contained in an initrd.*img file found in /boot (for Linux).

    During booting, one of the initrd files from /boot is copied to
    /initrd, and used to boot, with the "/" partition name in that
    initrd file determining which will be the "root partition" of
    the system when booted.

    After creating the first / partition I was never given the option to
    create another one.

    As mentioned, you can create only one instance of a name for a
    partition in the firmware. You do not need any partition to be
    named / in that firmware.

    Within operating system software for one os, you likewise can have only
    one named / (root) partition. If you have 14 operating systems
    installed on a disk, each on a separate partition, each one
    will have its own / partition, and each of those partitions
    will have its own (different) name in firmware.

    I left 30GB free space maybe I will be able to use that space as / when
    installing Mageia8?

    Yes, when you install Mageia8, you can tell the installer to name
    that 30GB partition /. The installer will put that name "/" in the
    initrd file that will be created for that Mageia8.

    You also have 145G currently used for /var in its own partition.
    That could be resized to provide 100G or more for Mageia8.

    same for the /local or usr/local...I wonder when and how are you guys
    creating and naming them that way...

    The same sort of parallel names applies for other partitions. One
    name for the actual hardware partition in firmware. The name used
    by the booted operating system is completely independent. It is
    created for and contained in the initrd file for the operating system.

    Do you have lsblk installed? If not, I would suggest installing
    util-linux. That allows an easy means to display partitions and their
    hardware and current-os names.

    If you have Mageia 7 installed, you can also load mageia control center
    (mcc), then go to Local disks and then to manage disk partitions. You
    may need to shift to expert mode to get some information on partitions.

    Look over the partition names listed at the top. One set of names
    pertains to hardware (e.g. sda) and then below that you have names for
    the partitions assigned by and for the current operating system.

    The second is to install the new updated distro version from scratch.
    This has the advantage that you will get a new installation with
    nothing left over from the old installation to possibley cause
    problems. It has teh disadvantage that you have to reinstall or
    specify all of the configuration options you spent time setting up in
    the old version.

    exactly...

    Given that it is a completely new system it will be a totally new
    installation.

    A 500MB exfat /boot partition for your UFI. If Windows is already
    installed it should have already made one of these.

    yes it had one already but only 100MB did not tamper with it even if I
    had the chance...

    A 100MB exfat partition for UFI is more than large enough for several operating systems. Win10 will have boot software in there, as will
    Mageia once you have installed one (or more) Mageia versions.

    the fact is I do not understand/know how to do this stuff...

    When you set up the disk, which you apparently do know how to do since
    you have installed before, make your four partitions. swap , /, /spare
    (each of say 30GB) and /local Install .

    OK...this is what confuses me...is this passage when I select the free
    spaces during Custom disk partition or is sometime before installing ?
    because as I said before during custom disk partitioning I was not able
    to do it...

    First, you must have partitions created for UFI (the exfat partition,
    I think that already exists), probably more than one partition for
    Windows, and have free space available for Mageia to create partitions.

    Gparted can come in handy here. This is all before you install Mageia.
    You can create the new Mageia partitions you want at this point using
    gparted (or the sysrescue disk, if I remember correctly).

    Or, you can start the install for Mageia and during Custom disk partition create and label (name for os use) the partitions you want.


    In the following, why is /var 145G ? Actual space used by /var
    on my system is under 10GB. That could be resized to create
    space for another operating system or two, depending on how
    big you want the partition file systems to be in the new ones.

    #####
    this is what it looks like now...
    /usr and /opt /home are on a separate partition...
    Filesystem Size Used Avail Use% Mounted on
    /dev/sda1 96M 27M 70M 28% /boot/EFI
    /dev/sda6 29G 100M 28G 1% /
    /dev/sda8 20G 3.5G 15G 20% /usr
    /dev/sda11 25G 51M 25G 1% /home
    /dev/sda10 153G 139M 145G 1% /var
    /dev/sda9 9.6G 37M 9.1G 1% /opt
    /dev/sda3 98G 24G 74

    #You have seven disk partitions listed above.

    devtmpfs 1.9G 0 1.9G 0% /dev
    tmpfs 1.9G 0 1.9G 0% /dev/shm
    tmpfs 1.9G 1.1M 1.9G 1% /run
    tmpfs 1.9G 0 1.9G 0% /sys/fs/cgroup
    tmpfs 1.9G 8.0K 1.9G 1% /tmp

    Cheers!

    jim b.

    --
    UNIX is not user-unfriendly, it merely expects users to be computer-
    friendly.

    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From William Unruh@2:250/1 to All on Fri Feb 5 20:37:59 2021
    On 2021-02-05, santo <nanci@auroville.org.in> wrote:
    On Fri, 29 Jan 2021 18:00:46 +0000, William Unruh wrote:


    OK, then my advice of making 2 30GB or 40GB partitions is good. They are
    for / in the current booting version and a spare for the where you will
    install the next operating system version. (call is /spareroot)

    OK...Mageia7.1 installed.

    I had no idea how to create a usb bootable drive and the explanation I
    found on the Mageia site and elsewhere were too difficult for me to understand so I shifted the cdrom from the old system to this new one and installed from DVD.
    I really wanted to create 2 / partition and call the second one
    /spareroot ...I liked the idea that when Mageia8 was released I could use that one but nowhere I was given the chance to create another / and
    'call' it like that.

    There is nothing special about a boot partition. It is simply another
    partition just like all the others. You just make another partition and
    give it the name /spareroot. Jut like you make a partition and give it
    the name /home, or /local, or whatever.

    After creating the first / partition I was never given the option to
    create another one.

    There is NOTHING special about a / partition except its contents, and a
    note in /etc/fstab that you want it placed on /. Thus in Mageia 7.1 you
    call that partition / On Mageia 8 you tell the system you want to use
    the partition which you mount on /spareroot on 7.1 on / when you boot 8.

    I left 30GB free space maybe I will be able to use that space as / when installing Mageia8?

    Sure. Just make the partition and call it /spareroot for now. When you
    install 8 tell 8 to put the / contents into that partition.


    same for the /local or usr/local...I wonder when and how are you guys creating and naming them that way...

    You do not chose the automatic way but the manual paritioning . And you
    give it whatever name you want. It may suggest you call it something,
    but you can change that.



    The second is to install the new updated distro version from scratch.
    This has the advantage that you will get a new installation with
    nothing left over from the old installation to possibley cause
    problems. It has teh disadvantage that you have to reinstall or
    specify all of the configuration options you spent time setting up in
    the old version.

    exactly...

    Given that it is a completely new system it will be a totally new
    installation.

    A 500MB exfat /boot partition for your UFI. If Windows is already
    installed it should have already made one of these.

    yes it had one already but only 100MB did not tamper with it even if I
    had the chance...

    You can change that if you want, by I do not know why you would want to.


    the fact is I do not understand/know how to do this stuff...

    When you set up the disk, which you apparently do know how to do since
    you have installed before, make your four partitions. swap , /, /spare
    (each of say 30GB) and /local Install .

    OK...this is what confuses me...is this passage when I select the free spaces during Custom disk partition or is sometime before installing ? because as I said before during custom disk partitioning I was not able
    to do it...

    Thanks anyway for your help...
    Santo

    this is what it looks like now...
    /usr and /opt /home are on a separate partition...
    Filesystem Size Used Avail Use% Mounted on
    devtmpfs 1.9G 0 1.9G 0% /dev
    tmpfs 1.9G 0 1.9G 0% /dev/shm
    tmpfs 1.9G 1.1M 1.9G 1% /run
    /dev/sda6 29G 100M 28G 1% /
    /dev/sda8 20G 3.5G 15G 20% /usr
    tmpfs 1.9G 0 1.9G 0% /sys/fs/cgroup
    tmpfs 1.9G 8.0K 1.9G 1% /tmp
    /dev/sda1 96M 27M 70M 28% /boot/EFI
    /dev/sda11 25G 51M 25G 1% /home
    /dev/sda10 153G 139M 145G 1% /var
    /dev/sda9 9.6G 37M 9.1G 1% /opt
    /dev/sda3 98G 24G 74G 25% /media/windows
    tmpfs 381M 24K 381M 1% /run/user/1000
    /dev/sr0 4.2G 4.2G 0 100% /run/media/santo/Mageia-7.1-x86_64 [santo@localhost ~]$

    So you manged to make /home, /var, /opt, Having 153GB for /var is just
    silly. Go into /etc/fstab, and rename /var as /local. Make a directory
    called /local
    (mkdir /local as root)
    reboot.
    Now everything that was in /var will now be in /local.
    Copy over everything in /local into /var
    rsync -av /local/ /var

    (that might be better done using a boot disk, or a live distro, because
    /var tends to be used always while running the computer, and the
    procedure make leave things a bit unstable. I would thus advise reboot imediately after you have copied over /var.)

    I would tranfer /opt to /local
    As root
    rsync -av /opt /local/opt
    umount /opt
    rmdir /opt
    ln -s /local/opt /opt

    Now /opt conents will be in /local/opt, and you will have a link from
    /opt to /local/opt

    Or you can just leave /opt alone. Both would be acceptable. It will
    leave you with 9GB that is really not used for much in either case.


    I do not know why you made a separate directory for /usr either, but
    Nothing really harmed by doing so, except maybe lost space. When you
    reinstall Mga8 I would tell it not to use a separate partition for /usr,
    since if you tell it to use the mga7 /usr partition, the programs and libraried from 7 will be replaced by programs from mga8 which may well
    make the mga7 unstable or unseable, which was probably the main reason
    for reinstalling-- have a fallback.

    So, the partitioning I suggest is

    / 30-40GB
    /spareroot 30-40GB
    swap 10GB (Ie somewhat bigger than your memory amount so that you can
    hibernate which copies memory to swap)
    /local rest of available space

    Nothing will get installed into either /spareroot or into /local by the
    Mageia installer.

    The way you do it is you tell the system to make another partition, and
    it will suggest a name (like /var) to you. Erase that suggestion and put
    in what you want.

    After you reboot after install.

    mkdir /local/usrlocal
    rsync -av /usr/local/ /local/usrlocal
    (Note for rsync the terminal / is super important as it copies the
    content, not the directory plus the content. If you do
    rsync -av /usr/local /local/usrlocal
    instead of the content of /usr/local in /local/usrlocal, you will get
    the content in /local/usrlocal/local)
    rm -rf /usr/local
    ln -s /local/usrlocal /usr/local

    I do the same for /opt since it is also outside programs (usually) which
    you do not want to lose when you install Mageia 8

    rsync -av /opt /local
    rm -rf /opt
    ln -s /local/opt /opt

    rsync -av /home /local
    rm -rf /home
    ln -s /local/home /home

    (Some might worry that when you install Mga8 , your configuration files
    in your home directory will be the Mga 7 configuration files, and that
    could cause problems. He might suggest installing /local/home7,
    /local/home8 and /homecommon
    and have /home on mga7 linked to /local/home7 and on mga8, link /home
    to /local/home8
    in in /home7 and /home8 link common stuff to /homecommon
    That means that you have discipline yourself to not just dump files into /home/beaver (Assuming your home directory is /home/beaver) but rather
    putting them into subdirectories in /home, and linking them to
    /home/beaver directories

    Eg, rsync -av /home/beaver/Photos /local/homecommon/beaver/Photos
    rm -r /home/beaver/Photos
    ln -s /local/homecommon/beaver/Photos /home/beaver/Photos

    and do that for each of the directores in /home/beaver that you know
    will not change between Mga7 and Mga8
    (Photos, Downloads, Documents, ...)

    But it will mean that you will have to resetup all of the programs you
    use which store configuration stuff in you home directory, whenever you
    change distribution. I find it easier to just use a the same home
    directory and deal with problems when they arise.
    Both options are a pain the ass.







    ..


    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From William Unruh@2:250/1 to All on Fri Feb 5 20:54:27 2021
    On 2021-02-05, santo <nanci@auroville.org.in> wrote:
    On Fri, 05 Feb 2021 07:36:27 -0600, Bit Twister wrote:


    You have ignored advice to not have separate /usr, /var, /home
    partitions if you want to multi-boot linux installs.

    I am shocked...I have no idea how all this came about...!!!

    I do not remember creating a separate partition for /var I would never do that I have no idea how it come to have 145 G...
    Long ago I remeber I was given the suggestion to have a separate
    partition for /usr so that progrms etc installed there remain in case of
    a new install...I always did and there was never any issue with it...

    No, you do NOT want the system installed programs to stay there. That is
    one of the purposes of installing a new system. You do want all other
    programs ( which are usually installed either into /usr/local or into
    /opt which is the newer fashion for what used to be called /usr/local)

    So /opt and /usr/local should be on a separate partition (either one
    like /local, or if you really wanted to you could make separate
    partitions for them-- that is usually very wasteful of space)




    In my stupid opinion, you could create 3 30g partitions to have a
    previous, current, next Linux installs.

    tried but as I wrote I do not seem to be able to
    do it when selecting Custom Partition so I really do not know how to
    create 2 even less 3...

    Yes you can, and you did so. Your do NOT label them as / You label them
    as say
    /oldroot and /nextroot.
    And you change the labels that the system suggests by editing the system suggestion in Custom partitioning.


    Sharing /home between installs is a good way to screw up user login.

    It has happened with one of my previous installation and you helped me solve that screw up

    yes, as I said there are various approaches to that. One is his
    suggestion of essentially having separate homes for each distribution,
    the other is handling problems as they arise. My assumption is that
    keepign the old distro is as a backup in case something gets screwed up
    in the new installation. That means after the first few days when you
    have discovered that everything works, you never again use the old
    version. It can then be used for the next new installation (ie only 2
    possible root partitions). If however you go between the old and the new constantly ( the old one still supports some hardware say that the new
    one does not) then separate home directories is a good idea.



    I have /accounts for my /home files that are shared between previous,
    current, next installs.

    you have /account many here have /local or /usr/local or /spareroot
    etc... I always wondered how and from where they were coming from......

    It is sysadmin preference. I like /local/homecommon since the title
    tells you want this is for. account is pretty generic and does not, but
    it is entirely up to you.


    sorry I am repeating myself

    I will reinstall...

    Probbly a good idea.

    Note that I do not like a huge number of partitions, because it ALWAYS
    happens that one partition will fill up completely and the other has
    50GB still free in it. I like to have things so whatever needs the space
    can use it without any intervention from me. (eg /usr, /var all in one partition). That can lead to a problem is for example the /var logs fill
    up the partition making booting tough, or impossible If /var is in a
    separate partition from /, then /var filling up does not usually lead to
    an unbootable syste. In the other hand it costs you in unused space.
    /var needs more space, while / still has 20GB available.
    As usual one advantage can become a disadvantage sometimes, and you have
    decide which possibility to live with.




    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From William Unruh@2:250/1 to All on Fri Feb 5 21:09:37 2021
    On 2021-02-05, Jim Beard <jim.beard@verizon.net> wrote:
    On Fri, 05 Feb 2021 11:14:41 +0000, santo wrote:
    On Fri, 29 Jan 2021 18:00:46 +0000, William Unruh wrote:
    OK, then my advice of making 2 30GB or 40GB partitions is good. They are
    for / in the current booting version and a spare for the where you will
    install the next operating system version. (call is /spareroot)

    OK...Mageia7.1 installed.

    I had no idea how to create a usb bootable drive and the explanation I
    found on the Mageia site and elsewhere were too difficult for me to understand so I shifted the cdrom from the old system to this new one and installed from DVD.

    I really wanted to create 2 / partition and call the second one
    /spareroot ...I liked the idea that when Mageia8 was released I could use that one but nowhere I was given the chance to create another / and
    'call' it like that.

    One name for a partition is contained in firmware on the motherboard.
    That name should never be duplicated in that firmware. Most system
    software will not allow you to duplicate that name in that firmware.
    I think you somehow created name "/" for a partition in that firmware.

    I have no idea what you are saying. There are no names in firmware.
    You could say that
    nvme0n1p1 or sda4 is a "firmware" name ( it is a partition number
    scheme) but even that is supplied by the kernel, not firmware.
    sda4 is the fourth partition in the partition table on the first sectors
    of the disk sda is the first disk of sd type that the OS came
    across when it was booting the system (which can be problematic on some motherboards as there can be a race condition in which one disk is
    "found" first in some situations and another in other situations, which
    is where labels and UUIDs come in.) but certainly there is nothing about
    / in any of this. It is the operating system that decides on which
    partition to make the / partition. It either looks in /etc/fstab (or
    initrd looked in /etc/fstab to see which raw disk partition should be /
    when it was created).


    It is completely independent of the / name that your operating sees
    and shows as the "name" of the root partition. That name / is
    contained in an initrd.*img file found in /boot (for Linux).

    It is contained in /etc/fstab.


    During booting, one of the initrd files from /boot is copied to
    /initrd, and used to boot, with the "/" partition name in that
    initrd file determining which will be the "root partition" of
    the system when booted.

    It was determined when the initrd was created by looking into the
    contents of the /etc/fstab file which was in the partition which you
    told it to use as the / partition when creating the initrd file.


    After creating the first / partition I was never given the option to
    create another one.

    As mentioned, you can create only one instance of a name for a
    partition in the firmware. You do not need any partition to be
    named / in that firmware.

    In any boot of a operating system, there is one / partition. It can be
    any partition on the disk. Disk partitions do not have names. (well you
    could call the label of the UUID a name I guess, but it sure does not
    look like / or /spareroot, or whatever.)


    Within operating system software for one os, you likewise can have only
    one named / (root) partition. If you have 14 operating systems
    installed on a disk, each on a separate partition, each one
    will have its own / partition, and each of those partitions
    will have its own (different) name in firmware.

    I left 30GB free space maybe I will be able to use that space as / when
    installing Mageia8?

    Yes, when you install Mageia8, you can tell the installer to name
    that 30GB partition /. The installer will put that name "/" in the

    I do not believe he made a partition yet. It is unallocated space on his
    disk. Yes you could tell the installer during its partitioning phase
    that you want it to make a partition in that space and to use it for
    Mga8's / partition.

    initrd file that will be created for that Mageia8.
    .....

    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From David W. Hodgins@2:250/1 to All on Fri Feb 5 23:30:07 2021
    On Fri, 05 Feb 2021 16:09:37 -0500, William Unruh <unruh@invalid.ca> wrote:
    I have no idea what you are saying. There are no names in firmware.

    Correct. However be extremely careful with the contents of the efi nvram entries. See https://www.theregister.com/2016/02/02/delete_efivars_linux/
    for how to permanently brick a uefi system.

    Regards, Dave Hodgins

    --
    Change dwhodgins@nomail.afraid.org to davidwhodgins@teksavvy.com for
    email replies.

    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From Aragorn@2:250/1 to All on Fri Feb 5 23:48:42 2021
    On 05.02.2021 at 20:54, William Unruh scribbled:

    Note that I do not like a huge number of partitions, because it ALWAYS happens that one partition will fill up completely and the other has
    50GB still free in it.

    Only if you do not know your distribution, or even GNU/Linux as a
    whole. Even though there are differences in file placement between distributions, an experienced user should still be able to assess
    within a reasonable margin how much space each of the main directories
    in the root is going to need. =20

    Virtually all of you here have been using this one and the same Mageia distributin since the beginning, so your margin of error should by now
    be fairly close to zero. Mageia has been using systemd for many
    years now, and the /usr merge in Mageia was also already completed quite
    a few years ago. Things are not likely to change radically anymore on
    account of the amount of required drive space per root-level directory.

    I myself always oversize my system partitions =E2=80=94 I like keeping about 50-70% of free space per partition, with the exception of /home and
    /srv, both of which contain user data; private and shared, respectively
    =E2=80=94 but I know what to expect when I create my partitions, and I'm usually quite close to the mark.

    The free space I keep also allows =E2=80=94 at least, in theory, because I haven't done that yet =E2=80=94 to create a btrfs snapshot as a backup. The reason why I haven't done that yet is that I regularly back up
    everything (except caches) to a partition on a separate HDD =E2=80=94 my ma=
    in
    system is installed on an SATA-3 SSD. I also keep some very important
    selected files in my Google Drive account, just in case, and I
    immediately update those copies every time I've made any changes to the originals.

    I like to have things so whatever needs the space can use it without
    any intervention from me. (eg /usr, /var all in one partition). That
    can lead to a problem is for example the /var logs fill up the
    partition making booting tough, or impossible If /var is in a
    separate partition from /, then /var filling up does not usually lead
    to an unbootable syste. In the other hand it costs you in unused
    space. /var needs more space, while / still has 20GB available. As
    usual one advantage can become a disadvantage sometimes, and you have
    decide which possibility to live with.=20

    Use btrfs with subvolumes. That way, the available free space is shared between all subvolumes within the partition, but you can still use
    separate mount options per subvolume, and/or make snapshots of the
    individual subvolumes.

    Also, /var should not be too big, because journald resorts to a certain percentage =E2=80=94 I think it's 20% but I'd have to check =E2=80=94 of th=
    e available
    space within the partition for the journal. So /var is not a good
    candidate for a subvolume; better is to make that into a
    separate partition.

    Of course, every deployment is a case of its own. If you're going to
    do things as Bit Twister does them, then that's a very specific
    installation scenario that works well for distro testers, but way too complicated for a production system.


    Note: My above comments are from the vantage of a machine with only a
    single operating system, installed in a way that makes sense to
    someone with a UNIX mindset, with robustness and security in
    mind, and whereby the distribution is rolling. (I know Mageia
    isn't really a rolling release.)

    My /boot/efi, /boot, /usr, /usr/local and /opt are all separate
    partitions and are mounted read-only during normal operation. I
    use vfat for /boot/efi (of course) and ext4 for /boot, but
    everything else is btrfs =E2=80=94 not subvolumes but separate
    partitions, so that a potential filesystem error could never lead
    to a loss of the data in a subvolume. Segregation at the level
    of a GPT partition table is always a more robust approach.

    (I am running Manjaro Stable =E2=80=94 the Plasma edition =E2=80=94 a=
    nd Manjaro
    is an Arch-based curated rolling release. In Manjaro Stable,
    updates are bundled together and pushed out on average twice per
    month, accompanied by an official announcement thread on the
    forum with the most important changes and caveats, unless there's
    an urgent security update, as was the case with sudo. We
    received the fix only one day after the vulnerability was
    discovered =E2=80=94 this does of course also depend on whether one's
    mirror has synced already. The Manjaro Testing and Unstable
    branches get updates more often, as individual packages are
    pushed out in between the bundled updates =E2=80=94 almost on a daily
    basis. And then there's Manjaro ARM64, also with its own Stable,
    Testing and Unstable branches, but that's an entirely different
    thing.)


    --=20
    With respect,
    =3D Aragorn =3D


    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: A noiseless patient Strider (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From santo@2:250/1 to All on Sat Feb 6 06:55:37 2021
    On Fri, 05 Feb 2021 20:54:27 +0000, William Unruh wrote:

    On 2021-02-05, santo <nanci@auroville.org.in> wrote:
    On Fri, 05 Feb 2021 07:36:27 -0600, Bit Twister wrote:


    I will reinstall...

    Probbly a good idea.

    Note that I do not like a huge number of partitions, because it ALWAYS happens that one partition will fill up completely and the other has
    50GB still free in it. I like to have things so whatever needs the space
    can use it without any intervention from me. (eg /usr, /var all in one partition). That can lead to a problem is for example the /var logs fill
    up the partition making booting tough, or impossible If /var is in a
    separate partition from /, then /var filling up does not usually lead to
    an unbootable syste. In the other hand it costs you in unused space.
    /var needs more space, while / still has 20GB available.
    As usual one advantage can become a disadvantage sometimes, and you have decide which possibility to live with.


    Hi ,
    I answer to all through you ...I did reinstall...All suggestions given
    about using gparted or rescue disk etc...are way above my level...never
    used them before and I was afraid of being a click away from the next
    disaster if I went ahead...

    So decided to just create a 30GB/ 8GB swap( I could not read that 10GB
    was better ) 15GB usr/local ( I could see it this time in the drop down
    menu when creating the partitions...) and of course all the rest to
    /home on a separate partition and left 30GB free to be used as root with Mageia8.
    Decided for xfce and I like it...

    Thank you all for your help and suggestions I could - and will be able to
    - only take what I could...
    Very appreciated
    Santo

    [santo@localhost ~]$ df
    Filesystem Size Used Avail Use% Mounted on
    devtmpfs 1.9G 0 1.9G 0% /dev
    tmpfs 1.9G 0 1.9G 0% /dev/shm
    tmpfs 1.9G 1.1M 1.9G 1% /run
    /dev/sda6 29G 3.6G 24G 14% /
    tmpfs 1.9G 0 1.9G 0% /sys/fs/cgroup
    tmpfs 1.9G 8.0K 1.9G 1% /tmp
    /dev/sda1 96M 27M 70M 28% /boot/EFI
    /dev/sda8 15G 41M 14G 1% /usr/local
    /dev/sda9 168G 68M 168G 1% /home
    /dev/sda3 98G 24G 74G 25% /media/windows
    tmpfs 381M 24K 381M 1% /run/user/1000
    /dev/sr0 4.2G 4.2G 0 100% /run/media/santo/Mageia-7.1-x86_64 [santo@localhost ~]$


    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: Aioe.org NNTP Server (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From Herman Viaene@2:250/1 to All on Sat Feb 6 09:23:17 2021
    Op Fri, 05 Feb 2021 11:14:41 +0000, schreef santo:

    On Fri, 29 Jan 2021 18:00:46 +0000, William Unruh wrote:


    OK, then my advice of making 2 30GB or 40GB partitions is good. They
    are for / in the current booting version and a spare for the where you
    will install the next operating system version. (call is /spareroot)

    OK...Mageia7.1 installed.

    I had no idea how to create a usb bootable drive and the explanation I
    found on the Mageia site and elsewhere were too difficult for me to understand so I shifted the cdrom from the old system to this new one
    and installed from DVD.
    I really wanted to create 2 / partition and call the second one
    /spareroot ...I liked the idea that when Mageia8 was released I could
    use that one but nowhere I was given the chance to create another / and 'call' it like that.
    After creating the first / partition I was never given the option to
    create another one.

    You should use Custom partitioning when you want to select and name
    partitions as you want. I have been doing that for ages. Just do not
    forget that you cannot install without a "/" partition.

    Herman Viaene



    I left 30GB free space maybe I will be able to use that space as / when installing Mageia8?

    same for the /local or usr/local...I wonder when and how are you guys creating and naming them that way...


    OK...this is what confuses me...is this passage when I select the free
    spaces during Custom disk partition or is sometime before installing ? because as I said before during custom disk partitioning I was not able
    to do it...

    Thanks anyway for your help...
    Santo

    this is what it looks like now...
    /usr and /opt /home are on a separate partition...
    Filesystem Size Used Avail Use% Mounted on devtmpfs 1.9G
    0 1.9G 0% /dev tmpfs 1.9G 0 1.9G 0% /dev/shm tmpfs
    1.9G 1.1M 1.9G 1% /run /dev/sda6 29G 100M 28G
    1% /
    /dev/sda8 20G 3.5G 15G 20% /usr tmpfs 1.9G 0
    1.9G 0% /sys/fs/cgroup tmpfs 1.9G 8.0K 1.9G 1% /tmp
    /dev/sda1 96M 27M 70M 28% /boot/EFI /dev/sda11 25G
    51M 25G 1% /home /dev/sda10 153G 139M 145G 1% /var
    /dev/sda9 9.6G 37M 9.1G 1% /opt /dev/sda3 98G 24G
    74G 25% /media/windows tmpfs 381M 24K 381M 1%
    /run/user/1000 /dev/sr0 4.2G 4.2G 0 100% /run/media/santo/Mageia-7.1-x86_64 [santo@localhost ~]$


    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: Aioe.org NNTP Server (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From William Unruh@2:250/1 to All on Sat Feb 6 10:25:56 2021
    On 2021-02-06, santo <nanci@auroville.org.in> wrote:

    Hi ,
    I answer to all through you ...I did reinstall...All suggestions given
    about using gparted or rescue disk etc...are way above my level...never
    used them before and I was afraid of being a click away from the next disaster if I went ahead...

    Fine. Diskdrake is OK as well (which is what you used in the
    installation.)

    So decided to just create a 30GB/ 8GB swap( I could not read that 10GB

    It is just one wants swap a little bit bigger than total memory.


    was better ) 15GB usr/local ( I could see it this time in the drop down

    You can also just type in the partition name. No need for drop down
    menus

    But you can certainly do this afterwards.

    Go to MCC (Mageia Control Center-- one of the little icons at the bottom
    or top of your screen-- looks like a broken gear) and click on the
    Local Disks->Manage disk partitions, click on the 30GB white space, and
    make a partition taking up the full space. Give it the name /spareroot
    and make it an ext4 type partition. Now it will be all ready when you
    wnat t install Mga8

    menu when creating the partitions...) and of course all the rest to
    /home on a separate partition and left 30GB free to be used as root with Mageia8.
    Decided for xfce and I like it...

    Thank you all for your help and suggestions I could - and will be able to
    - only take what I could...
    Very appreciated
    Santo

    [santo@localhost ~]$ df
    Filesystem Size Used Avail Use% Mounted on
    devtmpfs 1.9G 0 1.9G 0% /dev
    tmpfs 1.9G 0 1.9G 0% /dev/shm
    tmpfs 1.9G 1.1M 1.9G 1% /run
    /dev/sda6 29G 3.6G 24G 14% /
    tmpfs 1.9G 0 1.9G 0% /sys/fs/cgroup
    tmpfs 1.9G 8.0K 1.9G 1% /tmp
    /dev/sda1 96M 27M 70M 28% /boot/EFI
    /dev/sda8 15G 41M 14G 1% /usr/local
    /dev/sda9 168G 68M 168G 1% /home
    /dev/sda3 98G 24G 74G 25% /media/windows
    tmpfs 381M 24K 381M 1% /run/user/1000
    /dev/sr0 4.2G 4.2G 0 100% /run/media/santo/Mageia-7.1-x86_64 [santo@localhost ~]$


    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From santo@2:250/1 to All on Sat Feb 6 10:52:29 2021
    On Sat, 06 Feb 2021 10:25:56 +0000, William Unruh wrote:

    On 2021-02-06, santo <nanci@auroville.org.in> wrote:



    Go to MCC (Mageia Control Center-- one of the little icons at the bottom
    or top of your screen-- looks like a broken gear) and click on the Local Disks->Manage disk partitions, click on the 30GB white space, and make a partition taking up the full space. Give it the name /spareroot and make
    it an ext4 type partition. Now it will be all ready when you wnat t
    install Mga8

    Done...thank you very much...
    :-)


    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: Aioe.org NNTP Server (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From Bit Twister@2:250/1 to All on Sat Feb 6 12:47:35 2021
    On Sat, 6 Feb 2021 06:55:37 +0000 (UTC), santo wrote:

    Hi ,
    I answer to all through you ...I did reinstall...All suggestions given
    about using gparted or rescue disk etc...are way above my level...never
    used them before and I was afraid of being a click away from the next disaster if I went ahead...

    How sad. gparted is pretty straight forward GUI interface. If you want
    to multi-boot different Mageia installs your other option is command line partition setup and I have no desire to go that route myself.



    [santo@localhost ~]$ df

    Just for fun, run
    lsblk -o NAME,TYPE,FSTYPE,MOUNTPOINT,SIZE,FSAVAIL,FSUSED,LABEL,PARTLABEL


    Filesystem Size Used Avail Use% Mounted on
    /dev/sda1 96M 27M 70M 28% /boot/EFI
    /dev/sda3 98G 24G 74G 25% /media/windows
    /dev/sda6 29G 3.6G 24G 14% /
    /dev/sda8 15G 41M 14G 1% /usr/local

    sda8 seems a waste space in your setup since it was designed to be in /.
    Also another reason that you cannot have a Mageia test install/upgrade setup. Hehehek going to be another install for your to set it in /

    /dev/sda9 168G 68M 168G 1% /home

    Well, you certainly have plenty of space for users to store files
    in /home. :(

    I do suggest having a second and/or third user account for testing.
    I create "normnal" during install, then "junk" then regular users
    starting at uid/gid 1500.

    $ ls -ln /home
    total 32
    drwx------ 19 1500 1500 4096 Feb 5 21:16 bittwister
    drwx------ 14 1004 1004 4096 Aug 3 2020 gnome
    drwx------ 16 1001 1001 4096 Dec 20 20:26 junk
    drwx------ 14 1002 1002 4096 Aug 3 2020 kde
    drwx------ 15 1000 1000 4096 Aug 3 2020 normal
    drwx------ 14 1003 1003 4096 Aug 3 2020 xfce

    "normnal" is not changed and used as reference to find changes in
    user account files.

    Which brings a question to my mind, how many people use the system?
    There is only me on mine, but I use several accounts for testing and
    whatnot.

    You have no method of testing the next upgrade to Mageia Release 8. :-(
    Of course if upgrade fails you can do a clean 8 install. :)
    But that assumes Mga8 works on your hardware.
    Mga8 Live Release Candidate isos can be found on your mirror of choice.

    In my stupid opinion, it would be simple for you to use the rescue cd gparted to shrink/resize /home, create/format/label a partition for testing upgrades
    if nothing else.

    Might not hurt to go to youtube.com and search for gparted resize videos.

    Process would be boot rescue cd, hit Return, then startx when prompted,
    click hard drive icon (gparted) in bottom screen panel (4'th icon)

    Right click /dev/sda9
    select Resize/move
    You can then Left click the fat arrow on the Right and drag it left
    to shrink /home.
    If you enter 30720 in the Free space following (MiB) it would shrink
    it by 30 gig.
    FYI: if you were to enter 40960 in the New Size: box
    it would shrink /home to 40 gig. Click the Resize/Move button, then
    click the green Apply Icon
    I used https://wintelguy.com/gb2gib.html to make me a list of gig to MiB values.

    After the refresh, Right click the new Unallocated space and click New.
    Enter 30720 in the New Size: box.
    Click selection in the File system: box and select ext4
    Click Add button, then the Apply Icon
    after refresh, Right click the new partition, pick Name Partition
    and enter mga8 and click Ok, and then Apply icon.
    after refresh, Right click the new partition, pick Label File System
    and enter mga8 and click Ok, and then Apply icon.

    At this point you would have a new partition for doing a mga8 for
    upgrade testing or clean install.

    If it were me, I would label and name sda6 tp mga7

    Close gparted, Right click on desktop wallpaper, select Applications and
    wait for Log Out selection. At rescue prompt remove rescue cd, and enter reboot.

    Now run
    lsblk -o NAME,TYPE,FSTYPE,MOUNTPOINT,SIZE,FSAVAIL,FSUSED,LABEL,PARTLABEL









    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From Bit Twister@2:250/1 to All on Sat Feb 6 12:53:57 2021
    On Sat, 6 Feb 2021 10:25:56 -0000 (UTC), William Unruh wrote:
    On 2021-02-06, santo <nanci@auroville.org.in> wrote:

    Hi ,
    I answer to all through you ...I did reinstall...All suggestions given
    about using gparted or rescue disk etc...are way above my level...never
    used them before and I was afraid of being a click away from the next
    disaster if I went ahead...

    Fine. Diskdrake is OK as well (which is what you used in the
    installation.)

    So decided to just create a 30GB/ 8GB swap( I could not read that 10GB

    It is just one wants swap a little bit bigger than total memory.

    Bad advice if user is going to hibernate. Read swap size table at
    https://www.google.com/advanced_search
    with
    swap size hibernate
    in first box.

    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From William Unruh@2:250/1 to All on Sat Feb 6 17:28:47 2021
    On 2021-02-06, Bit Twister <BitTwister@mouse-potato.com> wrote:
    On Sat, 6 Feb 2021 10:25:56 -0000 (UTC), William Unruh wrote:
    On 2021-02-06, santo <nanci@auroville.org.in> wrote:

    Hi ,
    I answer to all through you ...I did reinstall...All suggestions given
    about using gparted or rescue disk etc...are way above my level...never
    used them before and I was afraid of being a click away from the next
    disaster if I went ahead...

    Fine. Diskdrake is OK as well (which is what you used in the
    installation.)

    So decided to just create a 30GB/ 8GB swap( I could not read that 10GB

    It is just one wants swap a little bit bigger than total memory.

    Bad advice if user is going to hibernate. Read swap size table at
    https://www.google.com/advanced_search
    with
    swap size hibernate
    in first box.

    And if you read the article, you will notice that the advice is all over
    the place.
    The key thing is that you need enough space for the whole memory if you
    are hibernating. Now, I would assume that the system does NOT hibernate
    all of the buffered programs which are no longer running but are there
    just in case you decide to run that program again. So in general the
    amount of used memory is much smaller than the occupied memory, and I
    assume (but do not know) that the amount of swap needed to store the
    memory state is much less than then actual ram space. I also think he
    had 4GB memory on his new machine, but again that is just a vague
    memory (of mine).

    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From William Unruh@2:250/1 to All on Sat Feb 6 17:45:13 2021
    On 2021-02-06, Bit Twister <BitTwister@mouse-potato.com> wrote:
    On Sat, 6 Feb 2021 06:55:37 +0000 (UTC), santo wrote:
    ....
    Just for fun, run
    lsblk -o NAME,TYPE,FSTYPE,MOUNTPOINT,SIZE,FSAVAIL,FSUSED,LABEL,PARTLABEL

    Why?



    Filesystem Size Used Avail Use% Mounted on
    /dev/sda1 96M 27M 70M 28% /boot/EFI
    /dev/sda3 98G 24G 74G 25% /media/windows
    /dev/sda6 29G 3.6G 24G 14% /
    /dev/sda8 15G 41M 14G 1% /usr/local

    sda8 seems a waste space in your setup since it was designed to be in /.

    Nope. /usr/local is where you store your own stuff-- stuff not proivided
    by the OS. Why would you want it to be somewhere that your next install
    wiped out? If you keep a list of OS stuff installed, then you can
    (barring idiotic name changes which Mageia was wont to do in the past) reinstall using that list. REinstalling outside programs is usually not
    that easy, especially if you compiled it (or wrote it) yourself.

    Also another reason that you cannot have a Mageia test install/upgrade setup.

    HuH? a Mageia install does not install anything into /usr/local. So why
    is this an impediment?

    Hehehek going to be another install for your to set it in /

    /dev/sda9 168G 68M 168G 1% /home

    Well, you certainly have plenty of space for users to store files
    in /home. :(

    I do suggest having a second and/or third user account for testing.
    I create "normnal" during install, then "junk" then regular users
    starting at uid/gid 1500.

    $ ls -ln /home
    total 32
    drwx------ 19 1500 1500 4096 Feb 5 21:16 bittwister
    drwx------ 14 1004 1004 4096 Aug 3 2020 gnome
    drwx------ 16 1001 1001 4096 Dec 20 20:26 junk
    drwx------ 14 1002 1002 4096 Aug 3 2020 kde
    drwx------ 15 1000 1000 4096 Aug 3 2020 normal
    drwx------ 14 1003 1003 4096 Aug 3 2020 xfce

    "normnal" is not changed and used as reference to find changes in
    user account files.

    Which brings a question to my mind, how many people use the system?
    There is only me on mine, but I use several accounts for testing and
    whatnot.

    You have no method of testing the next upgrade to Mageia Release 8. :-(
    Of course if upgrade fails you can do a clean 8 install. :)
    But that assumes Mga8 works on your hardware.
    Mga8 Live Release Candidate isos can be found on your mirror of choice.

    In my stupid opinion, it would be simple for you to use the rescue cd gparted to shrink/resize /home, create/format/label a partition for testing upgrades if nothing else.

    That is that spare 30GB that he mentioned and which he has now installed
    and formatted.



    Might not hurt to go to youtube.com and search for gparted resize videos.

    Diskdrake also does resize.


    Process would be boot rescue cd, hit Return, then startx when prompted,
    click hard drive icon (gparted) in bottom screen panel (4'th icon)

    Right click /dev/sda9
    select Resize/move
    You can then Left click the fat arrow on the Right and drag it left
    to shrink /home.

    He can use /home for all kinds of other stuff than just home
    directories. What is in a name?

    If you enter 30720 in the Free space following (MiB) it would shrink
    it by 30 gig.

    As mentioned he HAS an additional 30GB partition already for Mga8
    intall.

    FYI: if you were to enter 40960 in the New Size: box
    it would shrink /home to 40 gig. Click the Resize/Move button, then
    click the green Apply Icon
    I used https://wintelguy.com/gb2gib.html to make me a list of gig to MiB values.

    After the refresh, Right click the new Unallocated space and click New.
    Enter 30720 in the New Size: box.
    Click selection in the File system: box and select ext4
    Click Add button, then the Apply Icon
    after refresh, Right click the new partition, pick Name Partition
    and enter mga8 and click Ok, and then Apply icon.
    after refresh, Right click the new partition, pick Label File System
    and enter mga8 and click Ok, and then Apply icon.

    At this point you would have a new partition for doing a mga8 for
    upgrade testing or clean install.

    He already has.


    If it were me, I would label and name sda6 tp mga7

    So he has to relabel it when he wants to install mga9 ontothat
    partitions? One should not have to change labels on a partition.



    Close gparted, Right click on desktop wallpaper, select Applications and
    wait for Log Out selection. At rescue prompt remove rescue cd, and enter reboot.

    Unfortunately right click on wallpaper does not work for XFCE which he
    says he is using. Instead there is a small Logout icom in the taskbar,
    and if you click on your name, it lists a Logout option.


    Now run
    lsblk -o NAME,TYPE,FSTYPE,MOUNTPOINT,SIZE,FSAVAIL,FSUSED,LABEL,PARTLABEL

    Again, why?









    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From Bit Twister@2:250/1 to All on Sat Feb 6 18:40:36 2021
    On Sat, 6 Feb 2021 17:45:13 -0000 (UTC), William Unruh wrote:
    On 2021-02-06, Bit Twister <BitTwister@mouse-potato.com> wrote:
    On Sat, 6 Feb 2021 06:55:37 +0000 (UTC), santo wrote:
    ...
    Just for fun, run
    lsblk -o NAME,TYPE,FSTYPE,MOUNTPOINT,SIZE,FSAVAIL,FSUSED,LABEL,PARTLABEL

    Why?

    I have been editing his output.
    More descriptive, does not show tmp* stuff, partition numbers sequential,...





    Filesystem Size Used Avail Use% Mounted on
    /dev/sda1 96M 27M 70M 28% /boot/EFI
    /dev/sda3 98G 24G 74G 25% /media/windows
    /dev/sda6 29G 3.6G 24G 14% /
    /dev/sda8 15G 41M 14G 1% /usr/local

    sda8 seems a waste space in your setup since it was designed to be in /.

    Nope. /usr/local is where you store your own stuff-- stuff not proivided
    by the OS. Why would you want it to be somewhere that your next install
    wiped out?

    Exactly my point if going to be a multi-linux boot.

    If you keep a list of OS stuff installed, then you can
    (barring idiotic name changes which Mageia was wont to do in the past) reinstall using that list.

    Very true, but just keep in mind that the OP is not that advanced

    REinstalling outside programs is usually not
    that easy, especially if you compiled it (or wrote it) yourself.

    That is what make files are for if not using a build script.


    Also another reason that you cannot have a Mageia test install/upgrade setup.

    HuH? a Mageia install does not install anything into /usr/local. So why
    is this an impediment?

    But the sys admin might have. And you do not want to share between OS boots.
    If shared, a new compile/linked binary on new install might ruin current install binary.


    In my stupid opinion, it would be simple for you to use the rescue cd gparted
    to shrink/resize /home, create/format/label a partition for testing upgrades >> if nothing else.

    That is that spare 30GB that he mentioned and which he has now installed
    and formatted.

    No, I am talking about creating another 30g for the second Linux OS install.



    Might not hurt to go to youtube.com and search for gparted resize videos.

    Diskdrake also does resize.

    Very true, but Diskdrake better not allow it while using the partition.
    Always keep in mind the OP's knowledge.



    Process would be boot rescue cd, hit Return, then startx when prompted,
    click hard drive icon (gparted) in bottom screen panel (4'th icon)

    Right click /dev/sda9
    select Resize/move
    You can then Left click the fat arrow on the Right and drag it left
    to shrink /home.

    He can use /home for all kinds of other stuff than just home
    directories. What is in a name?

    Not much other than what is in /etc/passwd. Keep in mind that the purpose
    of a dual Linux OS boot is the new install should not disturb the current install.

    I have a /misc partition for sharing odd stuff between installs.

    $ ls /misc
    cats faq humor jpg lost+found mpeg php png sql txt


    If you enter 30720 in the Free space following (MiB) it would shrink
    it by 30 gig.

    As mentioned he HAS an additional 30GB partition already for Mga8
    intall.

    I seem to have missed it, Care to tell me the current partition number
    based on the new install layout?




    If it were me, I would label and name sda6 tp mga7

    So he has to relabel it when he wants to install mga9 ontothat
    partitions?

    Yup,

    One should not have to change labels on a partition.

    Well I suggest it is more informative to have it match contents.

    For example look at this snippet
    $ lsblk -o NAME,MOUNTPOINT,LABEL,PARTLABEL
    NAME MOUNTPOINT LABEL PARTLABEL
    sda
    ├─sda1 mga6 mga6
    ├─sda2 mga8 mga8
    ├─sda3 / mga7 mga7
    ├─sda4 cauldron cauldron


    sdb
    ├─sdb2 bk_up bk_up
    ├─sdb3 hotbu hotbu
    ├─sdb4 cauldron_bkup cauldron_bkup
    ├─sdb6 net_ins net_ins
    └─sdb7 net_ins_bkup net_ins_bkup

    Easy for me to see/find the cauldron or network install partitions
    and their backup's. hotbu is the backup of whatever mgX that used
    as mu "Production" install.




    Close gparted, Right click on desktop wallpaper, select Applications and
    wait for Log Out selection. At rescue prompt remove rescue cd, and enter
    reboot.

    Unfortunately right click on wallpaper does not work for XFCE which he
    says he is using.
    Instead there is a small Logout icom in the taskbar,
    and if you click on your name, it lists a Logout option.


    Humm, his Xfce may have the panel icons but should still have the
    Right click desktop wallpaper popup menu.

    By the way instructions were about using gparted on a rescue cd which uses Xfce.
    Not about his running OS install.


    Now run
    lsblk -o NAME,TYPE,FSTYPE,MOUNTPOINT,SIZE,FSAVAIL,FSUSED,LABEL,PARTLABEL

    Again, why?

    Go back to top of this post and read my reply.
    I wanted him to see the labels of the new partition.

    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From William Unruh@2:250/1 to All on Sat Feb 6 19:42:34 2021
    On 2021-02-06, Bit Twister <BitTwister@mouse-potato.com> wrote:
    On Sat, 6 Feb 2021 17:45:13 -0000 (UTC), William Unruh wrote:

    If you keep a list of OS stuff installed, then you can
    (barring idiotic name changes which Mageia was wont to do in the past)
    reinstall using that list.

    Very true, but just keep in mind that the OP is not that advanced

    rpm -qa --qf '%{NAME} \n' >~/mga7-installed

    Now you have a list of all of the installed programs
    After you have installed mga8 and booted into it

    urpmi `cat ~bugsbunny/mga7-installed|xargs --max-args=20 urpmi

    Assuming bugsbunny is your username.


    REinstalling outside programs is usually not
    that easy, especially if you compiled it (or wrote it) yourself.

    That is what make files are for if not using a build script.

    And usually it works fine on the next version of the OS. If not then you
    know which ones you have to waste time on.



    Also another reason that you cannot have a Mageia test install/upgrade setup.

    HuH? a Mageia install does not install anything into /usr/local. So why
    is this an impediment?


    He is installing . The sysadmin is him. He should NOT be putting stuff
    into /usr/local until after he has mounted /usr/local.

    But the sys admin might have. And you do not want to share between OS boots.

    Sure you do. I have very rarely had trouble. See above.

    If shared, a new compile/linked binary on new install might ruin current install binary.


    In my stupid opinion, it would be simple for you to use the rescue cd gparted
    to shrink/resize /home, create/format/label a partition for testing upgrades
    if nothing else.

    That is that spare 30GB that he mentioned and which he has now installed
    and formatted.

    No, I am talking about creating another 30g for the second Linux OS install.

    That was exactly what his 30G unallocated space was for, and what the
    partition which he just created in that space and formatted was for.




    Might not hurt to go to youtube.com and search for gparted resize videos. >>
    Diskdrake also does resize.

    Very true, but Diskdrake better not allow it while using the partition. Always keep in mind the OP's knowledge.

    Agreed. But diskdrake is not stupid, and AFAIK does not allow resizing a mounted partition, just like gparted. While I agree that learning
    gparted would probably be useful at least once a year for him, he is
    right now comfortable with the Mageia tools.




    Process would be boot rescue cd, hit Return, then startx when prompted,
    click hard drive icon (gparted) in bottom screen panel (4'th icon)

    Right click /dev/sda9
    select Resize/move
    You can then Left click the fat arrow on the Right and drag it left
    to shrink /home.

    He can use /home for all kinds of other stuff than just home
    directories. What is in a name?

    Not much other than what is in /etc/passwd. Keep in mind that the purpose

    ?? I was refering to using /home not only for the various user's home directories, but for other stuff as well. Eg, if he is going to compile
    lots of stuff, putting /usr/src/rpm into /home and linking to
    /usr/src/rpm. (Of course Mageia in its infinite wisdom decided to put
    the rpm home into the user's directory, which was completely brain dead
    as far as I am concerned, but maybe if you have 100 people on your
    machine all compiling their own stuff, it might be OK. But worse is
    putting roots rpm home into /root really is dumb. A great way of filling
    up the / partition, and bricking the system. )


    of a dual Linux OS boot is the new install should not disturb the current install.

    I have a /misc partition for sharing odd stuff between installs.

    I thought it was archive?


    $ ls /misc
    cats faq humor jpg lost+found mpeg php png sql txt


    If you enter 30720 in the Free space following (MiB) it would shrink
    it by 30 gig.

    As mentioned he HAS an additional 30GB partition already for Mga8
    intall.

    I seem to have missed it, Care to tell me the current partition number
    based on the new install layout?

    He will have to do that. He stated that he had 30GB unpartitioned. I
    suggested that he partition and assign a filesystem of ext4 to that
    current free space, and he said he did it, but did not publish his new
    df
    output.





    If it were me, I would label and name sda6 tp mga7

    So he has to relabel it when he wants to install mga9 ontothat
    partitions?

    Yup,

    One should not have to change labels on a partition.

    Well I suggest it is more informative to have it match contents.

    Well if he is going to label them, a label which survives re/install,
    like
    root1 and root2 say would give one less thing to worry about when he
    does install a new system.


    For example look at this snippet
    $ lsblk -o NAME,MOUNTPOINT,LABEL,PARTLABEL
    NAME MOUNTPOINT LABEL PARTLABEL
    sda
    ├─sda1 mga6 mga6
    ├─sda2 mga8 mga8
    ├─sda3 / mga7 mga7
    ├─sda4 cauldron cauldron

    So when you install Mga9 where mga6 now is, you have to relabel four partitions? Not my idea of fun.



    sdb
    ├─sdb2 bk_up bk_up
    ├─sdb3 hotbu hotbu
    ├─sdb4 cauldron_bkup cauldron_bkup
    ├─sdb6 net_ins net_ins
    └─sdb7 net_ins_bkup net_ins_bkup

    Easy for me to see/find the cauldron or network install partitions
    and their backup's. hotbu is the backup of whatever mgX that used
    as mu "Production" install.

    To each his own.





    Close gparted, Right click on desktop wallpaper, select Applications and >>> wait for Log Out selection. At rescue prompt remove rescue cd, and enter >>> reboot.

    Unfortunately right click on wallpaper does not work for XFCE which he
    says he is using.
    Instead there is a small Logout icom in the taskbar,
    and if you click on your name, it lists a Logout option.


    Humm, his Xfce may have the panel icons but should still have the
    Right click desktop wallpaper popup menu.

    Wehn I switched to xfce because zoom has a severe bug under Plasma, the
    desktop menu had no such option. It was under my hame on the task bar
    instead. right click on the desktop does not include any way of logging out/shutdown/sleep/... on my Mga7 version.


    By the way instructions were about using gparted on a rescue cd which uses Xfce.
    Not about his running OS install.

    Ah. Maybe the rescue cd has done that. I am not sure which rescue cd you
    are referring to



    Now run
    lsblk -o NAME,TYPE,FSTYPE,MOUNTPOINT,SIZE,FSAVAIL,FSUSED,LABEL,PARTLABEL >>
    Again, why?

    Go back to top of this post and read my reply.
    I wanted him to see the labels of the new partition.

    Ah. Telling him what, in the output, you want him to notice is helpful. Otherwise it is just a long list of incomprehensible numbers and
    letters.


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  • From Bit Twister@2:250/1 to All on Sat Feb 6 20:46:01 2021
    On Sat, 6 Feb 2021 19:42:34 -0000 (UTC), William Unruh wrote:
    On 2021-02-06, Bit Twister <BitTwister@mouse-potato.com> wrote:
    On Sat, 6 Feb 2021 17:45:13 -0000 (UTC), William Unruh wrote:

    If you keep a list of OS stuff installed, then you can
    (barring idiotic name changes which Mageia was wont to do in the past)
    reinstall using that list.

    Very true, but just keep in mind that the OP is not that advanced

    rpm -qa --qf '%{NAME} \n' >~/mga7-installed

    Now you have a list of all of the installed programs
    After you have installed mga8 and booted into it

    urpmi `cat ~bugsbunny/mga7-installed|xargs --max-args=20 urpmi

    Assuming bugsbunny is your username.

    I suggest the is not an optimum methodology. You could/would be loading
    old and obsolete rpms.

    Example mga7 has python2 and mga8 has python3


    REinstalling outside programs is usually not
    that easy, especially if you compiled it (or wrote it) yourself.

    That is what make files are for if not using a build script.

    And usually it works fine on the next version of the OS. If not then you
    know which ones you have to waste time on.



    Also another reason that you cannot have a Mageia test install/upgrade setup.

    HuH? a Mageia install does not install anything into /usr/local. So why
    is this an impediment?


    He is installing . The sysadmin is him. He should NOT be putting stuff
    into /usr/local until after he has mounted /usr/local.

    Again we are talking about two installs, current mga7 and new mga8 mga7/usr/local could have stuff that could be clobbered when he starts playing/testing mga8.


    But the sys admin might have. And you do not want to share between OS boots.

    Sure you do. I have very rarely had trouble. See above.

    Well you are lucky then. A compile/link app on mga8 may crash when running
    same app on mga7.


    If shared, a new compile/linked binary on new install might ruin current
    install binary.


    In my stupid opinion, it would be simple for you to use the rescue cd gparted
    to shrink/resize /home, create/format/label a partition for testing upgrades
    if nothing else.

    That is that spare 30GB that he mentioned and which he has now installed >>> and formatted.

    No, I am talking about creating another 30g for the second Linux OS install.

    That was exactly what his 30G unallocated space was for, and what the partition which he just created in that space and formatted was for.

    Then we are in agreement. I showed how to shrink home and create the new
    /mga8 partition.





    Might not hurt to go to youtube.com and search for gparted resize videos. >>>
    Diskdrake also does resize.

    Very true, but Diskdrake better not allow it while using the partition.
    Always keep in mind the OP's knowledge.

    Agreed. But diskdrake is not stupid, and AFAIK does not allow resizing a mounted partition, just like gparted. While I agree that learning
    gparted would probably be useful at least once a year for him, he is
    right now comfortable with the Mageia tools.

    And yet complaining he was unable to do what he wanted. :(





    Process would be boot rescue cd, hit Return, then startx when prompted, >>>> click hard drive icon (gparted) in bottom screen panel (4'th icon)

    Right click /dev/sda9
    select Resize/move
    You can then Left click the fat arrow on the Right and drag it left
    to shrink /home.

    He can use /home for all kinds of other stuff than just home
    directories. What is in a name?

    Not much other than what is in /etc/passwd. Keep in mind that the purpose

    ?? I was refering to using /home not only for the various user's home directories, but for other stuff as well. Eg, if he is going to compile
    lots of stuff, putting /usr/src/rpm into /home and linking to
    /usr/src/rpm. (Of course Mageia in its infinite wisdom decided to put
    the rpm home into the user's directory,

    Hmmm. out of the box install has all that stuff under '/'. There is no
    rpm stuff in $HOME.

    which was completely brain dead
    as far as I am concerned, but maybe if you have 100 people on your
    machine all compiling their own stuff, it might be OK. But worse is
    putting roots rpm home into /root really is dumb. A great way of filling
    up the / partition, and bricking the system. )

    Well is is the sys admin's job to keep an eye on partition space.

    I do not know the default setup, but in my stupid opinion system uses
    it's / space and users use their space. Even user tmp is in their space.

    $ env | grep tmp
    KDEVARTMP=/home/bittwister/tmp SSH_AUTH_SOCK=/home/bittwister/tmp/ssh-B9vmFl5D5vE2/agent.1442 SCREENDIR=/home/bittwister/tmp
    TMP=/home/bittwister/tmp
    TMPDIR=/home/bittwister/tmp
    KDETMP=/home/bittwister/tmp
    TEMP=/home/bittwister/tmp
    GCONF_TMPDIR=/home/bittwister/tmp




    of a dual Linux OS boot is the new install should not disturb the current
    install.

    I have a /misc partition for sharing odd stuff between installs.

    I thought it was archive?

    No idea where that came from unless you mean /accounts which is user stuff.
    As you can see here

    $ ls /misc
    cats faq humor jpg lost+found mpeg php png sql txt
    showed miscellaneous stuff.




    If it were me, I would label and name sda6 to mga7

    So he has to relabel it when he wants to install mga9 ontothat
    partitions?

    Yup,

    One should not have to change labels on a partition.

    Well I suggest it is more informative to have it match contents.

    Well if he is going to label them, a label which survives re/install,
    like
    root1 and root2 say would give one less thing to worry about when he
    does install a new system.

    Each to their own.
    root1 and root2 does not tell which is what install especially when mga10
    comes out.




    For example look at this snippet
    $ lsblk -o NAME,MOUNTPOINT,LABEL,PARTLABEL
    NAME MOUNTPOINT LABEL PARTLABEL
    sda
    ├─sda1 mga6 mga6
    ├─sda2 mga8 mga8
    ├─sda3 / mga7 mga7
    ├─sda4 cauldron cauldron

    So when you install Mga9 where mga6 now is, you have to relabel four partitions? Not my idea of fun.

    No, I just change mga6 to mga9, and during mga9 install, I know exactly
    what partition to pick for /


    Wehn I switched to xfce because zoom has a severe bug under Plasma, the desktop menu had no such option. It was under my hame on the task bar instead. right click on the desktop does not include any way of logging out/shutdown/sleep/... on my Mga7 version.

    No idea why yours is different than mine and my Neighbor's install.



    By the way instructions were about using gparted on a rescue cd which uses Xfce.
    Not about his running OS install.

    Ah. Maybe the rescue cd has done that. I am not sure which rescue cd you
    are referring to

    systemrescue-7.01-amd64.iso




    Now run
    lsblk -o NAME,TYPE,FSTYPE,MOUNTPOINT,SIZE,FSAVAIL,FSUSED,LABEL,PARTLABEL >>>
    Again, why?

    Go back to top of this post and read my reply.
    I wanted him to see the labels of the new partition.

    Ah. Telling him what, in the output, you want him to notice is helpful. Otherwise it is just a long list of incomprehensible numbers and
    letters.

    I was pretty sure that after dinking with /home and creating new partition
    he would see/understand the output.


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    * Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From David W. Hodgins@2:250/1 to All on Sun Feb 7 00:21:03 2021
    On Sat, 06 Feb 2021 12:28:47 -0500, William Unruh <unruh@invalid.ca> wrote:
    And if you read the article, you will notice that the advice is all over
    the place.

    The general advice for low ram systems is twice the amount of ram, but that is not normally needed for modern systems with more ram.

    It really depends on how many programs are running that require large amounts of ram are likely to be running when hibernations will be used.

    My advice, is to open all the programs, tabs that you will normally use, use them as normal for a day, and then check the output of "free -m". Look at the used column. The swap should be large enough to hold whatever is already in swap,
    plus the used Mem, plus some extra for safety.

    On my current system, with 16GB ram, 3 days uptime, running plasma with two browsers with over 30 tabs opened, ktorrent, some plasma applets, etc ...

    # free -m
    total used free shared buff/cache available
    Mem: 16022 5063 280 274 10678 10354 Swap: 32761 0 32761

    So in theory, I should be able to hibernate with 5GB of swap. I chose to make it
    much larger as I do testing of programs that can use a lot of ram, and want to ensure I can hibernate ok with those running, and I've got lots of disk space.

    To minimize swap usage, I've created /etc/sysctl.d/tales.conf with ...
    # Stop applications from being swapped to disk
    vm.swappiness=1
    # Don't shrink the inode cache
    vm.vfs_cache_pressure=50

    This is based on https://rudd-o.com/linux-and-free-software/tales-from-responsivenessland-why-linux-feels-slow-and-how-to-fix-that

    Regards, Dave Hodgins

    --
    Change dwhodgins@nomail.afraid.org to davidwhodgins@teksavvy.com for
    email replies.

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  • From Bit Twister@2:250/1 to All on Sun Feb 7 02:14:55 2021
    On Sat, 06 Feb 2021 19:21:03 -0500, David W. Hodgins wrote:
    On Sat, 06 Feb 2021 12:28:47 -0500, William Unruh <unruh@invalid.ca> wrote:
    And if you read the article, you will notice that the advice is all over
    the place.

    The general advice for low ram systems is twice the amount of ram, but
    that is not normally needed for modern systems with more ram.

    It really depends on how many programs are running that require large
    amounts of ram are likely to be running when hibernations will be used.

    My advice, is to open all the programs, tabs that you will normally use,
    use them as normal for a day, and then check the output of "free -m".
    Look at the used column. The swap should be large enough to hold
    whatever is already in swap, plus the used Mem, plus some extra
    for safety.

    Well, hibernation needs size of ram + desired swap + hibernation overhead,
    so that 2.05 times swap suggestion is not unrealistic as a general
    purpose rule.



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  • From santo@2:250/1 to All on Sun Feb 7 07:56:03 2021
    On Sat, 06 Feb 2021 06:47:35 -0600, Bit Twister wrote:

    On Sat, 6 Feb 2021 06:55:37 +0000 (UTC), santo wrote:

    Hi ,
    I answer to all through you ...I did reinstall...All suggestions given
    about using gparted or rescue disk etc...are way above my level...never
    used them before and I was afraid of being a click away from the next
    disaster if I went ahead...

    How sad...

    a few clarifications:


    [santo@localhost ~]$ lsblk -o NAME,TYPE,FSTYPE,MOUNTPOINT,SIZE,FSAVAIL,FSUSED,LABEL,PARTLABEL
    NAME TYPE FSTYPE MOUNTPOINT SIZE FSAVAIL FSUSED LABEL PARTLABEL
    sda disk 447.1G
    ├─sda1 part vfat /boot/EFI 100M 69.4M 26.6M EFI
    system partition
    ├─sda2 part 16M Microsoft reserved partition
    ├─sda3 part ntfs /media/windows 97.1G 72.8G 24.3G System Basic
    data partition
    ├─sda4 part ntfs 498M
    ├─sda5 part exfat 97.7G Data Basic
    data partition
    ├─sda6 part ext4 / 29.3G 23.2G 4G
    ├─sda7 part swap [SWAP] 7.8G
    ├─sda8 part ext4 /usr/local 14.7G 13.6G 40.1M
    ├─sda9 part ext4 /home 170.8G 167G 123.6M └─sda10 part ext4 /spareroot 29.3G 27.2G 44M
    [santo@localhost ~]$ df



    sda8 seems a waste space in your setup since it was designed to be in /.

    I was under the impression that if I wanted to install e.g.

    leela-zero-0.15-5.1.x86_64.rpm

    A Go Game program and not have it rewritten when I do a new clean
    install it should be put in a directory in a separate partition.
    Previously I used to put /usr in a separate partition and put the file
    there but If I understood well this is not advisable, better have a
    usr/local on a separate partition for this purpose...


    /dev/sda9 168G 68M 168G 1% /home

    Well, you certainly have plenty of space for users to store files in
    /home. :(

    The other possibility my supplier gave me was a system with a 2TB
    size...can you imagine the space to store file if I had chosen that one?

    I am a single low end user and do not share my system with anyone...480GB
    was the smallest size I was offered ( and less expensive...) and way big enough for my needs so...I do not see how else I could/should have used
    that space...

    Another flavour of Linux? I am not inrerested and anyway is enough to 'struggle' with one version than with two :-D

    I would never go Ubuntu who people says is the simplest Linux
    distribution...

    I do not have the knowledge to be a tester, install Cauldron etc...so I
    do not see any other option than to use the remaining free space for /home...waste or not...

    I do suggest having a second and/or third user account for testing.
    I create "normnal" during install, then "junk" then regular users
    starting at uid/gid 1500.

    yes this I should have done. create a junk user etc...you often suggest
    it...I think I can still do it

    $ ls -ln /home

    [santo@localhost ~]$ ls -ln /home
    total 20
    drwx------ 2 0 0 16384 Feb 6 17:03 lost+found/
    drwxr-x--- 18 1000 1000 4096 Feb 7 12:50 santo/
    [santo@localhost ~]$



    You have no method of testing the next upgrade to Mageia Release 8.
    :-(
    Of course if upgrade fails you can do a clean 8 install. :)
    But that assumes Mga8 works on your hardware.


    I always do a clean install and do not see why Mageia8 should not run on
    this system hardware given that it is new...

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  • From santo@2:250/1 to All on Sun Feb 7 08:05:02 2021
    On Sat, 06 Feb 2021 17:45:13 +0000, William Unruh wrote:


    As mentioned he HAS an additional 30GB partition already for Mga8
    intall.

    I just want to clarify - and reassure myself it is possible...- that in
    my intention there was never the idea of keeping Mageia7 and install
    mageia8 using the /spareroot

    So again, apologies for repeating mysel again... when the time comes to installing Mageia8 can I just delete Mageia7 '/' and rename /spareroot
    as / for Mageia8 and go ahead with the installation?

    ....and a side question.. /spareroot is it important its position in Diskdrake? it is at the end of the strip after /home...just wondering...
    Thanks in Advance...

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  • From Herman Viaene@2:250/1 to All on Sun Feb 7 09:36:08 2021
    Op Sun, 07 Feb 2021 08:05:02 +0000, schreef santo:

    On Sat, 06 Feb 2021 17:45:13 +0000, William Unruh wrote:


    As mentioned he HAS an additional 30GB partition already for Mga8
    intall.

    I just want to clarify - and reassure myself it is possible...- that in
    my intention there was never the idea of keeping Mageia7 and install
    mageia8 using the /spareroot

    So again, apologies for repeating mysel again... when the time comes to installing Mageia8 can I just delete Mageia7 '/' and rename /spareroot
    as / for Mageia8 and go ahead with the installation?

    You don't have to "delete" the partition which is your "/" for your M7 installation.
    Start the installation of M8, choose Custom partitioning, choose a free
    (or one you do not need any further) as "/" for your M8 installation.
    That would thus be another one than the M7 "/" partition.
    Then you can either leave the M7 "/" partition alone or assign it mount
    point "/spareroot", that does not matter.
    Then end the partitioning, and go on. The installation will the format
    your new "/", but by default it will not touch the "/spareroot"
    In the end you will ens up with a dual boot M7/M8, which one to boot, is
    your choice at the boot menu.
    If you choose to boot the M7, then the partition on which you assigned
    the M8 /, will not be assigned, it will just be an unused ext4 (or
    whatever format you take) partition, no bother.

    Herman Viaene


    ...and a side question.. /spareroot is it important its position in Diskdrake? it is at the end of the strip after /home...just wondering... Thanks in Advance...


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  • From Bit Twister@2:250/1 to All on Sun Feb 7 11:48:48 2021
    On Sun, 7 Feb 2021 07:56:03 +0000 (UTC), santo wrote:
    On Sat, 06 Feb 2021 06:47:35 -0600, Bit Twister wrote:

    On Sat, 6 Feb 2021 06:55:37 +0000 (UTC), santo wrote:


    Before I forget it, again, what iso are you using for install?
    Also what mirror are you using?


    a few clarifications:


    [santo@localhost ~]$ lsblk -o NAME,TYPE,FSTYPE,MOUNTPOINT,SIZE,FSAVAIL,FSUSED,LABEL,PARTLABEL
    NAME TYPE FSTYPE MOUNTPOINT SIZE FSAVAIL FSUSED LABEL PARTLABEL
    sda disk 447.1G
    ├─sda1 part vfat /boot/EFI 100M 69.4M 26.6M EFI system partition
    ├─sda2 part 16M Microsoft reserved partition
    ├─sda3 part ntfs /media/windows 97.1G 72.8G 24.3G System Basic data partition
    ├─sda4 part ntfs 498M
    ├─sda5 part exfat 97.7G Data Basic data partition
    ├─sda6 part ext4 / 29.3G 23.2G 4G
    ├─sda7 part swap [SWAP] 7.8G
    ├─sda8 part ext4 /usr/local 14.7G 13.6G 40.1M
    ├─sda9 part ext4 /home 170.8G 167G 123.6M
    └─sda10 part ext4 /spareroot 29.3G 27.2G 44M
    [santo@localhost ~]$ df


    Just for fun, install the gparted rpm. click up a terminal, su - root
    and enter gparted.

    Right click the /spareroot partition, pick Name Partition.
    enter mga7, click Ok, click Apply (Green check mark)

    You can click up another terminal and run the lsblk command to
    see the change.

    Now Right click /spareroot change the Label File System option.
    You have to Unmount /spareroot before you can use the Label option.

    Run the lsblk command to see the change.


    sda8 seems a waste space in your setup since it was designed to be in /.

    I was under the impression that if I wanted to install e.g.

    leela-zero-0.15-5.1.x86_64.rpm

    A Go Game program and not have it rewritten when I do a new clean
    install it should be put in a directory in a separate partition.
    Previously I used to put /usr in a separate partition and put the file
    there but If I understood well this is not advisable, better have a
    usr/local on a separate partition for this purpose...

    The purpose is correct but I maintain that usr/local should not
    be shared across installs. I do not care what anyone else says
    because I know for a fact it can lead to one install screwing up
    the other install. :-(

    Let pick a new name. /downloads. That directory will be shared across
    installs. You would then have downloaded leela-zero-0.15-5.1.x86_64.rpm
    into that directory. Let's say you also downloaded xscorch, a game of
    Tanks fighting other tanks, into /downloads.

    You could then have a general purpose script to install all rpmns
    found in /downloads.



    I am a single low end user and do not share my system with anyone...480GB
    was the smallest size I was offered ( and less expensive...) and way big enough for my needs so...I do not see how else I could/should have used
    that space...

    Just depends on your needs/usage. If you wanted to downloads music then
    you would use a lot of space.

    Another flavour of Linux? I am not inrerested and anyway is enough to 'struggle' with one version than with two :-D

    We are not talking about flavour but we are talking about releases.

    Seeing that you do have /spareroot partition, get a Mageia Rlease 8 iso
    from mageia/iso/cauldron/ directory. Example:
    https://mirrors.kernel.org/mageia/iso/cauldron/

    You could boot it and pick /dev/sda10 in Custom Partition phase
    to install mga8 which will not disturb/hurt /dev/sda6



    I do suggest having a second and/or third user account for testing.
    I create "normnal" during install, then "junk" then regular users
    starting at uid/gid 1500.

    yes this I should have done. create a junk user etc...you often suggest it...I think I can still do it

    Yep, Mageia Control Center (mcc) has a menu to do it.
    mcc->System->Manage users on system



    You have no method of testing the next upgrade to Mageia Release 8.
    :-(
    Of course if upgrade fails you can do a clean 8 install. :)
    But that assumes Mga8 works on your hardware.


    I always do a clean install

    Guessing you are restoring email, usenet settings from backup.

    and do not see why Mageia8 should not run on
    this system hardware given that it is new...

    That is your choice. My mga7 works without problems, and mga8 failed
    to give me a login screen. I will be doing another clean install
    to verify they have fix the problem.


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    * Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From Bit Twister@2:250/1 to All on Sun Feb 7 11:58:03 2021
    On Sun, 7 Feb 2021 08:05:02 +0000 (UTC), santo wrote:
    On Sat, 06 Feb 2021 17:45:13 +0000, William Unruh wrote:


    As mentioned he HAS an additional 30GB partition already for Mga8
    intall.

    I just want to clarify - and reassure myself it is possible...- that in
    my intention there was never the idea of keeping Mageia7 and install
    mageia8 using the /spareroot

    If that is the case, /spareroot is waste of space. or can be storage for
    use on new install. Example to store downloaded rpms.


    So again, apologies for repeating mysel again... when the time comes to installing Mageia8 can I just delete Mageia7 '/' and rename /spareroot
    as / for Mageia8 and go ahead with the installation?

    You just indicated you always do clean installs, so pick new install, sda6
    and mga7 will be erased and mga7 installed.

    ...and a side question.. /spareroot is it important its position in Diskdrake?

    No.

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    * Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From santo@2:250/1 to All on Sun Feb 7 12:52:10 2021
    On Sun, 07 Feb 2021 05:48:48 -0600, Bit Twister wrote:

    On Sun, 7 Feb 2021 07:56:03 +0000 (UTC), santo wrote:
    On Sat, 06 Feb 2021 06:47:35 -0600, Bit Twister wrote:

    On Sat, 6 Feb 2021 06:55:37 +0000 (UTC), santo wrote:


    Before I forget it, again, what iso are you using for install?
    Also what mirror are you using?



    Mageia-7.1-x86_64/
    http://mirror.math.princeton.edu.pub.mageia/distrib/7/X86_64

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    * Origin: Aioe.org NNTP Server (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From santo@2:250/1 to All on Sun Feb 7 12:57:31 2021
    On Sun, 07 Feb 2021 05:58:03 -0600, Bit Twister wrote:

    On Sun, 7 Feb 2021 08:05:02 +0000 (UTC), santo wrote:
    On Sat, 06 Feb 2021 17:45:13 +0000, William Unruh wrote:


    As mentioned he HAS an additional 30GB partition already for Mga8
    intall.

    I just want to clarify - and reassure myself it is possible...- that
    in my intention there was never the idea of keeping Mageia7 and install
    mageia8 using the /spareroot

    If that is the case, /spareroot is waste of space.


    You just indicated you always do clean installs, so pick new install,
    sda6 and mga7 will be erased and mga7 installed.

    OK...I just wanted to be sure of this

    thanks...

    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: Aioe.org NNTP Server (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From William Unruh@2:250/1 to All on Sun Feb 7 17:37:45 2021
    On 2021-02-07, santo <nanci@auroville.org.in> wrote:
    On Sat, 06 Feb 2021 06:47:35 -0600, Bit Twister wrote:
    ....
    NAME,TYPE,FSTYPE,MOUNTPOINT,SIZE,FSAVAIL,FSUSED,LABEL,PARTLABEL
    NAME TYPE FSTYPE MOUNTPOINT SIZE FSAVAIL FSUSED LABEL PARTLABEL
    sda disk 447.1G
    ├─sda1 part vfat /boot/EFI 100M 69.4M 26.6M EFI system partition
    ├─sda2 part 16M Microsoft
    reserved partition
    ├─sda3 part ntfs /media/windows 97.1G 72.8G 24.3G System Basic data partition
    ├─sda4 part ntfs 498M ├─sda5 part exfat 97.7G Data Basic data partition
    ├─sda6 part ext4 / 29.3G 23.2G 4G ├─sda7 part swap [SWAP] 7.8G ├─sda8 part ext4 /usr/local 14.7G 13.6G 40.1M ├─sda9 part ext4 /home 170.8G 167G 123.6M └─sda10 part ext4 /spareroot 29.3G 27.2G 44M

    sda8 seems a waste space in your setup since it was designed to be in /.


    I was under the impression that if I wanted to install e.g.

    leela-zero-0.15-5.1.x86_64.rpm

    If it is an rpm, then it probably will install in /usr/bin and /usr/lib
    rather than in /usr/local. Ie, it will not get saved unless you tranfer
    it and all of its files (rpm -qil leela-zero) into /usr/local/ rather
    than /usr/bin/lib/...


    A Go Game program and not have it rewritten when I do a new clean
    install it should be put in a directory in a separate partition.
    Previously I used to put /usr in a separate partition and put the file
    there but If I understood well this is not advisable, better have a usr/local on a separate partition for this purpose...

    As I mentioned, it will be a good idea if you do

    rpm -qa --qf "%{NAME}\n" |sort > ~santos/rpmfiles-mga7.back

    Ie, in the separate /home partition so it will be available to you when
    you install the new Mga8.

    When you install Mga8 you can then do
    rpm -qa --qf "%{NAME}\n" |sort > ~santos/rpmfiles-mga8.back
    And compare the two files to see what you had in mga7 and is not in mga8
    so you can install it if you still want it. If it has configuration
    files hidden somewhere eg in /etc you will still have the mga7 install to transfer
    them over to the mga8 install.

    The advantage of an update rather than a new install of mga8 is that
    such things will be automatically saved for you. The disadvantage is
    that if anything goes wrong you will not have a fallback to the old
    mga7. And with the best of intentions of the Mageia team and their hard
    work to ensure that upgrades do work properly, the chances of something
    going wrong on a update seems to be higher than on a new install.






    I am a single low end user and do not share my system with anyone...480GB was the smallest size I was offered ( and less expensive...) and way big enough for my needs so...I do not see how else I could/should have used
    that space...

    It is fine. Just remember that /home need not only be used for the home directories of your users (or user) but can also be used to put other
    stuff. Eg, if you run out of room on /, you can transfer, say,
    /usr/share into /home
    (
    rsync -av /usr/share/ /home/usrshare
    mv /usr/share /usr/share.old
    ln -s /home/usrshare /usr/share
    and once you are sure things are OK,
    rm -rf /usr/share.old
    )

    ....

    I do suggest having a second and/or third user account for testing.
    I create "normnal" during install, then "junk" then regular users
    starting at uid/gid 1500.

    yes this I should have done. create a junk user etc...you often suggest it...I think I can still do it

    Sure. Do it now if you wish
    open MCC
    go to System-->Manage users
    and put in a new user.


    I always do a clean install and do not see why Mageia8 should not run on this system hardware given that it is new...

    Because bugs happen.


    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From William Unruh@2:250/1 to All on Sun Feb 7 17:48:15 2021
    On 2021-02-07, Bit Twister <BitTwister@mouse-potato.com> wrote:
    On Sun, 7 Feb 2021 07:56:03 +0000 (UTC), santo wrote:
    On Sat, 06 Feb 2021 06:47:35 -0600, Bit Twister wrote:

    On Sat, 6 Feb 2021 06:55:37 +0000 (UTC), santo wrote:


    Before I forget it, again, what iso are you using for install?
    Also what mirror are you using?


    a few clarifications:


    [santo@localhost ~]$ lsblk -o
    NAME,TYPE,FSTYPE,MOUNTPOINT,SIZE,FSAVAIL,FSUSED,LABEL,PARTLABEL
    NAME TYPE FSTYPE MOUNTPOINT SIZE FSAVAIL FSUSED LABEL PARTLABEL
    sda disk 447.1G
    ├─sda1 part vfat /boot/EFI 100M 69.4M 26.6M EFI
    system partition
    ├─sda2 part 16M Microsoft
    reserved partition
    ├─sda3 part ntfs /media/windows 97.1G 72.8G 24.3G System Basic
    data partition
    ├─sda4 part ntfs 498M
    ├─sda5 part exfat 97.7G Data Basic
    data partition
    ├─sda6 part ext4 / 29.3G 23.2G 4G
    ├─sda7 part swap [SWAP] 7.8G
    ├─sda8 part ext4 /usr/local 14.7G 13.6G 40.1M
    ├─sda9 part ext4 /home 170.8G 167G 123.6M
    └─sda10 part ext4 /spareroot 29.3G 27.2G 44M
    [santo@localhost ~]$ df


    Just for fun, install the gparted rpm. click up a terminal, su - root
    and enter gparted.

    Right click the /spareroot partition, pick Name Partition.
    enter mga7, click Ok, click Apply (Green check mark)

    Uh, he wants that for mga8, not mga7. Labeling the partition mga7 will
    only completely confuse him when he installs mga8


    You can click up another terminal and run the lsblk command to
    see the change.

    Now Right click /spareroot change the Label File System option.
    You have to Unmount /spareroot before you can use the Label option.

    Run the lsblk command to see the change.


    The purpose is correct but I maintain that usr/local should not
    be shared across installs. I do not care what anyone else says
    because I know for a fact it can lead to one install screwing up
    the other install. :-(

    And I do not care what you say. I have given my reasons for
    /usr/local/being a partition which is not destroyed by a new
    installation. IF you are constantly hopping from mga8 to mga7 and back,
    they it might (although I have not had it happen) be as Bit says, that
    the programs in /usr/local will not work on Mga8 anyway, or that somehow
    the mga8 use could mangle the mga7 version.


    Let pick a new name. /downloads. That directory will be shared across installs. You would then have downloaded leela-zero-0.15-5.1.x86_64.rpm
    into that directory. Let's say you also downloaded xscorch, a game of
    Tanks fighting other tanks, into /downloads.

    mkdir /home/downloads
    ln -s /home/downloads /downloads

    and now /downloads will be on a partition which is not destroyed by
    install of mga8.


    You could then have a general purpose script to install all rpmns
    found in /downloads.

    Well, yes, except that he would have to first learn how to write
    scripts.

    ....

    and do not see why Mageia8 should not run on
    this system hardware given that it is new...

    That is your choice. My mga7 works without problems, and mga8 failed
    to give me a login screen. I will be doing another clean install
    to verify they have fix the problem.

    The disadvantages of running cauldron. He is not ready for becoming a
    beta tester. Give him time. Lets not overburden him right now.



    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From William Unruh@2:250/1 to All on Sun Feb 7 18:01:55 2021

    In alt.os.linux.mageia, you wrote:
    On Sat, 06 Feb 2021 17:45:13 +0000, William Unruh wrote:


    As mentioned he HAS an additional 30GB partition already for Mga8
    intall.

    I just want to clarify - and reassure myself it is possible...- that in
    my intention there was never the idea of keeping Mageia7 and install
    mageia8 using the /spareroot

    So again, apologies for repeating mysel again... when the time comes to installing Mageia8 can I just delete Mageia7 '/' and rename /spareroot
    as / for Mageia8 and go ahead with the installation?

    NONONO. Do NOT delete mga7 /. When you install Mga8 you will tell it to
    use the partition which is now called /spareroot on Mga7. It will
    mount it as /. YOur old mga7 partition which mga7 used as / will still
    be there, and you can mount it as say /mga7
    The partition names like / /spareroot /home are for your convenience--
    nothing changes as far as the disk partitions are concerned they are
    still there, named things like sda5, sda10 .... It is YOU in the file /etc/fstab that tells the system what names as part of your filesystem
    to call them when they are mounted. Thus the same partition can be
    called / on one installation, /oldroot on another, /mga7 on a third, /home/I_WANTED_TO_GIVE_IT_COMPLICATED_NAME_FOR_FUN on a fouth. None of
    those names change anything on the partition sitting on the disk.

    Unlike Shakespeare, you can give the boyfriend the name Peter Capulet
    instead of Romeo Montague without changing him in the least (the rose by
    any another name would smell as sweet) if the boyfriend were a partition
    on the disk.


    ...and a side question.. /spareroot is it important its position in Diskdrake? it is at the end of the strip after /home...just wondering...

    No, Linux does not care a whit where on the disk it is, or even on which
    disk it is. You tell the system what name you want to give a partition
    (in /etc/fstab) and it does all the rest. None of this C: D: ..., boot flags,... junk from some other operating systems.


    Thanks in Advance...

    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From William Unruh@2:250/1 to All on Sun Feb 7 18:08:08 2021
    On 2021-02-07, Bit Twister <BitTwister@mouse-potato.com> wrote:
    On Sun, 7 Feb 2021 08:05:02 +0000 (UTC), santo wrote:
    On Sat, 06 Feb 2021 17:45:13 +0000, William Unruh wrote:


    As mentioned he HAS an additional 30GB partition already for Mga8
    intall.

    I just want to clarify - and reassure myself it is possible...- that in
    my intention there was never the idea of keeping Mageia7 and install
    mageia8 using the /spareroot

    If that is the case, /spareroot is waste of space. or can be storage for
    use on new install. Example to store downloaded rpms.

    It is not a waste of space, anymore than a backup is a waste of space.
    It is an insurance policy so that if your install of Mga8 goes Kablooie,
    you still can boot into mga7 and think some more. Once you are
    comfortable with Mga8 then you keep that old mga7 / partition as a spare
    for the installation of Mageia 10, just as /spareroot is not being kept
    as a partition for mga9



    So again, apologies for repeating mysel again... when the time comes to
    installing Mageia8 can I just delete Mageia7 '/' and rename /spareroot
    as / for Mageia8 and go ahead with the installation?

    You just indicated you always do clean installs, so pick new install, sda6 and mga7 will be erased and mga7 installed.

    What??? They will not be erased unless you stupidly tell the system to
    erase them. They are you r insurance policy. You just tell the mga8
    install to use sda10 for / and to leave everything else alone. ( or
    rather to mount them on /usr/local and /home and the old mga7 root as
    say /mga7)


    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From Bit Twister@2:250/1 to All on Sun Feb 7 20:35:32 2021
    On Sun, 7 Feb 2021 17:48:15 -0000 (UTC), William Unruh wrote:
    On 2021-02-07, Bit Twister <BitTwister@mouse-potato.com> wrote:

    Right click the /spareroot partition, pick Name Partition.
    enter mga7, click Ok, click Apply (Green check mark)

    Uh, he wants that for mga8, not mga7. Labeling the partition mga7 will
    only completely confuse him when he installs mga8

    You are correct, I have problems hitting the 8 key. :(




    You can click up another terminal and run the lsblk command to
    see the change.

    Now Right click /spareroot change the Label File System option.
    You have to Unmount /spareroot before you can use the Label option.

    Run the lsblk command to see the change.


    The purpose is correct but I maintain that usr/local should not
    be shared across installs. I do not care what anyone else says
    because I know for a fact it can lead to one install screwing up
    the other install. :-(

    And I do not care what you say.

    How sad. I have
    $ locate /usr/local/ | wc -l
    154
    directories/files. all having files placed there by third party packages,

    I have given my reasons for
    /usr/local/being a partition which is not destroyed by a new
    installation.

    And yet if I were to share /usr/local between mga7 and mga8, as you
    indicate, my mga8 install would overwrite the mga7 files.

    I feel that it is a poor methodology to run programs compiled/linked
    on a higher release on an old release system.




    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From Bit Twister@2:250/1 to All on Sun Feb 7 20:46:26 2021
    On Sun, 7 Feb 2021 18:08:08 -0000 (UTC), William Unruh wrote:
    On 2021-02-07, Bit Twister <BitTwister@mouse-potato.com> wrote:
    On Sun, 7 Feb 2021 08:05:02 +0000 (UTC), santo wrote:
    On Sat, 06 Feb 2021 17:45:13 +0000, William Unruh wrote:


    As mentioned he HAS an additional 30GB partition already for Mga8
    intall.

    I just want to clarify - and reassure myself it is possible...- that in >>> my intention there was never the idea of keeping Mageia7 and install
    mageia8 using the /spareroot

    If that is the case, /spareroot is waste of space. or can be storage for
    use on new install. Example to store downloaded rpms.

    It is not a waste of space, anymore than a backup is a waste of space.

    It is based on his statement "that in my intention there was never the
    idea of keeping Mageia7 and install mageia8 using the /spareroot"

    It is an insurance policy so that if your install of Mga8 goes Kablooie,
    you still can boot into mga7 and think some more.

    Well, we have kept pushing that having a fallback install is a good idea.
    As the saying goes,
    You can lead a camel to water, but you can not make him drink it.

    So again, apologies for repeating mysel again... when the time comes to
    installing Mageia8 can I just delete Mageia7 '/' and rename /spareroot
    as / for Mageia8 and go ahead with the installation?

    You just indicated you always do clean installs, so pick new install, sda6 >> and mga7 will be erased and mga7 installed.

    What??? They will not be erased unless you stupidly tell the system to
    erase them.

    Oh, I can agree with about that, but you seem to keep ignoring that I
    am answering/replying to the poster's questions.


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    * Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From William Unruh@2:250/1 to All on Sun Feb 7 21:42:08 2021
    On 2021-02-07, Bit Twister <BitTwister@mouse-potato.com> wrote:
    On Sun, 7 Feb 2021 17:48:15 -0000 (UTC), William Unruh wrote:
    On 2021-02-07, Bit Twister <BitTwister@mouse-potato.com> wrote:

    Right click the /spareroot partition, pick Name Partition.
    enter mga7, click Ok, click Apply (Green check mark)

    Uh, he wants that for mga8, not mga7. Labeling the partition mga7 will
    only completely confuse him when he installs mga8

    You are correct, I have problems hitting the 8 key. :(




    You can click up another terminal and run the lsblk command to
    see the change.

    Now Right click /spareroot change the Label File System option.
    You have to Unmount /spareroot before you can use the Label option.

    Run the lsblk command to see the change.


    The purpose is correct but I maintain that usr/local should not
    be shared across installs. I do not care what anyone else says
    because I know for a fact it can lead to one install screwing up
    the other install. :-(

    And I do not care what you say.
    Note- that was a paraphrase of a quote by you (see the line 5 above this).


    How sad. I have
    $ locate /usr/local/ | wc -l
    154
    directories/files. all having files placed there by third party packages,

    Yes, they may have been put there by third party packages, NOT by
    Mageia. And they are (almost) all no specific to Mageia 7. If you
    dispute that please give us an example of a package what is Mageia 7
    specific that is /usr/local.


    I have given my reasons for
    /usr/local/being a partition which is not destroyed by a new
    installation.

    And yet if I were to share /usr/local between mga7 and mga8, as you
    indicate, my mga8 install would overwrite the mga7 files.

    No, it would not. Mageia programs are installed in /usr/bin or /usr/lib
    etc, not /usr/local/. What may put packages into /usr/local are third
    party program, which are (usually) not Mageia 7 specific.


    I feel that it is a poor methodology to run programs compiled/linked
    on a higher release on an old release system.

    As I said, my advice is for someone who is using the mageia 7 as an
    insurance against Mga8 being a disaster. If you actually keep hopping
    back and forth between Mga7 and Mga8 constantly (eg if you are acting as
    a cauldron tester) then other rules may apply. And you are of course
    welcome to organize your system just as you want. But in giving advice
    to others, your organisation makes far more work for zero benefit. As
    far as I can tell, Santos is not going to be jumping between Mga7 and 8
    and is not going to get bitten by the situation you describe (a program complied specifically for Mga 7 and running properly only on Mga 7 which
    is destroyed byMga8, or vice versa).

    It is of course up to the reader how much of my advice, or yours to
    take.




    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From Bit Twister@2:250/1 to All on Mon Feb 8 00:58:20 2021
    On Sun, 7 Feb 2021 21:42:08 -0000 (UTC), William Unruh wrote:
    On 2021-02-07, Bit Twister <BitTwister@mouse-potato.com> wrote:
    On Sun, 7 Feb 2021 17:48:15 -0000 (UTC), William Unruh wrote:
    On 2021-02-07, Bit Twister <BitTwister@mouse-potato.com> wrote:


    And I do not care what you say.
    Note- that was a paraphrase of a quote by you

    Quote or not, the words convey meanings which I have to take at
    face value.


    How sad. I have
    $ locate /usr/local/ | wc -l
    154
    directories/files. all having files placed there by third party packages,

    Yes, they may have been put there by third party packages, NOT by
    Mageia. And they are (almost) all no specific to Mageia 7. If you
    dispute that please give us an example of a package what is Mageia 7
    specific that is /usr/local.

    And right there is the difference between us in this thread.

    I may be responding to a post, but my responses are to any
    lurkers and anyone coming across this thread sometime in
    future.

    Yes, you are absolutely correct that Mageia install does not
    put anything in /usr/local. All I am saying is that you do
    not share any of the directories found in / with any other
    installs. That statement will insure that one install will
    cause any damage to the other install.




    I have given my reasons for
    /usr/local/being a partition which is not destroyed by a new
    installation.

    And yet if I were to share /usr/local between mga7 and mga8, as you
    indicate, my mga8 install would overwrite the mga7 files.

    No, it would not. Mageia programs are installed in /usr/bin or /usr/lib
    etc, not /usr/local/. What may put packages into /usr/local are third
    party program, which are (usually) not Mageia 7 specific.

    You overlooked the term "MY INSTALL" and ignore that anyone
    else's install might have files in /usr/local


    I feel that it is a poor methodology to run programs compiled/linked
    on a higher release on an old release system.

    As I said, my advice is for someone who is using the mageia 7 as an
    insurance against Mga8 being a disaster.

    And yet your advice is flawed if the user has files in the shared /usr/local.

    If you actually keep hopping
    back and forth between Mga7 and Mga8 constantly (eg if you are acting as
    a cauldron tester) then other rules may apply.

    I maintain the third party type user's Mga8 install would overwrite Mga7
    /usr/local files at the point they complete "THEIR" install.

    And you are of course
    welcome to organize your system just as you want. But in giving advice
    to others, your organisation makes far more work for zero benefit.

    It is not "far more work for zero benefit." and is the only way to verify
    the new "Complete" install works without changing the old install.

    As
    far as I can tell, Santos is not going to be jumping between Mga7 and 8
    and is not going to get bitten by the situation you describe (a program complied specifically for Mga 7 and running properly only on Mga 7 which
    is destroyed byMga8, or vice versa).

    I completely agree with your above statement. Worse case I see for him
    is he will do a clean install and if the system does not come up as the previous install, he will just clean install the old install.

    It is of course up to the reader how much of my advice, or yours to
    take.

    Yup. I can not agree more.

    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From William Unruh@2:250/1 to All on Mon Feb 8 02:01:07 2021
    On 2021-02-08, Bit Twister <BitTwister@mouse-potato.com> wrote:
    On Sun, 7 Feb 2021 21:42:08 -0000 (UTC), William Unruh wrote:
    On 2021-02-07, Bit Twister <BitTwister@mouse-potato.com> wrote:
    On Sun, 7 Feb 2021 17:48:15 -0000 (UTC), William Unruh wrote:
    On 2021-02-07, Bit Twister <BitTwister@mouse-potato.com> wrote:


    And I do not care what you say.
    Note- that was a paraphrase of a quote by you

    Quote or not, the words convey meanings which I have to take at
    face value.

    So do yours.



    How sad. I have
    $ locate /usr/local/ | wc -l
    154
    directories/files. all having files placed there by third party packages, >>
    Yes, they may have been put there by third party packages, NOT by
    Mageia. And they are (almost) all no specific to Mageia 7. If you
    dispute that please give us an example of a package what is Mageia 7
    specific that is /usr/local.

    And right there is the difference between us in this thread.

    I may be responding to a post, but my responses are to any
    lurkers and anyone coming across this thread sometime in
    future.

    Yes, you are absolutely correct that Mageia install does not
    put anything in /usr/local. All I am saying is that you do
    not share any of the directories found in / with any other
    installs. That statement will insure that one install will
    cause any damage to the other install.

    I think you forgot a "not" in that last sentence. Or am I to take
    anything you write seriously?
    Since ALL files and directores are under /, I also do not think you
    mean the previous sentence. Perhaps you meant any files or directories on the same partition under /





    I have given my reasons for
    /usr/local/being a partition which is not destroyed by a new
    installation.

    And yet if I were to share /usr/local between mga7 and mga8, as you
    indicate, my mga8 install would overwrite the mga7 files.

    No, it would not. Mageia programs are installed in /usr/bin or /usr/lib
    etc, not /usr/local/. What may put packages into /usr/local are third
    party program, which are (usually) not Mageia 7 specific.

    You overlooked the term "MY INSTALL" and ignore that anyone
    else's install might have files in /usr/local

    The install ( which I take to mean, the installation of a new version
    of the operating system). My claim is that if you save what is installed
    under /usr/local, the time and effort saved more than makes up for the
    time and effort spent on fixing stuff which breaks under the new OS
    (assuming those OS are Linux OSs. I would not advocate trying to run
    Linux programs under Windows.)



    I feel that it is a poor methodology to run programs compiled/linked
    on a higher release on an old release system.

    As I said, my advice is for someone who is using the mageia 7 as an
    insurance against Mga8 being a disaster.

    And yet your advice is flawed if the user has files in the shared /usr/local.

    ???? Not under the conditions I stated.


    If you actually keep hopping
    back and forth between Mga7 and Mga8 constantly (eg if you are acting as
    a cauldron tester) then other rules may apply.

    I maintain the third party type user's Mga8 install would overwrite Mga7
    /usr/local files at the point they complete "THEIR" install.

    Not sure what a "third part type user's Mga8 install" is. Mga8 comes
    from mageia which is not a third party. Of course you probably mean installation of programs which third parties specifically targeted to
    Mga8. Since those are a rather rare kind of bird, I am not particularly
    worried about it shitting on me, or on others who read this. I did ask
    you to give me examples on your system of third party software that you
    run which is specific to Mga8 and will fail on Mga7?


    And you are of course
    welcome to organize your system just as you want. But in giving advice
    to others, your organisation makes far more work for zero benefit.

    It is not "far more work for zero benefit." and is the only way to verify
    the new "Complete" install works without changing the old install.

    You are a distro tester. I will grant that all distro testers who read
    this may have other concerns. But then again they are not liable to care
    what either you or I say, and have already set up their system for
    themselves.

    Note that as a tester, finding out whether Mga7 third party software
    still runs under Mga8 (or vice versa) is perhaps of interest to users as
    well.


    As
    far as I can tell, Santos is not going to be jumping between Mga7 and 8
    and is not going to get bitten by the situation you describe (a program
    complied specifically for Mga 7 and running properly only on Mga 7 which
    is destroyed byMga8, or vice versa).

    I completely agree with your above statement. Worse case I see for him
    is he will do a clean install and if the system does not come up as the previous install, he will just clean install the old install.

    Since any install (even on an SSD takes many hours, and under the advice I gave, all he
    need do is to reboot, without reinstall, to the saved Mga7, I would say
    this falls under the category of much work for no benefit, especailly as
    he will again have to configure all of the programs he spent time
    configuring before to make them work as he likes them under Mga7 again.


    It is of course up to the reader how much of my advice, or yours to
    take.

    Yup. I can not agree more.

    --- MBSE BBS v1.0.7.21 (GNU/Linux-x86_64)
    * Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)
  • From Bit Twister@2:250/1 to All on Mon Feb 8 03:14:25 2021
    On Mon, 8 Feb 2021 02:01:07 -0000 (UTC), William Unruh wrote:
    On 2021-02-08, Bit Twister <BitTwister@mouse-potato.com> wrote:
    On Sun, 7 Feb 2021 21:42:08 -0000 (UTC), William Unruh wrote:
    On 2021-02-07, Bit Twister <BitTwister@mouse-potato.com> wrote:
    On Sun, 7 Feb 2021 17:48:15 -0000 (UTC), William Unruh wrote:
    On 2021-02-07, Bit Twister <BitTwister@mouse-potato.com> wrote:


    And I do not care what you say.
    Note- that was a paraphrase of a quote by you

    Quote or not, the words convey meanings which I have to take at
    face value.

    So do yours.

    Yep, because I have had experience with /usr/local which you appear to
    not have.



    Yes, you are absolutely correct that Mageia install does not
    put anything in /usr/local. All I am saying is that you do
    not share any of the directories found in / with any other
    installs. That statement will insure that one install will
    cause any damage to the other install.

    I think you forgot a "not" in that last sentence.

    Ah, frap. Thank you. It has been a long day since about 3am. It should have read
    " That statement will insure that one install will not cause any damage
    to the other install."

    Since ALL files and directores are under /, I also do not think you
    mean the previous sentence. Perhaps you meant any files or directories on the same partition under /

    I meant a stock/standard install with no other partitions beside swap.
    That meas no separate /home or /usr/local partitions.






    I have given my reasons for
    /usr/local/being a partition which is not destroyed by a new
    installation.

    And yet if I were to share /usr/local between mga7 and mga8, as you
    indicate, my mga8 install would overwrite the mga7 files.

    No, it would not. Mageia programs are installed in /usr/bin or /usr/lib
    etc, not /usr/local/. What may put packages into /usr/local are third
    party program, which are (usually) not Mageia 7 specific.

    You overlooked the term "MY INSTALL" and ignore that anyone
    else's install might have files in /usr/local

    The install ( which I take to mean, the installation of a new version
    of the operating system).

    And I mean it to say all packages install by a user, not your definition
    of just the default Mageia install and any Mageia packages the user would add.

    My claim is that if you save what is installed
    under /usr/local, the time and effort saved more than makes up for the
    time and effort spent on fixing stuff which breaks under the new OS

    Hehehe, what I hear you say is I have to save /usr/local, do the new install and if I fall back to the old install I restore /usr/local. or wipe
    /usr/local and reinstall those packages. Trust me, I wold save all sorts
    of time by leaving /usr/local as a sub directory of / instead of your
    shared /usr/local and having restore or compile/link/install the packages..


    And yet your advice is flawed if the user has files in the shared /usr/local.

    ???? Not under the conditions I stated.

    What is with the above statement! I have already agreed with you that
    a Mageia only install creates no files in /usr/local.


    I maintain the third party type user's Mga8 install would overwrite Mga7
    /usr/local files at the point they complete "THEIR" install.

    Not sure what a "third part type user's Mga8 install" is.

    It means they install third party packages.



    You are a distro tester.

    Not realty. I test the next release to make sure new release install
    works on my setup and that the third party apps work.


    Note that as a tester, finding out whether Mga7 third party software
    still runs under Mga8 (or vice versa) is perhaps of interest to users as well.

    Then I suggest they might want to keep an eye on Mageia bugzilla page.
    https://bugs.mageia.org/buglist.cgi?component=RPM%20Packages&product=Mageia

    Since any install (even on an SSD takes many hours,

    That is just terrible. Network install takes me about 30 minutes, 10 minutes
    in install configuration screen. and install/changes take
    $ grep elapse tb*8*
    tb_mga8_8_o0_day_one_install.rpt_002:Elapsed: 0 00:04:52 for 27 packages tb_mga8_8_o0_install_addons.rpt_001:Elapsed: 0 00:11:36 for 153 packages tb_mga8_8_o0_install_changes.rpt_001:Elapsed: 0 00:12:08 for 7 packages tb_mga8_8_o0_install_toys.rpt_001:Elapsed: 0 00:14:35 for 54 packages tb_mga8_8_o0_new_install.rpt_001:Elapsed: 0 00:02:33 for 32 packages

    on spinning rust drives.

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    * Origin: A noiseless patient Spider (2:250/1@fidonet)