Upgrading RH7.2 to RH9 questions

[Howard Gibson]

On Wed, 29 Oct 2003 19:16:07 -0500
Jim Ruxton <cinetron-uEvt2TsIf2EsA/PxXw9srA at public.gmane.org> wrote:

> I'm going to upgrade a dual boot XP , RH7.2 laptop to dual boot XP, RH9 
> . I have some questions that I was hoping someone could help me with.
> I think I'm just going to install RH9 rather than update RH7.2 so I can 
> start over. RH7.2 was my first Linux system and I've learned a lot. My 
> file systems are a bit messed up so I think I'd rather start from 
> scratch . I want the new install to be as painless as possible so I 
> figure there are some things I should save like the files beneath  ~/  . 
>   Are there other files I should save to make my life easy when I 
> upgrade ?  I figure my old XF86Config-4 would be a good thing to have 
> handy. Yes I have backups but I want the files I really need to be 
> easily accessible.
>  I  also want to save all my email and bookmarks. I'm currently using 
> Mozilla 1.0 . Is there an easy way to do this?
> When I start the install will the RH9 CD's recognize that I have a dual 
> boot system and leave my XP partition alone.?
> Will the install automatically delete my old system (Rh7.2 files) or do 
> I have to do that manually?
> I'm a bit nervous to start all over from scratch. It was a bitch getting 
> everything working in the first place but then I knew nothing about 
> Linux at that point. Thanks for any hints on the best way to proceed.
> Jim

Jim,

   When you write your /home filesystem out to CD, all of your email, your bookmarks and everything else will be saved.  Next time (assuming you did not do it this time) place /home on its own partition.  Then you can blow away /, and re-install to your heart's content.

   Red Hat gives you a bunch of choices for an install.  Most of these are dangerous if you have partitions you want preserved.  If you want to re-partition, do a Custom install.  If you do not want to re-partition, consider doing an Upgrade.  Since all the valuable data on my system is off the / partition, I do the Custom install systematically.

   In addition to your /home filesystem, make sure you back up /etc.  You will want to look at this stuff, later.

-- 
Howard Gibson 
hgibson-MwcKTmeKVNQ at public.gmane.org
howard-42qnO8ePF9cV+D8aMU/kSg at public.gmane.org 
http://home.eol.ca/~hgibson
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