[Novalug] best way to back up a home partition.

[Megan Larko]

Bonnie Dalzell wrote:
> 
> i have two harddrives - each with an Ubuntu installation on them. they 
> go into externally accessable drive drawers. one sits on the shelf as a 
> backup.
> 
> last night while trying to get alien to work (the rpm to deb program - 
> not a game) I managed to ugrade ubuntu on the ubuntu drive in the 
> machine. this resulted in loosing the ability to start up x - when you 
> try startx you get the error:
> 
> xinit connection refused (error111)
> 
> so before doing anything else I put the backup harddrive in an booted 
> from it and I used gnome-commander to copy the home directory from the 
> messuped installation harddrive to a subdirectory on another harddrive.
> 
> then it occured to me: what is the best way to do such a backup copy?
> 
> also of course any suggestions on getting x working again would be 
> apprectiated.
I concur with rsync.  It's a cool utility.  ....or one could always tar 
the home/userid directory and store the tarfile somewhere....
> 
> trying to get alien to install resulted in a report that the 
> dependencies were broken - apt-get was not able to get rpm which is 
> needed for alien to work.
> 
> another problem I had - part of the reason for tryign to upgrade - was 
> that I could not compile the tar.gz version of anything because the 
> install routines wanted to call cc and apparently my system has gcc and 
> is not set up to tell the installer routines that cc and gcc are the same.
On my box, the cc compiler is linked, via /etc/alternatives set-up to 
gcc.   Here is what I have:
larkoc at larkoc:~$ which cc
/usr/bin/cc                          #cc runs /usr/bin/cc...
larkoc at larkoc:~$ ls -l /usr/bin/cc
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 20 2007-08-07 14:29 /usr/bin/cc -> 
/etc/alternatives/cc                 #...which is a symlink to 
/etc/alterntives/cc...
larkoc at larkoc:~$ ls -l /etc/alternatives/cc
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 12 2007-08-08 12:23 /etc/alternatives/cc -> 
/usr/bin/gcc                         #...which actually goes to the 
/usr/bin/gcc executable.

So when I issue cc on my command line, I'm really getting gcc.  Also gcc 
can be a versioning issue with some programs.  My version of cc-->gcc is :
larkoc at larkoc:~$ gcc --version
gcc (GCC) 4.1.2 (Ubuntu 4.1.2-0ubuntu4)
Copyright (C) 2006 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
This is free software; see the source for copying conditions.  There is NO
warranty; not even for MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.

> 
> I have a lot to learn.
> 
> right now I am booted off of the ubuntu installation on the backup 
> harddrive which is either dapper or edgy. i have not figured out which.
To get the Ubunutu version enter:
larkoc at larkoc:/etc$ cat lsb-release
DISTRIB_ID=Ubuntu
DISTRIB_RELEASE=7.04
DISTRIB_CODENAME=feisty
DISTRIB_DESCRIPTION="Ubuntu 7.04"
larkoc at larkoc:/etc$ cd
larkoc at larkoc:~$ cat /etc/lsb-release
DISTRIB_ID=Ubuntu
DISTRIB_RELEASE=7.04
DISTRIB_CODENAME=feisty
DISTRIB_DESCRIPTION="Ubuntu 7.04"

For Red Hat users, it is /etc/redhat-release.

megan
(pet the dogs for me)
> 
> 
> 
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>                        Bonnie Dalzell, MA
> mail:5100 Hydes Rd ---- Hydes MD USA 21082-----EMAIL:bdalzell at qis.net
> 
> freelance anatomist, vertebrate paleontologist, writer, illustrator, dog
> breeder, computer nerd & iconoclast... Borzoi info at www.borzois.com.
> 
> Editor Net.Pet Online Animal Magazine  - http://www.netpetmagazine.com
> HOME http://www.qis.net/~borzoi/          BUSINESS http://www.batw.com
> 
> _______________________________________________
> Novalug mailing list
> Novalug at calypso.tux.org
> http://calypso.tux.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/novalug