[Novices] upgrade installation

[Robert G. Brown]

On Sat, 04 Mar 2006 12:54:44 -0500, Eric Beversluis <econophil at charter.net> wrote:

>On Sat, 2006-03-04 at 17:10 +0000, Robert G. Brown wrote:
>> On Sat, 04 Mar 2006 09:06:26 -0500, Eric Beversluis wrote:
>> 
>> >I'm about to upgrade my Mandrake 10.1 to Mandriva 2006. I'm not sure
>> >exactly what I do about my home directory: How much of what the new
>> >install creates should I keep and how much should I replace with the
>> >backup of my current home directory? 
>> It is ALWAYS a good idea to back up things you want to keep (and I won't
>> argue with "everything") before a major upgrade.
>> 
>> Now, is this really an upgrade, or a new install? Ususally, upgrades
>> do not touch home directories.
>
>I'm contemplating a clean install--maybe even on a new HDD if I dcide to
>go that way. My bad not to distinguish clearly. It will be an upgrade
>with a clean install, not an upgrade install--my sense from what I've
>read and heard is that upgrade installs are not such a good idea.
Ok, so I would call this a new install, not an "upgrade" install, or 
any other kind of install or upgrade. It's a new version of Linux, you 
are going to reformat everytrhing and install from the new distro 
media.. that's a new install.
 
>> >1.  Presumably I create a user (ericb) when I do the install.
>> OK, again, my question.. install or upgrade?
OK, since you've answered that question above, then you are going
to have to backup EVERYTHING you want to keep.
 
>> It is very common to so isolate home directories (like on a different
>> partition or drive) that an install/upgrade doesn't see them.
>So a new version, or even a new distro, doesn't (need to) change
>anything in the home directories?
It might, and youwould do wll to read up on this before you act.
In general, new installs do NOT touch home directories, and changes
are done on an application-by-application basis.

>> >2.  If so, do I then copy the entire contents of my old /home/ericb
>> >directory, replacing what Mandriva has created, or do I need to keep
>> >some of the new stuff? If so, what? (Initial hypothesis: just copy the
>> >documents and documents directories and let Mandriva manage the hidden
>> >files and folders? This doesn't seem quite right because, for example,
>> >my email is in the .evolution folder. )
>> 
>> A lot of what I've said makes these issues moot. I would claim that backing
>> up and restoring EVERYTHING (or detaching /home) is the best approach. In
>> any case, you may run into some problems if the upgraded applications 
>> treat files differently, but that's going to happen in any case, on any 
>> system... Once you upgrades, go through things and make sure they work
>> as expected. If they don't, read the upgrade documents, and see if they 
>> have anything to say about the software that's misbehaving...
>> 
>> Good luck! 
>> 							Regards,
>> 							---> RGB <---