|
Home > Archive > Linux Debian support > October 2005 > The need to do lots of clean installs
You are viewing an archived Text-only version of the thread.
To view this thread in it's original format and/or if you want to reply to
this thread please [click here]
| Author |
The need to do lots of clean installs
|
|
|
| Many have said that Debian only needs to be installed once - and that,
after that, one can simply modify it. Let me try to make the case
against that.
If you want to learn, you have to try things.
That means taking risks.
An expert can restore things.
A beginner can't.
He doesn't really know what he's done.
Nor the consequences.
So he doesn't know how to get back to a clean state.
However, a clean install takes about an hour.
So there is a need for something.
Drive imaging.
In Windows I could use something like DriveImage or Norton Ghost or
Acronis True Image.
I would do a clean install; tidy everything up; get rid of all the
rubbish ... and then image the active partition to another partition or
DVD ... and hence never have to do another clean install. Instead, I
could just restore the image.
Now then - what is the Debian Sarge equivalent of that?
--
Chris
| |
|
| Chris wrote:
> Many have said that Debian only needs to be installed once - and that,
> after that, one can simply modify it. Let me try to make the case
> against that.
>
> If you want to learn, you have to try things.
> That means taking risks.
> An expert can restore things.
> A beginner can't.
> He doesn't really know what he's done.
> Nor the consequences.
> So he doesn't know how to get back to a clean state.
>
> However, a clean install takes about an hour.
> So there is a need for something.
> Drive imaging.
>
> In Windows I could use something like DriveImage or Norton Ghost or
> Acronis True Image.
> I would do a clean install; tidy everything up; get rid of all the
> rubbish ... and then image the active partition to another partition or
> DVD ... and hence never have to do another clean install. Instead, I
> could just restore the image.
>
> Now then - what is the Debian Sarge equivalent of that?
Hey,
You can still use ghost (if you want to use propriatary software),
there is g4u (ghost for Unix, it is open), you can also use 'dd',
dump/restore, tar, cpio (these are backup utils more than a 'ghost' like
SW, but they still work) and possibly many other utilities that I have
not named. Since I come from a Redhat background, Debian may have a
'kickstart' like tool, but I don't know what that would be offhand.
This would perform a fresh install rather than take an image.
S.
--
--> GNU/Linux is user friendly... it's just picky about its friends.
| |
| Michael Perry 2005-10-29, 5:46 pm |
| Chris wrote:
> Many have said that Debian only needs to be installed once - and
> that, after that, one can simply modify it. Let me try to make the
> case against that.
>
> If you want to learn, you have to try things.
> That means taking risks.
> An expert can restore things.
> A beginner can't.
> He doesn't really know what he's done.
> Nor the consequences.
> So he doesn't know how to get back to a clean state.
>
> However, a clean install takes about an hour.
> So there is a need for something.
> Drive imaging.
>
> In Windows I could use something like DriveImage or Norton Ghost or
> Acronis True Image. I would do a clean install; tidy everything up;
> get rid of all the rubbish ... and then image the active partition to
> another partition or DVD ... and hence never have to do another clean
> install. Instead, I could just restore the image.
>
> Now then - what is the Debian Sarge equivalent of that?
I've been using Acronis TrueImager a lot of late on a few systems here.
I wanted to clone the drive on the XP box I use for work but what I did
initially was create a "clone drive" that has all the stuff I need on a
smaller disk drive. I put in a new drive and run Acronis from its CD
boot media.
On Linux, I've done this a few ways in the past. One of the ways was
to create what I would call a "blank install" on a drive. Lets say I
get things just the way I want them on a 200g ide drive running
unstable. Its a basic footprint of the packages, kernel, stuff I need.
I then copy all that over to a new disk drive using the hard disk mini
upgrade as a menu. Now I have the same clone drive on Linux which I
can then modify, upgrade, add to for different uses. Sometimes I just
plop the clone drive in and do a dist-upgrade to get the latest goodies
at a base level. Now when I want to try something else, I copy over
the clone drive to a new drive or an old one for that matter and add
the stuff I want to try.
Maintaining the Linux clone drive is really easy for me since I have a
system with a P4 Zeon processor that I use to build things these days.
its a mirror of my other systems so the kernel works across the board.
I also have the same type of sound cards, nics, etc on everything. So,
normally, my new drives just work. I have had a few issues with things
in the past that I've dealt with by upgrading the kernel on my clone
disk.
The actual number of re-installs I do now using a netinstaller is
pretty limited since I have the hard disk upgrade howto down to a
series of easy copy commands. Then I just switch the drives out and
I'm ready to go. I have not done this with IDE to SATA but I have done
a bit of prep and gone from IDE to SCSI in the past. All of this takes
about 15 minutes on my systems which have as a blueprint Pentium IV, 2g
of memory, SBlive cards, and Nvidia display adaptors.
--
Michael Perry | Do or do not. There is no try --Master Yoda
mperry@lnxpowered.org | http://www.lnxpowered.org
| |
| Madhusudan Singh 2005-10-29, 5:46 pm |
| Chris wrote:
> Many have said that Debian only needs to be installed once - and that,
> after that, one can simply modify it. Let me try to make the case
> against that.
>
> If you want to learn, you have to try things.
> That means taking risks.
Yes.
> An expert can restore things.
> A beginner can't.
If he is willing to play, tinker and learn, yes.
> He doesn't really know what he's done.
> Nor the consequences.
> So he doesn't know how to get back to a clean state.
You would never wander far from a "clean" state if you kept reinstalling.
Which kills the amount you can learn.
>
> Now then - what is the Debian Sarge equivalent of that?
They call it a full system backup using rsync and an external hard drive.
| |
|
| In article <4363f5d7$0$41141$14726298@news.sunsite.dk>, Madhusudan Singh
<spammers-go-here@spam.invalid> writes
>Chris wrote:
<A beginner>
[vbcol=seagreen]
>You would never wander far from a "clean" state if you kept reinstalling.
>Which kills the amount you can learn.
I like the scientific principle of trying one thing at a time.
If my system was messed up by a variety of my mistakes,
then I wouldn't know why the next thing had failed.
Two installations would be good: a configured one; and a bare one to
keep imaging back to a clean state.
<DriveImage>
[vbcol=seagreen]
>They call it a full system backup using rsync and an external hard drive.
Thanks, I will look into that.
--
Chris
|
|
|
|
|