[ale] YAY! (or, why I love Linux (tonight :))

[Robert L Harris]

> 
> Ok, this starts out really bad: my main Linux drive just took a header.  It 
> won't even be recognized at boot time.  REALLY bad!
> 
> However, this is why I love Linux.  I made the unusually brilliant move about 
> 2 years ago to create separate partitions for /home, /usr/local, /usr/X11R6, 
> and /project (my work stuff) on disks /dev/hdb and /dev/hdc.  I don't know 
> what came over me!  I also followed a strict habit of installing all new 
> software into /usr/local (and removing the originals from /usr when they were 
> still there).
> 
> About a month ago, I finally decided to upgrade from 1.2.13 to 2.0.31.  Since 
> I'm a cheap bastard, and refuse to buy a decent disk (why, when there are all 
> these crappy 300-800 MB ones lying around :), I put it on a new 540 Caviar 
> (replacing a 340 :), and simply remounted those directories.
> 
> I thought I was hot shit... a complete upgrade in under 2 hours, with all of 
> my data still there.
> 
> Today was much better.  I pulled out the 540, put in the 340, and I'm up and 
> running!  Ok, I had to make a new LILO floppy, but who cares!
> 
> Tomorrow, I buy the new Maxtor 7GB DMA disk (I finally broke down and upgraded 
> my DX 50 to a K6 200 with DMA support :).  However, /home/ and /project are 
> staying on the slow 540 they live on now :)
> 
> Just thought I'd share in case there are any out there with just one Linux 
> partition!  
> 

Sounds like a great system.  I prefer one / right now though.  For backups
I have a 4mm dat.  The problem is that with that you have to re-install if
you loose the disk and rebuild your kernel before you can read the tape, I
haven't found a module I can load for tape support on the redhat boot/root
disks.  I did find a better method.  I have a Jaz drive that the boot disks
will see and initialize at boot.  I use CPIO and gzip to put a 2Gig filesystem
( Compresses to 600Megs) on a Jaz.  I did have a severe failure about 3 weeks
ago.  I just booted off the boot/root set, mounted the Jaz, which had a copy
of gzcat and cpio with perms set right, and un-cpio'd it,  made the links
from /mnt (disk I'm fixing) to / for  /boot, /dev/sd* and /etc/lilo.conf,
ran lilo and rebooted.  Worked great.

Just a thought for those who worry about disk failures.

Robert
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Robert L. Harris          |   If NT is the answer,
System Engineer For Hire. \_    You don't understand the question

Voice:
  (303) 971-9218
Email:
  Robert at ast.lmco.com

http://www.orci.com/~nomad

DISCLAIMER:
      These are MY OPINIONS ALONE.  I speak for no-one else.

perl -e 'print $i=pack(c5,(41*2),sqrt(7056),(unpack(c,H)-2),oct(115),10);'