[ale] OOOhh! That smarts!

[John Mills]

ALErs -

Last night in the process of backing up my system to an old HDD, I blew away the '/var' directory from my RH6.2 installation. Lots of morals to be drawn from the mis-step, but meanwhile I'm faced with damage control.

Three things I know immediately I've lost are:

1. unsaved mail in /var/spool
2. printer installation in /var/spool
3. log information in /var/log
4. 'rpm' history and overhead files

No point crying about what's gone, but I want as little rework as practical when I put the #$%@!! back together.

Thus I no longer have the information which 'rpm' expects in order to do an orderly repair. I can go back and do a re-installation from the CD, but I would appreciate any suggestions as to:

1. Avoiding replacment of files which are still in place (and may represent upgrades or customizations) with 'stock' files from the rpms, and

2. Achieving (so far as possible, given the lost 'rpm' files) an upgrade/repair type of installation, rather than a 'new' installation I would then have to rework.

3. What I need to do in order that otherwise complete utilities like 'sendmail' can go back to work.

4. Any good sources of prosthetic toes? &;^(
[Is there a Free Toe Foundation?]

TIA - at least you can be happy it wasn't your system!

Regards,
 John Mills
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