installing from BareBones Puppy Linux 2.01r2, when i try to tell grub to put it's files in /dev/hda1 (the windows partition), it says that "/dev/hda1 is not linux". and it won't let me put the files there. how do i fix this?

Well not sure why you might be getting the partition problem - personally when doing new installs, I've always just made the partition space and then left it so that it's unallocated. Most install routines should offer you the choice of either installing to unallocated space or killing the windows and using the whole hard drive (or if, like me, you already have a partitioning scheme set up, you'd just install the system to the / (aka root) partition, I have seperate /boot, /swap, / and /home partitions - no windows - so I only ever want to install the system to the / partition, that way I get to retain any data and personalisations that I have set up and live in /home).

As for the bootloader files, well the ideal place is to tell the installer to put it on the first part of the first hard drive (or drives if you have more) and let it overwrite the windows bootloader on the MBR (major boot record). That way it can see all installed OS(s) and offer you the choice of what you want too boot. If you put it on to the linux partition then you have to have a way of booting that partition i.e. either meddle with the boot order in the BIOS or boot floppy or something. Don't worry, because if you mess up and worry about loosing the windows then you can usually just boot the windows/recovery disc and fix the MBR. Some of the more mainstream distros (mandriva, SuSE etc) offer the choice of re-installing the windows bootloader from a rescue terminal.

As for checking which partition is which, then once the install is complete once you're booted into linux then just use the command df -a. If your windows was already on the hard drive before then it's probably gonna be hda1 (don't forget that the hd? nomenclature is usually IDE/PATA hard drives - if you have either scsi or SATA devices then they'll probably be listed as sd?).

regards

John

so when it asks where to put them, i should say C: ?

*edit* ok so now i can mount my other partition, but when i try to tell grub to put it's files in /dev/hda1 (the windows partition), it says that "/dev/hda1 is not linux". and it won't let me put the files there. how do i fix this?

I'm not sure if I'm missing something here, because I've never had it soe that it asks anything other than "where do you want to install the bootloader?" giving the options of the MBR, the linux partition or a boot floppy.

Erm I'm thinking that you could try and see if it will put the grub files on /dev/hda i.e. no partition number - because logic suggests that to offer a "choice" of OS to boot, it must be able to "see" all installed OS.

It may well be that you might consider trying a different distro - I'm not familiar with "puppy", but I have used Mandrake/Mandriva, SuSE, Debian (both the current kanotix and knoppix derivatives), Ubuntu and kubuntu (same distro really just different front ends - and yes I prefered Kubuntu) and Gentoo (ha ha! not for the faint of heart, or the inexperienced - as I learned to my cost).

Hence, I'd say either Kubuntu or Kanotix (kanotix has more of the original repositories). If you still wanted to "do" puppy, then the experience would give you a better grounding in "the ways of Linux". It's not that I think it's "hard" per se, but it's rather different.

regards

John

yay! i finally figured out the problem! i'm posting this from my newly installed puppy linux. thanks so much for all the help!

Well done slickhare. though I wouldn't say that I've been much in the way of help.

For the first two years of my linux meddling, if I screwed up, I just used to re-install whatever straight over the top. It taught me enough to be able to install without many problems. In fact I only learned the benefits of having a seperate /home because I used to get pissed off, having to re-enter the info for my address book(s).

You could just as easily do the same (irrespective of whether you have 1 or multiple hard drives). That way, you just install or re-install whatever to the root partition and don't loose anything normally - I did have to have a "crash course" in making backups though because I f****d up when I installed this kanotix(debian Sid) that I'm using now, I didn't bother to read what the installer was asking me and it "binned" my /home as well. Never again, because I spent nearly a tonne (£100) on external hard drive hardware so that any backup I make now lives on a completely different HDD and if I meddle, I can just unplug it.

regards

John