I would like to know how can I install Redhat and Slack 9.0, which OS first? and how many partitions I need to do, and what partitions? Thanks

Either OS can be installed first, you just need to add an entry for each into the lilo or grub boot loader configuration, whichever you're using.

As for partitions, I would recommend having one partition for each system, one swap file partition which can be used by both, depending on which you boot at the time, and one partition for the /usr directory tree. This way you can store all your personal data in the /usr directory, which is another partition completely, and have each distro mount that partition on /usr, making the info available to each distro.

Also, if something horrible goes wrong with one distro, then you can also access that info from the other distro as it should remain unaffected.

I'm sure there'll be many more views to this, but that's my $0.02

You mean a seperate /home partition. I dont think a seperate /usr one will help, that's where apps go iirc.
I personally have 2 / partitions, one swap, and 2 /usr partitions. No chance of conflicting app versions or anything.

Use a journalised file system for all but the swap ones! Ext3 or ReiserFS. Saves a lot of problems when things go slightly wrong

yeah sorry Proud, I think that's what I did mean... what I was thinking was that all the non-system proggies are usually stored in the /usr dir (according to the File Heirarchy Standard) and therefore if they are on another partition you don't have to have them installed on each system, just mount that partition to /usr.

But for data it would be the same thing using the /home dir as a mount point for all the user data.

Sorry, just got my wires crossed.

Yeah I think non-vital apps are in /usr, but how would you install another distro without attempting to write over these or encountering other problems? Plus it's nice to have a desktop install and a stripped&locked down server style install for practice
I also dunno how smart some apps are if you have different versions installed but use the same /home partition for storing their configs.

Hi again:

I installed Redhat fist now I want Install Slack 9.0.

I maked 1 "/ partition", "1 swap", "1/home" and I leave the rest of my 30 GB free, (about 10GB free), I tried to make another "/partition ext3" but appear me that I have one and cannot make another one, what can I do,?

PS: How can I do to appear me in my grub the both OS?

Thanks!!

You can edit the bootloader afterwards, just be sure to not have the second install do anything to the loader or MBR yet. Unless you want to only be able to boot Slask for a little while.
How are you trying to make that partition? You can only have one / partition mounted in a system, but you can format the drive and mount the partition as a different name for each install.

to use a separate partition with your apps (like openoffice and xmms for example) mounted on /usr you will obviously have to have modified the standard install setup of both distros, so essentially you install the basic distro without all the extra productivity/entertainment programs, and then install the productivity/entertainment programs that you would like to use on a separate partition mounted on /usr.

You would have to make sure that all dependencies are accounted for in each distro, but that's part of the work of setting up your system like this. Same goes for the config files, but if you had one partition with all your programs on it, then you wouldn't need different versions and they would simply use the same config file in the /home dir or wherever.

Notable exceptions would be programs like gcc as I can see these may have problems attempting to use it on both distros, because of different versions of glibc or the kernel header files version used, or whatever.

Also, you would have your separate XFree for each distro, as that way you can have your stripped down system and your desktop one, while still allowing you (if you wish) to play music/view openoffice docs on the stripped down system (so long as the requirements for that program are taken care of of course).

And that sounds like a lot of hastle just to really have to runlevels with the same name but starting different services. You can already have more than one kernel booted for one install, so why tie two installs together?
I'm sure you could do it, but what do you gain? Except maybe saving some space from only having one /usr. But that isnt a lot, is it?

I trying to do the new partition for slack 9.0 with Disk Druid of RedHat CD, what do you think? you said me that I can format the drive and mount the partition as a different name? how can I do that? please if you can tell me step by step I will appreciate you.

Thanks to MoRoSiS and Proud!!

Yeah Proud, it may seem like a little hassle, but so's installing two different distros... what gain can really be had? Both can turn into the same system with a little work, so what's the point of having both? But that's what some people want to do... it's just playing to learn basically. I know a few people who have done this and it has helped them to learn a bit more of what makes a linux system tick (though I'm a bit of a newbie myself, I know many of the basics).

You suggets me that just install one OK, but now I have a 10GB free space without partition what can I do to take advantage of the free space ? I tried with this:

[root@ud3-25 Gerardo]# /sbin/fdisk /dev/shm
You will not be able to write the partition table.

Unable to read /dev/shm

Thanks