OK - so I read that it could be done some time ago - and my new HDD configuration
just seemed to fit the bill.

I'm sharing /home/<username's> between Slack and Gentoo.

But, its gonna be a nightmare to get everything working right. For example, since I'm
using kde (primarily right now), Slack installes kde in /opt/kde, but gentoo installs kde
in /usr/kde. So my ~/.xinitrc can only be modified for only one OS. So I made an alias
to start X in slack. Thats fine for me, but not for my wife. So I made slack boot to
runlevel 4 - thats all fine and dandy.

Then come font paths, kde settings, etc, etc, etc. Even if I try to localize (wallpapers,
fonts, icons, program paths, etc) as much as I can, I'm affraid that I'm gonna continually
run into small problems here and there - and thats not what I need right now. I need a
problem free (maintenance free) computer for the next 6-8 months at least.

So my question is, has anyone here SEAMLESSLY shared thier home directory between
2 different versions of linux? And if so, how much trouble was it to get working
seamlessly?? Or is it more trouble then its worth.

-tw

p.s. - I really don't want 2 different users and symlinks to achive my goal.

(drive configuration (simple version) )
sda - slackware
sdb - gentoo
sdc - home
sdd - home_backup

my /home is shared between 3 linux setups........slack 10, 10.1, and LFS..........
it was no trouble to get working because I use a different username in each distro........on a 75 gig drive, my /home partition is 25 gigs to make sure I never run out of space.........

freakyg said:
Thanks for the response, but thats not what I want to do. I'm looking into the feasability to
use the same user (and same /home<username> directory) for differnet distros. I want to make sure any work I do in 1 distro, I have in the other, for example:
/home/<username> /documents , or /home/<username>/mail.

I considered using 2 users, and placing symlinks on important directories (like mail, documents,
pcitures, work) and the more thinking/reading I do, this looks like what I might end up doing.

I also considered using 2 different users and using some type of rsync command at startup - since I would seldom obtain a LOT of new info, it shouldn't increase boot time too much. But then my info would be in 3 places (taking up excessive disk space), 2 /homes, and 1 on the backup drive.

Still searching and thinking. thanks though for the input.
-tw

Why not create a symlink in gentoo like :
ln -s /usr/kde /opt/

(same for font path, etc...)
I know it is not a easy solution, but it should work

With 3 distro's changing the ~/.kde and Desktop directories, I wonder if that could cause problems for you. I think that having 3 user names with your work linked to the same directory would work out better. You would also need to be sure that the UID and GID matches, so that you can have full access to your work.
Some distributions use different UID and GID ranges. They may complain about files created while using a different distribution.

I share my /home between slack & gentoo, it works flawlessly.

I don't see the problem with the .xinitrc - why does it matter where KDE is installed? "startkde" always worked for me. (On the rare occasions I wanted to use it)

But, if it really DOES make that much difference, then try an "out of the box" approach: Leave /home alone and tackle KDE itself. Gentoo is hugely customiseable, use it to your advantage.

Unmerge KDE, and then add a "prefix=/opt" to its compile options, then re-emerge it. That'll install KDE in the /opt directory, and everything will match between Slack & Gentoo.

In fact, you could mail Pat & ask him exactly what compile options he uses to create the KDE packages for Slackware, and emerge a completely identical KDE for Gentoo.

You don't even have to email him. All the build scripts are available on the CDs and on the mirrors.

keefaz said:
yeah, that was one of my first thoughts, but like you said, its probably not
the easiest. either symlink my /home/<user>, or various apps.

schiwal
Thanks for the warning.

oneandoneis2 said:
humm... maybe you planned ahead more then I did . Thanks for the info, and its
something to keep in mind, but I think I'll keep that as a last resort. I'm not real keen
on recompiling kde... again..... for the 3rd time. I've had great luck with gentoo so far
(only been using it for 1-2 months... its a keeper!)


I'm thinking I'm going to use 2 different users with symlinks temporarily, while I work and
make sure X, kde, fonts, and all that are matching and/or work before I switch over completely
to 1 user for both. Thanks A LOT for the info, suggestions, and warnings though folks. Its appreciated.

-tw

In terms of KDE settings ... none of the setup-files under
~/.kde and ~/.kde2 contain references to KDEs location
on my Slack-boxes, I have reason to believe that they
wouldn't in Gentoo either ;}


Cheers,
Tink

Personally, I'd be inclined not to try to share a /home between two distros. I'd have thought it better to create a documents partition, and either symlink to it, or, if you're only running a single-user system, mount it directly to /home/$LOGNAME/Documents or something.

Otherwise you're just asking for trouble, with different versions of the same software trying to use the same configuration files. Then again, I've never tried it, so you may find that you don't have any trouble after all. I'd be wary of it, though.

Using the same /home parition for different distro's would not be a problem as long as each distro uses a different directory. Think of the /home partition as simply a storage device for a subdirectory that contains your files. That's exactly what it is. You could have your home directory located on a Network Access Storage server if you wanted. A thin client work's like this.

I think that a more interesting way of doing things would be to use the identical distro on different computers and share resources. For example, using the /home partition on your desktop as the $HOME for a user on the laptop. Suppose that you have an older laptop that lacks horsepower and drive space, but you can't bring yourself to part with it. You could have it running X-Windows, set $HOME to your home directory on your desktop, and even have many of the links running programs on the desktop but displaying on your laptop. You could be using ssh for this and be away from home. The emails you read will actually be downloading to your desktop, so you don't even need to synchronize the computer data as many people do.