What packages must I install rather than copy the files of?
 

I bought new (to me) computer. I used a USB drive to partition and format, then I copied my old hard disk over. I know this doesn't work for /proc or /dev , so I installed those packages, but it halts on boot when it gives me the first boot prompt. I can boot from the drive when I boot first from USB drive. I find no errors in the logs, though I think I see one scroll by. It has an SSD (the listing said HDD; I'm not used to the quiet and speed of an SSD.) so it goes by too fast for me to see. I suspect I need to install some package that I can't just copy over the files of. The CapsLock key doesn't even toggle its LED.

I keep my personal data in my user's directory in /home, so that is really all that I ever need to back up or restore. Then I just install slackware all over, my third party packages, copy my user's directory, and create a user of the same name with adduser, which asks me if I want to use that user's directory, and I say yes.

But you could reinstall the packages in the "a" set: slackware 15 uses pam, so it won't login without that. When you are just copying your hard disk over, did you preserve the permissions and ownerships? Did you just use "cp", or did you use "dd", or "rsync"? You may want to share more info about what you did to get accurate responses.

I do that too - doesn't everyone? Clearly my problem involves only system files. I hoped this would be a shortcut.

I did all the aaa packages - think the rest can be copied. Figured out I needed pam and shadow, too.


I used cp -urp

It halts right after loading gpm, puts up a bunch of @. It detects the power switch, so it isn't completely dead. It's as though it no longer sees the keyboard, though it does beforehand. It still doesn't see the mouse, either one (I usually use a wireless but have a wired in my box of stuff.), even when I boot off the USB drive. I built a clean kernel - no dice.

I reinstalled every package - still halts. I noticed that, after pressing the power button, the display shows the shutdown process. It seems to be ignoring the keyboard only.

When you copy a Slackware installation from one drive to another, you need to verify 2 things:

1. That the correct root partition is listed in LILO/eLILO/GRUB config file
2. That the correct partition is listed as the root partition in /etc/fstab

The "correct" partition being the one you want to boot into, as seen by the kernel.

If you're doing what it sounds like, (i.e: copying a non-running installation to another drive), then you don't have to worry about /proc, /dev, /sys or /run. Just copy them as they are. The kernel will take care of them.

I'll extend my post above by saying that I'd advise against copying a running installation.

If there is no other way, then boot the machine using a live distro and use that to mount the source and target drives and then copy everything over.

For this purpose, I'd recommend Alien Bob's live Slackware iso: https://download.liveslak.org/ It'll boot from a Ventoy USB stick.