Distro Upgrade Questions
 

(I posted this in "Software," but was getting no replies, so I figured it was in the wrong forum. I tried to delete it in Software (loggin in), but it wouldn't let me do so. I wish to follow the rules about not posting same thing to different forums, so can someone please inform me as to how to delete my own posts, or move them to the correct forum- I must be missing something, as it doesn't seem to work.)
-------------------------------------------
I've looked in the forums, and not found specific answers, so I'm submitting my questions (all related) for some expert advice. I've never upgraded a distro before, and tried to save my home partition at the same time, Basically, I know you don't format a partition you wish to save, and have (expert mode) installed the rpm based distros many times.

I'm wanting to upgrade from Mandrake 8.2 to 9.0, and have the 3 9.0 install cd's, which work fine on a different hard drive. So, my plan is to do a clean install of Mandrake 9.0 (not the upgrade choice- read about bad experiences doing that), reformat boot, root, usr, temp, and leave home alone. I assume this will completely wipe 8.2 and install 9.0, leaving all data on home partition intact.

My concerns are:
1. Will my bookmarks AND email in Konqueror and KMail be accessable in the new 9.0?

2. Do I need to reconfigure, or will the new Konqueror and KMail recognize the data from the old ones automatically in the old home partition? If I create the same mail folders in the new version of KMail as were in the old one, will the new one access the old emails in the same folders stored in home?

3.I seem to recall the Konqueror bookmarks are stored in a hidden file in "home." If so, will they be picked up, or inaccessable to 9.0? Are they in the same format as the new 9.0, or do I have a problem?

4. Which files (including hidden) in home should be backed up regarding KMail, and Konqueror bookmarks? I don't have a cd burner to back up most of "home," so I'll be doing it on floppies along with other selected data.

I really need a complete fresh and lean install of 9.0 with the new gcc 3.2, as I'm interested in recompiling the Mandrake source rpms with Athlon xp optimizations, thus I really don't want to just do the "upgrade" installation.

Any advice about specific procedures, and/or how to avoid pitfalls is greatly appreciated!

Thanks,
wrc1944

Well, no just because your not getting replies doesn't mean its in the wrong forum. But lets try to keep from posting the same question in more than one forum please as its against the rules when you do. And if you believe it you posted in the wrong forum, just report it to the Moderator and they can gladly move it to another forum.

Thanks

If your post is not getting any replies at all, you could try bumping it so that it appears at the top of people's 'new posts' listing, but you shouldn't start another thread.

I actually was inticed by your question(s), and was going to answer them later on, but at the time I read them, I was cruising the boards, and just giving quicky answers and such.

I know it can be frustrating when looking for a response, and nothing shows up, I do my best not to let that happen here, so just give it a little time, I will do what I can usually as do most other's here.

I'll knock out 1 question right now, and either leave the other question for other members, or come back and answer a few more later ;)

Yes, yes they will. For the mail question, it's still a yes, but with a sort of a twist. You can still read your email, but it depends on what you had for mbox's in your old version. If you had mbox rather than maildir, then you will be able to drag the old folder over, and it should read immediately, where the maildir (btw I might have these backwards as it's been a while ;) ) you will need to create the directory, and then drag and drop your old email's into the maildir you create.

I hope that helps at least with the first question ;)

Cool

Most of the user-specific configuration files are located inside that user's home directory... do a "ls -a" from your home to see what I mean. there will be a lot of hidden files and directories (with a "." as the first character of the name). With this in mind, it seems reasonable that if you use the same programs then the configurations shouldn't change.

I have heard some bad stuff about upgrading... could be rumors thoug, and as i've never done it myselfe, i couldn't give you any first hand experiences.

good luck

Well pretty much goes with the above answers. Konqueror you are probably good to go with your links and things, since these are pretty universal. At worst you might have to import them rather than auto recognition.

As for your email, well that's a good question, but I think it too would auto recognize your old settings/mail/addresses. They didn't change much there, so I don't think it will be a problem. Again though, at worst, it'd be simple pointing to the files, or moving them to the preferred new directories.

Cool

Many thanks for the advice! I had no problems, save one. All the .php files in my home partition no longer open with Konqueror, which seems odd, as they used to, and are mostly forum webpages I saved in 8.2, with Konqueror. So far I haven't been able to figure a way to fix this in the kde control center, and must use Galeon. Perhaps the different file system is the cause? Any ideas? They open in text editors, and are obviously html format, so one would assume Konqueror should work fine.

I did a clean install (reformatted all my 8.2 partitions except /home), and while I was at it, I changed from ext3 to ReiserFS on all partitions except /home. Seems faster. It was a breeze using the Drake cd1 install disk and DiskDrake. 9.0 picked up all the old Konqueor Browser settings and bookmarks, and old KMail emails and folders too, from the old /home partition files, even thought they are in ext3. I was very impressed. Konqueror Browser and KMail are superb- better than anything else I've tried in any Linux distro.

I'm assuming all would go well even if I were to change distros, and the new Konqueror and KMail would still pick up everything- or is that incorrect?

wrc1944