I have a Compaq 6710 with RHEL5.

I downloaded the Ubuntu 8.3 iso.

I wish to install it on this system

Without any changes to existing partition and Which is Easily uninstallable

Because i am new to Linux and dont know much about partitions and all

This is my pa's Notebook and i dont wish to spoil any existing PARTITION SETTINGS.

This is because, if i wish to revert back to RHEL5 only, i can have a safe return.

Someone there?

Who can help me.

You will have to resize the RHEL5 partition. This can be done during the Ubuntu installation. How big is your hard drive, and how much is used? There's plenty of information on these forums about dual-booting, use Search. And don't panic!

Hi,

First, there is no Ubuntu 8.3. (Ubunut "versions" are actually dates; Ubunut 8.04 was released April 2008 and Ubuntu 8.10 was released Oct 2008, etc. Those were the only releases in 2008.)

Second, it is a little unclear to me what you want to do. You can install using the same partitions that currently exist, but that will overwrite the existing installation. I am not sure that is what you want to do. If you want to preserve the contents of what is already there then you will need to either shrink one or more existing partition(s) or install another drive. (Assuming the RHEL5 installation takes up the entire drive.)

Please post back and clarify what you are trying to do.

Actually
I believe he can "manually" install Ubuntu
and have it run as if off usb,
meaning frugal-type
Meaning, just copy the contents of the Ubuntu iso
to HD, edit grub menu.lst
and boot

To have persistency you will have to have a fat32 usb
with a casper-rw on board
Or, make the usb ext3 and Label it "casper-rw"
plug the usb in when you boot ubuntu
and it will save settings, apps, updates back to the
casper-rw

To uninstall, simply delete the ubuntu folders.

If you need help holler back

I dont really know about Linux so, i dont know the partitions in the system and how to fiddle with them.

i want to retain my RHEL5 installation and to install Ubuntu on one of the existing partitions(which i dont know, if there are any) in such a way that if i neeed to remove Ubuntu later, i can do it easily and restore everything to as it is right now.

This is the outcome of command
ds

Filesystem 1K-blocks Used Available Use% Mounted on

/dev/sda2 9920624 4252448 5156108 46% /


/dev/sda1 101086 14468 81399 16% /boot

tmpfs 253588 0 253588 0% /dev/shm

/dev/mapper/homevg-home--snapshot
9903432 153660 9238592 2% /snapshot

/dev/mapper/home 55635832 212872 52596748 1% /home

OK
I'm not talking about partitioning your hd
or anything destructive

It's a frugal install
meaning you just download whatever Ubuntu you want
plop it down in the partition
and edit menu.lst to also boot ubuntu alongside redhat

Do you need complete instructions?
is that what your saying?

If you want to be able to restore what you have, a common method is to clone the drive using something like Ghost or the Linux utility "dd".

Another option is to simply install another harddrive.

Please post the output of "fdisk -l" (that's an ell, not a one---and run this as root), so that we can see how all of your disk is utilized.

Looking at the response by the forum members, i am feeling overwhelmed. They all come so nicely and without any egos, to help the newbies or anyone else who needs help!

Thank You Pals!


1 is for Sire! Linus 72

2 is for Sire! Pixellany

1.

Yeh! That will make things easy for me.

2.

[root@localhost ~]# fdisk -l

Disk /dev/sda: 80.0 GB, 80026361856 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 9729 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 * 1 13 104391 83 Linux
/dev/sda2 14 1288 10241437+ 83 Linux
/dev/sda3 1289 1419 1052257+ 82 Linux swap / Solaris
/dev/sda4 1420 9729 66750075 5 Extended
/dev/sda5 1420 9729 66750043+ 8e Linux LVM

Sir, i dont understand what all this outcome means!

Please be pateint for me to understand what you tell me.


Thank You

Hmm, it is an extra stumbling block that RH appears to reside on an LVM as it is quite a pain to work with compared to regular partitions. An extra reason to make sure you have a reliable back-up !

.................

Does that mean i am ona path not to be followed for it will not lead to what i wish to achieve. or it can never lead to the place where i wish to be.

Am i supposed to be.......

No, it is not impossible, the situation is simply more complicated than it could have been.

An LVM does not behave like regular partitions so unless you know what you are doing, there is a real risk that the Red Hat system will end up having booting issues (at best). LVM is managed by the operating system (Red Hat in this case) so if you fiddle with it behind its back, it could get very displeased.

ok...........

means i should go forward leaving this until i learn required things about linux partitions.

Where can i get this kind of tutorials which is helpful for newbeis like me.

From the bottom only.