There must be a simular program or commands to record the system before any changes.
 

I don't see anything on LQ that can help my question, so here goes:

In my first life using windoz 98 I used a program(can't remember the name, it's been
so long ago), that I would ran before making any changes on the system such as
installing a new program or just making changes in a config file.

Then after words I would run this same program again and it would tell me everything
that the program installation did, or all the changes that the configruation file made.

This program kept windoz running as far as I was concerned. Without it I stayed in
the blue screen of death.

There must be a simular program or commands to record the system before any changes
or installing software is done and then repeat afterwords to see thoes changes?

TIA, for any thoughts or help!fb

hm, applications for linux don't make such changes that would crash the system. The system doesn't get bloated over time. And there is no registy.. Probably such application is not necessary for linux.

While I agree that in general you will not suffer from BSOD-like behavior from GNU/Linux, I think your question deserves an answer.

On the very rare occasions when I allow third party installers to run on my system (Virtualbox comes to mind) I like to take a reference snapshot of my system beforehand, then compare it with the system after the installer has run. This shows me unambiguously what was done by the installer. I keep the diff of the before and after snapshots as a sanity check for uninstalls as well.

The way I do it is, as root:

The "-I 'home|tmp|...root'" causes tree to skip those paths, your requirements may vary.

install.diff will show any added, deleted or altered files.

See man tree and man sdiff (or man diff) for additional ways of doing this.

astrogeek
 

Thank you astrogeek, that's what I'm talking about and looking for!

I will be using what you posted going foward! Thanks so much for taking the time!

I would like to impose one additional question, you don't have to answer if you are busy helping
someone else or don't have the time.

Where would I look to find more about the subject of taking snapshots of the system?

Thanks ever so much again???fb

yooy, thanks for taking a look at my post!
You have stated all the reasons I left windoz in the dust and have never looked back, that's about
15 years now.
Your right on at 99.9%, but I have installed applications that put files in the wrong folders and were corrected in a update version. But, had I knew it at the time I could have corrected the problem without waiting for the new version.

My big reason for the posted question was more about the changes I make. I want to know what I did to the system when something screws up from what I did.

Thanks again!fb

You are very welcome!

As to your additional question, I think the best advice I could offer is to explore and learn the various wonderful Unix-y tools available on a GNU/Linux system - such as tree, diff, grep, sed, awk and friends, to name a few. Read the man pages of course (they really are your best source of information), set up your own test cases to really learn how they all work, and keep lots of notes!

Keeping with that thought, learn your way around the man pages. Most newbies and quite a few experienced users too, really have no idea of the depth of information that is there, or how to access it.

Start with man man and probably some online searches as well, but try to realize that the man pages on a Unix-y system are literally the operating manual for that particular system. That manual has an organizational structure and quite a few options for finding what you need via searches and indexes. Learn your way around - you'll be glad you did!

Good luck!

Thanks again astrogeek for taking the time. I've copied your advice and will begain to check
it all out. fb