I am seriously considering switching from Mandrake 9.1 to Slack. Mandrake was good for an intro to LINUX, but I would like a more hands on system. From everything I've read, Slack seems to be perfect distro for me. I'm coming up on finals, so I won't be doing this for a few weeks, but I have a question:

1. Aside from my documents, what should I backup to copy into my home directory? I am going to copy my Firebird and Thunderbird directories so I don't lose e-mail and bookmarks. Is there anything else I should take out of home directory?

Thanks,
Andy

If it's important, or you even think it might be important, then make a backup. It never hurt anyone to have extra data that was deleted later

and Welcome!
Once you go Slack, you'll never go back.

anything that you are too lazy to do again, with me i copy .xchat, .gaim ,etc so i dont have to configure the programs again

I keep a seperate partition for /home. I could reinstall if necessary, and after it finishes, everything is exactly as it was before. I also back up my entire home directory (I image the entire hard disk actually). ALL of your personal configuration settings are there, so...

"I keep a seperate partition for /home. I could reinstall if necessary"
Good man!

its nice having all that stuf there for future use, it took me 2 distros before I learned how much easier it is to just keep a seperate /home parition.

I was just going to interject that you also might consiter backing up the /etc directory, thats one of the reasons they put all the config files in the same place. you never know when you'll need to reverence an old config file (like the xfree86 one). I dont know about mandrakes startup files/procedure but it would be nice to be able to see what modules are being loaded on startup (incase some device of yours isnt detected properly)

Yea, after spending all that time getting your system config files just the way you need them, it would be a real pisser to have to do it again just for lack of a backup Along with full system backups, I keep a handwritten log book that tracks all system changes made as root in case of a real proper disaster That way I can at least retrace my steps. Makes it easier to remember stuff when trying to help a fellow *nix'r as well.