linux-file-structure: what needs to be saved while moving the installation

[Maze]

 linux-file-structure: what needs to be saved while moving the installation

 

well this is one of the best place to ask  joomla-related question.

today i have no question regarding joomla.

today i want to ask a linux-question: i am preparing a upgrade from opensuse 13.1 to 13.2

and i want to do a fresh installation.

first of all - as a preliminary task i will do a saving of all the files - that are in the home of the current installation

what else shoud i safe - more than the /home/my_name

should i save anyting else ...

http://tldp.org/LDP/intro-linux/html/sect_03_01.html

Table 3-2. Subdirectories of the root directory
Directory    Content
/bin    Common programs, shared by the system, the system administrator and the users.
/boot    The startup files and the kernel, vmlinuz. In some recent distributions also grub data. Grub is the GRand Unified Boot loader and is an attempt to get rid of the many different boot-loaders we know today.
/dev    Contains references to all the CPU peripheral hardware, which are represented as files with special properties.
/etc    Most important system configuration files are in /etc, this directory contains data similar to those in the Control Panel in Windows
/home    Home directories of the common users.
/initrd    (on some distributions) Information for booting. Do not remove!
/lib    Library files, includes files for all kinds of programs needed by the system and the users.
/lost+found    Every partition has a lost+found in its upper directory. Files that were saved during failures are here.
/misc    For miscellaneous purposes.
/mnt    Standard mount point for external file systems, e.g. a CD-ROM or a digital camera.
/net    Standard mount point for entire remote file systems
/opt    Typically contains extra and third party software.
/proc    A virtual file system containing information about system resources. More information about the meaning of the files in proc is obtained by entering the command man proc in a terminal window. The file proc.txt discusses the virtual file system in detail.
/root    The administrative user's home directory. Mind the difference between /, the root directory and /root, the home directory of the root user.
/sbin    Programs for use by the system and the system administrator.
/tmp    Temporary space for use by the system, cleaned upon reboot, so don't use this for saving any work!
/usr    Programs, libraries, documentation etc. for all user-related programs.
/var    Storage for all variable files and temporary files created by users, such as log files, the mail queue, the print spooler area, space for temporary storage of files downloaded from the Internet, or to keep an image of a CD before burning it.

well - reagarding the thunderbird and other things more.
note:  i have thunderbird and enigmail up and running.

so i need to save
a. the passwords
b. the mails.


question: is there a need to save more than the home/my_name ?!

love to hear from you

greetings

[requinix]

Do you have a way to back up everything? Theoretically /home is all you "need" but you may find out (too late) that there were other files or configuration settings that you wanted to keep.

[Maze]

hello dear requinix

 

 

well i have a extern hdd with 1 terabyte.

 

i can use this for saving.

 

by the way - how do you like this idea:

to create a file structure like so#

~> lsblk
NAME MAJ:MIN RM SIZE RO TYPE MOUNTPOINT
sda 8:0 0 465,8G 0 disk
├─sda1 8:1 0 156M 0 part /boot/efi
├─sda2 8:2 0 400M 0 part /boot
└─sda3 8:3 0 465,2G 0 part
└─cr_ata-ST500LT012-xxx_xxx-part3 254:0 0 465,2G 0 crypt
├─system-swap 254:1 0 2G 0 lvm [SWAP]
├─system-root 254:2 0 40G 0 lvm /
└─system-home 254:3 0 423,2G 0 lvm /home

 

look forward to hear from you

[requinix]

well i have a extern hdd with 1 terabyte.

Sounds adequate.

 

by the way - how do you like this idea:

 

to create a file structure like so#

Depends on your needs. I myself have never needed (or wanted) any special partitioning besides root and swap.

[Maze]

hello many many thanks

 

well a final question -  to create a file structure like so

 

 

~> lsblk
NAME MAJ:MIN RM SIZE RO TYPE MOUNTPOINT
sda 8:0 0 465,8G 0 disk
├─sda1 8:1 0 156M 0 part /boot/efi
├─sda2 8:2 0 400M 0 part /boot
└─sda3 8:3 0 465,2G 0 part
└─cr_ata-ST500LT012-xxx_xxx-part3 254:0 0 465,2G 0 crypt
├─system-swap 254:1 0 2G 0 lvm [SWAP]
├─system-root 254:2 0 40G 0 lvm /
└─system-home 254:3 0 423,2G 0 lvm /home

well - how to do that?

 

how is this being  done

└─cr_ata-ST500LT012-xxx_xxx-part3 254:0 0 465,2G 0 crypt
├─system-swap 254:1 0 2G 0 lvm [SWAP]
├─system-root 254:2 0 40G 0 lvm /
└─system-home 254:3 0 423,2G 0 lvm /home

note: i want to do this with gparted!

this line looks interesting. ....

└─cr_ata-ST500LT012-xxx_xxx-part3 254:0 0 465,2G 0 crypt

how to do this with gparted

[requinix]

That lsblk output is making a lot more sense now that I realized the commas are decimal points.

 

If you're doing a new installation then the installer should help you set up the partitions at that time. Don't have to do it now.

With that said, I don't think there's any particularly difficult process to do it with GParted. Add new partitions for the first three, and for the encrypted volume you choose something "crypt" for the file system type. (Then add an LVM partition to it, and add the root and /home partitions to that.)