On Thu, 2005-04-21 at 18:11 +0000, Siri Amrit Kaur wrote:
> On Thursday 21 April 2005 10:26 pm, Joseph Sinclair wrote:
> > That doesn't work nearly as well for Windows.  When you upgrade the
> > system, all of the data in the profiles still has to be backed up and
> > later restored, because the profile directories are (usually)wiped out
> > when the user is created, and any settings in the registry (where most
> > Windows programs store preferences) are lost because the registry hive
> > cannot be reused (not to mention the system registry hives, which are
> > stored in the windows system directories, not the user profile
> > directories).
> >
> > With Linux, I retained all of my data, application settings,
> > preferences, etc...  The only headaches I had were from migrating
> > certain applications off my Windows box onto Linux, and that was still
> > easier than migrating from one Windows machine to another.  The rest of
> > the system "Just Worked" after the upgrade (I still had to reinstall
> > many applications, but that took less than 2 hours, compared to the 3
> > weeks it took to re-do all my application settings last time I performed
> > a Windows "upgrade")
> >
> > I'm not saying that you cannot improve some aspects of system management
> > in Windows by using a separate partition for the user profiles, only
> > that it doesn't work nearly as well as the same tactic does in Linux.  I
> > have been working in the Windows world for 17 years (since version
> > 1.0!), and I've only rarely used multiple partitions, primarily because,
> > even with 2000, XP, or 2003, the system still has so many assumptions of
> > a C: drive, that it's just easier to manage with a single large
> > partition (the settings directory works just as well for backup
> > management on C: as it would on D:, and there's not much other benefit
> > from partitioning a single drive)
> >
> > ==Joseph++
> 
> You make some very good points. About all a D drive can do is save data, not 
> all the user preferences, etc that a /home partition can save. 
----
actually - it can but you have to be knowledgeable and deliberate - two
things that most Windows users won't do and of course, have the presence
to create the separate partition for the data files - which isn't
possible the way Windows is distributed by the vendors - at least not
without some major steps of partition alteration or reformatting and
starting over. Thus after you solve the partition issues...

There are profile migration tools both built in to Windows NT-2K-XP and
available separately and of course, you can always do some registry
editing to redirect the specific user profile elements (My Documents
and/or Favorites/Application Data/Desktop etc.)

Then of course, there is always the option of creating a windows domain
- where the profiles roam and are backed up on the server thus you can
delete, reformat, upgrade or add another computer to the mix and your
user settings will follow you automatically.

All in all, Windows scores pretty well on this topic so I would
generally disagree with Josephs assertions about Windows not handling
this well...it just doesn't handle it well for unknowledgeable users.

Now - as for Linux upgrades...I have had problems migrating to newer
releases on the following (i.e. - retaining $HOME directories through
and upgrade):
- openoffice.org
- gnome
- kde
- mozilla

and probably some others - but it is relatively simple to...
cd $HOME
mv .mozilla .mozilla.bak
then launch mozilla and finally quit it again and manually move my
bookmarks etc. from the .mozilla.bak subdirectory to the .mozilla
subdirectory.

Craig

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