linux saved my butt, but ....

[Craig White]

On Thu, 2005-08-25 at 14:28 -0700, Josh Coffman wrote:
> 
> --- "Eric \"Shubes\"" <plug at shubes.net> wrote:
> 
> > Josh Coffman wrote:
> > >   My kids started fighting over playing Tux games
> > on
> > > my laptop. So i figured I would dual boot the
> > > desktop...
> > > 
> > >   I backed-up, defragged, and booted a livecd
> > (Mepis)
> > > to shrink the partition. 
> > > 
> > >   Well Mepis messed up. I like Mepis and was
> > planning
> > > on using it for the desktop. But now I couldn't do
> > > anything. Actually, it was QTParted that caused
> > the
> > > problem. 
> > > 
> > >   fixmbr didn't work, couldn't install windows,
> > Mepis
> > > couldn't install. I tried a couple others that
> > > couldn't fix it. Anyway, Fedora Core 4 installed
> > > great. I just told it to use the whole disk an
> > remove
> > > any previous partitions.
> > > 
> > > Thing is I was planning on partitioning the drive
> > so I
> > > could at least have seperate /home and /swap. That
> > way
> > > I could easily switch distros without deleting
> > > everyone's files.
> > > 
> > > Now I'm a little gun-shy about trying to shring a
> > > partition again, but I'd like to be able to switch
> > > distros if I feel like it. Suggestions?
> > > 
> > > -j
> > > 
> > If possible, bring it to the Installfest on
> > Saturday. We should be able 
> > to get the partitions set up for you (and show you
> > how to do it).
> > 
> > -- 
> > -Eric 'shubes'
> 
> It would be fun to come if even only to watch and
> learn. Honestly, I probably won't make it though.
> Perhaps someone could tell me the steps they would do
> to fix my hard drive config? I can probably figure out
> the howto part if I just know the steps in order.
> 
> Something like(and am just guessing): 
> 1) shrink partition; use command "unknown-command"
> (I'll figure out the usage of the command)
> 2) create partitions for /home /swap (think i already
> know how to do this.)
> 3) copy current /home contents to new /home partition
> (that's easy)
> 4) configure x to use on partitions
> 5) reboot (obvious)
> 
> I'm hoping that shrinking a linux partition is easier
> than windows. I guess since I just installed last
> night, I could just start over again and partition it
> right this time if that's easier?
----
really really dumb question...how big is the hard drive? Is it big
enough to handle the binaries of several different distro's?

Craig