[opensuse] deleted my /home directory
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On my last upgrade from 10.3 to 11.0, Suse installed the 10.3 root directory into my home directory, which I never noticed because I don't go there, until a few days ago when I decided to upgrade from 11.0 to 11.1. As I was deleting these directories, I accidently deleted my home directory. I don't keep much there, but linux and its apps do. Is there a recovery. Also I have OOo files in another directory, but I don't know which partition. Is there a way to: 1) Find out which partition a file is in. 2) Copy these files from disk to a usb stick drive while in the "live" mode? tia, John -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org
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-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 On Tuesday, 2009-01-06 at 18:48 -0800, John R. Sowden wrote:
On my last upgrade from 10.3 to 11.0, Suse installed the 10.3 root directory into my home directory, which I never noticed because I don't go there, until a few days ago when I decided to upgrade from 11.0 to 11.1. As I was deleting these directories, I accidently deleted my home directory. I don't keep much there, but linux and its apps do. Is there a recovery.
Recovery of deleted files? No. There is an undelete for ext2, not ext3, though. Midnight commander can do it. You might recover text files from empty space... umount partition, or remount ro, do a dd of entire partition to an image, run text search on image, copy bits. Good luck and tons of patience. Or hire a recovery specialist or company. ¡Do backups! ¡Always!
Also I have OOo files in another directory, but I don't know which partition. Is there a way to: 1) Find out which partition a file is in.
Mount them all, run a search.
2) Copy these files from disk to a usb stick drive while in the "live" mode?
Of course. - -- Cheers, Carlos E. R. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v2.0.9 (GNU/Linux) iEYEARECAAYFAklkHw8ACgkQtTMYHG2NR9UyMwCeMOb/GmzplsBve+Kyp+kaIpYW /uQAnj+SQEXuEvRCB0Z39DWU7fGPmHW3 =emVJ -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
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On Tuesday January 06 2009 19:18:37 Carlos E. R. wrote:
On Tuesday, 2009-01-06 at 18:48 -0800, John R. Sowden wrote:
On my last upgrade from 10.3 to 11.0, Suse installed the 10.3 root directory into my home directory, which I never noticed because I don't go there, until a few days ago when I decided to upgrade from 11.0 to 11.1. As I was deleting these directories, I accidently deleted my home directory. I don't keep much there, but linux and its apps do. Is there a recovery.
Recovery of deleted files? No. There is an undelete for ext2, not ext3, though. Midnight commander can do it. You might recover text files from empty space... umount partition, or remount ro, do a dd of entire partition to an image, run text search on image, copy bits. Good luck and tons of patience. Or hire a recovery specialist or company.
¡Do backups! ¡Always!
Also I have OOo files in another directory, but I don't know which partition. Is there a way to: 1) Find out which partition a file is in.
Mount them all, run a search.
2) Copy these files from disk to a usb stick drive while in the "live" mode?
Of course.
Re: #2: The reason that I asked is when I installed a USB stick drive, nothing happened (it didn't mount). I checked the 'my computer' to see if it was connected, just not on my desktop, no soap. How do I mount a usb stick drive in a live suse 11.1 mode? I can mount the disk drive with the data so I can access the files in the live mode, I just don't see how to copy them off the drive. John -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org
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On Tuesday 06 January 2009 9:23 pm, John R. Sowden wrote:
Re: #2: The reason that I asked is when I installed a USB stick drive, nothing happened (it didn't mount). I checked the 'my computer' to see if it was connected, just not on my desktop, no soap. How do I mount a usb stick drive in a live suse 11.1 mode? I can mount the disk drive with the data so I can access the files in the live mode, I just don't see how to copy them off the drive.
Do "fdisk -l" -- it should list all the devices. Perhaps you will see something like "/dev/sda1". Also do "df". It wil list the mounted devices. Look for a device shown by fdisk that is not shown by df and mount that. Perhaps something like: mount /dev/sda1 /mnt Look in /mnt to see if you got what you are looking for. Bob -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org
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John R. Sowden wrote:
On my last upgrade from 10.3 to 11.0, Suse installed the 10.3 root directory into my home directory, which I never noticed because I don't go there, until a few days ago when I decided to upgrade from 11.0 to 11.1. As I was deleting these directories, I accidently deleted my home directory. I don't keep much there, but linux and its apps do. Is there a recovery.
Yep. Just recover them from your back ups.
Also I have OOo files in another directory, but I don't know which partition. Is there a way to: 1) Find out which partition a file is in. 2) Copy these files from disk to a usb stick drive while in the "live" mode?
Take a look at the path to the file. Then compare that with the contents of /etc/fstab to find the top directory of that path. -- Use OpenOffice.org <http://www.openoffice.org> -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org
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On Wed, Jan 7, 2009 at 7:10 AM, James Knott <james.knott@rogers.com> wrote:
John R. Sowden wrote:
On my last upgrade from 10.3 to 11.0, Suse installed the 10.3 root directory into my home directory, which I never noticed because I don't go there, until a few days ago when I decided to upgrade from 11.0 to 11.1. As I was deleting these directories, I accidently deleted my home directory. I don't keep much there, but linux and its apps do. Is there a recovery.
I've used photorec for recovering files before, but the file system wasn't ext3. If you were using ext3, you may find this site informative: http://www.xs4all.nl/~carlo17/howto/undelete_ext3.html.
Yep. Just recover them from your back ups.
LOL I don't think he'd be asking if he had backups.
No one is addressing the issue of the fact that I cannot connect a usb stick drive in the live mode. Is this the case, or am I trying to do something that has not been done? The reason that I am using the live mode is because linux will not boot with the home directory missing.
Several responses already addressed the usb stick - check fdisk -l and dmesg to see if the drive is detected. The OS just needs /root, /boot, /etc, /proc and a couple others to boot - /home is only necessary to actually load your user's desktop. You can still log in as root and do whatever you need to do. Iirc a home directory is automatically created if one isn't available... as long as your /etc/fstab isn't pointing to the non-existent /home. Nkoli -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org
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On Wednesday January 07 2009 11:09:24 Nkoli wrote:
On Wed, Jan 7, 2009 at 7:10 AM, James Knott <james.knott@rogers.com> wrote:
John R. Sowden wrote:
On my last upgrade from 10.3 to 11.0, Suse installed the 10.3 root directory into my home directory, which I never noticed because I don't go there, until a few days ago when I decided to upgrade from 11.0 to 11.1. As I was deleting these directories, I accidently deleted my home directory. I don't keep much there, but linux and its apps do. Is there a recovery.
I've used photorec for recovering files before, but the file system wasn't ext3. If you were using ext3, you may find this site informative: http://www.xs4all.nl/~carlo17/howto/undelete_ext3.html.
Yep. Just recover them from your back ups.
LOL I don't think he'd be asking if he had backups.
No one is addressing the issue of the fact that I cannot connect a usb stick drive in the live mode. Is this the case, or am I trying to do something that has not been done? The reason that I am using the live mode is because linux will not boot with the home directory missing.
Several responses already addressed the usb stick - check fdisk -l and dmesg to see if the drive is detected. The OS just needs /root, /boot, /etc, /proc and a couple others to boot - /home is only necessary to actually load your user's desktop. You can still log in as root and do whatever you need to do. Iirc a home directory is automatically created if one isn't available... as long as your /etc/fstab isn't pointing to the non-existent /home.
Nkoli
Just to let all know, in case this happens to another: First of all, I do not back up my home directory because I don't put anything there, except downloads, that I transfer to cd, etc. But Linux does put things there, in hidden directories. That was my problem re accessing the system. Then I had an epiffany: Set up another user. I did that, then I was able to log in as normal, with one caveat: all of my data files that were accessable under the old name, were read only to the new name. I then used chown to change the owner to the new name. Now Linux is running normally and my files are accessale. Thanks to all for the ideas. I am now going back to exercise the suggestions so I learn more about Linux! John -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org
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Here's what IMHO everyone should do: -have a separate partition (I call mine local) and link your home directory there (when logged on as root) -keep all your non rpm installed products there (java jdk's, tar and source distributed products downloads, whatever) I keep mine in /local/opt When you upgrade or rebuild your system leave that partition out of the mix and when its all up and working remount it as /local and relink your home dir. Using this technique you can replace your distro or upgrade/downgrade in about 2 hours. Beware of packages that aren't compatible withe the .hidden files in your home dir wcn John R. Sowden wrote:
On Wednesday January 07 2009 11:09:24 Nkoli wrote:
On Wed, Jan 7, 2009 at 7:10 AM, James Knott <james.knott@rogers.com> wrote:
John R. Sowden wrote:
On my last upgrade from 10.3 to 11.0, Suse installed the 10.3 root directory into my home directory, which I never noticed because I don't go there, until a few days ago when I decided to upgrade from 11.0 to 11.1. As I was deleting these directories, I accidently deleted my home directory. I don't keep much there, but linux and its apps do. Is there a recovery.
I've used photorec for recovering files before, but the file system wasn't ext3. If you were using ext3, you may find this site informative: http://www.xs4all.nl/~carlo17/howto/undelete_ext3.html.
Yep. Just recover them from your back ups.
LOL I don't think he'd be asking if he had backups.
No one is addressing the issue of the fact that I cannot connect a usb stick drive in the live mode. Is this the case, or am I trying to do something that has not been done? The reason that I am using the live mode is because linux will not boot with the home directory missing.
Several responses already addressed the usb stick - check fdisk -l and dmesg to see if the drive is detected. The OS just needs /root, /boot, /etc, /proc and a couple others to boot - /home is only necessary to actually load your user's desktop. You can still log in as root and do whatever you need to do. Iirc a home directory is automatically created if one isn't available... as long as your /etc/fstab isn't pointing to the non-existent /home.
Nkoli
Just to let all know, in case this happens to another:
First of all, I do not back up my home directory because I don't put anything there, except downloads, that I transfer to cd, etc. But Linux does put things there, in hidden directories. That was my problem re accessing the system.
Then I had an epiffany: Set up another user. I did that, then I was able to log in as normal, with one caveat: all of my data files that were accessable under the old name, were read only to the new name. I then used chown to change the owner to the new name. Now Linux is running normally and my files are accessale.
Thanks to all for the ideas. I am now going back to exercise the suggestions so I learn more about Linux!
John
-- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org
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I just installed an 11.1 and was surprised it wanted to delete my /home partition, make a new extended partition there and install 11.1 in that. I also have two swap partitions and two Linux partitions. It offered to leave those alone. So I am guessing it looked for a partition that was not swap or did not already have a linux installed, and offered to put it there. My intention was to overwrite one of the linux installs (Caldera 2.4!). Anyway, if I had not been careful, I would have lost my /home as well. This sort of thing has never happened before. I did my own setup instead of that offered and that worked fine. So it is not a matter of the install not doing what it said it would do to the partitions. It is that the default suggestion is bad. IIRC, didn't earlier installs require an empty partition into which they could be installed? So you first had to make free space on the disk. They would never default to replacing an existing partition. -- Roger Oberholtzer OPQ Systems / Ramböll RST Ramböll Sverige AB Krukmakargatan 21 P.O. Box 17009 SE-104 62 Stockholm, Sweden Office: Int +46 8-615 60 20 Mobile: Int +46 70-815 1696 -- "On two occasions I have been asked (by members of Parliament!), 'Pray, Mr. Babbage, if you put into the machine wrong figures, will the right answers come out?' I am not able rightly to apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such a question. - Charles Babbage 1791-1871) English computer pioneer, philosopher And remember: It is RSofT and there is always something under construction. It is like talking about a large city with all construction finished. Not impossible, but very unlikely. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org
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Roger Oberholtzer wrote:
I just installed an 11.1 and was surprised it wanted to delete my /home partition, make a new extended partition there and install 11.1 in that. I also have two swap partitions and two Linux partitions. It offered to leave those alone. So I am guessing it looked for a partition that was not swap or did not already have a linux installed, and offered to put it there. My intention was to overwrite one of the linux installs (Caldera 2.4!). Anyway, if I had not been careful, I would have lost my /home as well.
FWIW, my /home is located on a removable drive. So, I just unplug the drive containing /home, prior to the install. After the install, I just plug the drive back in and mount it on /home. -- Use OpenOffice.org <http://www.openoffice.org> -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org
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On Tuesday January 06 2009 18:48:50 John R. Sowden wrote:
On my last upgrade from 10.3 to 11.0, Suse installed the 10.3 root directory into my home directory, which I never noticed because I don't go there, until a few days ago when I decided to upgrade from 11.0 to 11.1. As I was deleting these directories, I accidently deleted my home directory. I don't keep much there, but linux and its apps do. Is there a recovery.
Also I have OOo files in another directory, but I don't know which partition. Is there a way to: 1) Find out which partition a file is in. 2) Copy these files from disk to a usb stick drive while in the "live" mode?
tia,
John
No one is addressing the issue of the fact that I cannot connect a usb stick drive in the live mode. Is this the case, or am I trying to do something that has not been done? The reason that I am using the live mode is because linux will not boot with the home directory missing. thnaks -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org
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-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 On Wednesday, 2009-01-07 at 08:35 -0800, John R. Sowden wrote:
No one is addressing the issue of the fact that I cannot connect a usb stick drive in the live mode.
Yes, we did. Look up the answer by Robert Paulsen. - -- Cheers, Carlos E. R. -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v2.0.9 (GNU/Linux) iEYEARECAAYFAklmjSEACgkQtTMYHG2NR9VjCgCeI7gZPAlBDFcKb4xKQu0Rue+u fMwAn09y1F6d3hsRr/2VQ7p7t2jr8VFm =abA7 -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org
participants (7)
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Carlos E. R.
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James Knott
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John R. Sowden
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Nkoli
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Robert Paulsen
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Roger Oberholtzer
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Wendell Nichols