From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 4.0.0 (2022-12-14) on finch.gentoo.org X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-0.1 required=5.0 tests=DATE_IN_PAST_24_48, DMARC_MISSING,INVALID_DATE,MAILING_LIST_MULTI autolearn=unavailable autolearn_force=no version=4.0.0 Received: from anarchy.io.com (anarchy.io.com [199.170.88.101]) by cvs.gentoo.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 5240E942E for ; Wed, 24 Jan 2001 17:33:07 -0700 (MST) Received: from deliverator.io.com (root@deliverator.io.com [199.170.88.17]) by anarchy.io.com (8.9.3/8.9.3) with ESMTP id SAA27892 for ; Wed, 24 Jan 2001 18:33:54 -0600 Received: from fnord.io.com (egabriel@fnord.io.com [199.170.88.12]) by deliverator.io.com (8.9.3/8.9.3) with ESMTP id SAA29159 for ; Wed, 24 Jan 2001 18:33:51 -0600 Received: from localhost (egabriel@localhost) by fnord.io.com (8.8.7/8.8.7) with ESMTP id SAA05432 for ; Wed, 24 Jan 2001 18:33:51 -0600 From: Gabriel To: gentoo-dev@gentoo.org Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Subject: [gentoo-dev] Erasing existing system Sender: gentoo-dev-admin@gentoo.org Errors-To: gentoo-dev-admin@gentoo.org X-BeenThere: gentoo-dev@gentoo.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.0 Precedence: bulk Reply-To: gentoo-dev@gentoo.org List-Help: List-Post: List-Subscribe: , List-Id: Gentoo Linux development list List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: Date: Wed Jan 24 17:34:02 2001 X-Original-Date: Wed, 24 Jan 2001 18:33:51 -0600 (CST) X-Archives-Salt: 2317060a-5d60-415c-bb5f-c041dc5405b8 X-Archives-Hash: b84a2baecd9945207123d1ca5d9ad1a2 Currently, one can download the iso, or if one has two partitions, boot into one and mount the other and untar sys.tbz2. This is great. However, if I want to replace a fully-partitioned system which is already running Linux with the tarball, I can't. Well, I could, but there would be cruft from the old install. What would be neat is a script that could be run, and it would create a small temporary bin dir with enough utilities within to cp sys.tbz2 into itself, then rm -rf what you have and pour sys.tbz2 into it. Then remove itself. Yes, if something goes wrong you are in a world of hurt, but it would be nice to have as an option. It's a feature I won't care about when rc4 comes out, but since I have scsi drives on one system and a k6 on the other, I haven't been able to install Gentoo yet. I think this could be useful for other situations where it would be a nasty job to hack the .iso to include whatever you need to get Gentoo running on your unique and problematic system, but just adding something to the tarball would be a breeze. Well, just a suggestion. --Gabriel