[gentoo-user] HowTo rebuild everything same way differently

[gentoo-user] HowTo rebuild everything same way differently

[Meino.Cramer]

Hi,

ok, the subject: is something "helpless"... ;)

Before I screw up everything ... better ask:

My Gentoo system is kinda "old"...not in the sense
of not being updated regulary but in the sense of
"used for a (too?) long time"

Therefore I want to reinstall everything the same way (read: same
application and system funktionality) but in a different way: Using
a new stage3 (was it "3" ...dont remember exactly) and I want to make
the system "unstable" right from the beginning just to check, how that
works.

The only thing I dont know: How?

What is the best (sanest) way to acchieve what I want in the most
efficient (time) way?

Thank you very much in advance for any help!
Best regards,
Meino

Re: [gentoo-user] HowTo rebuild everything same way differently

[Alan McKinnon]

On 10/04/2015 19:29, Meino.Cramer@gmx.de wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> ok, the subject: is something "helpless"... ;)
> 
> Before I screw up everything ... better ask:
> 
> My Gentoo system is kinda "old"...not in the sense
> of not being updated regulary but in the sense of
> "used for a (too?) long time"
> 
> Therefore I want to reinstall everything the same way (read: same
> application and system funktionality) but in a different way: Using
> a new stage3 (was it "3" ...dont remember exactly) and I want to make
> the system "unstable" right from the beginning just to check, how that
> works.
> 
> The only thing I dont know: How?
> 
> What is the best (sanest) way to acchieve what I want in the most
> efficient (time) way?
> 
> Thank you very much in advance for any help!
> Best regards,
> Meino


So you want to reinstall?
Right now you have an arch system and want the new one to be ~arch?

1. Have enough free disk space to hold the entire new install
2. Create partitions/disks/volumes/whatever for the new system
3. Follow the Gentoo install docs and install into this new volume
4. Copy all portage config files (/etc/portage/*, world) to new system
5. Chroot into new system as normal
6. Cleanup/remove old system. How to do this is left as an exercise for
the reader.


-- 
Alan McKinnon
alan.mckinnon@gmail.com

Re: [gentoo-user] HowTo rebuild everything same way differently

[Mick]

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On Friday 10 Apr 2015 18:36:11 Alan McKinnon wrote:
> On 10/04/2015 19:29, Meino.Cramer@gmx.de wrote:
> > Hi,
> > 
> > ok, the subject: is something "helpless"... ;)
> > 
> > Before I screw up everything ... better ask:
> > 
> > My Gentoo system is kinda "old"...not in the sense
> > of not being updated regulary but in the sense of
> > "used for a (too?) long time"

How "old" is old?  I still have a box here running the same original gentoo 
installation since 2005.  I had another which died due to hardware failure 
with its original 2003 installation.

 
> > Therefore I want to reinstall everything the same way (read: same
> > application and system funktionality) but in a different way: Using
> > a new stage3 (was it "3" ...dont remember exactly) and I want to make
> > the system "unstable" right from the beginning just to check, how that
> > works.

OK, that's a different requirement.  Oldness doesn't come into it.


> > The only thing I dont know: How?
> > 
> > What is the best (sanest) way to acchieve what I want in the most
> > efficient (time) way?
> > 
> > Thank you very much in advance for any help!
> > Best regards,
> > Meino
> 
> So you want to reinstall?
> Right now you have an arch system and want the new one to be ~arch?
> 
> 1. Have enough free disk space to hold the entire new install
> 2. Create partitions/disks/volumes/whatever for the new system
> 3. Follow the Gentoo install docs and install into this new volume
> 4. Copy all portage config files (/etc/portage/*, world) to new system
> 5. Chroot into new system as normal
> 6. Cleanup/remove old system. How to do this is left as an exercise for
> the reader.

Alan wisely recommends a low risk approach.  If the new system comes a cropper 
you can always return to your current installation.  

Alternatively, create a back up, change the arch to ~arch in ACCEPT_KEYWORDS, 
first rebuild @system and then the rest.  Expect some breakages, there usually 
are.  Also, if you resync often expect a lot of time being spent emerging 
packages and rolling back updates, compared with stable.  For this purpose 
using '--buildpkg y' is quite useful in rolling back any updates in short 
order to a known good version.

-- 
Regards,
Mick

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Re: [gentoo-user] HowTo rebuild everything same way differently

[Neil Bothwick]

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On Fri, 10 Apr 2015 19:29:54 +0200, Meino.Cramer@gmx.de wrote:

> Therefore I want to reinstall everything the same way (read: same
> application and system funktionality) but in a different way: Using
> a new stage3 (was it "3" ...dont remember exactly) and I want to make
> the system "unstable" right from the beginning just to check, how that
> works.

You can't. The stage3 tarballs are stable packages, so you will always
start on arch before switching to ~arch.

You can certainly do what you want, but you will end up exactly where you
started. You may get rid of the odd bit of cruft by deleting and
reinstalling, but the words sledgehammer and nut come to mind. emerge
--depclean and qfile --orphans will help you clean up your system with
far less distruption.


-- 
Neil Bothwick

Top Oxymorons Number 20: Synthetic natural gas

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Re: [gentoo-user] HowTo rebuild everything same way differently

[Philip Webb]

150410 Mick wrote:
>> On 10/04/2015 19:29, Meino.Cramer@gmx.de wrote:
>>> My Gentoo system is kinda old ... not in the sense of not being updated
>> regularly, but in the sense of "used for a (too?) long time"
> I still have a box running the same Gentoo installation since 2005.
> I had another which died due to hardware failure
> with its original 2003 installation.

Same here : I've never re-installed Gentoo in the same machine,
but updated weekly on the everyday system & less often on the others ;
ANB2 (2003) still opens up, but won't talk to today's mice,
ANB3 (2007) has a graphics-card problem, so can't boot intelligibly,
ANB4 (2012 : this one) has no software problems,
Horace (EEE-PC 2009) was recently updated successfully after  2 yr .

Short advice : you're probably wasting your time (smile).

-- 
========================,,============================================
SUPPORT     ___________//___,   Philip Webb
ELECTRIC   /] [] [] [] [] []|   Cities Centre, University of Toronto
TRANSIT    `-O----------O---'   purslowatchassdotutorontodotca

[gentoo-user] Re: HowTo rebuild everything same way differently

[Grant Edwards]

On 2015-04-10, Philip Webb <purslow@ca.inter.net> wrote:
> 150410 Mick wrote:
>>> On 10/04/2015 19:29, Meino.Cramer@gmx.de wrote:
>>>> My Gentoo system is kinda old ... not in the sense of not being updated
>>> regularly, but in the sense of "used for a (too?) long time"
>> I still have a box running the same Gentoo installation since 2005.
>> I had another which died due to hardware failure
>> with its original 2003 installation.
>
> Same here : I've never re-installed Gentoo in the same machine,

I've been using Gentoo on a handfull of machines for something like 13
years now, and have only re-installed a handfull of times in a few
differnt situations:

 1) Though I have done many motherboard replacements without
    reinstalling, on one occasion after a hardware failure the new
    motherboard and drive arrangement was different enough that I
    decided to reinstall.  I'm pretty sure I could have used a livecd
    or rescuecd to get the old installation tweaked and running on the
    new hardware, but a reinstall seemed simpler.  

 2) RAM or root hard drive failure corrupted caused system crashes. 
    After the underlying hardware problem was fixed, I didn't trust
    the contents of the root fs.

 3) Switching from 32-bit install to 64 install.  That's happened a
    few times, and I don't think there's a practical alternative to
    reinstalling.

> but updated weekly on the everyday system & less often on the others ;
> ANB2 (2003) still opens up, but won't talk to today's mice,
> ANB3 (2007) has a graphics-card problem, so can't boot intelligibly,
> ANB4 (2012 : this one) has no software problems,
> Horace (EEE-PC 2009) was recently updated successfully after  2 yr .
>
> Short advice : you're probably wasting your time (smile).


-- 
Grant Edwards               grant.b.edwards        Yow! Maybe I should have
                                  at               asked for my Neutron Bomb
                              gmail.com            in PAISLEY --

[gentoo-user] Re: HowTo rebuild everything same way differently

[James]

 <Meino.Cramer <at> gmx.de> writes:

> Therefore I want to reinstall everything the same way (read: same
> application and system funktionality) but in a different way: Using
> a new stage3 (was it "3" ...dont remember exactly) and I want to make
> the system "unstable" right from the beginning just to check, how that
> works.

> Meino

Let's assume you only have one computer but a second HD:

What I would do, is pull your existing HD and set it asside; so if you need
to you can reboot with it, check something, and switch back to the new
install as needed. Continue with what ever advice you have received
with the second HD.


Easily and quickly reversible.

If/when we have ansible based installs, something like this is almost
trivial. Maybe (wink wink, nudge nudge) we'll get a new install semantic.

Holy jeepers, batman, we do we do!

First build up a usbstick with gentoo (~arch)
https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/Install_Gentoo_on_a_bootable_USB_stick

Then use persistence (the precious?) to make savable changes? 
https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/LiveDVD-Persistence-Mode


NO second HD need, just a 16Gb usbstick (or larger) usb3 really helps!


hth,
James