Panther? Perhaps but...

pete · 10-12-2003, 12:04 PM

I have an old iMac DV SE 400 mhz. It is tasked pretty much with Jaguar. Switching to 9 is positively snappy compared to X, but I can't live without X now! Panther will work in it, I just haven't decided if I want to upgrade or not.

I just rebuilt my system from a bad MacOS X 10.2.8 updater (first ed.) &/or Jaguar Cache Cleaner. I re-installed X11 and Fink, along with numerous packages. My system is once again happy. Unfortunately, Fink discards the downloaded packages, as far as I can tell, so I can't re-install packages later on. I am on a slow dial-up. Downloading OOo103 took 16 1/2 hrs, The GIMP, Bluefish, Mozilla and a number of other packages took quite some time also.

Is there a safe way to backup all this from Jaguar and then restore to Panther, without mucking up permissions etc? If I do decide to upgrade (and I am going to wait to see how it is received initially,) I don't want to have to download everything all over again.

I will say that on each major upgrade, I installed the OS on a fresh, clean partition. I'd rather not mix things up, but have a clean start to a new OS.

TIA!

pete

yellow · 10-12-2003, 01:15 PM

First off I don't have an iMac, but a variation of this will work for you. Personally, I plan on Carbon Copy Cloning my current (10.2.8) system to another ATA drive internally. Thanks install Panther over the boot drive and use it for a while. If I encounter no problems with apps and the like, away I go. If I do have troubles, I'll boot from my 10.2.8 clone drive.
Since you won't be able to use another ATA, you can use an external fireiwre drive that you can boot from if things go badly and restore from there.

mervTormel · 10-12-2003, 01:28 PM

another approach is an archive install.

the entire /sw/ tree can be moved to inside your user home.

then, archive install.

then move /users/you/sw/ back to the root dir.

pfbbt

another stellar reason to partition a drive and avoid this dilemma altogether

pete · 10-12-2003, 01:45 PM

I have 4 partitions, so I was thinking that I could install Panther in one of the partitions. Then, when all was good, transfer the /sw folder into Panther. I was just wondering if all permissions would be preserved etc. on copying the /sw folder from the Jaguar partition to the Panther partition.

If not - I'll have OOo & Fink archived, so it won't take as long to download all that I want again.

sigh ah to have high speed where I am. I can get it, but it entails about $1,500 in set-up costs and about $100 more a month than what I am paying now!

whats a day or so of downloading?

pete

sao · 10-12-2003, 02:01 PM

Quote:


	pete wrote: Unfortunately, Fink discards the downloaded packages, as far as I can tell, so I can't re-install packages later on.

Fink doesn't discard your downloaded packages automatically, it keeps them in /sw/src in case to need to rebuild the packages. Unless you deleted yourself everything in /sw/src, all the tar.gz files of the packages you installed with Fink should be there. Please, check.

But, in case you want to delete all of Fink before installing Panther, you could also do the following:

1- Make a backup copy of all the packages in /sw/src.

2- Use the following command to create a list of all your installed packages in a file named "installed" in your home directory:

Code:

dpkg --get-selections |egrep "\binstall" | awk '{print $1}' | xargs > ~/installed

3- Reinstall Fink on Panther.

4- Move all your packages (tar.gz) back to /sw/src

5- Run: fink install < ~/installed

pete · 10-12-2003, 02:16 PM

Thanks sao!

I am great at not reading manuals. I did keep all of Finks' files to read up more on it. I just assumed that the compressed files were discarded after they had been expanded & installed.

What you have suggested sounds like the easiest, safest way to re-install everything I have already downloaded with Fink. That will make the move to Panther (if I upgrade) a lot smoother. The /sw/src folder will be archived whenever I eventually make it home.

Thanks again sao - much appreciated.

mervTormel · 10-12-2003, 02:17 PM

Quote:


	Originally posted by pete I have 4 partitions, so I was thinking that I could install Panther in one of the partitions. Then, when all was good, transfer the /sw folder into Panther. I was just wondering if all permissions would be preserved etc. on copying the /sw folder from the Jaguar partition to the Panther partition.

you could migrate /sw/ off-world

ditto /sw/ to a suitable partition, remove it from root dir, then symlink it back.

never again to worry about /sw/

that's how it is here without issues.

pete · 10-12-2003, 02:27 PM

Quote:


	Originally posted by mervTormel ditto /sw/ to a suitable partition, remove it from root dir, then symlink it back. never again to worry about /sw/ that's how it is here without issues.

I used to have my Home folder structure on another partition, but I ended up at some point with all the symlinks choking after having had to run fsck in single user mode. None of the hard links worked. I deleted them and just re-installed the Home folder back in the OS partition.

With that experience I had been leery of using symlinks. I had Palm & a number of other folders etc linked out. Was too much of a hassle to go back to setting it all up, so I use symlinks sparingly these days.

Maybe I'll try this again and see how all goes.

pete

pete · 10-14-2003, 02:24 PM

I finally returned home and checked the /sw directory. The src directory is empty - just as I thought. All the compressed files are being deleted by Fink, even when I say No to deleting them.

Actually, all I ended up doing was what mervTormel suggested earlier - ditto'ing sw to another partition, deleting the original sw and then symlinking it.

Now I should be OK as far as Fink goes for updating the OS.

Thanks for the help, sao & mervTormel!

sao · 10-14-2003, 03:50 PM

Quote:


	pete wrote: The src directory is empty - just as I thought. All the compressed files are being deleted by Fink, even when I say No to deleting them.

All downloaded 'source' tarballs will be placed into '/sw/src/ ' and they will not be deleted unless you delete them yourself. You are probably not installing from source.

Even if that's the case, still the packages are not deleted, you will find in the folder /finkinfo the package descriptions (.info and .patch) and in /binary-darwin-powerpc the compiled .deb packages.

If this is the case, you could copy (backup) the .deb files and after reinstalling Fink, to install them use the command:

sudo dpkg –install <filename>

For example, if you put the .deb file in your home directory, just run:

sudo dpkg –install ~/fink-0.14.0-1.deb

Anyhow, I think you did well to move all of Fink to another partition with ditto as MervTormel suggested, it's a clean and easy way to organize your system. That's the way I have it too...

bluehz · 10-15-2003, 07:55 AM

Is the consenus that all previously compiled software installed in pre-Panther will have to be re-compiled under Panther? Is that the reasoning behind the discussion above?

If so - hope my computer's not busy for about a week....

mervTormel · 10-15-2003, 10:56 AM

Quote:


	Originally posted by bluehz Is the consenus that all previously compiled software installed in pre-Panther will have to be re-compiled under Panther?

no.

bluehz · 10-15-2003, 11:09 AM

Good! I wasn't looking forward to that!

So the Fink and /usr/local stuff should transition fairly painlessly?

mervTormel · 10-15-2003, 11:17 AM

Quote:


	Originally posted by bluehz So the Fink and /usr/local stuff should transition fairly painlessly?

yes.

sao · 10-15-2003, 12:02 PM

Quote:


	bluehz wrote: Is the consenus that all previously compiled software installed in pre-Panther will have to be re-compiled under Panther?

bluehz, my guess is that *some* packages would probably need to be recompiled. The *good* news is that the vast majority of the *stable* packages have already been moved from 10.2/stable to 10.2-gcc3.3/stable and that after the release of the fink package manager 0.14.0, Fink is now finally compatible with last summer's Developer Tools updates. (if you install both the new package manager and the Developer Tools 'update', fink will ask you to reset your gcc version whenever that is necessary)

If you want to go ahead and help testing packages to save time, you can install fink-0.14.3-beta.tar.gz which has also rsync capabilities, but is for users who are willing to help test the full conversion to the gcc 3.3 compiler. If you install the -beta you will need to recompile a number of the fink packages, and you may find that some of the packages from the *unstable* tree are not yet present in the new fink installation. (It also requires the new Developer Tools)

Quote:


	bluehz wrote: Is that the reasoning behind the discussion above?

No.

bluehz · 10-15-2003, 12:14 PM

thx for the info sao - I will have to wait until my Panther install disks show up next week before I can get the developer tools up and running and do any testing. I don't know where I thought I had read everything was going to have to be recompiled.. what a relief it doesn't!

WillyT · 10-21-2003, 08:29 PM

If you switch compilers some things (shared libraries) may not link correctly and would have to be recompiled. So if you only use gcc 3.1 all your stuff should be ok, or if you only use gcc 3.3 you're ok too. Mix and match between compilers "may" be a problem.

Now back to Panther:

Since I have /Users symlinked to another partition I will have to be careful. My upgrade to 10.2 wiped the symlinks and moved some but not all users back to the root partition.

So I will login >console su to root (unix seems to be unhappy if you don't have a home dir) and rename the new /Users to /Usersbac and rebuild the symlinks, I guess. Then when I'm sure all the users are where they belong and all data is intact, then and only after all users are checked finally delete /Usersbac.

sao · 10-22-2003, 12:25 AM

Yes, as WillyT said, if you build a package with gcc 3.1, anything you build against that package must be built also with gcc 3.1 .

Which means that you cannot 'mix and match' compiled c++ code between gcc 3.1 and gcc 3.3 as everything has to match.

The current fink gcc3.3 tree and a future panther tree will upgrade everything c++ to be able to build all packages with the new gcc.

10-12-2003, 12:04 PM	#1
pete Prospect Join Date: Oct 2003 Location: Brighton ON Posts: 46	Panther? Perhaps but... I have an old iMac DV SE 400 mhz. It is tasked pretty much with Jaguar. Switching to 9 is positively snappy compared to X, but I can't live without X now! Panther will work in it, I just haven't decided if I want to upgrade or not. I just rebuilt my system from a bad MacOS X 10.2.8 updater (first ed.) &/or Jaguar Cache Cleaner. I re-installed X11 and Fink, along with numerous packages. My system is once again happy. Unfortunately, Fink discards the downloaded packages, as far as I can tell, so I can't re-install packages later on. I am on a slow dial-up. Downloading OOo103 took 16 1/2 hrs, The GIMP, Bluefish, Mozilla and a number of other packages took quite some time also. Is there a safe way to backup all this from Jaguar and then restore to Panther, without mucking up permissions etc? If I do decide to upgrade (and I am going to wait to see how it is received initially,) I don't want to have to download everything all over again. I will say that on each major upgrade, I installed the OS on a fresh, clean partition. I'd rather not mix things up, but have a clean start to a new OS. TIA! pete

10-21-2003, 08:29 PM	#17
WillyT Major Leaguer Join Date: Jan 2002 Location: Midwest Not quite Normal Posts: 416	Switching compilers? and Symlinks If you switch compilers some things (shared libraries) may not link correctly and would have to be recompiled. So if you only use gcc 3.1 all your stuff should be ok, or if you only use gcc 3.3 you're ok too. Mix and match between compilers "may" be a problem. Now back to Panther: Since I have /Users symlinked to another partition I will have to be careful. My upgrade to 10.2 wiped the symlinks and moved some but not all users back to the root partition. So I will login >console su to root (unix seems to be unhappy if you don't have a home dir) and rename the new /Users to /Usersbac and rebuild the symlinks, I guess. Then when I'm sure all the users are where they belong and all data is intact, then and only after all users are checked finally delete /Usersbac. __________________ I have a Reason3 not to be grumpy and now I have a Rosegarden that works. Willy

10-12-2003, 01:15 PM	#2
yellow Moderator Join Date: Jan 2002 Posts: 10,677	First off I don't have an iMac, but a variation of this will work for you. Personally, I plan on Carbon Copy Cloning my current (10.2.8) system to another ATA drive internally. Thanks install Panther over the boot drive and use it for a while. If I encounter no problems with apps and the like, away I go. If I do have troubles, I'll boot from my 10.2.8 clone drive. Since you won't be able to use another ATA, you can use an external fireiwre drive that you can boot from if things go badly and restore from there.

10-12-2003, 01:28 PM	#3
mervTormel League Commissioner Join Date: Jan 2002 Posts: 5,536	another approach is an archive install. the entire /sw/ tree can be moved to inside your user home. then, archive install. then move /users/you/sw/ back to the root dir. pfbbt another stellar reason to partition a drive and avoid this dilemma altogether

10-12-2003, 01:45 PM	#4
pete Prospect Join Date: Oct 2003 Location: Brighton ON Posts: 46	I have 4 partitions, so I was thinking that I could install Panther in one of the partitions. Then, when all was good, transfer the /sw folder into Panther. I was just wondering if all permissions would be preserved etc. on copying the /sw folder from the Jaguar partition to the Panther partition. If not - I'll have OOo & Fink archived, so it won't take as long to download all that I want again. sigh ah to have high speed where I am. I can get it, but it entails about $1,500 in set-up costs and about $100 more a month than what I am paying now! whats a day or so of downloading? pete

10-12-2003, 02:16 PM	#6
pete Prospect Join Date: Oct 2003 Location: Brighton ON Posts: 46	Thanks sao! I am great at not reading manuals. I did keep all of Finks' files to read up more on it. I just assumed that the compressed files were discarded after they had been expanded & installed. What you have suggested sounds like the easiest, safest way to re-install everything I have already downloaded with Fink. That will make the move to Panther (if I upgrade) a lot smoother. The /sw/src folder will be archived whenever I eventually make it home. Thanks again sao - much appreciated.

10-14-2003, 02:24 PM	#9
pete Prospect Join Date: Oct 2003 Location: Brighton ON Posts: 46	I finally returned home and checked the /sw directory. The src directory is empty - just as I thought. All the compressed files are being deleted by Fink, even when I say No to deleting them. Actually, all I ended up doing was what mervTormel suggested earlier - ditto'ing sw to another partition, deleting the original sw and then symlinking it. Now I should be OK as far as Fink goes for updating the OS. Thanks for the help, sao & mervTormel!

10-15-2003, 07:55 AM	#11
bluehz MVP Join Date: Jan 2002 Posts: 1,562	Is the consenus that all previously compiled software installed in pre-Panther will have to be re-compiled under Panther? Is that the reasoning behind the discussion above? If so - hope my computer's not busy for about a week....

10-15-2003, 11:09 AM	#13
bluehz MVP Join Date: Jan 2002 Posts: 1,562	Good! I wasn't looking forward to that! So the Fink and /usr/local stuff should transition fairly painlessly?

10-15-2003, 12:14 PM	#16
bluehz MVP Join Date: Jan 2002 Posts: 1,562	thx for the info sao - I will have to wait until my Panther install disks show up next week before I can get the developer tools up and running and do any testing. I don't know where I thought I had read everything was going to have to be recompiled.. what a relief it doesn't!

10-22-2003, 12:25 AM	#18
sao Moderator Join Date: Jan 2002 Location: Singapore Posts: 4,237	Yes, as WillyT said, if you build a package with gcc 3.1, anything you build against that package must be built also with gcc 3.1 . Which means that you cannot 'mix and match' compiled c++ code between gcc 3.1 and gcc 3.3 as everything has to match. The current fink gcc3.3 tree and a future panther tree will upgrade everything c++ to be able to build all packages with the new gcc.