Re: Wrong Second HD Partition During 9.2 Install - Best Way To Fix It?

From: Dik Voorthuis (dik_at_none.nowhere)
Date: 04/13/05 

Date: Wed, 13 Apr 2005 00:17:02 +0200

Johannes Engel wrote:

> John Hinkey schrieb:
>> Installed 9.2 on to a brand new WinXP machine that has two HDs
>>
>> I had intended for the first HD to be the boot with both WinXP and Suse
>> installed along with a FAT32 partition to share files between the two.
>>
>> The second hard drive was not formatted or partitioned prior to install
>> and I had intended it to be a single partition meant for a working
>> directory that would contain only data files.
>>
>> Suse install went OK, but I mistakenly made the second HD (sdb) be
>> partitioned as /usr and when SUSE installed everything my hard drives
>> now look like
>>
>> Filesystem Mounted on
>> /dev/sda7 /
>> tmpfs /dev/shm
>> /dev/sdb1 /usr
>> /dev/sda1 /windows/C
>> /dev/sda5 /windows/D
>>
>> under the /usr directory I have
>>
>> /bin
>> /games
>> /include
>> /lib
>> /lib64
>> /local
>> /sbin
>> /share
>> /src
>> /tmp
>> /x11
>> /x11R6
>> /x86_64-suse-linux
>>
>> when I expected (wanted) there to be nothing at all - no
>> sub-directories at all. Should I have made the second hd /usr1 or
>> something?
> That depends on what you want to have. ;) For the things you told us the
> behaviour of SuSE is quite natural. The folders up there belong to the
> /usr tree. If you want a spare partition, you will have to choose a
> different mount-point.
>
>> What is the best way go back and have the second hd be just /usr1 or
>> something like that?
> Maybe it is possible to copy the files of the /usr tree to the first hd,
> then dismount the second hd and correct the entry in the /etc/fstab.
>

You could do something like this:

open /etc/fstab in a text editor, find the line that starts with:
/dev/sdb1 /usr .....
and change it to:
/dev/sdb1 /usr1 .....
and save it (you have to be root to do this).
Now end your KDE session (if that is what you are using).
press CTRL+F1, this gives you a text console. Log in as root, and enter:
# init 1
this will bring the system into single-user mode. Type your root password
when asked, and do:
# mkdir /usr1
# umount /usr
# mount /dev/sdb1 /usr1
# cp -a /usr1 /usr
# init 5

Now everything should be running again. No reinstall, not even a reboot.
Now you can delete everything in /usr1.

>> A full reinstall would not be a pain since I've not installed any
>> software or data at all - is that the option?
> Maybe it's an option, but I think not the best one. ;)
>
>> Thanks for any help
>>
>> John
> Greetings, Johannes Engel

As always, be very careful when doing these things as root, check and
double-check every command before you press enter, and make sure that you
know what every command does.
But of course, if you screw things up, you can always do it the M$-way
(reinstall).
greetings, ***