[arch-general] Re-installing whole system without touching configs.
Hi, Some time back, while xscreensver was running the system got locked, so that I couldn't log back neither under X, neither under the console. The only solution at hand was to do a hard reset. After such hard reset, the partition for /tmp got corrupted and it had to be repaired. However ever now and then since that incident I get errors when xscreensaver is running, including system freeze. Some times when running the demo application (xscreensaver user interface), in some screen saver applications I get errors in the preview indicating problems with gtk, or some gnome libs and the like, but then the same screen savers after reboot don't give that problem. Notice I've uninstalled xscreensaver and installit back, with no effect... Perhaps important to note is that I'm using ext4 in all partitions. So I have run already "fsck -f" over all partitions, but what's left is to re-install everything... I don't want to do a install from scratch, just want to re-install everything, but not touching the configuration files. Still I want to re-install all packages already installed in the system. Is there a way to do such re-install through pacman? If so, please let me know. Thanks, -- Javier.
2010/1/17 Javier Vasquez <j.e.vasquez.v@gmail.com>:
I don't want to do a install from scratch, just want to re-install everything, but not touching the configuration files. Still I want to re-install all packages already installed in the system. Is there a way to do such re-install through pacman? If so, please let me know.
In the pacman's wiki page (italian translate) [1] there's a procedure that you could do. With this procedure you can install all the package that you have now in the new system after the re-installation of Arch. First you have to do a package's backup # pacman -Qqe > pkglist after that you must save the file pkglist in an USB drive or where you want. In the new Arch, browse in the directory that contains the pkglist file and type # pacman -S $(cat pkglist) all of your "old" package will be re-install in the new Arch. Alberto [1] http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Pacman_%28Italiano%29 -- Bonacina Alberto email: bonacina.alberto@gmail.com Per favore, non mandatemi allegati in Word o PowerPoint http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/no-word-attachments.it.html Sai perche' GNU/Linux e' meglio? http://www.whylinuxisbetter.net/index_it.php
2010/1/18 Alberto Bonacina <bonacina.alberto@gmail.com>:
2010/1/17 Javier Vasquez <j.e.vasquez.v@gmail.com>:
I don't want to do a install from scratch, just want to re-install everything, but not touching the configuration files. Still I want to re-install all packages already installed in the system. Is there a way to do such re-install through pacman? If so, please let me know.
In the pacman's wiki page (italian translate) [1] there's a procedure that you could do. With this procedure you can install all the package that you have now in the new system after the re-installation of Arch. First you have to do a package's backup
# pacman -Qqe > pkglist
after that you must save the file pkglist in an USB drive or where you want. In the new Arch, browse in the directory that contains the pkglist file and type
# pacman -S $(cat pkglist)
all of your "old" package will be re-install in the new Arch.
Alberto
[1] http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Pacman_%28Italiano%29
Often times it's the user configuration files that mess up a system, so keep that in mind unless you're really confident it's all in the packages themselves. And if you're thinking of reinstalling a la pacman -S $(comm -3 <(pacman -Qq) <(pacman -Qqm)) then remember to put it in a list first, remove them (-Rscn) and then (re)install (-S). This is because some, if not many packages, contain post-remove/install commands that may affect the outcome. -- GPG/PGP ID: B42DDCAD
On Sun, Jan 17, 2010 at 6:51 PM, Ray Rashif <schivmeister@gmail.com> wrote:
Often times it's the user configuration files that mess up a system, so keep that in mind unless you're really confident it's all in the packages themselves.
And if you're thinking of reinstalling a la pacman -S $(comm -3 <(pacman -Qq) <(pacman -Qqm)) then remember to put it in a list first, remove them (-Rscn) and then (re)install (-S). This is because some, if not many packages, contain post-remove/install commands that may affect the outcome.
I don't know if it's a good idea to remove pacman, libfetch, libarchive, glibc, bash, ... If you are worried some important files got corrupted, a simple reinstall with pacman -S should be fine.
On 1/17/10, Xavier Chantry <shiningxc@gmail.com> wrote:
On Sun, Jan 17, 2010 at 6:51 PM, Ray Rashif <schivmeister@gmail.com> wrote:
Often times it's the user configuration files that mess up a system, so keep that in mind unless you're really confident it's all in the packages themselves.
And if you're thinking of reinstalling a la pacman -S $(comm -3 <(pacman -Qq) <(pacman -Qqm)) then remember to put it in a list first, remove them (-Rscn) and then (re)install (-S). This is because some, if not many packages, contain post-remove/install commands that may affect the outcome.
I don't know if it's a good idea to remove pacman, libfetch, libarchive, glibc, bash, ...
If you are worried some important files got corrupted, a simple reinstall with pacman -S should be fine.
Ok thanks... The stpes are then to grab the list of packets as others have suggested, and then re-install the list with pacman -S, that should be the easier less risky approach. I justdon't want to break the system any more, and I want to prevent installing it from scratch... Thanks, -- Javier.
2010/1/18 Xavier Chantry <shiningxc@gmail.com>:
On Sun, Jan 17, 2010 at 6:51 PM, Ray Rashif <schivmeister@gmail.com> wrote:
Often times it's the user configuration files that mess up a system, so keep that in mind unless you're really confident it's all in the packages themselves.
And if you're thinking of reinstalling a la pacman -S $(comm -3 <(pacman -Qq) <(pacman -Qqm)) then remember to put it in a list first, remove them (-Rscn) and then (re)install (-S). This is because some, if not many packages, contain post-remove/install commands that may affect the outcome.
I don't know if it's a good idea to remove pacman, libfetch, libarchive, glibc, bash, ...
If you are worried some important files got corrupted, a simple reinstall with pacman -S should be fine.
Yes, that's stupid. I think what I would do is filter extra and community and leave core alone. At least that's what I did at one point of time when I was paranoid. -- GPG/PGP ID: B42DDCAD
This one time I accidentally removed my /etc (never login as root to solve a problem when you're half the way onto Morpheus' land) and I created the package listing with pacman and reinstalled everything. Had to reconfigure things back, but it was all fine by the end.
participants (5)
-
Alberto Bonacina
-
Guilherme M. Nogueira
-
Javier Vasquez
-
Ray Rashif
-
Xavier Chantry