Hi Folks, Thanks for all your help. In the end I re-installed Debian for two reasons: I'm already familiar with it and I'm confident that the package management system will easily install the mathematical and statistical applications that i need, which Mandrive would not.
However, one (at least) question remains. Before the installing I copied /home/robin (as well as /etc, /var, and /usr/local) to my external HD using tar as su. After install I copied them back to my internal HD. But now all files & folders in /home/robin have root, not robin, as owner. I've already changed back all the stuff I created but I'm uncertain as to whether I should also change back all the hidden flies and folders in /home/robin. I'd appreciate any advice you could give me. Robin On 1/10/08, Richard Carter <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > On 1/8/08, Richard Carter <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > Hi Rick, > > > > Thanks for the tip. I'll take a look at it. > > > > Robin > > > > On Jan 8, 2008 11:45 AM, Rick Norman <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > > > Hi Robin, > > > > > > Sorry to hear your install of Debian got messed up... been there > > > myself a few times. > > > > > > >In a perfect world you would have the time to try as many distros as > you > > > >can, and then choose the one that you "clicked" with. > > > > > > With regard to what Gustin said, you could always use a tool like > > > VirtualBox > > > to try out new distros: http://virtualbox.org/ > > > > > > That's how I settled on Debian and FreeBSD (after starting out with > > > Ubuntu, which is also very good). > > > > > > Another nice thing about virtual machines is that you can try out > complex > > > configuration changes with no risk to your actual system--If you bust a > > > VM, > > > just roll it back to the previous snapshot and try again. If it works, > go > > > ahead > > > and make your changes to the actual install. > > > > > > This approach has saved me a lot of hassles while learning new stuff. > > > Might be worth exploring... :-) > > > > > > Cheers, > > > Rick. > > > > > > > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > > > clug-talk mailing list > > > [email protected] > > > http://clug.ca/mailman/listinfo/clug-talk_clug.ca > > > Mailing List Guidelines (http://clug.ca/ml_guidelines.php) > > > **Please remove these lines when replying > > > > > > _______________________________________________ clug-talk mailing list [email protected] http://clug.ca/mailman/listinfo/clug-talk_clug.ca Mailing List Guidelines (http://clug.ca/ml_guidelines.php) **Please remove these lines when replying
