Gus Wirth wrote:
At 16:47 08/31/2005 -0700, Ralph Shumaker wrote:
[snip]
On a side note there's likely a checkbox in the program you're using to
burn
the CD that says "verify CD contents after burn" or something along those
lines (maybe not), but even so I would say you could have installed
Fedora a
few times over the last couple days by now and would just know. It's never
been a problem before........
(You snipped away the context of the quote that follows (in case anyone
is wondering).)
"and would just know"? How would I know that there is not some gotcha
that is just waiting to be stepped on. Not everything starts running
and cordially reporting errors right after installation is complete. It
could be that a portion of the "ls" code is never actually run until a
specific switch is used, at which time the glitch (not caught by the
media test) decides that there is nothing important on my HD. How would
you "just know"?
The rpm packaging system is fairly robust. When an installation is created,
the system is initialized by creating partitions, and a default directory
layout is created. Then an empty rpm database is created. Using the package
list that either is the default for the installation you chose (desktop,
workstation, server) or custom package selection, installation proceeds by
actually installing the packages. The rpm package contains metadata, the
files themselves as a cpio archive, and scripts. Pretty much at any point
in the installation of a package, if there is something wrong with it (i.e.
file corruption) rpm will barf. The probability of getting through an
installtion without throwing errors all over the place using bad packages
is small enough it is reasonble to use a system that says it completed
installation normally.
I can't quantify the probability for you, but having done dozens of
installs myself plus helping at installfests and teaching class (I teach
Linux at UCSD) I have a high level of confidence in systems that had a
sucessful install.
James Keeline can add to this since he teaches also and has seen probably
hundreds of installs.
Thank you *very* much. This is the type of endorsement for which I was
hoping, although its antithesis would have been just as welcome. I just
wanted to know with high probability one way or the other.
It was encouraging to me that the media test in rh9 gives its appoval of
the fc3 discs.
I *did* do a test install, both to a blank partition as well as to a
copy of my current rh9 setup (as an upgrade). The install went well
except that in the upgrade my modem wouldn't work anymore, no matter
what I tried. I'm guessing that it has something to do with SELinux,
though I have nothing really on which to base that.
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