reinstall ubuntu urgent

[Joep L. Blom]

On 08-05-12 08:29, Basil Chupin wrote:
> On 08/05/12 16:06, Joep L. Blom wrote:
>
>
> The only way I know of retaining the /home directory is to use the
> manual - ie, NOT allow the installation process to determine what has to
> be done - option when it gets to the point about which partitions you
> want to install the new system to. Use the manual approach and select
> the old "/" to be formatted so that the new system will get installed
> into this but do NOT allow the existing /home partition to be formatted.
> All this usually can be done by using the option in this part of the
> installation process (the selection of the partitions) by Importing the
> current partition table and then editing it - as per what I just wrote:
> format the "/" partition and mount it as "/" but do *not* format the
> "/home" partition but leave it as mountable as "/home". Oh, and leave
> "swap" alone as well.
>
> Of course, it would be most prudent to backup whatever important data
> you have in your /home (I always backup, daily in fact) the /.mozilla
> and the /.thunderbird directories which I certainly don't want to lose,
> and backup any files in Documents and Downloads etc which are special
> (like family pictures etc) - the rest are not important as they can be
> replaced by downloading them from the 'net.
>
> (If you don't already have an external HDD then get one so that you can
> do these backups in the future. If you don't have such destination then
> burn what you don't want to lose to a CD/DVD - which in your current
> case you probably won't be able to do [I don't know if you could this if
> you had a System Rescue CD - perhaps somebody could advise on this
> one?]. If you a USB memory stick(s) use these to backup as much as you
> can.)
>
> BC
Basil, Thanks,
I normally backup all my systems daily (using BackupPC) but this system 
- as it is the replacement of an old Windows system - hadn't been 
backed-up yet (stupid!) as it has the same name as the old one but a 
completely different directory set-up. Of course that will be the first 
thing I will do after restoration!.
Yes, I think I'll follow your advice and hope it will function again as 
expected.In the old days I have had once a comparable problem with an 
old SuSe installation but that was > 10 years ago.
Joep