Ubuntu
firefox-3.5 package

Can you upgrade from previous versions of Ubuntu to 9-10?

Asked by thewizard

How can one upgrade to 9-10 from a previous version without loosing all the previous data and programs one was currently using. I tried once on a previous version but it did not install correctly. I could not login and the screen would go into different colors and then reboot itself. I had to do a clean install and everything went smoothly.

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Ubuntu firefox-3.5 Edit question
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Vu Do Quynh
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Best Vu Do Quynh (vu-do-quynh) said : 		#1

The best way to prevent that would be to install the root system "/" and the "/home" in two separate partitions. In this way, if your personal data being on a separate partition than the root system, if something goes wrong during the upgrade or if you need/want to do a fresh installation, your /home won't be touched.

You need to backup three files to be able to resume your /home with all the users that were declared before:

/etc/passwd
/etc/group
/etc/shadow

You may also wish to always use the same username for the installation of the system, as it usually gets the 1000 value for its ID (GNU/Linux users are identified by their numerical ID in the file system, not by their actual usernames).

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thewizard (edsellsstuff02) said : 		#2

Thanks for the input and understand. Should have thought of it since I do a similar process with windoze installs.