(linux subject again) im ready to resize windows , can i ?

hi, im posting (again) a linux thread,
my question is: i have a 20gb hdd split in 2 (10gb windows, 10 gb linux mandrake)
but i whant more space on linux and less on windows now, can i decrease the size
the windows partition and increase the linux one? without loosing anything ?

also, i can't see what's inside my cd drives when i put a cd into them under linux, anyone had this problem? how can it be solved?


thx again.

the linux newbie, cahaz.

(*edited from go to gb ;-) )

 

On the cd rom issue you might find you need to right click the cd rom drive and tell it to mount the cd. Partitioning all i know of that can repartitition without losing data is partition magic - a windows program but its very easy to use.

just one more thing - in english its GB, not GO as the word it is abrreviated from is gigabyte in english, gigaoctet in french :smt033

 

oh, yeah, i forgot! :smt043

anyway, thx for the information i'll try! :-D

edit: tried the mount and unmount thing , it doesn't work. they say there's no medium found. :smt009

 

Not sure about that then, not really a linux expert - just used it a few times. Hope it all goes well for you though and you manage to solve your problems

 

You need to recompile your kernel from source, while enabling the "resize partitions" module, which then needs to be downloaded and cross-compiled from its original target of a Texas Instruments TI-89 graphing calculator - this can take some time. While it's compiling, you need to mount a virtual ramdisk that is emulating your current system, log in as root, and test the recompiled kernel. The module should be done compiling now, so you reinstall the kernel and reboot, at which time your partitioning module should be available. However, you really have to guess if you want to use it - it only runs from the command line, and the author himself doesn't even know how the options work, or what the available arguments are.

Sorry, I'm just being a smartass. So a man walks into a bar and says, "I heard Linux was now user friendly!" :smt043 :smt043 :smt043

Anyways, the only linux program I'm familiar with that does something like that is called Disk Druid, which was part of Redhat, although I believe you could find it online for other distros. There should have been one included with your install of Mandrake, and despite owning a commercial Mandrake distro a few years back, I can't for the life of me remember what the hell it was called. You might just try poking around your start menu area - I seem to remember the utility being hidden in there somewhere. Sorry if that's too vague, but it's been a while since I've used the accursed OS. :smt043

 

never done any repartitioning before, but i can try and point you in the right direction. if you're using an ext2/3 filesystem for linux you can use partition magic, although it will cost you..
there is a gnu partition management program called parted, although i don't think it can resize windows partitions. also check out this thread over at the gentoo forums, same problem you're having, perhaps it can shed some light on your problem.

as for your cd problem, the drive must be mounted after you insert the disk in order to read off of it. to mount the cdrom drive manually, after inserting the disc, in your console type mount /dev/cdroms/cdromX, where X is the number of the drive you want to mount (i'm assuming mandrake set up your /etc/fstab file up correctly)

 

It also depends on how your Windows partition is formatted. If it's 95/98SE/ME, it's definitely in FAT (known as vfat in linux) and you should be OK with using something like Disk Druid. If it's 2K/XP you may be using NTFS formatting; if this is the case you need to use Partition Magic because AFAIK, no free thing can successfully manipulate an NTFS partition in that way. Disk Druid can be run from a Fedora Core 3 installation CD/DVD, and probably a Mandrake disc as well.

 

uhhhh.... well, i think i'll just reinstall linux mandrake then.. :smt043
i have problems installing rpms from the mandrake cds too, it just won't start.

btw, when i install mandrake, can i download the new kde desktop and install it before running mandrake for the first time? (simplier?)

and wich partition should i increase the most? home or user?
if i increase my swamp from near 1gb to (by exemple) to 1.5gb, will it affect my system (for games , for programs,...). or it will be useless? (i already have 256 mo of memory withotut the swamp)

:smt043 :smt043 :smt043 , well, i love to learn and i'm really tired of windows!

i'm waiting your responses before i erase everything, in case of... :-D


cahaz,

 

OT: What does Ko/Mo/Go etc stand for anyway? I know it's the non-English kilo/mega/gigabyte (kibi/mebi/gibibyte) but whats the "O"???

 

I am guessing it stands for gigaoctet :-D

 

the ''o'' stands for octet.
you must pronounce ok-teah

:smt023

 

So does the word byte exist in the French dictionary? Or is octet the only way to describe 8 bits?

 

byte doesn't exist in the french dictionnary , but bits are still bits. ;-)

 

Resizing windows is quite easy. Just move your mouse pointer to the lower right corner of the windo... oh wait

If you have a FAT filesystem I think you can use FIPS too, it's a free DOS program. But you need to defrag first, as it just cuts part of your partition off from what I've heard.

Oh and having a 1.5gb swap is pointless, mine is 400mb and I have 512mb of RAM.

Actually octet would be a more logical word to use, just like "ordinateur" but that's another matter entirely.

 

well, i think i'll just reinstall everything. which part should i increase the most: user or home?( i only have one central user on linux btw), what's the user partition anyway?

 

I'm not sure why you would want multiple partitions for linux apart from the swap and the rest... I assume "user" and "home" refer to the partitions mounted as /usr and /home ?
Think of it this way... if you're the only user (and don't log in as root) your personal files, settings, etc - but normally not your installed programs - are stored in /home, and a load of other crap in /usr.

 

ok , i just reinstalled linux. now my hhd have only 2.5 go for windows. :-D
and now i can install rpm without the console, wich wasn't possible before (it bugged). but i still have the same ****ing problem with my cd drives. i can't mount them! there's a percent bar apearing when i click on mount..... and the bar doesn't move at all. i try the 2 cd-rom drives i have (since i don't know wich one is no1 and wich one is no2), but the same thing happen. strangely enough, i installed linux with my cd-rom drives, and i can install rpm of my mandrake cds with no problems. what's going on? i whant to run ut 2003 and quake 3 on my mandrakelinux pc...

:-(

 

Have you tried mounting them in the command line? I think you need to do "mount /dev/cdrom /mnt/cdrom" but I'm not quite sure...

 

the problewm is that i don't know the path and the name of the installation program for ut 2003 cd3 (linux). if i could only see what's inside...but with the console commands i just can't.

 

Just go into the console, and type what Antipasta said:

Code:

mount /dev/cdrom /mnt/cdrom

Alternatively, you may have to do it from the /bin directory, where the mount program is stored.

Also, you could try

Code:

mount -a /dev/cdrom /mnt/cdrom

which should make the device auto-mount upon startup from now on.