Ubuntu 20.04 LTS

[retina]

Originally Posted by xilman

You are using the words "no one" in a way which is unfamiliar to me.

For instance, read https://9to5linux.com/new-ubuntu-lin...ulnerabilities

Good. Finally someone is getting to some actual specific reasons to upgrade.

[storm5510]

Originally Posted by retina

So based upon the responses above.

1. We upgrade our OS because of a vague promise that newer stuff is "more secure" than older stuff.

2. We upgrade our OS because of an application's new features we want.

The first one looks like a catch-all to scare people into complying
The second one looks like a non-sequitur to me. And application version shouldn't be tied to an OS.

I think a lot of the time people upgrade because the vendor tells them to. "We have some new shiny , upgrade immediately because we say so." Amirite?

I used to fall into this trap. No more. In many years past, I would spend hours trying to correct something a patch messed up. Some instances, there would be nothing more than a black screen. I am too old to put up with this now. With my W10 setup, I can do entire partition backups onto an external drive. With Ubuntu, I do not know if this is even possible.

Sorry for going a bit off-plumb...

[PhilF]

Originally Posted by storm5510

I used to fall into this trap. No more. In many years past, I would spend hours trying to correct something a patch messed up. Some instances, there would be nothing more than a black screen. I am too old to put up with this now. With my W10 setup, I can do entire partition backups onto an external drive. With Ubuntu, I do not know if this is even possible.

Sorry for going a bit off-plumb...

ANYTHING is possible in Linux. Especially at the console prompt if you know what you are doing.

For example, you can keep a backup synced up with your production system by using Linux's powerful rsync command. What I do is login as root, insert a USB thumb drive, mount it as /mnt, then at the console prompt I run:

rsync -aAXv --delete --exclude=/dev/* --exclude=/proc/* --exclude=/sys/* --exclude=/tmp/* --exclude=/run/* --exclude=/mnt/* --exclude=/media/* --exclude="swapfile" --exclude="lost+found" --exclude=".cache" --exclude="Downloads" --exclude=".VirtualBoxVMs" --exclude=".ecryptfs" / /mnt/

Of course, this is stored in a shell script, I don't type all that every time I want to do a backup.

Also, by using dd, you can even make a bit-level image copy of your entire hard drive, partition tables, mbr, everything, all at once:

https://www.opentechguides.com/how-t...isk-clone.html

One can have much fun at the Linux command prompt while logged in as root.

[xilman]

Originally Posted by storm5510

I used to fall into this trap. No more. In many years past, I would spend hours trying to correct something a patch messed up. Some instances, there would be nothing more than a black screen. I am too old to put up with this now. With my W10 setup, I can do entire partition backups onto an external drive. With Ubuntu, I do not know if this is even possible.

Sorry for going a bit off-plumb...

I back up essentially everything on all the Linux and Windoze machines at home

Any half-way decent backup system will let you do this with ease. I use backuppc.

I no longer have powered-up MacOS and BSD systems in-house but backuppc used to look after them too.

[storm5510]

Originally Posted by PhilF

https://www.opentechguides.com/how-t...isk-clone.html

One can have much fun at the Linux command prompt while logged in as root.

This is interesting. I do not clone. I make images. A section of the link above addresses creating images.

Before you create a disk image backup, make sure no partitions on that disk are mounted...

This is a bit fuzzy. The primary partition must be loaded or nothing would work. Perhaps I am not understanding "partition" in the context?

[PhilF]

Originally Posted by storm5510

This is interesting. I do not clone. I make images. A section of the link above addresses creating images.

This is a bit fuzzy. The primary partition must be loaded or nothing would work. Perhaps I am not understanding "partition" in the context?

No, I think you've got it. It is just that if you want to make an image of your internal hard drive, the best way to do it is have a USB stick with Ubuntu loaded on it so that you can boot from it. Then your internal drive holding your working copy of Ubuntu is unmounted, so you are safe to use dd to make an image of it.

Just make darn sure you have your devices straight (/dev/sda, /dev/sdb, etc). Use lsblk at the command prompt to see all your drives and partitions.

[storm5510]

Originally Posted by PhilF

No, I think you've got it. It is just that if you want to make an image of your internal hard drive, the best way to do it is have a USB stick with Ubuntu loaded on it so that you can boot from it. Then your internal drive holding your working copy of Ubuntu is unmounted, so you are safe to use dd to make an image of it.

Just make darn sure you have your devices straight (/dev/sda, /dev/sdb, etc). Use lsblk at the command prompt to see all your drives and partitions.

My internal hard drive is called sda and is referred to as "disk." A branch below is called sda1 and is referred to as "part /"

My external HD is called sdb and is also referred to as "disk." The branch below, sdb1, is called "/media/norman/backup." Nothing in either case is called dev.

sda and sda1 both show the same drive capacity. The same applies to the external, sdb and sdb1.

Both source and destination are required for an image. I would say my source is sda. My destination would be /media/norman/backup. There is a folder on the external called "linux." So, I could expand the destination out to /media/norman/backup/linux.

I have a USB here which is not being used. Hopefully 16GB would be enough. The long command string could be placed into a bash file once the parameters are correct, I hope...

[PhilF]

Originally Posted by storm5510

My internal hard drive is called sda and is referred to as "disk." A branch below is called sda1 and is referred to as "part /"

My external HD is called sdb and is also referred to as "disk." The branch below, sdb1, is called "/media/norman/backup." Nothing in either case is called dev.

sda and sda1 both show the same drive capacity. The same applies to the external, sdb and sdb1.

Both source and destination are required for an image. I would say my source is sda. My destination would be /media/norman/backup. There is a folder on the external called "linux." So, I could expand the destination out to /media/norman/backup/linux.

I have a USB here which is not being used. Hopefully 16GB would be enough. The long command string could be placed into a bash file once the parameters are correct, I hope...

Sounds good. Once you boot from a 16GB USB stick, it will likely be sda and the others will change. Once you know for sure which drive is which you should be good to go.

Keep in mind dd is a low-level bit-for-bit read/write program. Don't confuse it with other image creation applications which might include the ability to resize drives and/or partitions upon restore. dd works best when restoring an image to a drive that is the exact same size as the drive from which the image was taken.

[garo]

Originally Posted by xilman

I back up essentially everything on all the Linux and Windoze machines at home

Any half-way decent backup system will let you do this with ease. I use backuppc.

I no longer have powered-up MacOS and BSD systems in-house but backuppc used to look after them too.

Thanks for the timely reminder. I have slacked off on adding the new box to my backup schedule.

[storm5510]

Originally Posted by PhilF

Sounds good. Once you boot from a 16GB USB stick, it will likely be sda and the others will change. Once you know for sure which drive is which you should be good to go.

Keep in mind dd is a low-level bit-for-bit read/write program. Don't confuse it with other image creation applications which might include the ability to resize drives and/or partitions upon restore. dd works best when restoring an image to a drive that is the exact same size as the drive from which the image was taken.

I did not have any problems making the USB. I found a step-by-step reference on the web.

This is what I have come up with so far in a bash:

#1/home
clear
dd if=/dev/sda of=/dev/sdb/home/norman/backup/linux/hp.img bs=64M conv=sync,noerror status=progress

The "dd" example I found had a pound sign, #, in front. I would take this as a remark indicator. The relevance of the top line is not clear. When I open a terminal window, it displays the system name concatenated with @ and my user name as a prompt followed by ~$. If I do a ls command, all the files and folders in "home" appear.

I got the system to boot from the USB. It took seven attempts to get the system to boot from the hard drive again. It would go so far and then stop on a black screen. On the web, I found something which said to hold down the "Shift" key when powering up. That worked. The info from the wed also said the "grub" loader would appear. It never did.

This is more than enough tinkering for today. Even though I started this thread, I apologize for going away from the main subject.

[dcheuk]

Originally Posted by retina

So based upon the responses above.

1. We upgrade our OS because of a vague promise that newer stuff is "more secure" than older stuff.

2. We upgrade our OS because of an application's new features we want.

The first one looks like a catch-all to scare people into complying
The second one looks like a non-sequitur to me. And application version shouldn't be tied to an OS.

I think a lot of the time people upgrade because the vendor tells them to. "We have some new shiny , upgrade immediately because we say so." Amirite?

As Fedora users we are basically forced to upgrade every 6 months or a year.

Now come to think of it, gnome 3 has been lagging like crazy for years. Was excited for wayland but nvm that.