Migrating distro

[goatedpenguin]

Hi all so I have grown quite bored of vanilla arch Linux and I really like Linux mint since it just works. Now the only thing keeping me back from doing so is that I don't wanna lose all my files etc. I have heard ppl say I can backup my /home folder and copy it or something like that but I have no clue how to do that. Any help regarding this will appreciated thanks in advance  

[goatedpenguin]

Shit I just checked a stack exchange question and I realized my home and root partition are both on the same partition... I can't do the migration... 

[goatedpenguin]

Btw if I use LMDE instead of normal LM will I be having older packages or no? 

[LloydLynx]

34 minutes ago, goatedpenguin said:

Hi all so I have grown quite bored of vanilla arch Linux and I really like Linux mint since it just works. Now the only thing keeping me back from doing so is that I don't wanna lose all my files etc. I have heard ppl say I can backup my /home folder and copy it or something like that but I have no clue how to do that. Any help regarding this will appreciated thanks in advance  

You can use a terminal program called rsync to help you migrate. But you'll need an EXT4 formatted 2nd drive.

rsync -avxs <source> <destination>

Use rsync to copy your home directory to a 2nd drive, and then use rsync to copy from your 2nd drive to your newly installed Linux Mint home.

Here's an example if I were to do it on my own system.

# this will copy "lloyd" into "2ndDrive" (resulting in /mnt/2ndDrive/lloyd)
rsync -avxs /home/lloyd /mnt/2ndDrive/

# and copy back to the new OS:
rsync -avxs /mnt/2ndDrive/lloyd /home/

Pay attention to where you put forward slashes, rsync might act differently than you expect if you don't.

 

The reason we use rsync is because with the "-avxs" flags it will retain permissions and all the other stuff to keep it a faithful copy of data.

 

41 minutes ago, goatedpenguin said:

Btw if I use LMDE instead of normal LM will I be having older packages or no? 

Yes or no. Depends on which version of Debian (LMDE) or Ubuntu (normal LM) that it's based on.

This table should help you figure it out. https://linuxmint.com/download_all.php

[Drvulcanlord]

You are losing your "I use Arch by the way" privileges

[goatedpenguin]

20 minutes ago, Drvulcanlord said:

You are losing your "I use Arch by the way" privileges

Noooooooooo

I use mint btw.

[goatedpenguin]

1 hour ago, LloydLynx said:

You can use a terminal program called rsync to help you migrate. But you'll need an EXT4 formatted 2nd drive.

rsync -avxs <source> <destination>

Use rsync to copy your home directory to a 2nd drive, and then use rsync to copy from your 2nd drive to your newly installed Linux Mint home.

Here's an example if I were to do it on my own system.

# this will copy "lloyd" into "2ndDrive" (resulting in /mnt/2ndDrive/lloyd)
rsync -avxs /home/lloyd /mnt/2ndDrive/

# and copy back to the new OS:
rsync -avxs /mnt/2ndDrive/lloyd /home/

Pay attention to where you put forward slashes, rsync might act differently than you expect if you don't.

 

The reason we use rsync is because with the "-avxs" flags it will retain permissions and all the other stuff to keep it a faithful copy of data.

 

Yes or no. Depends on which version of Debian (LMDE) or Ubuntu (normal LM) that it's based on.

This table should help you figure it out. https://linuxmint.com/download_all.php

Thanks I will try it out ASAP! Will I run into any compatibility issues etc.? 

[LloydLynx]

1 minute ago, goatedpenguin said:

Thanks I will try it out ASAP! Will I run into any compatibility issues etc.? 

Maybe, maybe not. You'll probably be able to fix whatever kinks you run into along the way. It's just the user directory, not system files.

[Eigenvektor]

9 minutes ago, goatedpenguin said:

Thanks I will try it out ASAP! Will I run into any compatibility issues etc.? 

I think this is the guide I used to move multiple directories to their own dedicated partitions in the past, including Home but also directories for Docker.

 

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Partitioning/Home/Moving

 

No compatibility issues, just make sure you have nothing running while you move stuff that is writing to the directories in question.

 

Best run rsync more than once to make sure it doesn't copy anything the second time, meaning everything is in sync.