How to tidy up?

[T J Tulley]

I have Mint Bianca installed in 40 GB on hda2 and Mint Cassandra on hdb1 and/or 3, also 2 aborted Cassandras on sda1. (IDE disk in adapter from SATA socket).

I want to install Cassandra on hda2 replacing Bianca. It is on a CD written from a downloaded ISO file, and there the Partition Editor fails to set more than 1 partition - this fault was reported in a recent Forum item. Can I edit the CD to install the revised Partition Editor?

How do I format hda2 so that I can set up the correct partitions there to receive Cassandra, without overwriting the non-booting Windows system in hda1? Or do I simply overwrite it?

How do I format partitions to remove the aborted installations? - I have no access to Windows in this PC.

Yours hopefully, -

Theo Tulley.

[Boo]

Are you using KDE Mint?
if so there will be a revised KDE, 3.0r1, Next week if you can wait.

can you give some more information:
fdisk -l
df -h

so you have 3 disks
hda, hdb, and sda.
Partitions:
windows hda1
bianca hda2
cassy hdb1/3
cassy sda1

do you have a home partition?
have you saved your important stuff.
you should not have to overwrite windows.

[T J Tulley]

Thanks Boo:

You ask - am I using KDE Mint?

How can I know? I just downloaded Cassandra 3.0 which looked the most attractive version on the Download page.

At present most of my stuff is in Windows partitions, including backups.
I would like to back up the increasing volume of mail in Thunderbird, but don't yet know where its mail store file sits. At present I have a reserve collection of recent mail accumulating on my laptop but I want to finish this asap and get them all properly filed - My OE directory structure is complex and I shall need to reproduce that in TB.

You also ask:
can you give some more information:
fdisk -l
df -h

What does that mean?

Desktop shows me "Theo's Home" and that contains a copy of my Windows XP folder "Theo Tulley's Documents" which I am maintaining as my main data store; the parent folder in Windows is also up to date and at present will serve as backup, as will another image of the Windows partition. These contain copies of my OE mail store folder up to about a fortnight ago - it's about 1 GB.

The total of Theo Tulley's Documents, including the mail store, is 2.3 GB.

If you look at my other question in this forum (Desktop presentation of partitions) you will see a bit more about my puzzles. Scorp123 has posted a reply to that but I haven't had time to study it - I'm entertaining my sister-in-law and going to Scotland for the w/e tomorrow (Thursday) so I sha'n't get back to this seriously until next Tuesday, though I shall view e-mails and forum while there, and share the problem with IT-savvy members of my family. At present none of them are into Linux, though one is interested.
With many thanks,

Yours sincerely, -



Theo Tulley.

[linuxviolin]

You also ask:
can you give some more information:
fdisk -l
df -h

What does that mean?

They are commands that you must type in a console and copy/paste here the answers.

[scorp123]

I would like to back up the increasing volume of mail in Thunderbird, but don't yet know where its mail store file sits.

On Linux? Underneath the .mozilla-thunderbird directory inside your $HOME.

My OE directory structure is complex and I shall need to reproduce that in TB.

http://www.howtoforge.com/importing_outlook_express_into_thunderbird_evolution
http://kb.mozillazine.org/Import_from_Outlook_Express

[T J Tulley]

Thanks Linuxviolin: I was away for the weekend and have now tried to run the command fdisk -l which told me that I should specify Disk. I tried /dev/sda and /dev/hda + several others but none was recognised. I have read man fdisk which is enlightening - especially the end section labelled bugs! But I obtained no information from this command.

df -h produced an immediate response, which refuses to copy so can't be pasted: I have found previously that [Ctrl] only produces its own character in a command line. Is there a way round this? You evidently expect me to be able to copy the report generated by the command. It runs like this: (transcribed laboriously! omitting what I think are obvious entries):
FileSystem Size Used Avail Use% Mounted on
/dev/sdb1 40G 5.3G 33G 15% /
var/run 502M 120K 502M 1% /var/run
var/lock 502M 0 /var/lock
procbususb 502M 172K /proc/bus/usb
udev 502M 172K /dev
devshm 502M 0 /dev/shm
lrm 502M 33M 469M 7% /lib/modules/2.6.20-16-generic/volat
ile
/dev/sdb3 41G 20G /media/sdb1
/dev/sda2 35G 3.4G /media/sdb2
/dev/sdc2 40G 1.4G /media/sdd2
/dev/sdc3 40G 66M /media/sdd3
/dev/sdc5 65G 845M /media/sdd5
/dev/sdc6 2.1G 2.1G 100% /media/sdd6
/dev/sdc8 2.1G 2.1G 100% /media/sdd8
/dev/sda1 41G 18G 23G 45% /media/sda1
fusesmb 40G 5.3G 33G 15% /home/theo/Network

I find much of this very puzzling: why no hda, hdb?
I'm pretty sure that sda1 is my Windows partition, and sdb3 is a Windows image. I hope this info. will help you to reply. How can I obtain the fdisk -l info. which you requested?
With many thanks -
Theo Tulley.

[T J Tulley]

Thanks Scorp123 for URLs - you wrote that TB mail store is "In Linux - Underneath the .mozilla-thunderbird directory inside your $HOME. "

I have theo's Home on my desktop - when I open that I have 9 folders, 5 of them empty, the others are Desktop 8 items, Documents 1 item, Downloads 10 items, and Templates 1 item.

Most of the Desktop items are links which I put there, including a Thunderbird "Configuration file" which opens TB when I want it - but there is no directory.

Documents contains the folder Theo Tulley's Documents (2.3G) which actually works as a link to that folder in sda1, my non-booting Windows system. When I edit it here, I find the parent folder has been edited. Properties shows it as Volume: / and doesn't refer to sda1.

The Downloads remain from trying to import TurboPrint as Printer driver, but subsequently Cassandra found one directly.

The Template is an empty text file - I think it remains from successfully importing templates into Open Office from my Word Templates file in sda1.

So I still haven't found my TB directory. Shall be grateful for any help.

Yours hopefully,
Theo Tulley.

[scorp123]

So I still haven't found my TB directory.

Open a terminal.

Code: Select all

ls -al

Files with a dot "." in front of their name are "invisible" (well .... not really ), chances are your GUI program which you used is not yet configured to display them, hence your confusion. I suggest you make yourself familiar with some basic shell commands such as 'ls -al', 'cd /path/to/directory/where/you/want/to/go', 'ps -efH' ... they can be very useful and usually are more helpful than their GUI equivalents (especially given that you can copy & paste their outputs with just a few mouse clicks to your browser window and don't need to go into writing lengthy sentences that describe what you see .... copy & paste from a shell program's output is so much faster and more efficient )

[T J Tulley]

Thanks, Scorp 123, for your 2 replies.
ls -al didn't produce anything which I could recognise as the Thunderbird mail store - Thunderbird appears once, and only with date/time, no address.

I can't at present imagine a use for the ls -al and ps -efH commands - they both ran, and I viewed the attached manuals.

The cd - where-I-want-to-go command will require experiment and practice.

So I still don't know where that store sits!

Yours still hopefully,
Theo Tulley.

[Boo]

here is a good howto on terminal commands:
http://linuxmint.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=4306

to copy and paste from a terminal to another app or the terminal itself you just highlight the text in the terminal with your mouse left button down.
then go to the app (eg firefox) and middle click where you want the text.
copy and paste is a built in function on unix/linux.

you have to open thunderbird once for it to setup your /home/tulley/.mozilla-thunderbird directory structure.(or just .thunderbird)
the first time you run it it will go through a setup procedure.
of course you will have no mail until you are setup or you import it from another mail app store. ie your 2.3GB one.

if you open your home folder on the desktop you can change the settings to show hidden files. you may prefer to use a gui to the terminal to view files.

[T J Tulley]

Thanks again Boo - that's a useful ref. for commands; I've printed it. They will take a lot of learning for familiarity. I've copied the mailed list into a txt file, with a link to its folder on my desktop. .

I can't see how to change settings (to show hidden files) - there is no such facility in Home/Properties, nor in any menu brought up by the mouse.

ls -al lists 122 files, most with unintelligible names, and in any case provides no access to them.

I want to find the Firefox Bookmarks store, open it and add to it the contents of another from Firefox in Windows - not substitute one for the other. Perhaps that's being lazy, but I have a lot of new ones here, and a lot of structured folders of bookmarks in Windows.

I want to locate the Thunderbird mail store so that I can be sure of including it in backups - so far I've not tackled that here, relying on relative immunity compared with Windows!

Yours hopefully, -

Theo Tulley.

[capchuckprice]

to copy and paste from a terminal to another app or the terminal itself you just highlight the text in the terminal with your mouse left button down.
then go to the app (eg firefox) and middle click where you want the text.
copy and paste is a built in function on unix/linux.

For the less dexterous (esp those without a reliable "middle click" ), the key code for copy in the Terminal window is <SHIFT><CTRL>C, and paste is <SHIFT><CTRL>V. (Just hold the SHIFT key to get the copy/paste functionality, since <CTRL>C already has an important purpose at the command prompt.)

[nick]

I want to find the Firefox Bookmarks store, open it and add to it the contents of another from Firefox in Windows - not substitute one for the other. Perhaps that's being lazy, but I have a lot of new ones here, and a lot of structured folders of bookmarks in Windows.

For the Bookmarks:
copy
C:\Documents and Settings\NAME\Application Data\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\STRING_OF_LETTRES_&_NUMBERS\
bookmarks.html
TO
~/.mozilla/firefox/STRING_OF_LETTRES_&_NUMBERS/bookmarks.html
will copy over your windows bookmarks, not sure how to add, or even if it if possible


The bookmarks are in .mozilla/firefox

Nick

[linuxviolin]

will copy over your windows bookmarks, not sure how to add, or even if it if possible

For add bookmarks open Firefox, click on Bookmarks then Organize the Bookmarks. In this window click on File then Importing (or it's maybe import) then go to the location of your bookmarks (see nick post) and select the file, click open.

P.S.= I hope not be wrong in the English words, I use Firefox in French… but that should be good.

[newW2]

And (there's always and and isn't there?). For the book marks. If you are going to dual boot for a while and / or have multiple Linux distributions or computers. Try Foxmarks extension for Firefox; it will allow you to synchronize your book marks for all installations.