Xfce/ partitions/shorctuts [solved]

[altair4]

I'm going to agree with wayne128 on this one. XFCE 4.8 in Xubuntu has most of the stuff you're used to in Gnome. I just wish they moved to the latest Thunar.

Not that anyone's asked but I'm not a big fan of separate partitions for /boot, /home, etc.. I would create 3 partitions:
/
swap
/Data

You can bind or symlink subdirectories in /Data to your home directory if you want to preserve all your Pictures, Music, Documents, Downloads, etc ...

is home inside / on a standard install? is this the equivalent to 'my documents' being inside 'C' in windows?

Here's the problem with a separate /home partition: it's not the equivalent of "my documents" in Windows. It's more like "Documents and Settings" plus certain elements of the Windows registry. So let's say you've just made a royal mess of your install and you figure the easiest way out is just to reinstall. When you do that you just restored some or possibly all of the things from the /home partition that caused the problem in the first place. A separate Data partition makes more sense to me. So when you reinstall or if you decide that KDE is the best option for you all of your data is preserved and none of your old settings will interfere with your new install.

There is no right answer here and I'm not suggesting that my way is the right way. It just reflects my own experiences over the years.

[daveinuk]

Hello again . . . . .

Wow, the depth of replies never ceases to amaze me . . . . do you remember all this of the top of your heads?
I sometimes wish I'd never asked lol (*joke*)

Don't mind learning, in fact that's part of what drove me here, I do like this xfce, I got it cos' it's smaller than the standard mint install as I understand, it seems faster on this old T42 which I bought specifically to mess around with linux on, and since installing some of the goodies packs I like it even more!

I'm easily pleased. . . . got the fading/see thru windows effect on that I love and changed themes etc and I think I'll stick with this, I do like gnome/mint/ubuntu but I've got a thing for this now, I like the difference and how it works, it's great!

I think I might have a go at reinstalling it the way oneeyed suggested as that kind of sounds like what I was trying to achieve and I always set up windoze machine like that in case of the worst happening, as does with that . . . . eventually.
I do appreciate ALL your replies and suggestions, and will also have another go at doing it altairs's way too, that is what I bought this machine for after all. . . . I've done maybe ten compete format/installs now and I learn a little more every time going from distro to distro but xfce has caught my attention like mint did coming from ubuntu so I'll mark this as *solved*.
for now.

There is a lot of choice, it's mind boggling, and maybe i should just stick with 1 distro but with all that choice out there to play with I can't help wanting to try them 'cos that's all part of the fun . . . . . .

Thank you all very much for the help once again