how to install a program onto a specific drive?

[emelen]

hi,

is it possible to install a program onto a specific drive?
i have a 1TB drive partitoned into 5 partitions and would like to know how to direct the install of a program to a particular partition, be it from the Software Manager or command line..

Any help greatly appreciated..

.m.

[Aging Technogeek]

This eould be quite difficult since almost all programs and apps installed from any source will end up with files and folders spread over 2 or more directories in both root and your home .

As an example, here is the list of folders and files installed or required as dependencies for Firefox to work:

Code: Select all

/.
/etc
/etc/apparmor.d
/etc/apparmor.d/disable
/etc/apparmor.d/usr.bin.firefox
/etc/apport
/etc/apport/blacklist.d
/etc/apport/blacklist.d/firefox
/etc/apport/native-origins.d
/etc/apport/native-origins.d/firefox
/etc/firefox
/etc/firefox/syspref.js
/usr
/usr/bin
/usr/bin/firefox
/usr/lib
/usr/lib/firefox
/usr/lib/firefox-addons
/usr/lib/firefox-addons/distribution
/usr/lib/firefox-addons/distribution/extensions
/usr/lib/firefox-addons/extensions
/usr/lib/firefox-addons/extensions/{972ce4c6-7e08-4474-a285-3208198ce6fd}
/usr/lib/firefox-addons/extensions/{972ce4c6-7e08-4474-a285-3208198ce6fd}/icon.png
/usr/lib/firefox-addons/extensions/{972ce4c6-7e08-4474-a285-3208198ce6fd}/install.rdf
/usr/lib/firefox-addons/plugins
/usr/lib/firefox-addons/searchplugins
/usr/lib/firefox/Throbber-small.gif
/usr/lib/firefox/application.ini
/usr/lib/firefox/browser
/usr/lib/firefox/browser/blocklist.xml
/usr/lib/firefox/browser/chrome
/usr/lib/firefox/browser/chrome.manifest
/usr/lib/firefox/browser/chrome/icons
/usr/lib/firefox/browser/chrome/icons/default
/usr/lib/firefox/browser/chrome/icons/default/default16.png
/usr/lib/firefox/browser/chrome/icons/default/default32.png
/usr/lib/firefox/browser/chrome/icons/default/default48.png
/usr/lib/firefox/browser/components
/usr/lib/firefox/browser/components/components.manifest
/usr/lib/firefox/browser/components/libbrowsercomps.so
/usr/lib/firefox/browser/defaults
/usr/lib/firefox/browser/defaults/preferences
/usr/lib/firefox/browser/defaults/preferences/syspref.js
/usr/lib/firefox/browser/defaults/preferences/vendor-firefox.js
/usr/lib/firefox/browser/extensions
/usr/lib/firefox/browser/icons
/usr/lib/firefox/browser/icons/mozicon128.png
/usr/lib/firefox/browser/omni.ja
/usr/lib/firefox/browser/plugins
/usr/lib/firefox/browser/searchplugins
/usr/lib/firefox/chrome.manifest
/usr/lib/firefox/components
/usr/lib/firefox/components/components.manifest
/usr/lib/firefox/components/libdbusservice.so
/usr/lib/firefox/components/libmozgnome.so
/usr/lib/firefox/crashreporter
/usr/lib/firefox/crashreporter.ini
/usr/lib/firefox/defaults
/usr/lib/firefox/defaults/pref
/usr/lib/firefox/defaults/pref/channel-prefs.js
/usr/lib/firefox/defaults/pref/vendor-gre.js
/usr/lib/firefox/dependentlibs.list
/usr/lib/firefox/dictionaries
/usr/lib/firefox/distribution
/usr/lib/firefox/distribution/distribution.ini
/usr/lib/firefox/distribution/extensions
/usr/lib/firefox/distribution/searchplugins
/usr/lib/firefox/distribution/searchplugins/common
/usr/lib/firefox/distribution/searchplugins/locale
/usr/lib/firefox/distribution/searchplugins/locale/en-US
/usr/lib/firefox/distribution/searchplugins/locale/en-US/amazondotcom.xml
/usr/lib/firefox/distribution/searchplugins/locale/en-US/bing.xml
/usr/lib/firefox/distribution/searchplugins/locale/en-US/duckduckgo.xml
/usr/lib/firefox/distribution/searchplugins/locale/en-US/eBay.xml
/usr/lib/firefox/distribution/searchplugins/locale/en-US/google.xml
/usr/lib/firefox/distribution/searchplugins/locale/en-US/twitter.xml
/usr/lib/firefox/distribution/searchplugins/locale/en-US/wikipedia.xml
/usr/lib/firefox/distribution/searchplugins/locale/en-US/yahoo.xml
/usr/lib/firefox/firefox
/usr/lib/firefox/firefox.sh
/usr/lib/firefox/hyphenation
/usr/lib/firefox/libfreebl3.chk
/usr/lib/firefox/libfreebl3.so
/usr/lib/firefox/libmozalloc.so
/usr/lib/firefox/libmozsqlite3.so
/usr/lib/firefox/libnspr4.so
/usr/lib/firefox/libnss3.so
/usr/lib/firefox/libnssckbi.so
/usr/lib/firefox/libnssdbm3.chk
/usr/lib/firefox/libnssdbm3.so
/usr/lib/firefox/libnssutil3.so
/usr/lib/firefox/libplc4.so
/usr/lib/firefox/libplds4.so
/usr/lib/firefox/libsmime3.so
/usr/lib/firefox/libsoftokn3.chk
/usr/lib/firefox/libsoftokn3.so
/usr/lib/firefox/libssl3.so
/usr/lib/firefox/libxul.so
/usr/lib/firefox/omni.ja
/usr/lib/firefox/platform.ini
/usr/lib/firefox/plugin-container
/usr/lib/firefox/webapprt
/usr/lib/firefox/webapprt-stub
/usr/lib/firefox/webapprt/defaults
/usr/lib/firefox/webapprt/defaults/preferences
/usr/lib/firefox/webapprt/defaults/preferences/vendor-webapprt.js
/usr/lib/firefox/webapprt/extensions
/usr/lib/firefox/webapprt/omni.ja
/usr/lib/firefox/webapprt/webapprt.ini
/usr/share
/usr/share/applications
/usr/share/applications/firefox.desktop
/usr/share/apport
/usr/share/apport/package-hooks
/usr/share/apport/package-hooks/source_firefox.py
/usr/share/doc
/usr/share/doc/firefox
/usr/share/doc/firefox/MPL.gz
/usr/share/doc/firefox/README.Debian
/usr/share/doc/firefox/changelog.Debian.gz
/usr/share/doc/firefox/copyright
/usr/share/lintian
/usr/share/lintian/overrides
/usr/share/lintian/overrides/firefox
/usr/share/man
/usr/share/man/man1
/usr/share/man/man1/firefox.1.gz
/usr/share/pixmaps
/usr/share/pixmaps/firefox.png

As you can easily se, he list is long and divided between /etc and /usr. When Firefox is run, it will expect to find each file and folder in the proper place.

It is possible that, if you are an advanced enough coder, you could relocate all Firefox files and properly reroute the look-up functions for each, but it most likely would take quite a while.

[Lantesh]

When I first came from the the Windows universe years ago it was difficult for me to grasp that it isn't quite as easy to specify a program location in Linux as it is in Windows. What I later came to realize though is that for the most part it is entirely unnecessary. For the exceptions I use symbolic links. Steam is a good example of this. The actual game files are just too big. I keep those elsewhere, and simply put a symbolic link to them in the directory where they should be.

[emelen]

Thanks for your help, Lantesh, much appreciated..

.m.