Sharing a partition between Ubuntu and Arch (and other stuff)

SleepyFloyd · 2008-09-24 13:37:08

Hi guys...

After tinkering and fiddling around with Arch for quite some time I'm planning to do a clean reinstall once Ubuntu 8.10 is released to setup a dual-boot system.
Can I use the same home partition with both OS and if I can, is this recommended? Is there a guide or howto on using Ubuntu/Arch parallel? What to install first or other things to keep in mind?

IncredibleLaser · 2008-09-24 13:56:52

Personally, I wouldn't recommend it as your personal configuration files are saved in your home folder, but ubuntu and arch have different versions of the same software. And I'm not sure if any Installation will accept a partition which is not empty. You would then have to edit your fstabs manually.

SkonesMickLoud · 2008-09-24 15:24:36

The Ubuntu installer will allow you to install to an occupied partition, such as an existing distro's /home, but it's generally a bad idea to do so as you will run into conflicting config files and Ubuntu and Arch will complain about ownership of files.

Profjim · 2008-09-24 15:32:46

Design considerations:
1. The default groups for files created by Ubuntu will differ from those created by Arch. You can work around this by forcing one of the users to have the same default group as the other. Or by creating both groups on both systems, and making sure your user belongs to both groups on each.
2. As IncredibleLaser says, you're inevitably going to have some software with different versions on the two systems. Or even if it's the same software version, the default configs may be different on the two systems, so your ~/.blahblahconfig files will, at least until you've done some careful coordinating, probably want to be different too. There are two ways to handle this:
2a. Create a .config-arch folder and a .config-ubuntu folder. Create a symlink named .config to the .config-arch folder. Copy all your ~/.blahblahconfig files and directories to ~/.config/blahblah, and symlink ~/.blahblahconfig to ~/.config/blahblah. Have your Ubuntu BOOTUP routine replace the /home/USER/.config symlink with one to /home/USER/.config-ubuntu, and similarly for the Arch BOOTUP routine. The regular, non-config data in /home/USER/ can just be shared normally.
2b. (Easier). Have separate home folders, leave the .blahblahconfig files in their roots. Don't store any regular data in these folders, but just symlink to shared directories. So both /home/ArchUSER/media and /home/UbuntuUSER/media might be symlinks to /shared-data/media.

Implementation: I think the easiest/safest thing is to create a separate /home partition, but don't immediately try to use any of your existing data. Create a new empty home directory, and copy/move files from your existing ~.

I find the design challenges much more work than the implementation.

ljshap · 2008-09-24 16:08:39

In the past I did have 2 or more OSes share a common /home partition, but I found they might "fight" each other so that it wasn't worth the trouble. If you want a separate /home partition, I would just use it for my primary OS and let the other OS use their root partition for home.

What may be a good idea is to have a separate /data partition which can be shared by all OSes since it won't contain configuration files and can easily be mounted using fstab. This would leave your home partition primarily for configuration files and should be relatively small if you don't have virtual machine files there.

dunc · 2008-09-24 21:10:36

There's no problem with sharing a /home partition - I've had the same one for three years, over dozens of distros - but sharing a home directory isn't a good idea, as others have said.

It's a bit tricky: you have to make sure that the directories will never be shared (probably by using a different username in each OS), while also ensuring that the user numbers are the same, so that stuff can be symlinked from one to the other easily. But as I say, it is possible, and I wouldn't do it any other way now. (At least, I wouldn't if I still used any other distros. )

Sharing configs almost always leads to trouble, though.

Arch Linux

#1 2008-09-24 13:37:08

Sharing a partition between Ubuntu and Arch (and other stuff)

#2 2008-09-24 13:56:52

Re: Sharing a partition between Ubuntu and Arch (and other stuff)

#3 2008-09-24 15:24:36

Re: Sharing a partition between Ubuntu and Arch (and other stuff)

#4 2008-09-24 15:32:46

Re: Sharing a partition between Ubuntu and Arch (and other stuff)

#5 2008-09-24 16:08:39

Re: Sharing a partition between Ubuntu and Arch (and other stuff)

#6 2008-09-24 21:10:36

Re: Sharing a partition between Ubuntu and Arch (and other stuff)

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