6.06 to 8.04 upgrade a complete disaster

[Jonam]

I have been using Ubuntu 6.06 up until recently with no major problems. About a month ago, I tried to upgrade to 8.04 using the alternate CD. This failed with an error message which I later found out was a bug in the upgrade process with no solution. So, I upped the download limit on my internet account and went down the path of getting Synaptic to do the upgrade. What a disaster!

Initially, after waiting nearly two hours for download and install, Synaptic asked me to reboot. I found that on reboot, there was an error message about locales (LC=ALL not set) and the machine would not start the initial splash screen, complain about a problem with XServer and go into a terminal login.

I tried using apt-get to first fix locales and then do an update and reinstall of 8.04 but along with the locales problem I got a new problem with Kernel variables and then would end up in a terminal screen again. I noticed that when rebooting, Grub was running off the old 6.06 kernel hence the Kernel variables problem. Searching the /boot directory, I found that no new kernel had been installed.

To me it looks like the upgrade process doesn't work as I have a partially updated and broken system which I cannot use. All I can do is login and use text mode. I have searched these forums and the web for solutions but have only found that others have encountered similar problems but have not been able to resolve them.

I would really appreciate if anyone can help with telling me either how to get back to my old 6.06 system or fix up 8.04 so that it works. I would prefer not to have to a clean install as this would mean saving and reloading all my files.

Regards,

Jonam

[sukhhari]

The Ubuntu Upgrade process will have flow from 6.06 -> 7.04 -> 8.04.

[pansz]

From my experience, command-line programs are far more stable than the gui, sudo do-dist-upgrade would work a lot better than synaptics. Simply *never ever* use gui application to do anything critical. And obviously a system upgrade should be considered a critical mission for LTS-only users.

I had used the command-line program to upgrade a 6.06 server into 8.04 server, which does not work and I fired a bug, when 8.04.1 releases the bug fixed and I am able to upgrade it without problem. You can try the server upgrade way which should work for you.


Anyway, if you really have a well sorted-up system which has almost all data in your /home, then a clean install isn't that tough.

[dexterslab]

So, you tried an upgrade without a backup?

[Sef]

The Ubuntu Upgrade process will have flow from 6.06 -> 7.04 -> 8.04.
That is not correct. You can go from 6.06 directly to 8.04.


I would really appreciate if anyone can help with telling me either how to get back to my old 6.06 system or fix up 8.04 so that it works. I would prefer not to have to a clean install as this would mean saving and reloading all my files.


Check out Test Disk (http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/TestDisk).

[Jonam]

Some points of clarification for those that responded:

- I backed up my files about a week before the upgrade and currently still have terminal access to my hard-drive via what's left of Ubuntu to recover the differences.

- I read through all the notes on the Ubuntu website about upgrading from 6.06 to 8.04 before doing anything. In sequential order, I tried the following methods, all according to process:


CDROM Upgrade (failed due to bug but 6.06 still working)
Synaptic upgrade - (failed and destroyed 6.06)
apt-get upgrade - failed


Judging by the responses, my only option is to do a clean install which will be pain as I will have to re-install and re-configure all the software that I was using in 6.06 and then copy all the files back into the home directory.

I was hoping that there might have been a way to recover the system as it stands but that appears not to be the case.

Jonam