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vasa1
October 15th, 2014, 02:50 AM
I don't know anything about chroot but after reading a quotation provided by mc4man over here (http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2248240&p=13143142#post13143142) about crouton I want to know if it's possible to test other environments (say kubuntu-desktop, LXQt, whatever) without "contaminating" the original OS:
Like virtualization, chroots provide the guest OS with their own, segregated file system to run in, allowing applications to run in a different binary environment from the host OS. Unlike virtualization, you are not booting a second OS; instead, the guest OS is running using the Chromium OS system. The benefit to this is that there is zero speed penalty since everything is run natively, and you aren't wasting RAM to boot two OSes at the same time. The downside is that you must be running the correct chroot for your hardware, the software must be compatible with Chromium OS's kernel, and machine resources are inextricably tied between the host Chromium OS and the guest OS.

TheFu
October 15th, 2014, 03:08 AM
I normally just create a new user for each DE and test that way. Only the login screen seems to be screwed between the different DEs. Everything else is under the individual HOMEs.

When I'm done, aptitude purge removes the desktop/DE I don't like.

I've seen the chroot on chromium too and I've used chroot for various other needs, just don't see the need for my testing.

Take good notes, I'm sure others will appreciate it.

Tadaen_Sylvermane
October 15th, 2014, 03:59 AM
I normally just create a new user for each DE and test that way. Only the login screen seems to be screwed between the different DEs. Everything else is under the individual HOMEs..

I cannot count the number of times I have re-installed my system because I'm a clean freak and don't like useless stuff filling up my /home... May be obvious but I never even considered this before. +1 if I could.

TheFu
October 15th, 2014, 01:42 PM
I cannot count the number of times I have re-installed my system because I'm a clean freak and don't like useless stuff filling up my /home... May be obvious but I never even considered this before. +1 if I could.

Thanks.

Folks (especially coming from Windows) often forget that Linux/UNIX is designed from the start as a multi-user OS with clear file permissions controlling where things go for the system, for applications and for each, individual, user.