Re: Do I need to make a new partition to install F8?
Originally Posted by
RebounD11
I'm amazed noone answered, I'll try to and I hope that someone will correct me if I am mistaking.
If U want to try the LiveCD you don't need any partitions (you don't need a hard drive for that matter
), if U want to install it along side Ubuntu (or any other OS) U need to have some free space on your disk from which to create the necessary partitions for a Fedora install, without messing with the data on the Ubuntu partitions. I don't think you have to do anything special, as both Ubuntu and Fedora can use the same swap partition and you can add mount points for the Ubuntu partitions during the installation if you want to, and if you have grub installed already I think you can configure that during the installation.
I never tried dual-booting 2 Linux OS, but this seems the logical way to do it. When I installed Ubuntu on a computer that had Fedora, it set mount points for the Fedora partitions by itself and I only had to create teh partitions Ubuntu needed to install (only / partition in that case), the thing is I erased those partitions because I wanted to replace Fedora with Ubuntu back then.
In a word, yes. You need separate partitions, otherwise it will overwrite the Ubuntu install you already have. Also, it will not be able to use applications installed on the other install. However, you will be able to see the files on the other partition, so you wont have to keep multiple copies of documents or reboot to access other files or anything like that.
Also, when you install the second OS, it will ask you if you want to install a bootloader. Now, you already have one (grub), so you could select 'no' and manually configure Ubuntu's grub loader with the details of Fedora's install. This will be a huge PITA though, because Fedora upgrades the kernel all the time, and every time you upgrade you would need to modify your menu.lst manually to compensate (Fedora 8 is now 5 days old and already there has been a kernel upgrade). You could also install the Fedora bootloader (also grub) to the MBR (this is the default), which would over-write ubuntu's. Fedora's is prettier, and it might recognize the Ubuntu partition and set up the bootloader entry for you... or it might not. If it doesn't, you would need to add Ubuntu to fedora's menu.lst manually. Also, while ubuntu does kernel upgrade far less frequently, they do happen. And if/when they do, you would need to edit the menu.lst manually again in fedora to point to the new Ubuntu kernel.
There is a third way. You can tell Fedora to install the grub bootloader to the partition, instead of the MBR (master boot record). In this case, fedora and Ubuntu would each manage their own booting. Since Ubuntu's grub would be on the MBR, you would first get to ubuntu's grub upon boot. Now in Ubuntu's menu.lst file you would need to add a chainloader entry (the same entry you would use to point to a windows install, actually, in a dual boot situation), which acts as a handoff of sorts. Should you select the fedora/chainloader entry, it would continue on to boot into fedora's grub menu, from which the proper kernel would be set up automatically. This method will be the easiest in the long term, and while it sounds complicated, its actually not too bad. If you decide to go this route, post some more details about your hard disk partition setup and we can help you get it all up and running.
Oh, one more thing. Fedora and Ubuntu can share the same swap and /home partitions (if you do a separate /home that is), so theres no need to create duplicates of those.
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