My persistent home isn't persisting

[SunnyB]

You didn't mention where Firefox was being installed.
I assume /home/jdrake/Firefox.
Saveconfig does not do well at saving directories in your home.
I have always had a problem making anything persist
that was not in the Desktop directory. After many attempts
I finally had to install Firefox and Thunderbird in the Desktop
directory. If you show the Desktop icons it will become cluttered
quickly. Since I don't show Desktop icons that is no problem
for me.

Try installing Firefox in the Desktop and see if that works.

[j.drake]

Some questions for you:

- What if, instead of using "scan," you explicitly specify to Knoppix where your config & home are? e.g.

knoppix26 myconf=/dev/sda1 home=/dev/hdb5

(or whatever your thumb drive is -- sda1? -- I don't got one yet )

I don't think that's it (w/r/t the configuration), because knoppix is clearly finding the configuration file in whatever location is applicable. As I said, the prompts on boot pick it up, and it does, in fact, retain the configuration. As far as I can tell, saving and retrieving configuration is fine, whether on hdb5 or sda1.

Also, I have tried specifying the location of the config file and home before (I don't recall specifying /sda1 in a boot prompt, but like I said, there's no problem locating and finding the config file.

As for the thumb drive, don't deprive yourself! Watch the Sunday tech ads - someone always has one for $10-$20 after rebates, usually an office supply store. I go for the small, cheap ones to serve as floppy disk replacements. They aren't big enough to economically replace CDs yet, but I predict that vendors will soon be giving them away as freebies at tech shows with trial software and promotional software before long. Who knows- this time next year you may open your mailbox and find one with AOL 12.0 on it and 10,000 free hours to burn in the first month!

Do you have more than one hard disk partition with a "knoppix.img" file at the root of it? I think you said you did, and if that's the case, it may not be loading the one you want with the "scan" cheatcode.

Not to my knowledge, and not by intention. I haven't actually searched; though. Insofar as the CD with the Knoppix disk is also /hdc1/ (IIRC), would that be the problem?

When Knoppix boots, do you see a message where it tells you it's loading your persistent home, and which partition it's loading it from, before X starts? (You should.)

Yes.

If you mount "knoppix.img" on hdb5 as a loopback device, does the FireFox directory show up?

I don't know, I'm not sure I know what it means to mount as a loopback device.

Thanks,

JD

[j.drake]

You didn't mention where Firefox was being installed.
I assume /home/jdrake/Firefox.
Saveconfig does not do well at saving directories in your home.
I have always had a problem making anything persist
that was not in the Desktop directory. After many attempts
I finally had to install Firefox and Thunderbird in the Desktop
directory. If you show the Desktop icons it will become cluttered
quickly. Since I don't show Desktop icons that is no problem
for me.

Try installing Firefox in the Desktop and see if that works.

It's installed where klik installs it. klik doesn't offer an option.

Maybe the problem isn't persistent home, but klik! Maybe klik isn't appropriate for Live-CD users with a persistent home, and maybe this is a failing of klik rather than Knoppix. Hmmmm. . . . , most likely the folks using klik are hd installers, and are unaware of this limitation, if that's the problem. . . . I'll have to do some more checking on this - I was using klik for convenience, but maybe I need to try a download from the mozilla.org site to a specific home location and see what happens, or even just save a dummy text file.

As I recall (I'm in windows now, so I can't check), klik installs Firefox at /home/knoppix/, with an icon that looks like an empty cardboard box, and there's a special kind of script for launching (can't recall the buzzword now).

Here's a hint frm post#1 of the klik thread: "Because one software package is always exactly just one directory within ~/, you can always delete software packages without any problems for other software." see, http://www.knoppix.net/forum/viewtop...?p=34776#34776

[eco2geek]

Who knows- this time next year you may open your mailbox and find one with AOL 12.0 on it and 10,000 free hours to burn in the first month!

Oh man, one could only hope! At least when they sent out the floppies you could reuse them! Now their damn CDs just fill up landfills. Hmph.

I tried downloading FireFox with klik and FireFox doesn't work -- it complains about not being able to find the Mozilla runtime directory -- haven't read the forum posts about it yet -- but at least it's still there when I restore my persistent home!

By mounting your "knoppix.img" file (which is the file your persistent home is saved in) as a loopback device, I mean:

One of my "knoppix.img" files is at the root of /dev/hdb1, which is an ext3 partition. So mount that read-write:

mount -t ext3 -o rw /dev/hdb1 /mnt/hdb1

Then mount "knoppix.img" on /mnt/hdb1 read-write:

mount -o loop,rw /mnt/hdb1/knoppix.img /mnt/test

Then cd into /mnt/test, and you should see the contents of your persistent home dir. You can write to it, copy files from it, etc. (I have another "knoppix.img" on /dev/hda5, a vfat partition, and can mount it the same way.)

Does that work for you?

[SunnyB]

I also had a problem using klik. Nothing it installed persisted.
I had to manually move these things either to the desktop or to the
knoppix.img file.

The latest firefox build for linux is : Latest Firefox

After you extract to a temp directory run the installer. I use the install at each new build and they work great.

[j.drake]

I also had a problem using klik. Nothing it installed persisted.
I had to manually move these things either to the desktop or to the
knoppix.img file.

The latest firefox build for linux is : Latest Firefox

After you extract to a temp directory run the installer. I use the install at each new build and they work great.

Thanks, I wasn't aware of a linux installer. When I went to the mozilla.org site, the links took me to a linux version without an installer, and I had to move it where I wanted it and use the shell script to run. Before I learned where to find the Windows installer, I had a devil of a time making all the add-ins work (e.g., flash, shockwave). The installer version made that easy. Why Mozilla won't make it easy to find their installer versions, I don't know.

I'm in Windows now at work. When I get a chance to run Knoppix at home again I'll test out the "buggy klik" theory by booting with 'knoppix26 home=scan myconfig=scan', and run the installer you linked, instead of klik. If the theory is right, the persistent home should still exist from before, even if the klik-ed program didn't persist. If that doesn't work, I'll make a clean persistent home on hdb5, reboot with the same flags, and try your link again.

Thanks for sticking with me on this. I really do appreciate your patience and help.
JD

[j.drake]

I tried downloading FireFox with klik and FireFox doesn't work -- it complains about not being able to find the Mozilla runtime directory -- haven't read the forum posts about it yet -- but at least it's still there when I restore my persistent home!

Wierd, I have the opposite result. Klik installs it great, and I can run it during that same Knoppix session, but it doesn't stick around until the next one.

By mounting your "knoppix.img" file (which is the file your persistent home is saved in) as a loopback device, I mean:

One of my "knoppix.img" files is at the root of /dev/hdb1, which is an ext3 partition. So mount that read-write:

mount -t ext3 -o rw /dev/hdb1 /mnt/hdb1

Then mount "knoppix.img" on /mnt/hdb1 read-write:

mount -o loop,rw /mnt/hdb1/knoppix.img /mnt/test

Then cd into /mnt/test, and you should see the contents of your persistent home dir. You can write to it, copy files from it, etc. (I have another "knoppix.img" on /dev/hda5, a vfat partition, and can mount it the same way.)

Does that work for you?

The "Create a persistent home" script carries an option of saving the persistent home to a file (which is what I assume your knoppix.img file to be), or dedicating an entire partition to the persistent home. I chose to do the latter, as I already had a large partition mapped out from a previous Mandrake dual boot install, and I assumed (possibly wrongly) that assigning an entire partition would work better than creating a file. I'm going to try the "Klik is buggy" theory in my previous post first, and it that doesn't work, I'll try creating the PH using the file method instead. If that doesn't work (or even if it does and I'm just bored and curious ), I'll try your loopback suggestion.

Thanks again for sticking with me and offering some good suggestions. Dual boot HD installs are neat, and once Knoppix standardizes on the 2.6 kernel, and works the bugs out of captive NTFS, and other issues, such that I can just tee it up and go without cheatcodes and workarounds, I may try dual booting from HD again (after a thorough backup, this time). Until then, I'm still a little gun shy, and would prefer to stick with live CD and persistent home, if it will work. I have to share this computer with a wife who has no patience for the challenges of working with or debugging linux installs. OTOH, might be fun instead if I can perfect the PH andsaved configurations as files on the removable thumbdrive, together with captive NTFS drivers (and especially if I can boot from the thumbdrive too), so that the stock CD and thumbdrive will provide me with portable access to virtually anything I want from most PCs.

JD

[eco2geek]

The "Create a persistent home" script carries an option of saving the persistent home to a file (which is what I assume your knoppix.img file to be), or dedicating an entire partition to the persistent home. I chose to do the latter, as I already had a large partition mapped out from a previous Mandrake dual boot install

OK, now I get it. Pardon me for being dense. I thought you were saving your persistent home to a file (aka "knoppix.img").

(So, since I've just installed Knoppix to hard disk, with /home on a separate partition, I'll have to play around with the live CD and see if it will use the /home partition, like you're trying to do.)

I already had a large partition mapped out from a previous Mandrake dual boot install

How big is it? 5GB is enough to install Knoppix, and you can choose to install LILO to the root of that partition, rather than your MBR, and use a boot floppy.

Dual boot HD installs are neat, and once Knoppix standardizes on the 2.6 kernel, and works the bugs out of captive NTFS, and other issues, such that I can just tee it up and go without cheatcodes and workarounds, I may try dual booting from HD again (after a thorough backup, this time). Until then, I'm still a little gun shy, and would prefer to stick with live CD and persistent home, if it will work. I have to share this computer with a wife who has no patience for the challenges of working with or debugging linux installs.

I know what you mean, having ended up with broken dual boots on a couple of occasions -- and the last time it happened, I was sure I knew what I was doing. That was painful.

Fortunately, my wife and I now have separate computers (she doesn't want to deal with the outcome of my experiments either ). And I've found that using the Windows version of GRUB, made by the Topologilinux folks, run by NTLdr, works really well (but it only works if you've got WinNT/2K/XP, not Win9x).

[eco2geek]

After hiding all the "knoppix.img" files lurking at the root of various partitions (necessary because Knoppix will mount "knoppix.img" instead of the actual partition if it finds it), I tried mounting /dev/hdb1 (which is my /home partition on my Knoppix hard disk installation) as "home" with the live Knoppix CD. Works fine.

• This is using Knoppix v3.4-2004-05-17-EN.
• It was started with knoppix26 myconf=/dev/hda5 home=/dev/hdb1
• I got no notification of any kind (in the boot messages) that Knoppix had successfully mounted hdb1 as home.
• Curiously, hdb1 was mounted on /home/knoppix, rather than simply /home.
• And, of most relevance to this discussion, everything -- the dot (config) files and directories; the Desktop directory; the FireFox software (installed using klik); and Quanta (installed using Franz's script) -- is still there when I boot back into my hard disk install of Knoppix, and still there when I run the live CD again.

Don't know what to tell you.

[j.drake]

Well, flip. Seems to be working now.

I redid the PH as before, fresh in /dev/hdb5
installed Firefox per SunnyB's link, changing install location to home
created a link on my desktop for the firefox shell script
Saved configuration at /dev/sda1
rebooted using knoppix26 home=/dev/hdb5 myconfig=/dev/sda1

All is well.

Thank you SunnyB and eco2geek for all your help