moving /home [Solved - Corrected HowTo]

[Jeff Vian]

On Tue, 2005-12-06 at 00:41 +0500, Sergey wrote:
> Claude
> 
> This is a prolix but a valid step-by-step instruction. You may want to publish 
> it in a faq.
> 
> One note: your command 'cp -a/home/* /mnt/mynewhome' would not copy 
> the /home/.* entries. I don't really think there are chances such entries 
> exist, however having such a job to do you've got to ensure.
> 
You are correct *if* there were any .xxx entries in /home.  I have never
seen any there, only within the users actual home directory
(/home/user), and the command he gives will handle all of those. It is
important when doing something like this to make sure all the
possibilities are covered so another way to do it and verify everything
was copied could be:
# cp -a /home/* /home/.[!.]* <dest/directory>
In this command it explicitly asks for anything beginning with a '.',
but since both '.' and '..' match they need to be excluded, thus the
[!.] (not dot) part. For clarity read up on regexps.

Tim's recommendation is (I believe) actually a better command.
# cd /home
# cp -a . <dest/directory>
This form of the command will handle even the .xxx files in the current
directory properly.

> I've written a similar instruction, without any comments though. However 
> reading the next few commands makes it easier to understand, for some people.
> 
> Make sure /mnt/home does not exist.
> 
> # mkdir /mnt/home
> # mount /dev/sda1 /mnt/home2
> # cp -a /home /mnt
> # umount /mnt/home
> # mount --move /mnt/home /home
> # rmdir /mnt/home
> # sed "s|/dev/VolGroup00/LogVol00|/dev/sda1|" /etc/fstab >/etc/fstab- && \
> # mv -f /etc/fstab- /etc/fstab
> 
> No whatever file editing is needed.
> 
> That is it
> Make sure no errors produced after each command has run.
> 
> 
> 
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Claude Jones <claude_jones at levitjames.com>
> To: For users of Fedora Core releases <fedora-list at redhat.com>
> Subject: Re: moving /home [Solved - Corrected HowTo]
> Date: Monday 05 December 2005 19:44
> 
> >I apologize for this dual-post, but the first contained a serious error:
> >
> >On Sun December 4 2005 9:47 am, Claude Jones wrote:
> >> I would like to move my home directory to a new 300GB SATA drive - I edit
> >> video, so I need lots of space.
> >> I've installed the hardware, and using qtparted I've formatted it as ext3
> >> - in qtparted it appears as sda1
> >> My current mounts:
> >>
> >> /dev/mapper/VolGroup00-LogVol02 on / type ext3 (rw)
> >> /dev/proc on /proc type proc (rw)
> >> /dev/sys on /sys type sysfs (rw)
> >> /dev/devpts on /dev/pts type devpts (rw,gid=5,mode=620)
> >> /dev/hdb1 on /boot type ext3 (rw)
> >> /dev/shm on /dev/shm type tmpfs (rw)
> >> /dev/mapper/VolGroup00-LogVol00 on /home type ext3 (rw)
> >> /dev/hda1 on /mnt/windows type ntfs (ro,umask=0222,gid=100)
> >> none on /proc/sys/fs/binfmt_misc type binfmt_misc (rw)
> >> /proc on /var/named/chroot/proc type none (rw,bind)
> >> sunrpc on /var/lib/nfs/rpc_pipefs type rpc_pipefs (rw)
> >>
> >> I'm caught in a circular logic trap and I can't figure out what to do
> >> next. I've read the mount and fstab man pages, and googled this issue, but
> >> I'm missing something. What would be the next step?
> >
> >The long thread that followed this original query for help was the result of
> >my having to overcome many years of experience administering Windows based
> >file systems. I won't attempt to write a dissertation on the differences
> >between Linux and Windows file systems and media organization, but, in the
> >hope that it may be of use, here are the steps that worked.
> >
> >1) Install new drive:
> >After physical installation and a reboot, I opened qtparted (Linux
> >partitioning/formatting tool) - qtparted recognized the drive immediately as
> >sda.  I created a single partition on my new drive and formatted it as ext3.
> >
> >2) Create a temporary mount point:
> >I created a new directory in /mnt calling it "mynewhome"
> >
> >3) Boot into runlevel 1:
> >Restart the computer and at the first Fedora splash screen press the letter
> >'a' on keyboard. This halts the boot process and brings up the kernel line.
> >At the end of that line type '1' (the number one without quotes), and press
> >the enter key - this boots the machine into runlevel 1 or single user mode.
> > 
> >4) Mount drive to new directory:
> >When the prompt comes up, mount the new drive to the directory previously
> >created in /mnt (step 2 above)
> >'mount /dev/sda1 /mnt/mynewhome'
> >(the '1' is added to 'sda' to indicate the first partition on drive sda -
> > even though there is only one partition on the drive, this is the syntax
> > that must be used, else the command will fail)
> >
> >5) Copy the contents of current home folder to the new drive:
> >'cp -a/home/* /mnt/mynewhome'
> >(this step is important to get right - it takes all the contents of the
> >current /home and copies them to the root of the new drive, sda1, now
> > mounted as /mnt/mynewhome - you want everything BELOW /home to be
> > transferred to this new location - also, when copying the contents of /home
> > to the new location, you want all the attributes of the files preserved
> > which is what the '-a' option to the 'cp' command does - read the 'man cp'
> > pages for details of this command)
> >
> >6) Edit the fstab file:
> >This file is read at boot time by your system, and mounts your drives to the
> >correct locations in your directory structure.
> >There are a limited number of text editors available at the command line. I
> >use 'joe':
> >'joe /etc/fstab'
> >This opens the file in text editing mode. Find the line that contains the
> >mount for the current /home - on my system it looked like this:
> >/dev/VolGroup00/LogVol00   /home  ext3    defaults   1 2
> >Comment this line by adding a '#' to front of it.
> >Now, add the line that will mount your new home - mine looked liked this:
> >/dev/sda1          /home        ext3      defaults      1 2
> >If you use the 'joe' editor to to do this, then 'ctl-k' followed by 's' will
> >ask you if you want to save the file; pressing 'enter' will save. 'ctl-k'
> >followed by 'q' will exit joe.
> >
> >7) Reboot - if you got it all right, your machine should boot normally, but
> >using the new /home. If you made a mistake, you haven't altered anything
> >irreparably. You can revert the edited 'fstab' file to its prior state
> >easily, and be back where you started. All your old /home files will still
> > be there...
> >
> >After this has all run in a stable fashion for a few days, I will then
> > tackle how to eliminate the logical volume group 00, and take that space
> > and add it my logical volume group 01, which is where my '/' (the rest of
> > the file system) is mounted.
> >
> >Hope this of future help to someone, and thanks to all who helped me to
> > figure this out.
> >
> >--
> >Claude Jones
> >Bluemont, VA, USA
>