I have 4 partitions on my disk. 1. 31 GB NTFS where Windows XP is 2. 31 GB ext4 where Ubuntu LTS is 3. 432 GB ext4 Home partition 4. 6GB extended swap for Ubuntu I have a question which is on my mind for a long time; When the time comes for the next LTS (I could not wait to ask) I would like to learn how to partition my disk when I install Kubuntu.I will not touch the windows XP and the swap partitions.I will format and install Kubuntu on the 2nd partition where Ubuntu is.But I do not want to loose my documents and pictures,which are on the home partition.So should I leave the home partiton as it is (but there are hidden files about programs on that partition)or do I have to do a fresh install and format the Home partition, if so than I have to put my documents etc to an external media. Thanks in advance.
What I use when dual booting is one primary partition for XP, a primary for DATA and an extended partition for linux in which I create 3 logical volumes/drives; /, /home and swap. That way you can easily reinstall XP, if necessary, (re)install a (new) distro but always keep the data untouched and available to both OS's. 1 Primary partition; XP 2 Primary partition; Data (docs, music, movies etc) 3 Extended partition (3.1) Logical volume; / (3.2) Logical volume; swap (3.3) Logical volume; /home I've used above numbering to explain that the logical volumes are all inside the extended partition. Keep in mind that logical volumes will never be numbered as 3.1, 3.2 and 3.3 but will be assigned a number like 5, 6 and 7 by the partitioning program. I'd copy your data/documents once to an external drive, use such a partitioning scheme and you'll never have to worry about docs, music, etc when (re)installing. The data partition can be read in both XP and Linux if formatted as NTFS. Ubuntu how-to link
Once you have Windows 7 installed in one partition and a linux distro on another if you decided to uninstall linux can you add it back to the windows partition?
You could probably delete the linux partition(s) and then expand the Win 7 partition to use the entire disk.
You can do it with Win 7 built-in tools. Go into Control Panel -> System & Security -> Administrative Tools -> Computer Management and then Disk Management. From there you can right click on a Windows partition and Extend or Shrink it as desired. Make sure you back up any important data before doing this, just in case anything goes wrong.
I usually tell the partitioner to mount this partition under home without formatting, and while the installer is copying the files, I sneak to a virtual console and rename the user folder to user.1. After I boot into the fresh installation, I give ownership of /home/user.1 to user and move all relevant files (documents, music, pictures, videos, downloads and perhaps anything in Desktop) to the user folders. When I think I got all the files, I delete /home/user.1. In general, it's not complicated to mount an existing partition without formatting, when installing and move file around when the installation is finished. Edit: I would NOT assume that existing desktop configurations will work in the new installation, this is why I prefer to create a new profile and move data from the old profile.
I also have a dual boot system, Windows 7 and PClinuxOs. I decided I wanted to change the PCLinuxOs to Ubuntu but I did not want to lose my /home partition in PCLlinuxOs. Using a Ubuntu livecd I installed Ubuntu over PCLinuxOs. Using the partition tool in Ubuntu during the install I opted to use the existing partitions. I formatted the root partition, /, and installed Ubuntu to it and I chose to not format the /home partition or the /swap partition. I installed Grub2 to sda. The install went off without a hitch. All my data was preserved including my browser bookmarks, etc. and I still have a dual boot system. If you don't format or change the size of your /home partition you should be OK. But I would back up any important data. I used Clonezilla to clone my system prior to installing Ubuntu. I felt it to be good insurance in case of a catastrophic failure. Jim
You current partition scheme and plan is fine. Leave the /home partition as it is. You do not need to format it. Of course always plan for things to not go as planned and backup before starting.
When you get to the allocate drive space part of the install (from your live CD), choose to 'specify partitions manually'. Then just do what you did before when you installed 10.04 LTS, i.e. create the partitions. 6GB for swap sounds a bit excessive though. Install boot loader to /dev/sda as you did before. I would rather back up all the stuff on /home that you want to carry over to the new OS to a DVD(s) as there may be broken soft-links if you just choose not to format /home when doing the install.
best way is 1st. backup your home partition data in normal mode in case shrink drive don’t work you don’t able to loose your important data 2nd shrink disk space of home using gparted and make some space for your new OS if you use this OS as your main then no need to create separate home just make 30-50 GB one more / partition install in it (it will install root boot and home with in it) please also know shirking work only when its done from external media .....ie from live cd/dvd of kubuntu/ubuntu .......etc after that boot form ubuntu and grub update you see your kubuntu added as well in partition if all work fine i guess it should be no problem http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?p=9939745#post9939745 http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1498381 also this interesting read https://www.wilderssecurity.com/showthread.php?t=302812 to be honest i know its possible but i never did that on home/root partition so if you can wait for a week or so i make a video tutorial shrinking linux home partition and installing another linux on it