Help installing distros from a hard drive

[DMR]

I know this has been covered here before, but the forum search barfed on me when I tried to pull up past threads, so...

I've just installed a second (40G) drive, which I would like to partition and install Drake, Debian and Slack. I'm currently running Redhat 6.2 on my primary 10G drive, and would d/l the necessary files to that disk. I've got a fat pipe, so the downloads won't be a problem, but I don't have a burner to make CDs from the ISO images. I know that you can install from a hard drive, but I can't find clear, accurate instructions on how to do it. Do I d/l the ISOs, or are there different files I should use to install from disk?

Also- am I wrong in thinking that I can create one swap partition which could be shared by the three distros? In other words, create a single swap and then just "point" each distro to that partition during the installations. I would think that whichever distro I boot into would be able to use the partition, and the other distros wouldn't care because they aren't active. Any ideas?

TIA

[Bill]

Not to rain on your parade, but there isn't really that much difference between the various distros so you're really just spinning your wheels with this effort.

Mandrake is for newbies but is used by experts too. Debian is stable but a little out of date and Slack isn't as hard core as it used to be. If you are using Redhat now, stick with it and upgrade your kernel. If you really have an urge to change your distro, try Redhat 7.1 for a while.

Me? I'm trying Plan 9 :D

[DMR]

Thanks Bill, but there's no raining on parade involved; I'm not spinning my wheels, and I'm not a CompuNewbie. I've good reasons for doing what I outlined in my post, and I do understand the pros/cons/differences between distros. So, that being said- any helpful advice?

[bdg1983]

David... There is the FAQ on installing from a iso on the hd. Except it's based on using a fat32 partition for the install. Shouldn't be too hard to modify to ext2.

And yes, you can share a swap partition with multiple distros.

6.11. Can I install Linux using an ISO Image on the Hard Drive?
Yes, you can install from an ISO image file stored on the hard drive. Keep in mind this technique can be a bit tricky if you are new to Linux. The best way to use ISO images is to burn them to CD. Check http://www.linuxdoc.org/HOWTO/CD-Writing-HOWTO-3.html for more information on dealing with ISO image files.
You will need to mount the ISO image as a loopback device. This FAQ entry assumes that the ISO image is stored on a FAT16 / FAT32 partition on the hard drive.

First, start your distro's installer (which usually means creating the installation floppies and rebooting).

Next, execute an 'emergency shell' - a command-line interface to Linux. This will temporarily pause the installer. To get the the emergency shell, try 'Alt-F2'. In Debian, there is a menu option called 'Execute Emergency Shell'.

Execute the following commands:

mkdir /tmp_dos mkdir /tmp_iso mount -t vfat -o ro /dev/hda1 /tmp_dos mount -t iso9660 -o ro,loop=/dev/loop0 /tmp_dos/path/to/the/file/file.iso /tmp_iso

You might need to run 'modprobe vfat', and/or 'modprobe loop', and/or 'modprobe iso9660', depending on how your distro has compiled the default kernel.

Now your ISO should be mounted at /tmp_iso . To test this, do:

ls /tmp_iso

You should see a list of files.

Now type 'exit' or 'logout' or hit 'alt-f1' (depending on distro), to return to the installer. Tell the installer to install from a currently mounted filesystem, and specify '/tmp_iso'.

Once the install has finished, it's 'polite' to do:

umount /tmp_iso umount /tmp_dos

Another method is to use a Windows program like WinImage to extract the ISO to your Windows partition. IMHO, a less elegant solution, but if you have the hard drive space, it might be easier.