OS Reinstall/Changeout

[LinuxRules]

Ok, I have searched but not found a post that directly addresses this. Similar threads do not leave me hopeful, but here goes.

I need to rebuild (change out) my OS drive, but want to keep my other data drives intact. My concern is ownership of the data on the data drives, once the new OS drive has been built. Specifically, the OS is hda1 thru hda7 on a 10 gig drive. I have two 30 gig drives (hdb and hdd) where most of my data resides, mostly in the form of Samba shares. The new OS drive will be an 80 gig drive. I (unfortunately) do not have a tape drive.

Once the new OS is installed, and the users recreated, will I be able to mount and access the data on the two 30 gig data drives, that was created under the old (10 gig) OS drive?

Is there a way to archive or copy user data from the present OS installation, then restore that user data to the new OS and thus preserve user accounts, etc.?

Or, could I change the ownership of all the existing data to root (or nobody, or something), and then change it back to the original user (manually) after the new OS is built?

Any advice, tips, referrals to other sources of information, etc. would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you all!

P.S. I should probably mention that the current OS is RedHat 8.0, and the new OS will also be RedHat 8.0.

Thanks again...

[mdwatts]

All I can think of is to backup (or print) the filesystem, Samba etc. configurations you currently have in place.

/etc/fstab
/etc/passwd
/etc/shadow

Samba configs and anything else you can think of.

Possibly the user home directories or at least their configuration files.

Anyone else?

[LinuxRules]

Thanks for the input Mr. Google. Archiving the /home directory tree is no problem. And certain other config files as well, such as the Samba configuration, are no problem. Do you know the full list files from the system area would be required to re-establish the user accounts?

Thanks again, I really appreciate your time on this.

[mdwatts]

The passwd and shadow in /etc and the home directory should be all you need for the user accounts.

Oh yeah... /etc/group

I would backup everything in /etc to make sure.

[LinuxRules]

Thanks very much for the info Mr. Google. I will post the results when I have finished the migration.

Edit: Well, it looks like the migration has been postponed until next weekend. Will report afterward.

[LinuxRules]

Well it was longer than expected, but it is done. Thank you mdwatts, the task was accomplished without a hitch.

First I installed the new OS. Then I coppied in /etc/passwd, /etc/shadow, /etc/group from backup. I then restored /home from backup. All users, configurations, permissions restored.

Thank you again!