Partitions and the Installer

S

SoNSo1

Registered
Okay, this may already have been covered, but I need to ask.

I got the new 1GHz TiBook and decided to partition the 60Gig hard drive as such: 5 Gig MacOSX, 3 Gig OS9, 27 Gig Applications and a 25 gig Users. This means I moved my applications and users folder to these new partitions. I've read that this is a bad idea, but really can't find any in depth information about it. Can someone point me to any info?

The other thing is when I start an app the installer only allows me to install on the OSX partition. After installing I am forced to move the new app to the Application partition. Is this normal with the way I have it? Did I paritition it wrong?

Any help would be greatly appreciated.
 
Most installers require that a particular version of OS X be installed on the destination filesystem. To get around this, you can either create a symbolic link at /Applications that points to your mounted Apps partition, or mess with your /etc/fstab so that your Apps partition gets mounted on /Applications in the first place. The second way is the way that UNIX geeks have done it for decades. To most programs, you only have one filesystem, and that is /

The first way:
Make sure you have no /Applications folder. Then run this command in Terminal:

ln -s /Volumes/Appz /Applications

Where 'Appz' is the name of your apps volume.

The second way: (only verified with a cd-rom, not a HD partition)
Make sure you have an /Applications folder, which must be completely empty.
Insert a line like this into your /etc/fstab, which must be created if it does not exist:

LABEL=Appz /Applications hfs rw 1 2

Again, where 'Appz' is the name of your apps volume.

Similar techniques work for Users. Just replace Appz with the name of your users volume, and /Applications with /Users
 
Anyone else?

I have done the creation of the link to my /Voumes/Application disk partition. What I need more information is why does the installer always ask for only the partition with OS X on it? I read it was a bug, that Installer doesn't follow symbolic links, but I read that on the Internet and somehow I want to know more why.

Why is it that if I have 3 partitions for example OSX partition (with OSX), OS9 (with OS 9) and an Application partition when Installing a new app I only am allowed to Install on the OS X partition? I get an error choosing the Application partition that says something like "block 16" or the like can't be read. (That's not the exact error message. I don't have it in front of me.) Sometimes I want to install something somewhere else.
 
Being unable to install anywhere has to do with the installation package itself, and not the Installer app or your partitioning scheme. If a package is not marked "Relocatable", then it will always be installed at the same place relative to the volume you selected. If a package is marked "Root Volume Only", then it may only be installed on the volume mounted at / , that is, the volume you started up from. If you were to do as I suggested and mount your applications volume at /Applications, then the installer would install applications onto your Applications partition since it is then treated as part as your root filesystem.
 
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