[P1] Partitioning disk and installing two versions of an OS

[Shravan Vasishth]

On Wed, 11 Dec 2002, Richard McKay wrote:

> >I made the mistake of assuming that OS 9.1 can be installed on the new
> >ibook (it can't).
> 
> I may be wrong but I think the only reason you couldn't install the 9.1 was
> that there was already a newer OS on the disk (you said 9.2) 

It seems that the iceBook (which is what I have) only takes 9.2.1 or more.

http://www.lowendmac.com/pb2/ibook-guide.html

Makes no sense, I agree. Whoever creates backwards non-compatible
hardware?

> and apple is trying to help you from making a possible mistake.
> Besides do you really need to use 9.1? What are you missing in 9.2
> that you need 9.1? 

All I wanted was 9.x's Devanagari (Language kit for Hindi). I need to run
some experiments involving Hindi native speakers reading Hindi text on the
screen and pressing buttons, yielding their response times. The Language
Kit serves very well. I couldn't find it on the OS 9.2.2 disks, but after
I had done all the stupid things I did to the laptop, I discovered that
it's now in the Applications ... Apple Extras folder under Language Kits.
It seems to be compatible with the 9.1 language kit, which is what's
important for me (the compatibility).

> If you do need it you might get around this by
> repartitioning the Disk with 3,4 or more partitions 

All very useful, I wil try it at some point, just to see what happens.

> not familiar with YDL setup) but if you use YD why not see if the Unix
> roots of OS X can do everything you need without it? You could install
> Darwin and an X windows front-end and go from there or use fink (new
> version apparently available today) or just terminal with programs
> such as emacs, MySQL and others that are ported or available to the
> new OS?

I tried that too, but I could find no make, latex, and the hundreds of
other software packages that make life so easy on linux. I'd have to
install everything myself, and it's easier to just install linux. 

Maybe it's all there and I just don't know how to use the BSD, I don't
know.

> >one with the Mac Standard
> >format, and the other with an unallocated format. This is how the
> >dual-boot installation is done for Yellowdog 2.0, with OS 9.1.
> 
> because the mac OS generally uses HFS+ format and YDL uses other linux file
> system structures?

Right. 

> One thing you might consider if you repartition again is to have a/several
> partitions for saving (an original or copy of) your files/work/preferences
> as this may save a lot of work later if you need to reinstall, or simply to
> simplify making backups...as they are easier to locate and protected from
> crashes...

OK, I'll try this too.

Many thanks, all very educative,

-- 
Dr. Shravan Vasishth                           Phone: +49 (681) 302 4504    
Computational Linguistics, Universität des Saarlandes, Postfach 15 11 50
D-66041 Saarbrücken, Germany         http://www.coli.uni-sb.de/~vasishth