Transfer files from Windows to Linux

[papel]

Is it possible to trasfer all of my windows files to linux?

[oz]

Is it possible to trasfer all of my windows files to linux?

Welcome to the forums!

What kind of files you are talking about?

[papel]

My mp3 files and also some programs such as Dreamweaver,Photoshop ect..

[sdimhoff]

The important thing you have to remember is that the difficulty in transfering files has everything to do with the filesystem difference. Lets say you are dual booted and your files are in an NTFS partition. You can just install something called ntfs-3g which will allow you to mount your NTFS partition in linux.

If you want to be able to use the same set of files in both your linux and windows environments you may want to create a partition in the FAT filesystem which will allow you to read that partition in both linux and NTFS without the ntfs-3g installed.

Hope that helps

[Lich]

Is it possible to trasfer all of my windows files to linux?

The answer is yes.

It would be helpful to know which Linux distribution you're using, but as an example, I'll use my case.

I'm using Ubuntu 7.10. All I had to do was drag and drop my files onto a USB Flash drive on the windows machine, and then once Linux was installed, I just plugged the same flash drive in again and dragged my files to the location of my choice.

Due to proprietary formats, I have read some people have had to download VLC Media Player to play MP3's. You can do this by going to Applications, add/remove software, and looking for VLC Media Player in the list. Mark it for installation and apply the changes. Then open your MP3's with VLC.

I've also downloaded codecs for Totem (the default in Ubuntu) and all file formats work for it now, including DVD movies.

Let us know how you get along...


EDITED:

Your issues regarding photoshop, etc, are moot points. GIMP is the superior equivalent OpenSource photo editor, and there are equivalents to every piece of software you've worked with on Windows. If you ever find you must have a piece of Microsoft software, you can emulate it by running WINE. I began that way myself, but as I've found out, it becomes unnecessary since you can do anything you need on Linux.

Edited Again:

The importation issues that sdimhoff is referring to were a non-issue for me. All of my photo's were in a format like .jpg, .gif, .png, etc... which Gimp was able to open. Documents in .doc, and spreadsheets .xls, were all handled by open-office.

I hope this has helped you some.

[sdimhoff]

Thanks Lich for bringing up my vagueness. When I referred to filesystems, I was referring to the difference between say NTFS and ext3 and NOT the filetype *.mp3, .doc, etc. Filetypes are used to specify what type of data that particular file holds (linux does not REQUIRE the use of filetype extensions such as .mp3 in the same way that windows does, although since it is an easy way tell your system what program to open something with you still see them in linux systems)

Just for more clarification, NTFS is a proprietary windows filesystem (i.e. the way that they organize data within a harddrive). ntfs-3g is essentially a backward-engineered tool which allows your linux machine to read and write in an NTFS environment. (Usually linux systems use an ext, reiserfs, many others) The FAT filesystem is an older filesystem which was for the most part phased out due to restrictions in filesize etc. However, many usb storage devices are shipped with a FAT filesystem on them, which is why I made the clarification earlier. Also, FAT does not require any special tool such as ntfs-3g, as support is usually built in to modern kernels.

Hope this clears up any confusion from my previous post.

[Lich]

No problem at all.

I guess I understood the question to be simply if he could bring his files and programs over to Linux and still have faculty of them - since he mentioned MP3's and Photoshop. My reply was 'yes' to the files, and 'not necessary' to the programs, seeing as how Linux has equivalents.

I wasn't sure the direction you were taking with the file system explanation, or if it was even a part of his question. If it was, then apologies for jumping in. If it wasn't, then glad I could add to things.

[peteh]

You don't actually need ntfs-3g if you mount your windows partition read only. From there you can copy files to your linux partition with root (or sudo) permission.
You can't move them and the copy is only one way ie windows -->linux.
Any file that's readable on linux eg txt, mp3 etc will work.