How can I create a bootable ISO partition on a usb drive without affectiing the rest of the drive

[worthy junco]

I have a single 1 TB hard drive I use for extra storage and would like to reinstall fedora on my computer. I have been told it's possible to use just a partition of this drive for the ISO but I am not really sure where to find instructions of how to go about doing that.

[ancient tangle]

@worthy junco it's better to use a usb, incase you mess up

[worthy junco]

wdym? I am using a usb, I just want to isolate the live boot to a specific partition to leave the rest of the usb untouched

[edgy portal]

heres a better idea: install ventoy onto the drive (warning: first time installation wipes the drive)

that will let you boot off of any iso file located on the drive

[ancient tangle]

@worthy junco

[worthy junco]

but that will still wipe the drive, so can i localize that to a partition?

[edgy portal]

you can create a partition specifically for ventoy drives, but that wont stop the drive from wiping

[worthy junco]

then it doesn't solve my problem

[edgy portal]

if you're extremely extremely bored and you have a linux install on your pc already, you can just use grub to boot an iso from your internal drive

[worthy junco]

hmmmmmm seems unsafe if I accidentally mess up the install

but an option

[edgy portal]

how is it more unsafe than shrinking a partition that has data on it tho

exactly. it isn't

[worthy junco]

well I don't mind loosing alittle data on that, it isn't the end of the world

that drive really doesn't have anything but a .7z of my home directory

and I already resized it

[worthy junco]

also there's the minor issue that this is supported on ubuntu but not on fedora

but i can try it

I found a way to theoretically write to a disk partition with livecd-iso-to-disk

but it seems to be out of date and not work for newer fedora isos

[edgy portal]

its supported wherever grub exists, the fact this guide is on ubuntu's page does not mean anything

[worthy junco]

okay, fair

before i do this are there any other ways I can try to create a bootable partition on my external usb?

[worthy junco]

because this will be more difficult and is less familiar to me so I would rather first figure out if there's an alternative to livecd-iso-to-disk

[edgy portal]

your iso might actually include partitions inside of it, i know chromeos bootable images do that. and having partitions inside of other partitions is usually not a good idea

[worthy junco]

hmmmmm the documentation says I can target a partition with the tool tho

so i don't that that's an issue here

[edgy portal]

try it, all the data loss is your fault

gparted can shrink partitions iirc

[worthy junco]

I already shrunk the partition with the data in it, so that bridge is burned

[edgy portal]

well, go on then

[worthy junco]

so is that the only concern then? I would just need a way to write the iso to the partition I made then

[edgy portal]

dd if=~/Downloads/fedora.iso of=/dev/sdb3 or wherever your partition is located

if you're lucky that will even be bootable

use lsblk to figure out the partition location

for example, here /dev/sdb1 is my second (hence the b) sata drive, first partition on it (the 1)

[worthy junco]

yep, sda2

[worthy junco]

Well that’s,, interesting

I have never seen this before

needless to say it didn't work, but I just rebooted into my main OS so we're still good

[edgy portal]

that means the boot part of your fedora clearly did not expect to be inside of an iso

so your plan is fundamentally flawed, go install ventoy

[worthy junco]

hrmmmmmm

I don't think the booting from an internal drive will exactly work

[worthy junco]

if i can't do it without wiping my drive, I'm not gonna do it. I need to have access to my home data

[edgy portal]

you apparently can: https://www.ventoy.net/en/doc_non_destructive.html

[worthy junco]

atp I think i may just wait till I have access to a spare drive

thank you for the help, if nothing else i learned quite a bit and know of these options

[edgy portal]

speaking of spare drives

ventoy can look for isos on OTHER drives

so a 1 gig usb is all you really need

[worthy junco]

hmmmmm I could try using my other hard drive. I tried using fedora media writer to write an iso to it but it won't boot. It was the drive I used to initially install my system

not really sure why it won't boot

it just goes to a black screen and returns to the boot menu

[worthy junco]

yeah for some reason that drive just won't boot

[edgy portal]

try making a new gpt partition table on it

then do the funny again

[worthy junco]

Don’t know what that is, but I said fuck it and tried non destructive ventoy on the big usb

This might be a while

1tb full of random shit and a single fedora everything iso

[worthy junco]

I do however wanna try this once for shits and giggles

[worthy junco]

And if this takes to long

[edgy portal]

sudo cfdisk -z /dev/yourdrive, choose gpt, then do whatever

that WILL wipe everything from the drive

but i guess that drive you're struggling to boot off of is already empty anyway

[worthy junco]

Okay

[worthy junco]

This is still chugging along

Been at least 15 minutes now

Not sure when I should pull the plug

alr now am attempting the funny

first thing I'll try is plain old media writer

then if that fails I'll do the same thing again and try ventoy this time

okay so that failed

same issue, black screen and return to boot menu

yeah, tried ventoy and nothing

here's something notable

the VTOYEFI partition doesn't have the bootable flag

but the Ventoy one does

Well ima just try ventoy with the big drive tmrw

[worthy junco]

I got a fedora everything iso to boot but it can't connect to the internet it seems?

[edgy portal]

you can use your android device's usb tethering without any extra setup

just connect your phone and enable usb tethering

the virtual ethernet adapter its emulating is so generic there's almost no operating system that will ignore it

except, apparently, android on my householders' tv

[worthy junco]

Oh my god