Help - just deleted all my ISO files in Linux!

So, on day two of Nihil's make One Interesting Post a Day for Twenty-Eight Days Challenge, I did find myself already struggling... guess I'm just not that interesting... :P

Then, I did the unthinkable. Thinking I was removing a symbolic link to my external HD from my Slackware box, I typed "rm -R ISOs" and hit enter. Then fear gripped me as I remembered that I had actually moved all of my ISOs to that directory from my external HD the other day to save space. :(

So tell me, AO. What do I do to get my 10GB of ISOs back!? (Mostly legal copies of OSes and software such as Windows XP, Windows 2000, Office, and games etc that I've collected over the years.)

What a jackass right? Well **** happens. Now help me out on making it "un-happen"

Thanks!

Hi wiskic10_4,

Sorry to hear your tale of woe. I assume that the data is still there and has not been overwritten. I don't know of any linux data recovery software off the top of my head other than roadkil's "unstoppable copier"

Am I right in thinking that we are looking at a linux partition and not NTFS/FAT?

http://www.roadkil.net/program.php?ProgramID=29

It will do Linux 32 & 64 bit and 'doze 9.x through 7

It reads your drive at a low level and attempts to recover all files it finds, even if partially damaged. I can't remember if it can recover a selected partition or if it just goes at the whole drive.

I strongly suspect it is the whole drive (it used to be) but some clever stuff might have been added more recently :)

Thanks nihil,

Yeah, as soon as I realized what I had done, I started searching for a means of undoing it - careful not to save anything to the HD that may overwrite my recently deleted data.

Thanks for the link - I'll give it a shot tonight as soon as I get free and post back with the results. I've got to go on a job interview in a minute. But that's another post! :D

Good Luck mate!

BTW I downloaded the latest (January 2010) version and it does support partitions and even individual folders it would seem.

It has been expanded so you can use it as a backup application as well..........mind you, I could only try the Windows version, but would have thought that Linux was pretty much the same. :)

arrgh.

Missing a dependency to run the link you gave. I could mess with it and make it work, but I've already downloaded ISOs for Win2000SP4, WinXPHomeSP2, WinXPProSP3 and XPMediaCenterEdition2005. I've got a friend that can get me Windows 7 and Office 2007 cheap from his work, so I think I'll just mourn my losses and learn a valuable lesson - backup (i.e. practice what I preach :P)

Thanks though nihil - I'll bet it would have worked if I weren't too lazy to try... guess the end would have had to justify the means. ;)

Hi wiskic10_4

It has certainly helped me save a few people's butts in the past, so I can personally recommend it.

One thing I really like is that it will recover stuff from damaged drives, when a lot of similar products just refuse to run if they can't find the MFT or any partitions. Obviously you need to be able to read the drive, but that is all.

OH! and it is free :D

I guess I'm too late but for recovering files... I always keep on hand a hiren's boot cd.. it has about 5 or 6 file recovery apps.. shouldn't matter what the OS or partition type is if you're running the app off the bootcd

I give a 2nd for Hirens. Has saved my butt a few times in the past. Worth the download and should find itself a useful part of your security toolkit.

Quote:

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shouldn't matter what the OS or partition type is if you're running the app off the bootcd

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Partly, certainly as far as the OS is concerned. However the partition type is important. Hirens is basically a Windows site and most of the tools are the same, so they are highly unlikely to work on a Linux file system partition.

The only one on his boot CD I know that will do the job is the one that I have already suggested: unstoppable copier.

:(

Quote:

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Originally Posted by nihil

Partly, certainly as far as the OS is concerned. However the partition type is important. Hirens is basically a Windows site and most of the tools are the same, so they are highly unlikely to work on a Linux file system partition.

The only one on his boot CD I know that will do the job is the one that I have already suggested: unstoppable copier.

:(

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That's strange as i've used Hirens for both Win & *nix related issues. :confused:

Depending on the Format of the drive and file system you used, there was a way to undelete stuff in Linux. Of course typing out Inodes is a HUGE pain in the ass like no other (Unless of course you're a moron like me who once had to toggle a Boot Record in Hex, but hey it worked!) it's a carefully crafted art.

This is one reason I have the following Back up plan on my home network:

A Slackware 12 Server running SSH and FTP so whenever something changes on ANY drive in the LAN, it can be uploaded and saved. I used the first computer I ever bought to do it (Pentium 3 733 MHz, 384 MBs RAM, 43 GB HD, and one 160 GB HD) it contains multiple OSs of Unix and Linux and BSD, and has all my MP3s and movies.

A Celeron 433 MHz with 192 RAM running Slackware and dual booting Windows 98 for a game I like that won't work in NT based systems. I setup FTP on it with the 80 GB HD and it has a second back up of the important hard to get back crap.

A USB External Drive, 80 GBs, third copy of most important files only.

Each desktop has another 4th and 5th copy of the most important stuff, and my new machine's huge disk has everything.

A ZIP Drive from way back when that still works good, has smaller copies of the MOST important things.

A bunch of Floppies containing things mostly in text of picture format I can't get back.

Two Gmail accounts... Linux and FreeBSD have a tool that lets you mount your Gmail account as a storage device just as you would a Floppy. You then have 2 GBs of back ups for free and since you can make multiple accounts you have unlimited 2 GB incremented storage.

Online Back up plan for absolute needed things. I think I have my MuttRC ready ;)

Free online web hosting with a crap load of adds..... It sucks but it's free online storage.