[plug] I killed Woody :(

[Nathan D]

Howdy All,
I'm looking for some tips from the multitude of Debian Experts :)

I have had 2.2r3 running on my Samba Server for some time and have upgraded 
this box to Woody and a 2.4 kernel running ext3.  Apt-get is a wonderful 
thing so I have blown away RH on my own machine and put a base install on 
using the 2.2r3 CD.  The upgrade to Woody was painless and then I started 
on loading the required X packages.  Realising my Logitech USB mouse was 
not configured, I got the GPM package and wrongly configured it.  This 
totally killed my ps2 keyboard activity and left me unable to do 
anything.  A 'nasty' reboot also brought me back to a dead keyboard.
Trying to access my box from other machines I found I was refused access as 
root and a user (did I actually add 1?) using SSH, telnet and ftp.  Next 
trick was to access my linux partition from 2k using Explore2fs and after 
reading all the warnings about enabling write mode, I proceeded to delete 
/etc/gpm.conf.  Now I need a rescue disk to boot into linux and I get a 
kernel panic when I do.  I also get access violation errors when trying to 
use Explore2fs so can't seem to rescue the .debs that I d/loaded.  Yes I 
only created a / partition.

So now I am looking for tips from those who may know -
1.  Is it possible to save my packages?
2.  Recommended partitioning for a desktop machine with 4.5Gb to play with.
3.  Recommended upgrade path potato -> woody, ie a fully working potato 
with X, then upgrade vs a potato base and upgrade from there?


regards,
   Nathan

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