[tlug] How do recover from a re-format?

[Jean-Christian Imbeault <jc@example.com>]

I've been spending one too many late nights at the office recently it it 
finally caught up with me ...

In the middle of a RH8.0 install I remembered that I had forgotten to 
backup some files that were on the HD.

I stopped installation halfway but it had already gotten to the disk 
re-partitioning stage. So I lost my partition table.

I don't think the data has been overwritten but unfortunately I can only 
boot off the disk in single-user mode and only the first three 
partitions are still readable. The other partition entries, where my 
data resides, have been erased ...

I'm pretty sure the data is still there but the question is ... how can 
I get to it?

What tools should I be looking into?

And all I wanted was to get this last install done before going home for 
the weekend ... I should know better than to do an installation when I 
my eyes can't stay open :(

Jc