Thursday, January 21st, 2010
Tom asks a very good question in his comment to my first post: What about Live CD distributions of Linux?
There are about sixty “significant” Live CD versions of Linux and there are utilities that will easily let you create your own custom version that will boot and run from CD. DVD, or USB if your hardware supports bootable USB drives.
So you want to use a friend’s computer to work on a spreadsheet or write a novel without risking contaminating your files with your friend’s Russian and Chinese computer virus collection.
You boot the machine from a LiveCD and then write your files to a USB flash drive.
In essence you have a system you can carry around in your pocket and use on almost any piece of hardware you can gain access to.
In some contexts this can be cause to arrest you. So if you are hauling a LiveCD around with you stay out of places that require retina scans or security clearances.
I am still downloading the installation repository so today we’ll be playing with some LiveCD’s and perhaps doing an old school CD-ROM based installation to one of the boxes in the Computer Cave.
Tags: Distributions, Install, Linux, Live CD, USB
