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Knoppix for Rapid Desktop Deployment
heretic108 writes "From first boot to full desktop in 20 minutes! Knoppix has shot into the spotlight as a GNU/Linux distro suitable for demonstrating quality Open Source Software, standing out for its ability to self-configure itself into a vast range of hardware, and to run entirely off a CD boot without interfering with any existing system setup. That, plus its fat catalogue of pre-installed desktop software. But OSS enthusiast David McNab has poked a bit deeper, and found that Knoppix can install itself to disk, resulting in a completely configured GNU/Linux desktop system, ready to use, in 20 minutes, hassle free. CD no longer needed! Best of both worlds - use as a GNU/Linux demo disk, and if the user likes it, it's a snap to install permanently. I can't think of any distro that comes close to this, for ease and speed of setup. I found McNab's short Knoppix Installation Howto which gives a very brief and easy guide. With this rapid setup ability, Debian-based Knoppix makes a great contribution to the catalogue."
No Blue Screen of Death? No individual user licenses? No aborted installs? No minesweeper? Who actually would use this newfangled thing?
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When you come to a fork in the road, take it! --Yogi Berra--
if it is so wonderful, how come other distributions not use similar hardware detection? we have seen linux distros go in and out, people complain and complain about hardware detection, but we have yet to see one of the bigger distributions adopt a system similar to what knoppix is doing. i mean the worst thing that could happen is could detect the wrong hardware (tough, but possible) and you will have to remove the modules. but otherwise, seems like a win win situation.
BSD is for people who love UNIX. Linux is for those who hate Microsoft.
This might be a bit off-topic, but hey, at least I'm not wasting your time with an Ask Slashdot:
Can someone point me towards a live-CD that includes Flash, RealPlayer, and the ability to play as many multimedia files as possible? OpenOffice and some kind of Gecko browser are also required.
The reason is that Windows is just not cutting it on my girlfriend's computer. She's having all sorts of weird technical problems so I've decided something needs to be done. Unfortunately, my Debian is so wacked out and constantly tweaked into a semi-usable state that she doesn't trust Linux. So what I need is something she can use for a few weeks -- still accessing her docs on her Windows partition -- until she's sold.
How much is one of these frontpage /. ads? Please contact me, I may be interested in buying one.
Just my own little story how Knoppix helped me.. =)
My fiancee was volunteered to teach a class in algorithm design and c++ programming at the highschool she teaches at (for honors credit) -- the problems, though, were numerous.
She had to deal with:
1) NO funds available for purchasing of any programming utilities
2) Computer ADMIN not allowing her to install ANY programming software (borland freeware, DJGPP, etc) to disk
3) NOT allowing students to write (even temporary files) to the hard drive...
We looked at a LOT of different ways to handle these problems. Finally we decided that maybe using a linux livecd and having a disk with gcc/g++ for each student. Looked at a few different types that were mentioned on slashdot but NONE seemed to work well... until we saw a VERY old article that some user mentioned Knoppix.. went to it, d/l'ed it, burned to disk, popped it in and rebooted...
*WOW*
Knoppix comes fully loaded with office utilities, games (PLENTY of games), graphics software, but most importantly DEVELOPMENT software already on it. We were in love with it (in truth, my other box is still running it from cd just bc we liked it =) -- even more important was that it ran without the need for ANY files or ANY changes to the hard drive.
It discovered all devices hooked to my computer and actually had them working (AS WELL as the internet connection from "straight to cable modem" or "over network using ICS" setups we have at my house).
She took it to her school, popped it in, rebooted the computers (after fidgeting with bios to allow boot from cd, laugh) and QUICKLY came up with the Knoppix desktop. It certainly didnt take more than a min or so to bootup...
Most surprising thing was that for a "ran from cd" linux it was REMARKEBLY fast. Lets just say I was VERY impressed with Knoppix and recommend it for ANY new person. Without the threat of "ruining their computer," they can just pop in knoppix to try out linux... if they hate it, pop it out and its finished.
So in the end, fiancee's school didnt have to shell out money, didnt "screw up the computers" (sigh), have a setup for students to write and compile programs, and exposed students (and teachers) to Linux. I would say the entire situation was a big WIN =)
Knoppix is a GREAT distro. I regularly give it to people to try out Linux. It also makes a great recovery disk. I can go anywhere and pop it into a PC with a CD-ROM drive and it boots giving me all the tools I need.
/mnt/WINNT to /mnt/GoodDisk. Have a nice day.
What? Your Windows 2000 server's dynamic disk has crashed, again? No problem. Insert Knoppix. Copy
... is the sheer number of packages included on a *single* CD ROM. It's incredible. (Plus, they tend to be quite recent versions, and with some programs, like the excellent and promising Scribus, that's important because progress is rapid.)
Also, if you want to show someone the sheer variety of free and Free browsers available with Linux, Scribus has konqueror, mozilla, dillo, not to mention text-based ones as well.
It's an amazing distro -- demoware that really works. Anecdote: I have used Knoppix, from the CD, as my only OS for several days when using a borrowed laptop on which I could not politely do an OS swap. Except a slight slowness with the CD up-and-down-spinning, it was hard to tell I wasn't just using a recent Debian system installed normally.
timothy
jrnl: http://tinyurl.com/c2l8yr / foes: http://tinyurl.com/ckjno5
One really neat use of this would be to bundle VMWare into the CD dist so that you could actually drop the CD into a machine you don't trust (maybe your employer's?) to be free of keystroke loggers, etc.
Use Linux for any "private" work you want to do, use encryption tools (ssh, tunneling, etc.) to get out your corporate firewall to a trusted machine, and then simply run your other operating system inside VMWare for doing your work.
Does Knoppix make it easy to add new things into the cd image?
I'm not normally a debian zealot, and by me using the term zealot, you can figure out what I think of people who constantly tell me that I'm wrong for using redhat and mandrake. That having been said, I've really got to respect this. Well done.
Personally, I don't care about having 10 different editors, but I'm sure some people do. I can almost live entirely off of the redhat 8.0 personal desktop (I have other machines to compile on), save for the lack of mp3-ability out of the box (freshrpms, I love you) and dvd-ability (again, go freshrpms). But the ability to do something like this, be able to just install it on to a hard drive, type a single command for updates, no registering or anything, and continue on, is very nice.
I think this years install fest will see a lot more debian installs than it will redhat or mandrake because of this.
-- Who is the bigger fool? The fool or the fool who follows him? --
There's another Debian-based bootable distro, called LNX-BBC. It is only 50 megs, but you can still install Debian from it and apt-get all the packages you want.
http://www.lnx-bbc.org/
Wrongo buckaroo!
Read the knoppix documentation... it does not, by default, install ANYTHING to ANY hard drive.. you have the option to put a swap file ont he hard drive but you have to select it =)
Look down the page http://www.knopper.net/knoppix/index-en.html and you will see about what it does and does not do. NO installation or modifying of the hard drives are necessary -- with computers without necessary ram it will run SLOWER but it will still run.
Besides, its a worthless argument =) Their computers most definately have 128 mb ram...
20 minutes? Bah. My old vintage 1975 Sol-20 boots SOLOS from ROM in under a second. I can install a new OS ROM in seconds, it is conveniently provided on a ROM cart that pops in and out of a slot in the back. I can load BASIC or ASM-80 from Cassette Tape in under 2 minutes.
Yeah, yeah, before you mod this down, just think a sec, I'm only trying to show how ludicrous this "time to first boot" is, as a measure of an OS.
I've just gotta say, thanks Slashdot. This is what I've been looking for.
One of the major reasons I was very reluctant to try Linux out (I'm a dedicated Win2K admin) was that it would require me to re-partition a disk for an ext3 filesystem.
Well, seeing as how each and every one of my drives are NTFS Dynamic Volumes, there's no chance in hell that Linux is going to be able to read (or even repartition) them, and neither will most other software. So, it's a total wipeout if I wanted to try it.
I'm downloading the ISO of this right now; I can get a chance to use Linux without *installing* Linux this way. In essence, what I've wanted for a long time.
Yeah, but it comes with 2GB of apps, boots into KDE, GNOME or WindowMaker, and even sets itself up as a PXE boot network server for diskless machines.
:v)
To be honest, it also impresses the pants off Windows users and is very likely to convert them to Open Source software. There they are used to Windows products and have been told Linux is too hard. Then along comes this CD, they insert it, boot, and a fully-fledged Linux app with OpenOffice, Mozilla, network, sound and lots of toys rises before them without them having to type or do *anything*.
That's why I put it on the NZ PC World cover disk.
Vik
Yes, Windows sucks. If it's having that many problems, see if you can roust up a copy of Win2000 or WinXP. But if you force your girlfriend to use Linux, she will probably end up frustrated and hating it (and maybe even hating you).
Then, in a few years, when Linux is ready for the desktop (if that happens) then she won't want to try it.
If you really think Windows sucks too much for her to use, maybe you should look into getting her a Mac. Forcing nontechnical people to use Linux is not the way to win friends, or spread good feelings for the operating system.
(-1, Raw and Uncut is the only way to read)
I got Knoppix onto the cover CD of PC World in New Zealand and I hear there is a possibility it may go on the Australian version - write encouragement to the Ed and ask if it can be had from the Kiwis (the answer will be yes, I guarantee it :).
:v)
We had to cut it down to 350MB to fit the sponsor's Windows games and so forth on the CD too (thanks Eaden at Opentech) so no OpenOffice, but the reader response we got was incredible. See this and search for "Knoppix" for the feedback.
Vik
After reading the comments here Knoppix has just become my default Christmas gift to friends and family. The opportunity to quickly and easily expose new users to Linux without altering their current environment is a magnificent opportunity to "spread the gospel."
:)
I'm planning to bundle the CD with two sheets of paper, one showing how to start and use it and explaing that it won't interfere with the ordinary function of the computer concerned and the other David McNabb's HDD install HOWTO.
Then in January I'm going to apply for a position in the marketing department of AOL, I'll have all the required skills
There is BOCHS, but it emulates every x86 instruction, rather than being optimized for specifically running an OS. The developers (in the FAQ) do not recommended for the purpose you intend. I have not tried it.
Plex86 touts itself as *the* free (as in speech and beer) alternative. I have not tried this either.
Connectix makes Virtual PC, which is not free. I have not tried it.
Some other stuff it does well - it'll store swap, config and home directory on files in the first windows harddisk with enough space it can find. That means you can in fact use it as your primary OS if you're happy with not being able to add new software and slow bootup times. You can reconfigure, write docs and so on, and it'll all be saved to disk.
Yes, that's right. Remember that Knopppix was initially intended as a demo CD. The most important criteria was for it to not use a hard drive. But, Linux really likes to know that it has a swap partition even if it doesn't really need one. Knoppix fools Linux into thinking it has a swap partition by creating a small one in RAM. Knoppix also loopback mounts a crompressed file system tree which is accessed via symlinks in the / (root) tree but, the tree is a RAM disk. It is a beutiful piece of trickery to get Linux to run with NO HARD DRIVE AT ALL!
Unfortunately, that's correct.
It will allow you to save some of your settings to floppy. For example, I can save my network settings. However, I have to run the network setup tool (under the Knoppix menu) to get them to work.
I think so, although you can ckeck Knoppix forum for a definitive answer. The people have been quite helpful there.
Excellent question... I will hope you still read this but its a bit after this was posted so shrug...
Students each have a disk that they have their source code on (they write the code to the disk). We compile onto the disk and the executable remains on the disk. Students turn in their disks (along with algorithms (ie their funny little flowcharts)) to be graded.
It was a good question... we STILL have to have a disk even though now we dont have to put the development apps on there... I say it was a very good trade. =)
To test the new computer i was buying (and getting), i took my Knoppix CD along.
:)
I bought the box which caused the least trouble!
Knoppix was more than helpful
Voltaire: God is dead.
God: Voltaire is dead!
The idea is not without merit, and it would solve some problems but introduce others.
To run a game this way would mean that the end user can't do anything while they're playing the game. No e-mail checking, no downloading with Kazaa, no way to quickly get back to your desktop (short of rebooting), etc. The notion of multitasking is gone. In may ways this would be like the good/bad old days of rebooting just to play DOOM.
It also means saying goodbye to DirectX. Since we already have UT2K3 and all things Quake running on Linux already it's far from impossible, but many developers don't want to kiss DirectX goodbye. While Epic and id are two companies that favor cross-platform compatibility over ease of tools, many other developers think otherwise (witness Neverwinter Nights).
Back in the pre-DirectX days the developer would have to code for every concievable piece of hardware. DirectX shifted most of this burden to the hardware makers, but to do this LiveCD route would make the developer have to do it again. Not sure how big a problem this would be nowadays (since it might not be such a big deal to just throw every driver in history onto the disc) but it might be another Big Hassle for the developers.
Finally, this means that game developers would have to either become geniuses on making bootable Linux distros in addition to games, or else get cozy with Linux distro makers. Heck, this might even cause political distro wars as to whom gets used. Plus this probably won't do anything to further Linux on the desktop (if that's your bag).
But I can see this as an interesting option to do in addition to the install and run in Windows/Linux option. Kinda reminds me of when Windows wasn't popular yet and Adobe Photoshop 1.0 (I think) came out with a Windows Runtime.
Schnapple
You can do it even easier ... (one less step):
... that should work if you're running recent tools.
dd if=/dev/zero of=swapfile.dat bs=1k count=x
mkswap swapfile.dat
swapon swapfile.dat
- Michael T. Babcock (Yes, I blog)
Perhaps a Windows install might have succeeded. Is that damaging enough for you? (-:
Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing