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What's on Your USB Pen Drive?

Posted by Cliff on from the taking-it-with-you dept.

gmhowell asks: "With the popularity of USB pen drives, I've thought it time to join the crowd and get one. But I'm curious as to what is so important that you should always have a copy. Clearly PuTTY or your favorite SSH client is important. Perhaps with some keys. But what else? A copy of your browser cookies? MP3s? Pictures? What other software is smart enough to run from a portable medium without need for an installation? (Yup, MAME and z26 seem like likely candidates)."

3 of 172 comments (clear)

  1. what I'd do by Tumbleweed · · Score: 3, Insightful

    > A copy of your browser cookies?

    Cookies? Please. Try _bookmarks_. Definitely.
    One's preferred text editor. Compression tools (zip, bzip2, etc.).
    Perhaps some critical files for 'off-site' backups: your resume, a copy of your network settings, your address book, etc. The garbage file you snagged from that Gibson.

    A network tool or tool(s), a virus scanner. Disk partitioning tools (PartitionMagic if you're a Windows user). A copy of your favourite games (BZFlag, GLTron).

    Make this thing bootable, too, just in case, as some machines can boot off these things now. Yay!

  2. Nothing! It's just a geek toy by AdamBa · · Score: 4, Insightful
    I got my stylin' Thumbdrive Touch (with 21st-century-compliant biometric touchpad) just to look bitchin' on my keychain. I didn't store anything on it, what kind of propellor-head would actually do that?

    Of course then the cover (the plastic part with the hole that you use to put it on a keyring, which probably costs about 40 cents wholesale) broke and now I can't even find the damn thing.

    - adam

  3. PLEASE remember... by mcgroarty · · Score: 5, Insightful
    If you're walking around with ssh keys on your keychain, please remember to use strong password encryption on the key. The person who finds your keyfob may not be a stranger to your net habits.

    If you've got a key you tend to use from only one place (i.e. work->home), consider prefixing the authorized_hosts line with a from="some.hostname.com" as well. This will prevent the key being used from a different IP by someone who "borrows" your keychain.