Knoppix 3.8 at CeBIT w/ Kernel 2.6, FF, and More

clsc writes "The German tech news site Heise Online reports that Knoppix 3.8 is being presented at CeBIT (Hall 9, Stand C39). Knoppix 3.8 has kernel 2.6 as default, KDE 3.3.2, OpenOffice 1.1.4, as well as... Firefox 1.0 and Thunderbird 1.0. There's also a really neato new thing involving unionfs . It seems to imply that you can change most anything on the running system, even as it is running from CD - and changes can be stored too (even on NTFS)."

Comments

Plan 9 has had this feature for a long time

[Anonymous Coward]

Plan 9 from Lucent, the would-be successor to UNIX, has been built to support this sort of thing from the ground up.

It's a shame that novel OS's like Plan 9 are largely ignored, only for some of their features to be introduced later into mainstream OS's as "new" ideas.

Re:Plan 9 has had this feature for a long time

[idlake]

Plan 9 has a lot of good ideas in it, and I hope that many more of them make it into Linux.

However, unionfs did not originate with Plan 9--other UNIX systems have had it, too. I don't think it even came from Bell Labs.

It's a shame that novel OS's like Plan 9 are largely ignored, only for some of their features to be introduced later into mainstream OS's as "new" ideas.

Plan 9 was/is a research system; that's it's function in life. As long as the developers of other systems don't falsely claim that they invented it, and as long as they reference the inventors in publications, it's OK. Some large computer manufacturers are not quite honest about this sort of thing, though, and claim that they are constantly "innovating" when in reality, they are just copying.

Re:Knoppix has come full circle

[rokzy]

LiveDVDs are here, at least from SUSE

Re:Knoppix can REALLY impress

[qewl]

Feather is a great distribution for doing this. It only needs 128 to 256 MB to have everything loaded and still plenty of processing ram. Great for somewhat older computers and has all the hardware recognition of Knoppix 3.6

Re:What about a beowulf cluster of these?

[advocate_one]

Yes... just google for it... it comes up top with just a simple search... deity... kids these days want everything served up for them... too darn lazy, that's what it is... grrr... when I were a lad... we had to build our own clusters from scratch... none of these new fangled magic tools like ClusterKnoppix... aye... right tough we were...

Re:Are they going down the 'desktop fluff' path?

[d1v1d3byz3r0]

Gentoo. You can configure to your humble heart's content.

Re:Are they going down the 'desktop fluff' path?

[TractorBarry]

Hear hear.

Try Slackware. You'll love it. And by default you'll have to type "startx" to get any sort of GUI action going on.

Re:Knoppix is really good

[Mad Merlin]

You could always offer to buy the computer outright if it doesn't go back to the way it was before you got there after you have a look at it with Knoppix (which it of course it will). The sales clerk may think they have an easy sale on their hands.

Live DVD

[HogynCymraeg]

The concept of LiveDVD has already been done: Suse LiveDVD This is probably not the first.

Bullshit!

[Anonymous Coward]

You could always offer to buy the computer outright if it doesn't go back to the way it was before you got there after you have a look at it with Knoppix (which it of course it will).

Have you ever tried rebooting a computer (ab)used as a demo in a computer store? The chances are that in 85% cases it won't even boot. (Yes, IAACSC - i am a comp. store clerk). Besides, if you think any intelligent person would ever let you boot your own OS in his machine than you must be crazy. "Oh, look, it went back to the way it was before I got there after I had a look at it with Knoppix, which proves I have not installed any trojans!" I seriously hope your post was a joke.

Re:write to its own disk?

[clsc]

I understand this to be the exact case. From TFA:

Damit lassen sich im laufenden System sämtliche Dateien verändern; selbst das Nachinstallieren von Software in das CD-Linux ist problemlos möglich.

"With this all data on the running system can be changed; even post-install of software on the linux CD is possible without problems"

(no, i don't know exactly what the term "post-install" ("Nachinstallieren") means but i guess it's just any install of software that is not already on the disk)

Re:Writing to NTFS...

[Anonymous Coward]

google translation tools indicated the ntfs support mentioned in the article is the standard limited write support currently available in the 2.6.x kernel series: you can write to existing files on NTFS as long as you don't change the length of the file.

-brendan

Re:Writing to NTFS...

[clsc]

... a loopback file methinks. At least TFA states that you have to create an empty file of the desired size in your Windows partition first. It also states that there's a tool that does this for you, so you don't have to boot Windows first.

Not On BitTorrent yet...

[dohboy]

...but here's where to grab it once it is released:

http://torrent.unix-ag.uni-kl.de/

Re:Knoppix is really good

[Tomcat666]

My current laptop (HP/Compaq NX9030) doesn't run any kernel of the current Knoppix version well - driver modprobing crashes, one of them gets the laptop to just hang, the other one won't start X automatically and most stuff doesn't seem to work right. I haven't tried out the many boot options, but that also implies that it doesn't work that well.

However, the main OS on that laptop is Ubuntu Warty. I've never had a single problem concerning the hardware, everything works like a charm since the installation, the current Hoary LiveCD runs perfectly.

I agree to using Knoppix to test a laptop at the store, because if it works well it'll be a great Linux machine - but you might miss out on a few deals.

I guess the conclusion is: Try the LiveCD of the distro you want to install. If you want to install Ubuntu later, don't try Knoppix on the machine, it might make a difference.

keyloggers

[js7a]

Knoppix is not immune to hardware keyloggers or BIOS-level keyloggers, the latter of which have been rumored to exist (I have my doubts .)

However, it's plenty easy to install a hardware keylogger undetectably inside a chassis.

There are easier, safer ways for public terminal security.

Re:Like slax?

[Anonymous Coward]

While the two filesystems share some of the same properties unionfs also provides snapshotting and sandboxing. Also unionfs is developed as a stackable file system which was far easier to port to 2.6. If you had to take an existing 2.2 or 2.4 file system and port it over to 2.6 its a substantial amount of work. Many things have changed from 2.4 to 2.6.

Re:coLinux and live CDs

[DrXym]

While it would be cool to see Colinux working, I seriously doubt it will allow networking. Getting colinux to network is a massive pain involving installing Win32-Tap, reboots, messing around with bridges / NAT, fiddling Linux-side to make it work and generally ripping your hair out. This is definitely one area that requires improvement - both for Colinux and Microsoft who should ship some kind of TAP device by default.

Once it does work, it works like a charm, but it took me a couple of hours to figure it to work with my setup. I started with a pre3.0 Debian root_fs I grabbed from the net. Once I got the networking going, I changed sources.list and upgraded to Debian 'sarge' dist. Now I have a lovely GNOME 2.8 desktop all running under XP at (my guess) 80-90% of native speed. I've sucessfully gotten both VNC and NX to run under it though performance through NX is more sluggish than I expected.

And if you want Knoppix to run from the hard drive

[Anonymous Coward]

You should see how easy it was to install this damn thing - you can either use "sudo knoppix-installer" for a hand held new install or do this to literally get the live cd working on the PC with a persistent home directory -

* Partition the harddisk to make room for knoppix:
o ext2 partition /dev/hda1 used to boot the kernel with lilo (30 Meg)
o ext2 partition /dev/hda2 for the knoppix image (I used 10000 Meg, but 800 Meg should be enough)
o swap partition /dev/hda3 (I used 1024 Meg)
o ext2 partition /dev/hda4 for the persistent home (rest of drive
* Boot the knoppix cd with the cheatcode "tohd=/dev/hda2". This will copy the knoppix image to disk
* Reboot the knoppix cd with the cheatcode "fromhd=/dev/hda2" and check if it runs without the cd.
* Make the persistent homedir via the knoppix menu (penguin icon->configuration->make persistent dir, use entire /dev/hda4 and format)
* Do not save your KNOPPIX configuration via the menu, all changes to the environment will be saved automatically because of the persistent home.
* Copy the files from /boot to /mnt/hda1. Also copy the file "/mnt/cdrom/boot/isolinux/minirt24.gz" from the cd to /mnt/hda1.

Note, you will need to mount hda1 and make it read/write. The copying can only be done with sudo, thence the command to copy is "sudo cp /boot/* /mnt/hda1". Or, you can use su. I just found sudo was fine.

* Copy /etc/lilo.conf to /mnt/hda1 and make the following boot entries (do not forget to uncomment the line with "prompt", or else the lilo boot menu will not appear): (vi /mnt/hda1/lilo.conf)

Note, learn vi commands first

image=/mnt/hda1/vmlinuz
initrd=/mnt/hda1/minirt 24.gz
append="fromhd=/dev/hda2 home=/dev/hda4 lang=us myconfig=/mnt/hda4"
root=/dev/hda2
label=Knoppix
read-write

* Mount the /mnt/hda1 partition temporary as /boot so lilo writes its map-file to the right place (sudo mount /dev/hda1 /boot)
* Let lilo write the boot loader to the master boot record (sudo lilo -C /mnt/hda1/lilo.conf)
* Remove the knoppix cd-rom and reboot.

That's it. you can use lilo.conf to set up another OS that exists, like Windows 98. I chose to dedicate the disk, seems easier. 10 minutes and I'm working with a fully functional Knoppix bootable hdd based PC.

Now THAT fuckign rocks hard.

Re:Knoppix has come full circle

[quake74]

I don't know if that was a joke or not, but if you need LaTeX ona a LiveDVD you can use Quantian. I just downloaded the 0.6.9.3 (or try an older version for a LiveCD) and it' quite impressive. It also has AucTeX for Emacs and a bunch of other math packages I don't really use.

Re:coLinux and live CDs

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, we can do Knoppix for Windows from CD ... there's a QEMU on the CD which autoruns, and the CD will boot 'real' as well so there's no waste when you have finished learning and want to take the trainer wheels off. Not highly performant under QEMU, but good enough. Treats Windows like a NAT-router-firewall (!), so networking is preconfigured.

Torrents here

Ubuntu Warty is fine, if a little sluggish because HZ is 1000; but that is fixable.

Last time I tried Hoary there were slight problems with not supporting a virtual Cirrus Logic graphics adapter; hope it gets fixed.

unionfs workalike on BSD / Mac OS X

[headLITE]

Just for your information, Mac OS X and other BSDs can mount anything over another directory without hiding its own content. For example, on Mac OS X you'd use the -o union mount option to merge two different filesystems.

the best is always improvable

[BilliamBlake]

I hope this versin fixes the two biggest problems that I have had with the latest 3.6 (never tried 3.7 but I see it's available) - specifically:

1 - problem with captive ntfs (doesn't work unless you add the appropriate user and group). It's easier for me to use BartPE or Winternals.

2 - inadequite x support for flatscreen monitors (yes, I have tried many different cheatcodes for fixing this, even copying what is set on the native os) It seems there is about a 10-20% failure rate.

Having said that I am looking forwared to the new version.

Re:the best is always improvable

[Sylver Dragon]

Just gave captive-ntfs a go under Knoppix 3.7. It's still broken. It is necessary to add the captive user and group through KUser before you can mount NTFS partitions. Also, I tend to manually copy in the ntfs.sys and ntoskrnl.exe from floppy, as I had problems with captive under 3.6 if those files weren't from XP-SP1a, and I don't have any computers around that aren't SP2 already.

Re:spyware/malware cleaner on a livecd

[skadus]

You might try this. It's the Ultimate Boot CD for Windows. Takes a XP disc, makes a LiveCD out of it, and adds stuff like AntiVir to it.

I've used it once or twice (was testing it on a computer I was about to reformat anyway to see if it booted), but I haven't really gotten into all the programs, so I can't tell you much else than it exists. :p

Horrible fonts.

[Anonymous Coward]

This is not a troll! I installed 3.7 and the fonts were awful! Isn't there a way to have them look pretty out of the gate? It was very noticeable under the Spe python editor and mozilla. Any suggestions for fixing would be greatly appreciated. Thx Ovapositor (too hurrried to log in)

Re:Writing to NTFS...

[irgu]

Captive NTFS is defunct for a year now: Development Status: Project is no longer developed. It's very pitty it couldn't achieve reliability.

Knoppix uses the rewritten NTFS driver which supports loopback read-write mounting a file on NTFS. Nothing new, the now also dead Phat Linux already did the same in 2002 with the same open source kernel driver. Currently the most popular "run Linux from NTFS" distribution is TopologiLinux.

It's very nice to see Knoppix caught up too.

Note of caution

[rwa2]

I've run into at least one laptop that runs KNOPPIX fine, but hangs when loading Linux from disk (under Knoppix, Debian, and Redhat FC3). These distributions all install fine, but they invariably hang up halfway through the boot process, on inane things like starting up the print service (and stuff that has nothing to do with hardware). It's always in the same spot (but on different services between the different distros).

Really has me frustrated. BTW, the hardware in question is an Alienware Area-51m laptop.

Re:Any news, rumors, even hints

[headLITE]

Well CeBIT is from March 10 through March 16 so I speculate 3.8 will be available in two weeks?

hohoho

[bitspotter]

English version of the article

Re:Knoppix is really good

[Anonymous Coward]

That's interesting - I have an NX9010 running Libranet and it boots Knoppix perfectly (mind you, doesn't like the latest firewire drivers).

JB