Linux Live USB creator review.

[woodsmoke]

http://betanews.com/2012/05/02/linux...e-too-utility/

comments?

woodsmoke

[SteveRiley]

I think you should use this, with its enable-launching-in-Windows feature, for your classroom experiment. But instead of giving the drives directly to your students, litter a few of them around the classroom and let them become "found objects." Be sure to include an autorun.inf so that the virtual machine containing Bohdi automatically starts. Then just observe. Should be fun

[woodsmoke]

nice idea, but how would one add the autorun?

woodsmoke

[rms]

nice idea, but how would one add the autorun?

woodsmoke

http://www.autoruntools.com/autorun-inf.php

[woodsmoke]

sounds like a plan!
woodsmoke

[capt-zero]

Okay, is this program available for linux? We already have a long and involved thread on this subject and I still can't get linux on a USB stick. Will we have to resort to Windows to get this done?

capt-zero

[SteveRiley]

I still can't get linux on a USB stick

A quick search didn't turn up any other thread with your name that discussed USB booting, so forgive me if I overlooked it. Have you tried unetbootin? It's the repo, just apt-get install it.

[dancingmadrb3]

I actually use this all the time for all my linux usb needs, it actually works better then most of the stuff in linux itself for this sort of thing.

[capt-zero]

SteveRiley,

This "flash drive installs read 1st post B4" was the thread I was refering to. Also, I believe there is a thread in the 'How-to" section started by dibl on the subject. Once again I return to my first question, is linux live USB creator available in Linux? All the download places I checked out, had it only available for Windows. I've tried unetbootin and imagewriter, and could get neither to work for me. I've been trying to make bootable Linux Usb sticks with a couple of 8 Gb Sandisk Cruzers I have without any luck. Because of the trouble I've had in the past, I've kinda shelved the project for a while. I'm limited on my drives to 700 MB so there a number of distros I haven't tried, but would like to take a look at.

capt-zero

[woodsmoke]

Hi Capt. Zero.

Here is what I, personally, do to install a Linux on a usb stick.

A) about the minimum size for accomplishing it is 4 gig, I got Bodhi to install on one with some room to spare.
B) 8 gig will do Kubuntu.
C) I have done this with several somewhat older machines that have the hardware that recognizes basic usb.
D) Remove all usb connected components, such as an external usb hard drive, usb printer, a usb blue tooth dongle, etc. HOWEVER, one can keep a usb (wireless) mouse and keyboard.
E) Open the dvd or cd bay and put the disc in but do not close the drive.
F) Turn off the computer, keeping the drive open.
G) Remove the hard drive that is normally used.
H) Insert the usb drive into a usb port.
I) Turn on the computer and one will see the live cd load as normal.
J) Just install normally, and when one is at the screen to pick the drive or partition the usb drive will be RENAMED to something like hda or some similar Linux file term.
K) Tell it to format and install and go for it.
L) The install time will NOT be faster than for a hard drive, or if it is then a relatively negligible amount.

NOTE: Contrary to other posts, I have not found a method for removing the U3 file system from a SanDisk and ALSO getting the drive space to use. When one uses the Sandisk removal tool, it does, indeed, seem to remove the U3 system but the partition is unreadable by Linux I have not been able to resize it to minimize the footprint.

I would highly recommend getting ANY kind of generic usb stick because all that I have tested allow one to format to FAT and have the whole drive for use.

If you have any questions, please ask.

woodsmoke

[dancingmadrb3]

SteveRiley,

This "flash drive installs read 1st post B4" was the thread I was refering to. Also, I believe there is a thread in the 'How-to" section started by dibl on the subject. Once again I return to my first question, is linux live USB creator available in Linux? All the download places I checked out, had it only available for Windows. I've tried unetbootin and imagewriter, and could get neither to work for me. I've been trying to make bootable Linux Usb sticks with a couple of 8 Gb Sandisk Cruzers I have without any luck. Because of the trouble I've had in the past, I've kinda shelved the project for a while. I'm limited on my drives to 700 MB so there a number of distros I haven't tried, but would like to take a look at.

capt-zero

You can always try the app in wine, I never tried it in wine yet but its worth a shot

[capt-zero]

woodsmoke and dancingmadrb3,

I've recently installed Kubuntu Precise on one of my sticks and couldn't get it to boot. My machine appears to have the boot from removable source at the bios screen, but I get the message "no bootable device found" when trying. However, when I first began to use Linux I became interested in Backtrack and loaded it to one of my sticks with no apparent trouble using Unetbootin. No subsequent loading attempt has been successful. I've never tried an install with my HDDs disconected before though; interesting idea. Also, I've had the notion of installing Wine, but havn't played with it yet. The only Windows app I've been interested in is Civilisation III and it doesn't run under Wine. I realise my problem probably lies with Sandisk rather than elsewhere, but those sticks are what I'm stuck with for a bit. SanDisk is in bed with MS and basically when I sent an email to them for assistance, the answer was that they designed their sticks to run with what they considered "official" operating systems, not pirate systems.

Thanx,
capt-zero

[dequire]

...the answer was that they designed their sticks to run with what they considered "official" operating systems, not pirate systems.

Absolutely both ridiculous, hilarious, and ignorant at the same time. Would you have a copy of the email by chance?

[perspectoff]

I also use SanDisk 8 Gb Cruzer USB sticks. They are easily and automatically recognised in both my Oneiric and Precise installations (as well as in Windows) as soon as I plug them in. (They were recognised in previous versions, too, but from my memory those old versions are fading, fading, fading...)

I DID NOT need to remove the U3 system nor to re-format or change the sticks in any way. The U3 system appears as a separate folder -- I just ignore it. (When I use the (K)Ubuntu Startup Disk Creator, I also ignore the U3 folder -- it is irrelevant to the process.)

I used the offical Ubuntu instructions for "How to create a bootable USB stick..." at

http://www.ubuntu.com/download/help/...re-you-install

and it worked like a charm with these USB sticks. I installed Ubuntu Server, Kubuntu Alternate, and Kubuntu LiveCD (12.04 LTS both 32-bit and 64-bit) from USB sticks using these instructions, on multiple machines. No problems.

On an 8-year-old computer I did have to adjust my BIOS (option F2 at boot) to allow booting from "USB Floppies" (which is the term used by it), which the BIOS initially disallowed by default (it is a security risk). Once I allowed it, I was able to boot from the USB stick using the BIOS Boot menu (option F10 at boot).

Once I finished installing the OS from the USB stick, I again set the BIOS to disallow booting from the USB removable device (it is a security risk).

For REALLY old computers that don't allow booting from USB drives at all, Pendrivelinux has a method to enable booting from a USB stick with the aid of a special CD:

http://www.pendrivelinux.com/make-a-...-ubuntu-11-10/

(I don't see their updated instructions for 12.04, yet).

[GreyGeek]

When I installed Kubuntu 10.04.4 on an Acer 3690 last week I used unetbootin to create the LiveUSB stick that installed it. The problem was that unetbootin put grub on the stick and not on sda. I couldn't boot 10.04 without the stick in the USB slot. So, I used Kubuntu's "Startup Disk Creator" to make a LiveUSB stick and used it, which installed grub on sda and allowed a boot of 10.04 without the LiveUSB stick installed.