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Thread: Replace default cd home drive with persistant home drive ???

  1. #1
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    Replace default cd home drive with persistant home drive ???

    I'd like to replace the current default home drive from the knoppix cd,with my persistant home drive (which is in the form of one file).
    Anybody an idea on how to work to pull this one off ?

    This way ,even when the home drive get's corrupted during the job. It's solved after a simple reboot (turn power off and on again).

  2. #2
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    Hi ktheking,

    I am not sure I understand your goal.

    I have set up a project called burn_home.
    http://www.knoppix.net/docs/index.php/BurnHome

    Files on a second CD are automatically read into
    /ramdisk/home/knoppix at boot.

    You may work with them in memory.
    If you want to start over -- just shut the power
    off and reboot.

    If you want to save the canges you must use the
    second drive as a CDRW to burn you new
    persistnet home.

    This requires no hard drive or memory stick but
    does boot from a floppy. You will likely need 250
    to 500mb of memory.

    Best Wishes
    paradocs

  3. #3
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    Thanks for you interest...

    What I understood of your project was to use a CDRW so that a writable part as home drive could be used.

    In my case that is not exactly what I need.
    My goal is to :
    -Start knoppix livecd.
    -Use persistant home script (standard in each knoppix) to create you own home file (which is compressed).
    and now it comes :
    -Rework the knoppix livecd ,so that this home file which will be then also present on this livecd, will overwrite the default home drive (or use it directly at boot).This also means that as much programs as possible from the livecd have to be removed ,in order to make place for this home drive file .
    Using the KDE startupoptions (much like the windoze startup) ,will enable people to easely create their own adapted knoppix easely.
    I already used this principle using a HDbased knoppix. And it work fine.
    BUT... transferring this principle to a livecd is beyond my knowledge.

    It is much like the morphix principle ,but my goal is to create this for newbies like me who's knowledge is very limited and for which the use of Morphix is already too complicated .

    I hope this will explain it ....

    Koen..

  4. #4
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    Greetings,

    Yes, I see you are searching for a easy way to
    add to KANOPPIX without remastering.
    If you have enough disk space and partitions
    and time remastering is best.

    But your idea of quickly adding to KNOPPIX is
    interesting.

    If you don't need to add too much (prehaps just a
    presentation, mp3, or a document) and if you
    could live with a floppy boot -- try this experiment.

    Make a folder on your computer and in it make
    a folder called knoppix and copy the knoppix file into
    it. Also add to the folder on your computer the mp3
    and documents. There is not much room -- but
    remember you do not need all the files on KNOPPIX,
    only the one file.

    Now boot from a floppy with cheat codes to run
    knoppix form your non-bootable CD. Write a script
    to move or start you files.

    Let me know if this works.

    If you want more room - how about a DVD!

    Best Wishes,
    paradocs

    Let me know if this experiment work

  5. #5
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    I think what this person wants is a way to customize his/her home directory and then burn a custom Knoppix based CD which will load his custom /home/knoppix directory instead of the current default one.

    This is on the same thread as what I'm thinking about doing with Knoppix. My thought is to build a web page that'll allow me to enter in some custom user information( email related initially ) and then it'll generate a custom ISO file with this pre-set for the knoppix userid. I'll also want the default boot to have home=scan and myconfig=scan. The idea is to allow me to build custom Knoppix based CD's for family and friends where they won't have to do anything but boot the CD and they'll be able to get their email and browse( plus lots more ) all without entering anything at boot time.

    Back to the current issue. There should be a couple of ways to address this. One would be to either use the current "persist home directory" script to build your knoppix.img filesystem file and find the right init script location/name to replace the default /home/knoppix directory with the /home/knoppix filesystem in knoppix.img. Another way would be to use "tar" to create a copy of your custom /home/knoppix directory and then add a simple script to /etc/init.d to extract it over the default /home/knoppix directory. Then, just link the script in /etc/init.d to the correct runlevel directory( /etc/rc?.d ) so the extraction happens at the runlevel you want. You'll want to do it before rc5.d( runlevel 5 ).

    This all means you need to know enough to be able to build your own Knoppix CD since this is all about customizing AND building a custom CD.

    I hope this helps.

  6. #6
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    I could manage this fairly easy if I would know how to copy the persistant home image file to a RAM drive (which is then possible to acces in READ/WRITE) ,BEFORE the option home=........ is entering into action.
    This means that in this case I could alter the startupoption of the cd to home=RAMDRIVE/mypersistanthomefile.img .

    So now the sequential order of what the cd at boot should do :
    -cd should contain the file mypersistanthomefile.img
    -at boot it should copy this file to a RAM drive and turned into READ/WRITE acces.
    -now use the option home=RAMDRIVE/mypersistanthomefile.img to load my personal settings.

    I think a lot of people would use this .... and apreceate it

  7. #7
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    On-Demand customization of Knoppix

    Quote Originally Posted by locutus
    ...This is on the same thread as what I'm thinking about doing with Knoppix. My thought is to build a web page that'll allow me to enter in some custom user information( email related initially ) and then it'll generate a custom ISO file with this pre-set for the knoppix userid. I'll also want the default boot to have home=scan and myconfig=scan. The idea is to allow me to build custom Knoppix based CD's for family and friends where they won't have to do anything but boot the CD and they'll be able to get their email and browse( plus lots more ) all without entering anything at boot time...
    Wow, this is very close to a notion I had when I first became interested in Linux several years ago. I wonder how many other people have thought of something like it?

    With Knoppix' hardware recognition and configuration ability, it might now be practical to customize Knoppix for each application, but there are a few problems that would need to be overcome:

    • - Knoppix loads to RAM from a read-only CD, so if the user wants to save his work it has to be stored somewhere on a hard drive or other nonvolatile storage available to the computer. Perhaps the new USB "keys" are the best solution to that problem for most applications, but I have an application in mind, VHS-to-DVD, which requires a great deal of temporary storage for the digitized video. If the computer's hard drive is formatted NTFS then perhaps a serial ATA hard drive would be the best solution for someone who wanted to transpose his VHS family movies to DVD but wasn't up to partitioning his hard drive or installing a new one in his computer.

      - Each user's work could be stored in encrypted form, with the key on the CD. A password might also be desirable to prevent someone from stealing the CD and accessing the owner's files that way. Of course the encryption key and password need to be stored somewhere safe in case the CD needs to be replaced.

      - I suppose that what you have in mind is to download, or run from CD, some kind of minimal Knoppix to run on the target computer for which the Kustom Knoppix is to be created. That program would look around on the computer to see what hardware there is, perhaps ask some configuration questions of the prospective user, then report its findings back to the server which would then create a custom Knoppix with only the software necessary for what the user wants to do on the target computer. Presuming that the Kustom Knoppix is for someone who isn't likely to read instructions and doesn't care about the details of an operating system, you could also leave out most of the documentation that comes with Knoppix. The last problem is, how to get the CD to the user? I found downloading and burning an ISO to be pretty much a no-brainer with standard CD burning programs in Windows, but that method of distribution requires a high-speed internet connection.


    No doubt many more issues would arise in attempting such a scheme, but it does seem that Mr. Knopper has shown that it might be possible.

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