Knoppix 6.7.0: A View from the Forest

[utu]

Greetings, again Forester.

Are we on the same wavelength again? I think so.
The word 're-mastering' is itself a problem.

I surely don't imply the process KK must go through to make a new version of Knoppix.
Surely, he includes some new source compilation; I can forego that.
He brings in new kernels and makes all the drivers that go with that.
Lots of stuff I'm sure I don't even know about.
I'm talking about things a non-pro user might want to tide himself over between
official Knoppix versions. Something just little more elegant than persistence plus
backup.

What I would settle for in 'selection' might simply include a few Synaptic additions,
some minor home-grown script additions, plus the sundry tweaks one puts into tailoring
one's desktop. Nail these down and pack them into the compressed image. Have the
option to store that as a snapshot on a liveCD as well as a LiveUSB. I don't find it
useful to move all my stuff into VirtualBox or VMWare to try out new things, especially
on a Windows workspace. Been there; done that.

I have the feeling that handling Synaptic removal of things in KKs original compressed
file may be off-limits for any simple solution. I can give that up. Or, I can try it and
throw out the result and go back to a previous snapshot of everything that worked before.

The 'testing' phase I use is just everyday use of my LiveUSB. Whatever works, I keep
in persistence. If it doesn't work, I don't keep it. If it doesn't work and ruins my
current LiveUSB, I back up to an earlier version for which I have a (compressed) copy
of KNOPPIX-DATA that works and bring that in as update.tar.gz. Moving KNOPPIX-DATA into
KNOPPIX occasionally would solve the back-up problem automatically, and more elegantly.

I see 'Generating' as the neat scripts you and Capricorny and Werner use to re-generate
a new KNOPPIX file from an old one plus the accumulated 'additions' in persistence.
And re-plenishing the persistence file, of course.
Creating such a script is beyond both my capabilities and interest, but I'd like to
have the capability of such a script in my working LiveUSB. Here's my take on the
possibilities I know about:

The following table outlines my current estimate of the state of progress along these lines.
It would have been a little prettier if odf formats were allowed on the forum.
I will be glad to correct any errors in this representation.

                                       
iso Product  Workspace   Virtual     Infra-     Principle     LiveCD  LiveUSB  KK        KK
Concept      Req'd?      Req'd?      Structure  Status        Product Product  Aware     Interest

PCLinuxOS    No          Immaterial  Mandriva   In Practice   Yes     No       Probably  Prob Not
Forester     No          Optional    Knoppix    --?--         No      No       Prob Not  Likely
Capricorny   Yes         Optional    Knoppix    Proven        No      No       Prob Not  --?--
Schulz       Yes         Essential   Knoppix    Proven        No      No       Yes       Some

Desired      Pref No     Optional    Knoppix    Proven        Yes     Yes      Yes       Yes

My intention is to advocate a progression of one or more of these, or similar, concepts toward
a state of visibility sufficent to attract KK's awareness and interest such that that these new
functions might actually appear in some future incarnation of Knoppix.

We probably need a different name than re-mastering for this modest upgrade of Knoppix.
Something like it is called mylivecd in PCLinuxOS.