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Operating Systems Software Linux

Knoppix 4.0 DVD - Like a Kid in a Candy Store 353

Posted by timothy from the that's-a-lotta-knoppix dept.
IdleTime writes "O'Reilly Developer Weblogs has a nice review of the new yet unreleased Knoppix 4.0 on DVD. As the article says 'A totally new release of Knoppix was unveiled at LinuxTag 2005, Knoppix 4.0. This is the release that introduces the split between "maxi" DVD and "mini" CD releases. I've tried out the 4.0 DVD and let me tell you, I'm like a kid in a candy store.'" AlexanderT points to some currently available torrent files for the DVD.
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Knoppix 4.0 DVD - Like a Kid in a Candy Store More

Knoppix 4.0 DVD - Like a Kid in a Candy Store

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  • maybe im alone on this one (Score:5, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 27, 2005 @09:32PM (#12927942)
    But the article could have been summed up by just saying "it has tons of packages. Pretty much everything you'd expect."

    • Re:maybe im alone on this one (Score:4, Interesting)

      by (1+-sqrt(5))*(2**-1) ( 868173 ) <1.61803phi@gmail.com> on Monday June 27, 2005 @10:00PM (#12928172) Homepage
      [I]t has tons of packages. Pretty much everything you'd expect.
      That said, I really hope they put LaTeX back in the DVD version; LaTeX was my main motivation for booting up Knoppix at school.

  • RE: Knoppix plug (Score:5, Funny)

    by Tezkah ( 771144 ) on Monday June 27, 2005 @09:34PM (#12927965)
    This is the release that introduces the split between "maxi" DVD and "mini" CD releases

    My question is: are the maxi ones super absorbancy?

  • Woo! Knoppix! (Score:4, Funny)

    by idonthack ( 883680 ) on Monday June 27, 2005 @09:34PM (#12927967)
    It's made of pure awesome.

  • Uh (Score:2)

    by Sir_Real ( 179104 )
    One of the links to the torrents, links back to a slashdot 404. And the DE in the filename of two of the other links make me suspicious that they are German.

  • Nice....... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by compmanio36 ( 882809 ) on Monday June 27, 2005 @09:35PM (#12927973)
    See, this is awesome, because I can finally have everything I ever wanted in Linux with me, to run on any PC with a DVD drive (and who doesn't have one these days?), without having to install a thing. This means when I go to a friend's house, I don't have to use their spyware infested Windows partition, I can just pop in the Knoppix DVD and run that.

    I would like to know what else is included in the DVD version that isn't in the CD variant, though.

    • Re:Nice....... (Score:3, Interesting)

      by superpulpsicle ( 533373 )
      After seeing fedora core 4 crash with the eclipse that it comes with natively, I am skeptical of all new distros and features.

      We are at the point where we release too fast squeezing everything into every version on every distro. I am starting to think 2 releases a year is a rush.

      • Re:Nice....... (Score:4, Funny)

        by kesuki ( 321456 ) on Monday June 27, 2005 @10:32PM (#12928369) Journal
        I am starting to think 2 releases a year is a rush.

        I think you're ready for Debian linux. The current stable release spent 4 years getting ready to be released. Then they delayed the release by 6 months because 'it wasn't ready.'
        • I think you're ready for Debian linux. The current stable release spent 4 years getting ready to be released. Then they delayed the release by 6 months because 'it wasn't ready.'

          That's nothing Microsoft is projecting the first stable release of Windows in 2018. Not to be outdone, 3D Realms said Duke Nukem Forever will be released sometime after that just to make sure that all the bugs are really gone.

          However, they failed to clarify which software they were referring to.

      • Re:Nice....... (Score:2, Insightful)

        by everphilski ( 877346 )
        Come, my son. Come to the cool waters of Slackware Linux...
        -everphilski-

  • From the article (Score:5, Funny)

    by Jonathan ( 5011 ) on Monday June 27, 2005 @09:36PM (#12927983) Homepage
    "I've really only scratched the surface of the Knoppix 4.0 DVD"

    Ouch -- it hasn't been released yet and he's already ruined his copy? Hopefully he didn't delete the image file or he'll have to download it again.

    • Re:From the article (Score:3, Informative)

      by kesuki ( 321456 )
      These are DVD's you have to gouge the surface pretty bad to damage the data layer, which is in the middle. Clearly he's happy that unlike CD's when he 'barely scratched the surface' his knoppix 4.0 DVD kept working normally.

  • Does it have the Windows QEMU (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    The coolest Knoppix I've seen was last year's linuxtag (I think) that had a windows version of QEMU so if you autorun it on a Windoze machine it'll run Linux in a window.

    That sold one of my coworkers on it, and now he typically boots to linux instead of windows.

  • I love knoppix and all, but when was the last time you popped it into someone else's computer (especialy one at work or school if your not IT/fixing it) and didn't get your head bitten off.

    Hell, I still like booting school computers into knoppix when no one is looking, then taking the CD out and walking off. They FREAK out... lol

    • Re:Don't get me wrong... (Score:5, Interesting)

      by joe_bruin ( 266648 ) on Monday June 27, 2005 @10:09PM (#12928239) Homepage Journal
      I love knoppix and all, but when was the last time you popped it into someone else's computer (especialy one at work or school if your not IT/fixing it) and didn't get your head bitten off.

      Well, when I was travelling around the country, visiting my friends and family, for one. I wanted to ssh into my machine to read my mail, browse the web using firefox, and play my mp3s. To accomplish this on their spyware-ridden Windows machines, I brought with my a Knoppix CD, and a DVD of my mp3 files. No installing software on their machines (they surely don't have ssh installed), no worries about having my password stolen by whoever rooted that computer, no annoying pop-ups. Using Knoppix was the least intrusive method of doing this, as their PC is 100% back to its original state when I'm done with it.
      • Do you check your SSH host key fingerprints?
      • Did you check for hardware keyloggers on the borrowed machines before connecting to your servers using ssh? Even if you trust your friends/family not to install them, there's always the weird room mate to consider. Maybe having one time passwords on the server would help in that case just to be sure...
    • Hell, I still like booting school computers into knoppix when no one is looking, then taking the CD out and walking off. They FREAK out... lol
      Here's an idea... leave the disk in when you leave.
      Blanks don't cost much, and it's one way to "spread the word".

  • yeah but.... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by to_kallon ( 778547 ) on Monday June 27, 2005 @09:39PM (#12928015)
    good distro, rather light review, but, and bear with me on this one, what about machines that lack dvd-roms?
    i promise they're out there, they're not even uncommon. sure, any pre-packaged machine will have one these days but, imho, one of the advantages to knoppix has always been all the functionality you get from a just one cd. i can certainly see how nice it is to have the choice of 7+ window managers and all those bulky suites that were being cut, but no mention is made regarding the continuation of the cd-based distro. is it going to be dropped?
    download time is, as always, also a factor to consider.
    i'm sure i'll download and try out this release, as i have with more than i can remember in the past, but it crosses my mind to wonder if such bulk might not hurt the usefullness of a traditionally handy distro.

    • Maxi = DVD, Mini = CD (Score:2, Informative)

      by aywwts4 ( 610966 )
      http://linux.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/12/21/ 0050255&tid=190 [slashdot.org] So dont worry; we can have the best of both worlds.
    • I'm thinking of a machine right now that has the DVD drive, but nothing else. IDE has died at the motherboard and will not boot anything other than that DVD drive. And even though the computer is six years old, I want to keep it around. A bootable DVD is perfect for creating a nice little workstation that needs nothing else.

      A cheap thumb drive or small USB hard drive and it's a beast again.
    • In fact, a mention is not only made, the mention was in the Slashdot blurb:

      This is the release that introduces the split between "maxi" DVD and "mini" CD releases.

      The big news is that it's on a DVD, so it's no surprise that little detail is given on the CD version. Likely, it will have most of the same stuff that's been on every other CD release.

    • Re:yeah but.... (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Mike Savior ( 802573 )
      >what about machines that lack dvd-roms?

      That's what you use 3.9 or the "mini" version for. RTFA?

    • Re:yeah but.... (Score:3, Informative)

      by kesuki ( 321456 )
      what about machines that lack dvd-roms?

      Go buy a DVD-burner for $41 [newegg.com] not only can you burn the iso in the torrent, but you can then boot off it.. maybe you prefer a black front panel $45 [newegg.com] or silver $49 [newegg.com]
      perhaps you'd like a full retail box for a few dollars more. [newegg.com]

      Appologies if the capabilities of said drives vary --; and a few are 'one day sale' links... they go up in price by $4 if you missed out on the 'one day sale' price.

      Mind you this is for an NEC brand dvd burner, from a large and well rated online

  • Kid in a candy store? (Score:4, Funny)

    by lheal ( 86013 ) <lheal1999@yah[ ]com ['oo.' in gap]> on Monday June 27, 2005 @09:42PM (#12928032) Journal
    Having RTFA, I see he meant it was fun to look at all the cool treats in store for Knoppix users.

    I was hoping he didn't mean morbidly obese, toothless, and spoiled rotten by overindulgent or inattentive parents.
  • It's nice that you can cram every single package under the sun onto a DVD, but does it really make "knoppix" any better? I mean, the review basically says "OMG Packages! I can run teh Gnome & Firefox, then KDE and Konq! This makes knoppix awesome!!!

    I'm more interested in what the 4.0 "mini" release.

    • I would be more likely to use it as it now sounds like I can possibly have it close to how I want it configured, with UnionFS, I don't have to lose my changes, and it's chocked full of tools so I can just have one Knoppix DVD instead of a couple of specific variation knoppix CD's.

      I agree the review is of the "ohh...shiny" sort, but at the same time being able to carry one DVD and boot to a known (and fully equipped) environment is a nice thing. (assumming where you go has a DVD drive!)
    • I have one PC with a hyper-threading P4 and the recent Knoppix and Ubuntu live CD's I've tried lately all fail to boot. The LILO screen works and the kernel loads, but almost immediately I get a flood of error messages about IRQ 18 and then the kernels all hang or slowly repeat the errors over and over again.
    • UnionFS gets rave reviews, but is it possible to write the DVD in some extensible format that lets you burn the basic Knoppix onto it and then burn some extra data tracks for other applications (and then mount them with UnionFS or whatever)? That would make it easy to upgrade packages and to add a bunch of user data onto the basic distro, without having to rebuild your own.

      Also, I'm curious if the files are compressed? It's a tradeoff of storage and disk read speed vs. CPU speed, and unlike CDs, I'm

  • At the other end of the spectrum ... (Score:5, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 27, 2005 @09:51PM (#12928093)
    we have Damn Small Linux. www.damnsmalllinux.org

    It takes just 50 MB and can be run off read only memory (or memory that you shouldn't write too much to) like compact flash or a usb dongle. It is a riff off Knoppix. It is the easiest way to create an 'embedded' system that I've seen.

    Not only does Linux scale well but so, apparently, does Knoppix.
  • I just looked at the package list and Knoppix is still using XFree. Is Knoppix the only distro that still uses that? Why havnt they done to X.org? When the hole licence thing happened I switched all my machines(im on gentoo) and I never had a problem. Anyway it looks like a great release and I look foward to getting it.

    • Re:XFree? (Score:5, Informative)

      by Bri3D ( 584578 ) on Monday June 27, 2005 @10:00PM (#12928178) Journal
      Because Debian(which Knoppix is based on) still runs XFree.
      • It'll take them another couple of months to change but Debian will change to X.Org eventually! There's still a couple of issues eg the C++ conversion that are apparently more important at the moment. It won't happen overnight, but it will happen.

  • FYI: you can't choose the software (Score:5, Informative)

    by beforewisdom ( 729725 ) on Monday June 27, 2005 @10:00PM (#12928188)
    Please don't interpret this as a downer.

    I use knoppix myself, I think it is the best distro out there and I plan on continue using knoppix.

    I am just posting this because I was curious about it and had to go to the trouble to find out.

    If you are interested in installing the DVD version of Knoppix to your hard drive you have to install it all. You can't pick and choose among the software.

    FWIW.....
    • This is true. The installer is a dialog/Xdialog script that guides the user to partition the HD, create a user account, enter the root passwd, and then decompresses the entire compresed loopback KNOPPIX and KNOPPIX2 files to the new partition. Then it applies the user info, converts the init & runlevels to be normal init system, and installs grub to the MBR. At no point is there any choice in deciding which packages to install since ALL of them get installed.

      Knoppix users & newbies should also note

  • Saving a borked system (Score:5, Informative)

    by kebes ( 861706 ) on Monday June 27, 2005 @10:04PM (#12928211) Journal
    Many of you already know this, but one of the great things about linux LiveCDs is the ability to work on an otherwise screwed-up computer, and salvage it (or the data on it, etc.). A LiveCD is absolutely great for fixing a Windows or linux PC that has gotten messed up. For instance, you can create backup images of disks using partimage [partimage.org] and restore them with a LiveCD (in particular, the SystemRescueDisk [sysresccd.org] is good for that).

    A Knoppix LiveDVD is more geared towards booting a PC and being productive (with OpenOffice, Blender 3D, etc.)... however it's a great thing to have lying around because you can diagnose and repair a system, do a full virus scan (as pointed out in TFA), while having internet access, being able to open relevant wordprocessor documents, etc. etc. A LiveDVD like this could also help in extracting files from a corrupt filesystem (you can open and work with the files immediately, if that becomes necessary).

    To anyone in the /. crowd that has not played with LiveCDs yet (or linux at all) you should seriously consider burning a copy and seeing what all the fuss is about.
    • I prefer a Windows live CD. You get a full working NTFS read/write driver that way, and you can get support for any other drivers Windows has that way. Go to http://www.nu2.nu/pebuilder/ [nu2.nu] and you get the software necessary to build it. It's a little bit of a pain to set up, but once done you boot to a working Windows evnironment.

      Knoppix is nice for Linux recovery, and I did encounter one NTFS partion that was seriously messed up that Windows didn't know was NTFS but Knoppix could (sorta) read.
      • Knoppix has a utility called "Captive". This nice little utility allows you to actually use the NTFS driver from a Windows installation (Knoppix supports NTFS Reading right off the bat) in order to get fully working NTFS Read/Write.

        You could also put the NTFS(.sys?) driver on a USB drive, or a floppy to use. OR you could use Captive's builtin ability to download some service pack from Microsoft's website and automatically grab the file from there, though it takes awhile to download and I'm sure Microsoft d

  • English version (Score:2, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    The DVD boots into German by default, but this can be changed with the "lang=us" cheatcode [uni-kl.de](several other languages are also supported).

  • Define unreleased (Score:3, Funny)

    by slapout ( 93640 ) on Monday June 27, 2005 @10:29PM (#12928345)
    Two quotes from the Slashdot summary:

    "nice review of the new yet unreleased Knoppix"

    "currently available torrent files for the DVD"

    Someone must be using a definition of "unreleased" that I'm not fimilar with.
  • I've been sitting on the fence for too long now as an IT professional, and if I'm always working with NT then I'm going to lose my perspective, and my edge. Here I go!

  • Waiting for an actual review (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Stauf ( 85247 ) on Monday June 27, 2005 @10:53PM (#12928489)

    I really don't like it when people pass of a blog entry as a review. The author tells us that "There are simply tons of packages on this DVD", and spends three paragraphs (about a third of the 'review') describing ClamAV and how to use it - something which has little or nothing to do with Knoppix on DVD apart from that fact that it's included.

    Nothing against Kyle Rankin and his blog of course, he's doing what blogs do. And it is nice to know I can now run Gnome. But shame on you Mr. IdleTime.

    • Knoppix 4.0 is brand spanking new release only as a 4GB ISO that at last check had a 230:1140 seed to downloader ratio. I think that is why there is little to no info about it.

      As for the review, if you are at all familiar with Knoppix then it is just the same Knoppix with a huge load of packages, some GUI improvements, and some new functionality brought about by using packages & configuration info from Knoppix derivatives (like Kanotix) that was then accepted by Klaus Knoppix & fed back into Knoppi

  • So ugly (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Alioth ( 221270 ) <no@spam> on Tuesday June 28, 2005 @02:54AM (#12929360) Journal
    Knoppix is fantastic - it's been a great system-saver and diagnostic tool, as well as my way of making a ghosting system.

    My only complaint is if you let it load the desktop, the desktop is incredibly ugly - busy amateurish backgrounds, and almost always the ugliest KDE themes. I can see Knoppix putting off a lot of people who would otherwise move to Linux when they see the awful desktop theme in Knoppix. Can't they make it simple and elegant like Red Hat's Bluecurve?

  • DVD's have faster read speed (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Danathar ( 267989 ) on Tuesday June 28, 2005 @05:15AM (#12929773) Journal
    Since DVD's are quicker than CDroms that alone will get me to use the DVD. All the other software is bonus stuff!

  • Donations? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by jlseagull ( 106472 ) on Tuesday June 28, 2005 @09:53AM (#12931454) Homepage
    Does anyone know a place to donate to the people that produce Knoppix? It's saved my butt quite a lot, and it's an easy way to show people what Linux can do.

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