ada101 wrote:Thanks for this, working great! In fact, I am writing this post from the live os now!! I did something different to what you said. Instead of making the 2 partitions as the first two partitions, I made an extended partition and put them both there. the reason for this is because i need a fat32 partition at the start of the drive.. Look:
http://i45.tinypic.com/ylzdw.png
How did you move the boot partition into the extended partition? Did you instead really copy it, and then relabel? Thank you for your time in reply! I'm so excited about your idea, I made a video about it, here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pUR5hu2O_6s I think I solved it, but wanted to know your own steps, if you are willing to share them.
Why this question: I sooooo want to be able to get Linux on a stick, especially Mint 13. The value of doing so is enormous. Everyone in Windows will want to buy these, so Linux could make money while preserving Open Source, if the distro for 13 were available on a stick. No shame in charging for it. The few hackers can still do their hacking, but the developers got paid upfront. Perfectly moral thing, to charge for Linux Mint 13 on a stick. For on a stick, one can use Linux to fix Windows crashes and do a bunch of other stuff on almost any computer, without having to go the wubi route, without having to 'touch' the computer used. So not merely for 'trying', but for 'buying'. Computer in your pocket, better than Raspberry Pi. Potentially. If on a stick with PERSISTENCE equal to the full capacity of the stick. Just think: you take everything with you, so if you wanted to go to a tablet which can boot in Linux, well just plug it in. Want to run your netbook as you travel? Just plug it in. How about an Ultrabook, laptop, borrowed computer in the airport lounge? Plug it in. Whole new dimension, of mobile computing.
Linux Mint could justifiably sell the sticks (preferably SanCruzer, Kingston) at 64GB, pre-installed with Mint 13 plus extra disk management tools, for what.. $150 each? I'd buy sticks thus configured, if they worked out of the box. Many businesses would. Huge market of small businesses like mine, mom-and-pop consultants (or doctors, lawyers, brokers, accountants, tradesmen) -- who don't have IT departments, but make good money.
Although the sticks could be cloned, it's better to have several. Say, selling them in packs of 2 or three, or with bundle discounts. A consultant's time is worth over $100 per hour minimum, so the hour it takes to clone
* is already nearly the value of purchase. But purchase, takes five minutes; and during the rest of the hour he can make money to pay for the stick.
Example: I have 24 computers which only I own, only I use, no one else lives with me and no one is allowed in. Confidential data. Okay, so now I want to do stuff to the 12 computers which have the specs Mint 13 needs to run. So I put the stick into each one, do my disk management, and.. done! I don't have to do 12 installations. I don't have to set up a network. It's easier to just walk to each machine. Some of the Linux software runs best on one machine, some of the other software runs better on another. So, just walk to the machine which best works with that software.
Granted, the example is kinda rare, but its inherent pattern can apply to a number of situations. A truly live distro on a stick is valuable. Far better than CD, if PERSISTENCE is had. So far, the only distros which end up having persistence are Fedora 17 and Mint 13, but each seem capped at 1 GB above their own software, rather than addressing the whole of the capacity of the stick. That's why your solution is so intriguing. I used Unetbootin, and no matter how I tweak it, I can't bypass that add-1GB barrier in Mint 13 or Fedora. Fedora has its own Live USB installer, but the limits post-creation, are the same. Since I can't move the /home folder and can't get the rest of the stick to store the data or programs outside /root (because I'm given no option from the package managers where to install the programs), this 1GB limit will soon fill up. I can partition the remaining space as NTFS and then it is separately addressable (it's not using the space when marked ext2,3,4); but again all the package installers only go to /root or /home. This is an unhappy limitation.
This persistence doesn't occur with the latest Linux distros with any predictability. It's hit and miss. Alas, Mint 14 -- which I can't yet make persistent -- has no good desktop customization and is glitchy, really tempermental about permissions (like Ubuntu 13.04 and Fedora 18) so it's not viable, not useful at all. But 13 is great, especially if one wants to wean off Windows.
*It takes an hour to clone, because the typical buyer is not interested in becoming a Linux geek, so has to review the rules again for cloning. Takes time to do that. Then has to wait, and since it takes 20 minutes to clone 35GB on a standard external hard drive, it probably takes an hour to do it on a flash drive. Even if less, again the average buyer is NOT a Linux geek so would have to spend time refreshing on the steps for cloning. Not likely, he'll want to clone, if he can just BUY another stick, instead. If I could avoid learning Linux altogether, I would, so I could spend the same amount of time serving my customers. Millions of people share my situation and needs.