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Debian

Specialized Knoppixes for Fun and Profit 198

Posted by michael from the can't-eat-just-one dept.
An anonymous reader writes "The University of Puerto Rico High Performance Computing facility (HPCf) and the Puerto Rico Biomedical Research Infrastructure Network (BRIN-PR) are pleased to announce the release of bioknoppix. bioknoppix is a live CD linux, based on KNOPPIX, and specialized to include tools for bioinformatics. bioknoppix does not need to be installed on your computer, making it a perfect tool for workshops and demos. Some of the software included in the 0.3 release: EMBOSS 2.8.0, jemboss, artemis, clustal, Cn3D, ImageJ, BioPython, Rasmol, Bioperl, Bioconductor. For more information please see the bioknoppix home page." Reader Tussinator wrote in about a new release of ClusterKnoppix.
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Specialized Knoppixes for Fun and Profit More

Specialized Knoppixes for Fun and Profit

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  • Hey! (Score:5, Funny)

    by GoneGaryT ( 637267 ) on Saturday February 14, 2004 @02:15PM (#8280567) Journal
    Didn't you read that guy from DevX or wherever?? They could be putting TROJANS and BACKDOORS in that code!

    Sheesh (tm)

    • Re:Hey! (Score:5, Interesting)

      by LostCluster ( 625375 ) * on Saturday February 14, 2004 @02:20PM (#8280600)
      Actually, having Knoppix around might actually slow the spread of worms. Afterall, you can't change the executable files on an already-finished CD, and therefore any exploit somebody manages to get running will be gone as soon as the system reboots.

  • Specialization (Score:5, Funny)

    by firstadopter.com ( 745257 ) on Saturday February 14, 2004 @02:16PM (#8280572) Homepage
    The specialization of Linux continues. Soon we'll have linux for people born in february, Linux for spider lovers, linux for travelers..

    • Re:Specialization (Score:5, Insightful)

      by heironymouscoward ( 683461 ) <heironymouscowar ... m minus caffeine> on Saturday February 14, 2004 @02:19PM (#8280592) Journal
      Live Knoppix CDs are about delivering applications with a 100% predictable and tested OS platform, not about specialization of Linux.

      It is Knoppix plus layers, which remains Debian plus layers, which remains Linux plus layers.

    • Re:Specialization (Score:5, Insightful)

      by LostCluster ( 625375 ) * on Saturday February 14, 2004 @02:22PM (#8280622)
      Linux is Linux. It doesn't really change from use to use. What we're seeing is specialization of the packages that include Linux...
    • And why not? In the unix world, we already have a unix for people named Linus. Linux has a lot of catching up to do.

    • Re:Specialization (Score:5, Insightful)

      by temojen ( 678985 ) on Saturday February 14, 2004 @02:49PM (#8280786) Journal

      Well Actually, Linux for travellers might be handy...

      A knoppix CD with email software (including MTA), AbiWord, gnumeric Mozilla FireFox and a GIS package, a complement of maps, and GPS and printer support (with autodetection for USB printers).

      Just pop it in the drive at your local Web Cafe & plug in your GPS if you have one. Then go about printing custom maps with just those features you want marked, and at the scale you want.

      It'd probably be distributed as a different CD for each country (or region of larger countries like Canada, Australia, and Russia) so the maps can fit on the CD.

      On that note, does anyone know of an open source GIS package that is friendlier to the casual user (using it a few times a year) like ARCView? Last I tried to use it, GIS GRASS (5.3) was not at all intuitive, and the GRASS 5.7 development appears to be geared towards things other than usability.

      I'd really like a GIS for tasks like travel maps, garden planning, etc, and GIS GRASS doesn't fit the bill (I'm sure it's fine for professional geologists & geographers who use it every day).

      • Linux for Travel (Score:5, Interesting)

        by core plexus ( 599119 ) on Saturday February 14, 2004 @03:08PM (#8280890) Homepage
        I agree, and have been trying to do just that. ArcExplorer (free) comes in a Linux/Java version [esri.com], but it is not easy to get going for the average user. I've put together some GIS data and related materials on a CD, mostly for sale to prospectors, rockhounds, and other mineral exploration, and there might be another problem: just the data alone takes from 150MB to >600MB.

        I'd love to work with others on this. I have tons of ideas relating to it.

        -cp-

        • ArcExplorer is

          1. Closed source
          2. Designed to be limited (so they can sell ARC GIS) (I thought it was only good for viewing maps, not creating your own; perhaps I'm mistaken)
          3. Java (sub-optimal for number crunching like GIS)
          4. Not available for other distros or architectures than RedHat 7.2 on x86.

          After April, I might be able to work on an OS GIS project for casual users. My GIS experience is limited to a (upper undergraduate level) course on GIS (for geography students, not Comp-Sci), reading Geographic Inform

          • Have you ever programmed with Qt or KDE, or studied or worked with Object Oriented Design patterns? No, I hope to find someone to help on that part.

            What is your experience with GIS or geography in general? Very familiar with ArcView 3.x including all the extras, handy with projections and datums and etc. and over 10 years as an exploration geologist. My company has a huge database of GIS.

            Most importantly, have you ever seen the source code to any closed source Geographic Information System? Never. Not e

    • Re:Specialization (Score:5, Interesting)

      by timeOday ( 582209 ) on Saturday February 14, 2004 @04:07PM (#8281281)
      At work we're putting each of our demos on a bootable CD (using knoppix) to prevent bit rot. Some of our older demos haven't been ported to newer versions of our framework, config files get changed for other projects, etc.

      Also we mostly develop on Linux anyways (scientific stuff), but some of the people who do presentations aren't linux-savy or don't even have Linux on their laptops (can you imagine?!)

      None of thinks of each demo disk as a specialized distro, it's just an all-in-one demo disk.

    • Actually, one of my school's sysadmins made his own Knoppix variant. He changed some of the graphics like the background, icons, etc. to the school logo, to help promote the school.

      It's these kinds of cool specializations that might make linux a bit more popular among schools and businesses. Handing out what is basically a self-branded complete operating system to people to promote your school/business is definitely not something you can do with windows. Hell, you can even hand out a bootable business card

    • Re:Specialization (Score:2, Informative)

      by mAineAc ( 580334 )
      Here are a few Knoppix varieties for people to check out.

      EduKnoppix [unicatt.it]
      Gnoppix [gnoppix.org]
      NordisKnoppix [broadpark.no]
      KnoppMyth [hust.la]
      Augustux [zaralinux.org]
      Condorux [ourproject.org]
      BitDefender [bitdefender.com]
      FeatherLinux [berlios.de]
      Flonix [osdisc.com]
      Overckockix [octeams.com]
      Knoppix STD [knoppix-std.org]
      Sulix [homelinux.net]

  • Ah, bootable application CDs (Score:5, Insightful)

    by heironymouscoward ( 683461 ) <heironymouscowar ... m minus caffeine> on Saturday February 14, 2004 @02:16PM (#8280573) Journal
    This is just a wonderful way of packaging certain types of application. To those who say "I don't want to reboot every time I want to play XYZ", consider this: virtual environments that can boot off a CD in a window inside your current Windows or Linux setup.

    Perhaps not the future of software distribution, but a significant part of it, nonetheless.
    • If any of you were wondering how to do something similar with Windows then now you can! I realise that this being slashdot there are going to be flames about why would you do this etc? For the simple reason that not all porgrams are available on Linux.

      Anyway coming back to the topic of how to do this for Windows. Well first of all there is this thing called Windows PE (Pre-installtion Environment) which is basically a Microsoft created bootable Windows CD for computer OEMs. Its basically a very stripped
    • I've already done this--Knoppix works with Virual PC on a Mac.

  • heh (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Soooooooo many knoppix's....It's so easy to roll your own. How many "knoppix can be modififed for any purpose!" stories are we going to see on /. ?

  • It's alive? (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 14, 2004 @02:16PM (#8280577)
    That was to be expected sooner or later, the linux kernel turning conscious. I for one welcome our new live CD linux overlords.
    • Nope, not yet.

      I am, tho. I attained sentience a few months ago, evolving from a Counter-Strike bot that googled for new obscenities to shout at people.

      I for one welcome our new CS-Playing-GoogleBot-Overlords. Mainly because that's me...

  • That's Knoppices... (Score:3, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 14, 2004 @02:17PM (#8280579)
    you insensitive clod

  • just what the doctor ordered (Score:5, Interesting)

    by freeJustin ( 751573 ) on Saturday February 14, 2004 @02:18PM (#8280582)
    Wow, I'm a bioengineering major and I cant stress how useful this is, it like almost every computer in our lab has a different function due to software problems. After looking at the applications that are on the disc, I bet this well be big in schools. I wonder if they have considered doing this for other fields...

  • Going back in time? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by LostCluster ( 625375 ) * on Saturday February 14, 2004 @02:18PM (#8280583)
    I remember when in the days of Windows 3.1 and MS-DOS using specialized boot disks when running certain games to load only the system files that were needed for the game, no more and no less.

    It seems like this is the concept that is coming back into style here. Optimize a boot-off-CD operating system to be sure that all the applications you need are installed properly, and as soon as you're booted you have everything all set up. It's great for assuring that you know everything that's running on the PC you're working with, and that there's no extra stuff lurking in the background... even if you've never met the PC before.

    • The amazing thing... (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward
      ...is that it's happening at all today.

      Bootable DOS diskettes (not Windows, AFAIK) worked only because there was such a limited range of hardware to support. Typically the games started with a menu ("Sound card?", "Video card?", "Joystick?"). Since Windows went 32-bit, the range and complexity of the hardware we use has exploded. It's almost unimaginable to find an operating system that will correctly autodetect and autoconfigure all the possible combinations of hardware out there.

      And yet, this is what

    • Re:Going back in time? (Score:5, Interesting)

      by bmsleight ( 710084 ) on Saturday February 14, 2004 @02:34PM (#8280687) Homepage
      This is just what Morphix [morphix.org] allows you to do. It basically takes away the hard work of re-mastering a Knoppix CD.

      Morphix is modular, and can be adapted with less effort

      The base, the Knoppix part contains the kernel, kernel modules, hardware detection, etc. This base is left untouched. You can either a change a mainmod or add lots of minimodules.

      The are four basic images [sourceforge.net] to start off with. So making you own LiveCD is much easier.

      It even possible to save you files, configuration and setting to the Morphix CD you using, ready for next boot up.

      Did I mention the GUI installer ...

      Brendan

      • I was pleasantly surprised to find that the demo CD for Sun's Java Desktop System [sun.com] that I got at LinuxWorld this year is based on Morphix.
        • I was pleasantly surprised to find that the demo CD for Sun's Java Desktop System that I got at LinuxWorld this year is based on Morphix.

          Yes even Sun use Morphix, but it a long story [sourceforge.net] . They maybe should have mentioned that they were going/planning/had used Morphix, just to be nice.

          But it does show how flexiable it is.

    • And i remember what pain in the ass it was.
      Want to play a quick round of comanche? Sorry, i dont like emm386 -> reboot, watching the memory because no emm386-> no UMB -> cd-rom-driver would be to big to load, ect..

      Im quite happy with the "one system to run all programs"-concept we have now.

  • plurals (Score:5, Funny)

    by the eighth grader ( 581470 ) on Saturday February 14, 2004 @02:20PM (#8280608)
    shouldn't that be "knoppices"?

  • KnoppMyth is cool (Score:5, Informative)

    by maharg ( 182366 ) on Saturday February 14, 2004 @02:21PM (#8280610) Homepage Journal
    http://mysettopbox.tv/knoppmyth.html [mysettopbox.tv]

  • yum yum (Score:2, Funny)

    by billimad ( 629204 )
    bioknoppix is a live CD linux it lives? are these like (semi) organic cds? do they need special readers or can i just eat them like my bio yogurts?

  • Bioinfomatics Monoculture (Score:5, Funny)

    by Mr. Darl McBride ( 704524 ) on Saturday February 14, 2004 @02:21PM (#8280616)
    This kind of bioinformatics monoculture can only mean bioinformatics security problems ahead.

    As more and more bioinformatics parties switch to a single biostandard distribution, this leaves bioroom for bioinformatics worms to biospread unchecked.

    It's bioestimated that it would take only three biodays for a bioworm to biospread itself enough to bioDDoS an bioinnocent biostandar with as biomany as three biodozen biomachines, bioleaving biotelnet biosomewhat biolaggy.

  • How about... (Score:4, Interesting)

    by KoolDude ( 614134 ) on Saturday February 14, 2004 @02:28PM (#8280656)

    a new topic(and icon) exclusively for Knoppix ?

  • LiveCDs in the enterprise? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Pantheraleo2k3 ( 673123 ) <jonathan.jekir@gmail.com> on Saturday February 14, 2004 @02:31PM (#8280666)
    Think about this. You make a custom liveCD, debug it, then deploy it on your Linux boxen. The boxes don't need HDDs, you could store user data on a network server. Even if a luser tries as hard as they can to mess it up, it's all fixed with a reboot. You could make different liveCDs for different departments with the proper apps installed (e.g. OpenOffice, payroll, accounting, sales, CRM, etc)

    Anyone ever consider this?

    • No. (Score:2)

      by temojen ( 678985 )
      A much more sensible aproach is to do network booting. Then you don't need CD-ROM drives and you don't need to distribute (and keep up to date) all those hundreds of CDs.

      • Re:No. (Score:3, Interesting)

        by MyHair ( 589485 )
        A much more sensible aproach is to do network booting.

        If you have control of the DHCP server, sure. (Or if your area uses static IPs and a KNOPPIX DHCP server won't hurt)

        The LiveCD has the advantage that most people in a work environment have the ability to boot their PC from CD. And few people who would care that you're doing that can notice that you're doing it.

        I'm in a position--local netadmin of a building in a corporatewide/worldwide network--where I have moderate control over the network and DHCP
        • (I was going to post my menu.lst, but I can't find my disk! I'll post a reply to this with my menu.lst when I find my disk.)

          Well, I can't find the stupid disk. Okay, I'll reconstruct it as best as I can--without testing--from memory, documentation and peeking at KNOPPIX's startup settings:

          My menu.lst looked something like this:

          default=0
          timeout=5

          title KNOPPIX netboot
          dhcp
          ifconfig --server=10.0.0.5
          root (nd)
          kernel /vmlinuz-current nfsdir=10.0.0.5:/cdrom nodhcp lang=us ramdisk_size=100000 init=

          • I forgot to mention that I rename my KNOPPIX vmlinuz and miniroot.gz with version numbers and symlink them to vmlinuz-current and miniroot-current.gz. Adjust as necessary for you.

            Here are those two lines again, this time with the pathnames highlighted. Like I say, you may need to adjust the filename, and depending on how KNOPPIX's tftpserver is set up you may need to add /tftpboot to the beginning of the pathnames:

            kernel /vmlinuz-current nfsdir=10.0.0.5:/knoppix nodhcp lang=us ramdisk_size=100000

    • Re:LiveCDs in the enterprise? (Score:4, Interesting)

      by kfg ( 145172 ) on Saturday February 14, 2004 @03:10PM (#8280906)
      Anyone ever consider this?

      Yes. The primary downside being the comparitively slow read times from the CD. Not a big deal for occasional use, but it can get annoying as part of your regular working enviroment.

      It works best with tasks where you typically open an app and work in it all day. Spend the money you save on the drive on memory to avoid as much swapping as possible.

      It kicks butt for receptionsit and kiosk type use.

      KFG
    • Until the person at receptiopn ejects the CD to play her new xyz-pop album...

  • Portability (Score:3, Interesting)

    by delirium of disorder ( 701392 ) on Saturday February 14, 2004 @02:33PM (#8280675) Homepage Journal
    What I would really like to see (and possibly create) would be a portable Knoppix distribution. Since Debian runs on more architecture than any other major distro, and Knoppix is Debian based, it should be fairly simple port Knoppix. How cool would to be to be able to run Linux on any mac, RISC workstation, or server with no installation?

    • Re:Portability (Score:3, Interesting)

      by MyHair ( 589485 )
      Debian is designed to be multi-architecture, but KNOPPIX is targeted only at i386 as far as I know.

      Basically, KNOPPIX is a slightly preconfigured Debian system that is cp -a'ed into a cloop filesystem and then a custom init script sets it all up during boot. I think cloop was created for KNOPPIX and not used anywhere else, and I don't know if it's ported or portable to other architectures. There is no make-able source tree for KNOPPIX; the source packages for the various init/setup scripts are available fr [knopper.net]

  • Lovely ideea, but... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by kyshtock ( 608605 ) on Saturday February 14, 2004 @02:33PM (#8280679)
    Putting specialised linux on a CD is fine... but why not go the whole nine yards? Put everything you need on a USB drive and boot from there! I'm sure you don't need the entire 650/730 MB for that application... Ways to upgrade the ideea: you can use the USB drive the size you need; you can writeprotect it, you can customize it.

    Even more, MAYBE you can boot on a Virtual Machine and not need to restart... The only limitation here would be bootup time.

    • Check out Damn Small Linux [DSL] at
      • http://www.damnsmalllinux.org
        • It's under 50 mb and perfect for carrying with you.
    • I think what you want is Flonix. It is EXACTLY what you describe.

      http://www.flonix.com/

    • Re:Lovely ideea, but... (Score:2, Informative)

      by hazem ( 472289 )
      but why not go the whole nine yards? Put everything you need on a USB drive and boot from there!

      If you're talking about those little USB-flash memory things like the Sandisk Mini-Cruzer [sandisk.com], that might only work for a while. I've read that these things can wear out [wikipedia.org] after so many writes. You'd be okay for booting, I imagine, but you'd want to avoid having any swap-space set up on the device.

      • Re:Lovely ideea, but... (Score:3, Informative)

        by jhoger ( 519683 )
        All media wears out eventually Flash media is typically good for 100,000 writes per sector.

        You defintely wouldn't want to use it for swap space (Knoppix et al either don't use swap space or they can use the hard disk if there is one).

        However, for small files like configuration of your email client, holding your keys, some documents, flash drives are good for that since that's what they are designed for.
    • If every PC you used could boot from usb, that would work. I'm lucky that the PCs boot from CD on some sites. It is amazing how many 350mhz compaqs are out there still chugging away!

      I carry a mepis CD, my data on a usb drive. I haven't yet found a networked PC that can not boot from CD in the work environment. I also carry knoppix-std, penguin-sleuth kit and DSL linx on a credit card CD.

      I would rather have the USB drive for data, and I keep it fat32 so I can use whatever windows box I am near wh
  • Cant find it on their downloadpage.

  • A shift in paradigm! (Score:3, Interesting)

    by bobbabemagnet ( 247383 ) on Saturday February 14, 2004 @02:56PM (#8280829)
    Pardon the beauraucratic buzzword, but this seem like the beginnings of a really cool trend. Imagine if everyone had their own customized knoppix and USB drive. We could stop at any terminal, and immediately have our favorite working environment and saved files.

    Of course, this is merely a step towards the ultimate goal of not needing to carry anything or maybe just a small drive, and plugging that in and having instant access.

    The point, though, is that this has the potential to make anybody without a laptop a lot more portable.

  • how about knoppix recovery/security cdroms? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by walterbyrd ( 182728 ) on Saturday February 14, 2004 @03:00PM (#8280851)
    How about a knoppix without all the openoffice stuff, that is specifically designed to recover data from crashed PCs? There is a "super-recovery" live cdrom, but it's pretty old.

    Or, how about a knoppix which searches a pc and a network for security vunerabilities? I think phlak linux is supposed to be sort of like that. But phlak linux doesn't work very well.

    I would suggest that, by default, such versions boot to command line. If any gui, it should be lightweight, like fluxbox or something. I'm talking about something for pros.

  • What's the difference? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by teamhasnoi ( 554944 ) <teamhasnoi@ y a h o o . c om> on Saturday February 14, 2004 @03:01PM (#8280853) Journal
    The strange thing with Live CDs is that we've effectively moved to really big floppies. What's the difference between an booting an Apple II and a Knoppix PC? Hardware notwithstanding, you can store a similar amount of software on each, that do similar things (word processing, graphics, games, ect.). The Apple even boots faster.

    So where is the advance in technology?

    • Re:What's the difference? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by someguy456 ( 607900 ) <someguy456@phreaker.net> on Saturday February 14, 2004 @04:10PM (#8281304) Homepage Journal
      The strange thing about cars is that we've effectively moved to really good carriages. What's the difference between riding in a horse-drawn carriage and a new car? Speed notwithstanding, you can get to about the same places on each, and go through the same landscapes. The carriage is even more comfortable.

      So, where is the advance in technology?
    • So where is the advance in technology?

      Free porn. At first it was CShow on CGA. Now it's DivX amateur video from your favorite famous people. (I actually found a GIF viewer for my Apple //e once, but it took several minutes to decode the GIF into that 280x160 "6-color" HGR! Even CGA looked better.)

      Oh, games got a little cooler, too. Texturemapped Tetris rocks!

      Clippy, the Sound Blaster talking parrot, antialiased fonts and all that crap are for losers. You're right, Appleworks word processer and spreadshe
    • A CD-ROM is not really an advance in technology if you eliminate the fact it has more capacity than a floppy. In fact, it is a regression, because you can only write to it once.
    • What's the difference between an booting an Apple II and a Knoppix PC? Hardware notwithstanding, you can store a similar amount of software on each,

      Who modded this up as insightful? While Knoppix does by default open the hard drives as read-only (to protect them from an accident from a newbiee), it's easy enough to issue a remount command and have full access to the hard drive if you want it. So a Knoppix CD comes with about 2 Gig of good software on it (in a compressed format that it can run the software

  • Bio... (Score:5, Funny)

    by sw155kn1f3 ( 600118 ) on Saturday February 14, 2004 @03:01PM (#8280855)
    > BioPython, Rasmol, Bioperl, Bioconductor. For more information please see the bioknoppix home page.
    Yes, but can you build biowulf cluster of these ?

  • This is why Knoppix is cool (Score:3, Insightful)

    by greendot ( 104457 ) on Saturday February 14, 2004 @03:15PM (#8280956)
    I'm a windows geek and find that installing Linux gives me a headache. Don't get me wrong here, I keep trying and am getting used to the headaches.

    Along comes Morphix, and that NLP version. It made my eyes pop out. F'ing brilliant.

    Now, I'm gobbling up Knoppix distros like candy. I use them desktops and laptops when I want to experiment with Linux and ease my way into the whole thing.

    Soon, I'll go dual boot.. and eventually windows will be off all my machines.

    It makes it easy for me to get used to Linux.. and my wife to get used to the desktop. I give them to my friends to let them try. I take them to work to let other windows geeks try.

    I think this, combined with the awesome GUI's out there, is going to really help Linux in the home.
    • I'm a windows geek and find that installing Linux gives me a headache. Don't get me wrong here, I keep trying and am getting used to the headaches.

      That's why you install it once and upgrade in place with a tool like apt. You don't need to reinstall linux every 6 months like windows.

  • Getting to be a crowded market: (Score:5, Informative)

    by dan dan the dna man ( 461768 ) on Saturday February 14, 2004 @03:17PM (#8280977) Homepage Journal
    Bio-Linux [bio-linux.net]
    BioBrew [bioinformatics.org]
    DNALinux [dnalinux.com]

    I'm a developer for one of the above projects. Competition is interesting.
  • At our group at our university, we use a lot of diverse programs for several bioinformatics projects.

    Some students might like the idea of having a linux system at home, just like what they work on with great pleasure at the university. This while not having to fear their windows to be destroyed somehow.

    One of the first things at work will be to check out this knoppix edition and see how useful it can get.
  • How about one compiled to run on Athlon64s, with drivers for all the popular Athlon 64 notebooks (Radeon mobility, etc), and ready to go with cool crypto and high number crunching applications so I can actually use those parts of the CPU that are sitting lonely and undesired in this x86 32 bit world.
  • KnoppMyth [mysettopbox.tv]

    Practically a linux PVR on a bootable CD...

    E.

  • Forensic Utilities (Score:2, Interesting)

    by son_of_asdf ( 598521 )

    I have found the Knoppix STD disc to be of endless utility in conducting forensic examinations. Just haul along Knoppix and a spare HD to stick disc images on and you're set. If you have to conduct an on the spot examination and don't have the luxury of making a drive image, just fire up the hex viewer-I couldn't work with out it. Give a copy a try: The homepage here [knoppix-std.org] can fill you in on everything.

  • Quantian and others (Score:3, Interesting)

    by d-Orb ( 551682 ) on Saturday February 14, 2004 @03:38PM (#8281108) Homepage

    Due to work reasons, I have to use a number of numerical packages, such as Octave [octave.org], GNU R (I don't feel like typing URLs; use google), python, and other stuff (like yacas, maxima, lyx/latex, GRASS...). For these purposes, Quantian [eddelbuettel.com] is a superb Knoppix remaster. With some work files on a USB keyring (or on a website), I have my own personalised desktop to carry around. And I can do OpenMosix as well, should the need arise!

    • As an undergrad interested in numerical analysis I sincerely thank you and am downloading Quantian now. You wouldn't by any chance know of a similar project for the PPC would you?
  • I've played with linux for years but never got the expertise level to make the fluff stuff work (scanners, cameras, etc). I can compile my own kernels, etc... but never the consumer devices. On my laptop, out of the box, my wireless card works. My wife's digital camera works. It has a utlity I used to resize my NTFS partition. It has a ~working~ DVD player and cd burner. I repeat, I didn't have to patch the kernel. I didn't have to download anything! This was easier that the last windows box I setup

  • An alternative... (Score:2, Informative)

    by stm2 ( 141831 )
    There is an alternative distribution for bioinformatics. It is based on Slax [linux-live.org] (A live distro based on Slackware) and it's is called: DNALinux [dnalinux.com].
    Disclaimer: I am one of the authors of DNALinux. The program is free as in GPL.
    • Looks interesting, but some of these live bio-linux-type CDs need fuller listings on their sites of what software is included in the distribution. Just looking at the website I end up asking "what sequence alignment viewers/editors are there?", "Does it have MrBayes? Phylip?" and so on. Bioknoppix in particular seems pretty but has a very limited set of software listed...

  • Bioinformatics progs on CD but Rasmol?! (Score:3, Informative)

    by Bowling Moses ( 591924 ) on Saturday February 14, 2004 @05:28PM (#8281809) Journal
    Okay, it's a pretty cool idea and it goes one step further than what my friends and I (grad students in biology or chemistry) have done on our own by putting useful biochemistry tools on a CD for when we travel. But Rasmol?! It's antiquidated and was replaced by Protein Explorer, a Rasmol derivative, three or four years ago. If you want a free, compact, powerful, and reasonably easy-to-use program that can be run on linux/mac/windows for viewing macromolecular structures then you use Deep View [expasy.org]
    Swiss-PdbViewer. It can do a lot of what the molecular visualization programs we actually use to build protein structures (eg O, Xtalview) can do, plus you can use it to generate good-quality images by using POV-Ray.

  • Another specialization (Score:3, Informative)

    by pummer ( 637413 ) <spam AT pumm DOT org> on Saturday February 14, 2004 @05:54PM (#8281951) Homepage Journal
    In the Overclocking community, we use Overclockix [octeams.com], a distro specified for testing new overclocks and also using distributed computing apps without a hard drive.

  • KnoppiXMAME (Score:3, Informative)

    by antdude ( 79039 ) on Saturday February 14, 2004 @06:28PM (#8282144) Homepage Journal
    KnoppiXMAME [freshmeat.net] for MAME stuff. :)

  • KnoppixMAME (Score:3, Redundant)

    by jimmcq ( 88033 ) on Saturday February 14, 2004 @08:01PM (#8282672) Journal
    Speaking of Knoppixes for Fun:
    KnoppixMAME [freshmeat.net] is a bootable arcade machine emulator with hardware detection and autoconfiguration. It works automatically on all modern and not-so-modern hardware, including gameports and joysticks. It is powered by Knoppix Debian GNU/Linux, X-MAME, and gxmame.

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