PCLinuxOS-liveusb Creator

[Was_Just19]

                                       PCLinuxOS-liveUSB Creator

This is an explanation of what one should expect from this utility which is available from the PCLinuxOS repository and mirrors. This refers to version 0.8 (or greater) which should be in the repository very soon.

This is a PCLinuxOS utility only and is not designed to work with any other OS or ISO of a different distro.

It can be run from a ‘live’ session, either CD/DVD or USB device, or from an installed version of PCLinuxOS.

It installs only on removable media.


Purpose

The purpose is to create a ‘live install’ of PCLinuxOS on removable media. That media can be USB flash drive or external removable HDD etc. The device should, thereafter, be able to be booted from any PC capable of booting from USB device. There must be an existing partition, formatted to ext, already present on the drive, and of suitable size to accept the selected version of PCLinuxOS, before running the utility.


Capabilities

The combinations of running location and install media, and install type are quite varied, but I will cover a few of the high points in this post.


Getting started

Using an ISO as the source

Regardless of the running environment, the first thing to be done is to install the first  or primary operating system. This sets up the selected partition to be bootable and copies all the required files for booting the partition as well as those for the chosen operating system.
It provides both a persistent and a non-persistent boot option for that OS.

In addition, further OS releases may be added to the same partition, space allowing, and this will provide a non-persistent boot option for those secondary installs. You may install many such secondary versions of PCLinuxOS so long as space allows.
Do remember that if you are using persistence you will need to allow quite a bit of free space for the saved changes. Just something to watch for.

There are times when installing to a partition like this, that you do not want to interfere with an existing boot arrangement .....  maybe controlled by another install. So there is the option to install the boot manager (Grub) to the partition’s boot sector (ver .0.8+). This will ensure that the existing boot manager is not interfered with. If you need to do this then you will also need to add a boot option for the new live install to the existing boot manager.



Using the OS files (not an ISO)

Running from Live Media

When running live (live CD/DVD or USB) you have the option to use the files of the OS you are currently running to create a separate live install.
As an alternative to the files of your presently running session, you may also choose the files from another Live CD or USB of PCLOS.


Running from an Installed PCLinuxOS

When running from an installed session you can choose the files from live media that has PCLinuxOS installed.


Of course such installs can be either primary or secondary installs as explained above.

As changes occur this post will hopefully be updated to reflect those changes.



Have fun with your removable media and PCLinuxOS.