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Knoppix is a computer operating system which can be used as a live CD. It is a Debian based Linux distribution, developed by Linux consultant Klaus Knopper.
When repairing systems with non-booting hard drives, Knoppix is a much more comfortable environment than the previous solution of boot floppies, thanks to the complete graphical environment and networking.
Although Knoppix is primarily designed to be used as a live CD, it can also be installed on a hard disk like a typical operating system. Computers that support booting from USB devices can load Knoppix from USB flash drives and memory cards.
There are two main editions of Knoppix: the traditional Compact Disc (700 megabytes) edition and the DVD (4.7 gigabytes) "Maxi" edition. Each of these main editions have two language-specific editions. One language is English and the other is German.
When starting a program it is loaded from the optical disc and decompressed into a RAM drive. The decompression is transparent and on-the-fly.
Knoppix mostly consists of free software, but also includes proprietary software.
Knoppix
Usage
Contents
Requirements
Saving changes in the environment
Boot options
Popularity
Drawbacks
Versions
Variations
Sources
See also
Further reading
News articles
| | Name | Knoppix | | Screenshot |
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Usage
There are several possible uses of the Knoppix live CD:
an introduction to Linux, especially as a desktop operating system
in-store testing to determine whether a computer system is compatible with Linux before purchase
providing a safe Web browsing environment that is less susceptible to viruses, privacy invasion and data loss
restoring a system with a corrupted operating system or some of its data
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Contents
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More than 1000 software packages are included on the CD edition and more than 2600 are included on the DVD edition. Up to 9 gigabytes can be stored on the DVD in compressed form.
These packages include:
K3b, for CD (and DVD) authoring and backup
The GIMP, an image-manipulation program
Tools for data rescue and system repair
Network analysis and administration tools
Many programming and development tools
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Requirements
There are some requirements for a computer to be able to run Knoppix, which include:
To start KDE, as happens by default, about 96 MB of RAM is required.
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Saving changes in the environment
Prior to Knoppix 3.8.1, any documents or settings a user created would disappear upon reboot. This lack of permanence made it necessary to save documents explicitly to a hard drive partition, over the network, or to some removable medium, such as a USB thumbdrive.
It was also possible to set up a "persistent home directory", wherein any documents or settings written to the user's home directory would automatically be redirected to a hard drive or removable medium, which could be automatically mounted on bootup. What is stored there physically is a file called knoppix.img. The file is used to simulate a file system into which files are written for later use. This is transparent for the user. What the user perceives is that it is possible to write files to the home directory.
Since Knoppix 3.8.1, a UnionFS filesystem transparently saves any new or changed files to a writable filesystem - one which can reside either in memory (ramdisk) or on a hard disk, USB thumbdrive, etc.
This means that the user can modify the software installed on the Knoppix system, such as by using APT to install or update software.
By carrying a Knoppix CD and a USB thumbdrive, a user can have the same environment, programs, settings, and data available on any computer.
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Boot options
When using Knoppix as a live CD, boot options, also known as cheat codes, can be used to override a default setting or automatic hardware detection when it fails. For example, the user may wish to boot into a plain console, or proceed without SCSI support. For this, Knoppix allows the user to enter one or more cheat codes at the prompt before booting. If the user doesn't enter a cheat code, or if no key is pressed before the timeout, Knoppix will boot with its default options. For example, to set the language to French rather than the default, one would type:
knoppix lang=fr
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Popularity
Knoppix is reported to be one of the most popular LiveCD Linux distributions. There are factors that contribute to the popularity of Knoppix:
Knoppix was one of the first LiveCDs available, and is known as the "original" Debian-based LiveCD
Its extensive hardware detection allows most systems to start Knoppix without any configuration
Its ability to automatically connect to most kinds of networks
Its utilities for system repair and troubleshooting
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Drawbacks
Knoppix has some important drawbacks:
Knoppix works on a fairly high number of PCs or laptops, but not all. The automatic hardware detection cannot cope with all hardware, and sometimes the drivers used will not be optimal. Knoppix has difficulty recognizing some cards made before 1998, or motherboards with a BIOS made before 2002.
Memory usage: By default, Knoppix runs the KDE environment, which makes it require at least 128 MB of RAM, and creates a long startup time.
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Versions
Starting from version 4.0, Knoppix has been split into a DVD "maxi" edition (with over 9GB of software), and a CD "light" edition, both developed in parallel. The first release of Knoppix 5.0 was available to visitors of CeBIT in DVD form. Public editions of 5.0 are now available.
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Variations
Accelerated-KNOPPIX - takes only 60 seconds or less for a boot up from CD (depending on the hardware used)
Arabbix, an old project tasked with bringing forth a fully Arabized LiveCD distribution.
ASork, which provides tools for music production.
eduKnoppix is aimed at Italian primary schools. It focuses on children aged between 8-15, and thus contains a lot of educational software.
grml, targeted at sysadmins, texttool-users and geeks.
Hikarunix, which provides a full study/play environment for Go.
INSERT, which is an acronym for INside SEcurity Rescue Toolkit. It fits on a Mini-Live CD and is focused on security and system repairs.
Kanotix, which is partially based on Knoppix, but mostly based on Debian Sid.
KnopILS, an excellent Italian version.
KnoppMyth is a distro that attempts to make the Linux and MythTV installation as trivial as possible.
Morphix is a modular distribution with four basic variations and the ability to contruct more variations easily using a module system.
Oralux, for visually impaired persons
VigyaanCD, which contains Vigyaan, an electronic workbench for bioinformatics, computational biology and computational chemistry.
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Sources
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See also
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Further reading
Rankin, Kyle. Knoppix Hacks. O'Reilly (2004), ISBN 0-596-00787-6.
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News articles
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