Portable Linux 1.0

Portable Linux is a distribution designed for advanced users to use Linux (and more OS by virtual PC) as fast, portable and main operating system on USB device. Portable Linux is a Gentoo Linux binary release, configured for running on new and fast hardware with automatic hardware configuration and with your selectable hadware configuration profiles.

The Portable Linux hardware configuration creates a new /etc/X11/xorg.conf file, sets keymap and locale, mounts all partitions in writable mode in /mnt directory and automatically uses swap partition. If swap partition not found then it will use windows swap file.

Usage:

The kernel commandilne option 'conf=x' loads an existing x name profile or creates a new auto-configured hardware profile at boot process.
 The new profile is a virtuali new /etc directory. The changes are stored in /var/portable-conf/etc-x directory. You can delete this profile by delete this directory when it's not used.

Add 'fstab' kernel commandline option to start file system auto-configuration if existing configuration profile is selected.

To disable Portabe Linux functions add 'nodetect' option to kernel commandine or 'rm /etc/runlevels/boot/PortableConfig'.

If you see 'Could not find the root block device in LABEL=PortLinux' message at boot, wait until the pen drive stop flashing and press Enter.

Lots of computer has booting problems with USB. You can use the Portable Linux DVD to run installed system from your USB device.

To modify users, runlevels, install and uninstall applications are not recommended when configuration profile is selected, unless you know what you're doing!

Everything else (include install and uninstall applications) are Gentoo compatible, read Gentoo documentation.

Warning:

Portable Linux 1.0 Live DVD uses unionfs. It seems the unionfs not stable (IO and too many file open errors).

Therefore recommended to use it only for the purpose of installation.

It does not work well on some virtual PC maybe because it uses different processor instruction set than other popular distributions (see Minimum hardware requirements).

Installation:

Installable to any min. 6GB writable partition. The installer using /etc/PortableConfig/lilo-install.conf for boot menu.

Only Linux will boot from the target device by default!

For more boot options edit /etc/PortableConfig/lilo-install.conf or create your own boot menu after installation.

Abouth pen drive speed

The pen drive writing and reading speed are slower than hard drive, but the pen drive has no seek time, so runnig from pen drive is noticeable faster than running from hard drive.

Unfortunately, the write process to pen drive will slow down everything. Therefore the /tmp directory is mounted to memory.

The first kernel loading process is very slow on some computer, depends on BIOS. The USB is slow until the USB driver not loaded.

Minimum hardware requirements

Pentium2 processor with sse2, 256M ram, PCI or PCI-E mainboard with ACPI BIOS.

If you see invalid instruction errors at boot process, that means the processor is too old and not supported by Portable Linux.


Product's homepage

Limitations:

· Auto hardware configuration uses invalid CD mount option in /etc/fstab. Chage UTF-8 to utf8.
· Unionfs. The next version will use aufs filesystem on LiveDVD.
· The installer partition size checking is wrong, but it installable to 7 - 9GB partition.