[Discuss] Installing LINUX OS on USB Stick or external USB HD

[Alan W. Irwin]

On 2014-05-08 18:40-0600 Murray Strome wrote:

> Thanks for your reply, Alan.  I think I located the thread on
> http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.org.user-groups.linux.vlug/17869

Yes, that is the thread.

> Perhaps you could clarify something for me: If I am in the Live
pendrive or CD system, do I simply click on "Install {LINUX DISTRO}"
and select the USB drive for the place to install it? That wasn't
clear, as there are a lot of E-Mails in the thread.

I don't know.  I don't have experience with creating a pen-drive install
from a live one.  I installed that pen drive system by simply copying
from a hard disk install and then taking the required additional
measures mentioned in the thread.

> If that is the correct procedure, I believe at some point, it will
ask where I want to install GRUB. I presume that I would pick the
pendrive, is that correct?  How do I tell it to ignore any OS on my
hard drive?  Can I be certain that it will not affect the GRUB on the
HD on my computer?

In my case I removed the HD afterward.  So yes, I installed everything
including grub on the pen drive with no grub reference to any other
OS (since those obviously don't exist on my system).  For your case, all
sorts of additional grub options are possible.  So I would make the
decision based on your needs/convenience.

> Somehow, I did not yet find the part about the special measures to take so as to not wear out the drive too quickly.

Look for references to the mount command in that thread.  There are
additional measures that were taken, but they were probably discussed
in conjunction with the special measure taken for the mount command.

Alan
__________________________
Alan W. Irwin

Astronomical research affiliation with Department of Physics and Astronomy,
University of Victoria (astrowww.phys.uvic.ca).

Programming affiliations with the FreeEOS equation-of-state
implementation for stellar interiors (freeeos.sf.net); the Time
Ephemerides project (timeephem.sf.net); PLplot scientific plotting
software package (plplot.sf.net); the libLASi project
(unifont.org/lasi); the Loads of Linux Links project (loll.sf.net);
and the Linux Brochure Project (lbproject.sf.net).
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Linux-powered Science
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