USB booting :: usb256mb or 1g - how to?



hi,
i have 256mb and 1gb usb-stick

and i am looking for a  way to have a bootable portable system on some of them, to be able to travel with my thesis underconstruction :-)

where i can use firefox, pdf-viewer and word97(preferred as i have configured it the way i need it) and also save .doc files

normaly i have win98se with 1gh, 256ram, 20gb hard drive

i browsed dsl forums now for a while, but as i am non programmer, and non linuxer - i am a simple user, i feel unable to do it

so i ask - is there somewhere some realy good step by step way to install this on the usb-stick, or better some little programm, that i just click on it and it makes my usb-stick to bootable system? or some "image" i just need to copy on it and it works?

thank you in advance

Michaela
1.  Download DSL iso file
2.  Burn to a CD-R disk using the "Burn Image" function in your cd burning software.  For example it is "File -> Burn Image" or "Recorder -> Burn Image" from the Nero menu.
3. Set your computer BIOS to boot from the CDROM drive.
4. Insert thumbdrive and boot into DSL.
5. Open a terminal window and type:

Code Sample
dmesg | grep scsi -A 3


To find out the device name for your thumbdrive.  It usually is "sda".

6. Right click somewhere on an empty part of the desktop and choose:  Apps -> Tools -> Install to USB Pendrive
and choose USBHDD unless your computer can only boot from a USBZIP drive.
8. Follow the instructions.
9. After installation is finished, shut down the computer.
10. Set computer BIOS to allow for USBHDD booting.  For newer Dells, you can press <F12> at boot time and choose USB boot
11. Enjoy your DSL that is booted from your thumbdrive.
12. Click on th myDSL GUI and download OpenOffice from the UCI section.
13. Open emelfm as Super User and copy the open office uci file over from your /tmp directory to your /cdrom directory.
14. Enjoy your DSL that now has Open Office for editing MSWord docs.
I'm new to Linux also and I just surfed on into this thread in search of information.

cbagger01...I just wanted to thank you for the concise explanation. I followed your directions and it worked out perfectly. Thank you again.

original here.