Universal USB Installer ©2009-2010 Lance http://www.pendrivelinux.

com (offered und

er GNU GPL License) - see Uni-USB-Installer-Copying

Background of Universal USB Installer:

Universal USB Installer is an installer script I wrote using NSIS to automate th
e creation of a bootable USB device that can be used to put a select Live Linux
Distribution on USB. It utilizes Syslinux to make the drive bootable, and in a c
ouple of cases chainloads to Grub4DOS and uses a corresponding menu.lst. A sysli
nux.cfg file or text.cfg file is also used in some cases. 7-zip is used to extra
ct the files from the ISO or Zip to the USB device. The compressed filesystem of
the Live Linux distribution being placed on the device is not altered in any wa
y.
DD for Windows (dd.exe) and Mke2fs are used to make a casper-rw persistent file
for storing changes. The casper persistent feature was created by Ubuntu and can
in theory be used on any Ubuntu based remix.

Credits Resources and Tools used:

For the unmodified binaries, I have gathered source code as offered at the autho
rs sites and, included these sources within Universal-USB-Installer-Src.zip.
* Grub4DOS ©2004-2009, the Gna! people http://www.gnu.org/software/grub (unmod
ified binary used)
Specific Grub4DOS link: http://gna.org/projects/grub4dos/
* Syslinux ©1994-2009 H. Peter Anvin http://syslinux.zytor.com (unmodified bin
ary used)
* DD for Windows dd.exe ©2009 John Newbigin http://www.chrysocome.net/dd (unmo
dified binary used)
* mke2fs.exe ©2009 Matt WU http://ext2fsd.sourceforge.net (unmodified binary u
sed)
* 7-Zip is ©2009 Igor Pavlovis http://7-zip.org (unmodified binaries were used
)
NSIS Installer ©1995-2009 Contributors http://nsis.sourceforge.net (used to compil
e the MultiBootISOs.nsi script)
NSIS is the easiest method I could find to automate the creation process, aside
from batch installers which we have moved away from.
Initially, I offered Distro specific USB Installers that could be used to put a
specific Live Linux Distro on USB. They were based on Cedric Tissieres's Tazusb.
exe for Slitaz (slitaz@objectif-securite.ch). His Tazusb installer helped me qui
ckly understand how NSIS works and how easily it could be applied to this situat
ion. Reminances of Tazusb may still reside in this script.
There were many other textbook and online resources used over time to help me un
derstand how to put this all together.
Third Party Linux Distributions that can be put on USB using this tool (and thei
r Official Sites):
* Feather Linux http://featherlinux.berlios.de
* Redo Backup and Recovery http://redobackup.org
* Backtrack http://www.backtrack-linux.org
* Peppermint http://peppermintos.com
* Linux Mint http://www.linuxmint.com
* Ubuntu http://www.ubuntu.com
 * Xubuntu http://www.xubuntu.org
* Kubuntu http://www.kubuntu.org
* Lubuntu http://lubuntu.net
* Ubuntu Netbook Remix http://www.canonical.com/projects/ubuntu/unr
* Ubuntu Rescue Remix http://ubuntu-rescue-remix.org/
* Ubuntu Server Edition http://www.ubuntu.com/products/whatIsubuntu/servered
ition
* ubuntu mini remix http://ubuntu-mini-remix.crealabs.it
* GParted http://gparted.sourceforge.net
* Parted Magic http://partedmagic.com
* DSL initrd http://www.damnsmalllinux.org
* Ultimate Boo CD http://www.ultimatebootcd.com
* RIPLinux http://www.tux.org/pub/people/kent-robotti/looplinux/rip/
* Ylmf OS http://www.ylmf.org/en/index.html
* DBAN http://www.dban.org
* xPUD http://www.xpud.org
* Crunchbang http://crunchbanglinux.org
* KNOPPIX http://www.knoppix.org
* gOS gadgets http://www.thinkgos.com/gos.php
* Gentoo http://www.gentoo.org
* Simply MEPIS http://www.mepis.org
* EEEBuntu (Netbook Distro) http://www.eeebuntu.org
* EasyPeasy (NetBook Distro) http://www.geteasypeasy.com
* Lucid Puppy and Puppy Linux http://www.puppylinux.org
* Puppy Arcade (Console Game Emulator) http://scottjarvis.com/page105.htm
* Kiwi Linux http://kiwilinux.org/kiwi/en/index.html
* SLAX http://slax.org
* SLiTaz http://www.slitaz.org/en/
* System Rescue CD http://www.sysresccd.org
* Ophcrack XP http://ophcrack.sourceforge.net
* Clonezilla http://clonezilla.org
* Jolicloud Linux http://www.jolicloud.com
* Dynebolic http://dynebolic.org
* PLoP Linux http://www.plop.at/en/ploplinux.html
* Dr.Web LiveCD http://www.freedrweb.com/livecd/
* Debian Live http://live.debian.net