It's always fun to download the latest version of Linux if you have the bandwidth. But, how often do we really want to try them out, even though the installation process goes pretty fast these days. I've never been a fan of LiveCD's, like the kind you often see for SUSE distros, but they do have advantages.
According to this article at ComputerWorld, there are some 345 maintained distributions of Linux and BSD in circulation, so who knows which one is going to work best with your system? Since these LiveCD's are booted from a CD, DVD, USB keychain drive etc. you can give them a look see rather easily. You can check if the right libraries are there to support your applications etc. The obvious advantage too, is you aren't messing with your present setup or changing information on the hard drive. But, here is another interesting thing about booting a system with one of these puppies.
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The security threat this poses is obvious. Choosing a Linux distribution for your enterprise environment is a difficult decision, but it should be IT's decision. If your corporate desktops and notebooks are distributed with the ability to boot from CD-ROM enabled in the BIOS, ask yourself this: Do you know what your users' favorite Linux distributions are? |
What about it? Anybody use these LiveCD's as a method to test out a new distribution? Ever used one as a recovery tool at the office? If so are there any favorites? We seem to have quite a few Linux fans among us. You can read the article in it's entirety here.
Source: ComputerWorld
