CDCustomizer

[John Richard Moser]

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With all these LiveCDs, a CD customizer to make your own would be
awesome.  Customizing a LiveCD is a daunting task; however, a quick trip
through Synaptic and a few tweaks would make a CD Customizer an easy toy
for any user wanting to show off.

For example, I'm a business man so I'll take the business perspective.
Let's say you own a company, called (random name but I bet there is one)
Nexus Tech Service.  Your company has its own logo and all, and does PC
repair for Linux and Windows.

Obviously, Nexus would make great money by selling Linux installation
and customization, setting up dual boots and all.  But Nexus should
introduce Linux to their customer.  A generic LiveCD would be OK, but
what would be great?  Oh!  A Nexus custom LiveCD!

So, CD Customizer!  Obviously, intentions are a very nice UI for. . . .

WELCOME TO CD CUSTOMIZER!
INFO: You will use Synaptic to select the base system.  Repositories
have been chosen based on your current system; but you may edit to taste.
- -> Choose packages
- --> Select default system to work from? (i.e. ubuntu-desktop)
- --> Fine-tune your package selection
- -> Tune the CD theme
- --> USplash theme?  <chose> <create from image>
- --> Desktop background?  <choose>
- --> GTK+ theme?  [Gnome Themes [v]] <Details...>
- --> Log-in sound?  <choose>
INFO:  You may enter the user environment and configure the gnome panels
and session, after which the configuration information will be saved
Earlier theme choices, desktop backgrounds, and log-in sounds will
override those settings; all others persist to the LiveCD.
INFO:  You may select a /home/USER directory which will overlay the rest
of the /home directory for the Live environment.  This will let you
perform a more advanced customization by using a fake user account to
customize the account, and overlaying specific configurations from that
account onto the Live environment.  This is very advanced and requires
low level system administration.
- -> Tune user desktop
- --> Tune user desktop interactively?  <Yes> <No>
- --> Select other user configurations? <Yes> <No>
- -> Drivers
- --> Use non-free graphics (nVidia, ATi) drivers?  <Yes> <No>
- --> Use non-free Intel Centrino drivers? <Yes> <No>
- --> Use beta drivers (adm8211 Wireless, etc)? <Yes> <No>

Boom.  LiveCD created.  Give it 2 hours to press.

This would work as well for custom christmas packages (want to
distribute livecds in christmas cards, but don't care to learn how to
build or customize them at the command line?) or for just making your
own personal CD (I want Liferea and Thunderbird dammit!) or whatnot;
although businesses could squeeze a good bit out of this.

I love business.  Let businesses easily create a LiveCD themselves,
point and click, and you'll have a couple "<Manager> Hey neat, can you
make one that has our logo?  Hah, the other managers will get a kick out
of this. . ." "<marketting> omg yes that's awesome advertising!" showing
up.  Instant Linux/Ubuntu advertising for free.  Yes, I'm a PR whore.

Still, I want my own LiveCD >:O

I think an Advanced and a Simple mode would be good; Advanced mode would
be good for "run these scripts, use this kernel configuration, and make
me an environment to this spec based on my hacked-up /home/USER fake
directory"; while Simple would be more "Pick packages, USplash theme,
background, GTK+ theme, log-in sound, extra drivers."

Anyway, that'd be a nice target for Hoary+1 or so, IMHO.  LiveCD
customization is kinda like PC these days; a lot of people would
customize their software as well as their hardware just to look awesome.
 You can customize your desktop background and gnome theme and all, why
not customize a LiveCD to show off?  (Those types of people would have a
field day with Wobbly Windows. . .)
- --
All content of all messages exchanged herein are left in the
Public Domain, unless otherwise explicitly stated.

    Creative brains are a valuable, limited resource. They shouldn't be
    wasted on re-inventing the wheel when there are so many fascinating
    new problems waiting out there.
                                                 -- Eric Steven Raymond
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