Nexuiz etc LiveCD -- how far can hardware detection go?

[John Richard Moser]

How far can Ubuntu's hardware autoconfiguration go?  How far does 3D
support work in Linux now?  Joysticks/mice/etc?

One fascinating idea I've had for a while was to turn a PC into a gaming
console.  I hear a lot of "Windows runs my games" and "I have a high-end
gaming PC" these days.  Why not burn a game onto a DVD or CD, with
Ubuntu, with the configuration set up so it boots and finds a USB drive
or hard drive and lets you pick where to save config/games to?

This is just an off-the-cuff thought, but what about a release LiveCD
that really does boot up Nexuiz or something on boot, and shut it down
when you exit?  Fast shutdown:  remount all r/w drives as read-only, run
sync, wait 3 seconds, then flat out halt the system.  What about a boot
menu that picks the game (read /proc/cmdline) for you?  No Gnome, no
Fluxbox, no stripped UI.  Just load up X, have it use the game as the WM.

During boot, list drives found (list "initialized drives" with a
specific config file on them first) that may have configuration data
(i.e. wireless networks, save games, hardware settings...).  Allow
reconfiguration, including picking a wifi network, or such.  Aside from
that, pretty much "Pick profile.  Configure? [No]  Launching game..."

Feasible?  Interesting?  Challenging?  Likely to expose new and
interesting design considerations for general desktop OSes?  Any
thoughts or comments at all?


-- 
Bring back the Firefox plushy!
http://digg.com/linux_unix/Is_the_Firefox_plush_gone_for_good
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=322367