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Re: Is there a way to install Debian iso's from an existing installation onto a USB connected drive?



Quoting Brian (2019-05-02 19:35:07)
> On Thu 02 May 2019 at 17:09:26 +0200, Jonas Smedegaard wrote:
> > Quoting Brian (2019-05-02 16:01:31)
> > > Which is why I have a udev rule with
> > > 
> > >   SUBSYSTEM=="block", ATTRS{removable}=="1", GROUP="floppy"
> > > 
> > > in it. I might stop doing that if its use was demonstrated to have 
> > > an adverse effect on other things I do.
> > 
> > Good for you that you have a hack that works.  Really!
> 
> Labelling it a "hack" is not something I find sufficient to cause me 
> to abandon a technique that makes copying to a removable device safer.

Sorry - I meant "hack" as a power user compliment.


> > Reason I discourage that approach more generally is not that I want 
> > to "flame" anyone (as in that bugreport you referenced aboe), but 
> > that I seek ways reasonable also for non-technical users: Your udev 
> > hack is more (not less) complicated for a non-technical user to do 
> > right compared to my one-liner sudo+cp command.  Your approach is 
> > sensible if doing _many_ such operations, but not when doing few, as 
> > a beginner.
> 
> I am unfamiliar with sudo but didn't think sudo+cp prevented my 
> accidentally wiping a system disk.

It doesn't.

You and I are both power user.  We use (sudo or) su, or log in as root.  
That is needed to tune our systems e.g. by adding a udev rule.

Last summer I was in Taiwan at Debconf, together with many other power 
users.  Imagine I had forgotten my laptop at home, went out and bought a 
cheap taiwanese laptop, and wanted to install Debian on it.  I would 
then go over to one of my power user friends with my new laptop and a 
USB stick.  I could then ask my friend to...

  * Reconfigure their system to include a udev rule 
    so that writing to USB flash disks did not require root,
    and then run cp as regular user (even a guest account!)

  * Run a cp command as root.

Which would be most sensible?

Which would be most sensible to ask a non-technical friend to do?

Yes, your approach works, and is one that I might use myself and might 
recommend to power users for their own pleasure.  But not something I 
would recommend to power user for a one-time need, not something I would 
recommend non-technical users themselves (how *I* might tune their 
systems if granted root access is a very different story).


 - Jonas

-- 
 * Jonas Smedegaard - idealist & Internet-arkitekt
 * Tlf.: +45 40843136  Website: http://dr.jones.dk/

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