Bootable business card
Encyclopedia
A bootable business card (BBC) is a CD-ROM
that has been cut, pressed, or molded to the size and shape of a business card
(designed to fit in a wallet or pocket). Alternative names for this form factor include "credit card", "hockey rink", and "wallet-size". The cards are designed to hold about 50 MB
. The CD-ROM business cards are generally used for commercial product demos, are mailed to prospective customers, and are given away at trade shows.
Although the term "bootable business card" could be applied to any bootable CD-ROM in the business card form factor, it almost always refers one which contains a compact Linux distribution
generally containing a suite of system diagnostic and rescue tools and/or demos of specific packages.
employee Duncan MacKinnon proposed the idea of producing and distributing such a card for an upcoming tradeshow. He and his team of volunteers (fellow employees) coined the phrase "bootable business card".
The premiere version was available at the first LinuxWorld
Expo in San Jose, California
. The initial press run produced 10,000 copies. Most of those were given away at the show and shipped to Linux users groups in the ensuing months.
Since the project consisted of open source
and free software
, and the idea was compelling and simple, a number of other Linux BBCs rapidly became available.
The first derivative was produced by the Irish Linux Users Group. Over the years, most of the creators of the original Linuxcare BBC left the company, but have continued to work on the project which is now called the LNX-BBC.
At least one of the boxed Red Hat Linux
packages included a system rescue CD in business card form factor.
Many derivatives and clones of the BBC have proliferated. Almost all of these run on PC
s. Limited success has been achieved on BBCs and Live CDs on other computing platforms.
The early versions of the Linuxcare BBC were collections of packages that had been precompiled for other distributions (such as Debian
and Red Hat Linux
from which subsets of files were copied into the directory from which the BBC was "mastered" (the ISO 9660 CD images were built).
Building the entire mini-distribution from source code was the major undertaking of the LNX-BBC project (which formed of the original Linuxcare members with other contributors and volunteers). The first version of the LNX-BBC that was independent from Linuxcare was 1.618 (a number suggested by team member Seth Schoen, an approximation of the golden mean
, or phi
, and a tribute to Don Knuth who used successively more precise approximations of π
for versioning his TeX
typesetting system).
Beginning with version 2.0, all LNX-BBC discs are built entirely from source code using the GAR system.
This version was used by the Free Software Foundation
as their membership card (given sponsoring members for their donations).
More recently, the 50 MB Damn Small Linux
can be put on BBCs. There have also been "BBC" releases of other free operating systems such as FreeBSD
.
Once booted, the operating system
runs from the CD and out of the system's RAM. Because the business card form factor has such a small capacity the Linuxcare developers chose to use a compressed filesystem. This allows the typical BBC to contain about 100 megabyte
s of software in only about 50 megabytes of disc space.
The original BBC and most of its clones and derivatives will scan the system for recognized filesystems, automatically "mounting" these up in read-only mode. This makes filesystems on any local hard disks accessible while minimizing the risk of inadvertent corruption, deletion or other damage to files on local drives.
A typical BBC contains a suite of networking, back-up and data recovery utilities, which is why they are valued by Linux system administrators as rescue tools.
Many BBCs use the cloop (compressed loopback) driver which provided a compressed read-only filesystem for Linux. Of course they typically have some of the system's memory (RAM) configured as a ramdisk (or perhaps several RAM disks). This typically leaves the CD-ROM drive dedicated for the duration of the system usage. However, some BBCs create a larger ramdisk and copy the entire system off the CD, thus making the drive available for other CDs or DVDs. This is useful because some PCs have only a single CD or DVD drive.
Once booted, these systems provide a UNIX/Linux command line prompt (generally as the root user). Some also provide some very compact graphical user interface
(GUI) tools. The LNX-BBC includes a small X (X Window System) server and a web browser called BrowseX (among other tools).
At their core most BBCs are rescue and diagnostics tools for expert professionals, and normal user-operations are catered for better by Live CD distributions.
s, operating in a similar manner to a bootable business card, notably including the Knoppix
and Ubuntu
distributions. Similarly, Linux distributions can often be configured to run from a USB flash drive
, or a similar medium, such as a floppy disk
. Some can be booted over a network.
CD-ROM
A CD-ROM is a pre-pressed compact disc that contains data accessible to, but not writable by, a computer for data storage and music playback. The 1985 “Yellow Book” standard developed by Sony and Philips adapted the format to hold any form of binary data....
that has been cut, pressed, or molded to the size and shape of a business card
Business card
Business cards are cards bearing business information about a company or individual. They are shared during formal introductions as a convenience and a memory aid. A business card typically includes the giver's name, company affiliation and contact information such as street addresses, telephone...
(designed to fit in a wallet or pocket). Alternative names for this form factor include "credit card", "hockey rink", and "wallet-size". The cards are designed to hold about 50 MB
Megabyte
The megabyte is a multiple of the unit byte for digital information storage or transmission with two different values depending on context: bytes generally for computer memory; and one million bytes generally for computer storage. The IEEE Standards Board has decided that "Mega will mean 1 000...
. The CD-ROM business cards are generally used for commercial product demos, are mailed to prospective customers, and are given away at trade shows.
Although the term "bootable business card" could be applied to any bootable CD-ROM in the business card form factor, it almost always refers one which contains a compact Linux distribution
Linux distribution
A Linux distribution is a member of the family of Unix-like operating systems built on top of the Linux kernel. Such distributions are operating systems including a large collection of software applications such as word processors, spreadsheets, media players, and database applications...
generally containing a suite of system diagnostic and rescue tools and/or demos of specific packages.
History
In 1999 LinuxcareLinuxcare
Linuxcare was founded in San Francisco in 1998 by Dave Sifry, Arthur Tyde and Dave LaDuke. The company's initial goal was to be "the 800 number for Linux" and operate 24 hours a day...
employee Duncan MacKinnon proposed the idea of producing and distributing such a card for an upcoming tradeshow. He and his team of volunteers (fellow employees) coined the phrase "bootable business card".
The premiere version was available at the first LinuxWorld
LinuxWorld
LinuxWorld has various meanings:* LinuxWorld Conference and Expo - a series of Linux conferences worldwide that became OpenSource World in 2009.* LinuxWorld Magazine - a print publication produced from 2003 to 2006...
Expo in San Jose, California
San Jose, California
San Jose is the third-largest city in California, the tenth-largest in the U.S., and the county seat of Santa Clara County which is located at the southern end of San Francisco Bay...
. The initial press run produced 10,000 copies. Most of those were given away at the show and shipped to Linux users groups in the ensuing months.
Since the project consisted of open source
Open source
The term open source describes practices in production and development that promote access to the end product's source materials. Some consider open source a philosophy, others consider it a pragmatic methodology...
and free software
Free software
Free software, software libre or libre software is software that can be used, studied, and modified without restriction, and which can be copied and redistributed in modified or unmodified form either without restriction, or with restrictions that only ensure that further recipients can also do...
, and the idea was compelling and simple, a number of other Linux BBCs rapidly became available.
The first derivative was produced by the Irish Linux Users Group. Over the years, most of the creators of the original Linuxcare BBC left the company, but have continued to work on the project which is now called the LNX-BBC.
At least one of the boxed Red Hat Linux
Red Hat Linux
Red Hat Linux, assembled by the company Red Hat, was a popular Linux based operating system until its discontinuation in 2004.Red Hat Linux 1.0 was released on November 3, 1994...
packages included a system rescue CD in business card form factor.
Many derivatives and clones of the BBC have proliferated. Almost all of these run on PC
Personal computer
A personal computer is any general-purpose computer whose size, capabilities, and original sales price make it useful for individuals, and which is intended to be operated directly by an end-user with no intervening computer operator...
s. Limited success has been achieved on BBCs and Live CDs on other computing platforms.
The early versions of the Linuxcare BBC were collections of packages that had been precompiled for other distributions (such as Debian
Debian
Debian is a computer operating system composed of software packages released as free and open source software primarily under the GNU General Public License along with other free software licenses. Debian GNU/Linux, which includes the GNU OS tools and Linux kernel, is a popular and influential...
and Red Hat Linux
Red Hat Linux
Red Hat Linux, assembled by the company Red Hat, was a popular Linux based operating system until its discontinuation in 2004.Red Hat Linux 1.0 was released on November 3, 1994...
from which subsets of files were copied into the directory from which the BBC was "mastered" (the ISO 9660 CD images were built).
Building the entire mini-distribution from source code was the major undertaking of the LNX-BBC project (which formed of the original Linuxcare members with other contributors and volunteers). The first version of the LNX-BBC that was independent from Linuxcare was 1.618 (a number suggested by team member Seth Schoen, an approximation of the golden mean
Golden mean
Golden mean may refer to:*Doctrine of the Golden Mean , a chapter in Li Ji, one of the Four Books of Confucianism*Golden mean , the felicitous middle between the extremes of excess and deficiency...
, or phi
Phi
Phi may refer to:In language:*Phi, the Greek letter Φ,φ, the symbol for voiceless bilabial fricativeIn mathematics:*The Golden ratio*Euler's totient function*A statistical measure of association reported with the chi-squared test...
, and a tribute to Don Knuth who used successively more precise approximations of π
Pi
' is a mathematical constant that is the ratio of any circle's circumference to its diameter. is approximately equal to 3.14. Many formulae in mathematics, science, and engineering involve , which makes it one of the most important mathematical constants...
for versioning his TeX
TeX
TeX is a typesetting system designed and mostly written by Donald Knuth and released in 1978. Within the typesetting system, its name is formatted as ....
typesetting system).
Beginning with version 2.0, all LNX-BBC discs are built entirely from source code using the GAR system.
This version was used by the Free Software Foundation
Free Software Foundation
The Free Software Foundation is a non-profit corporation founded by Richard Stallman on 4 October 1985 to support the free software movement, a copyleft-based movement which aims to promote the universal freedom to create, distribute and modify computer software...
as their membership card (given sponsoring members for their donations).
More recently, the 50 MB Damn Small Linux
Damn Small Linux
Damn Small Linux or DSL is a computer operating system for the x86 family of personal computers. It is free and open source software under the terms of GNU GPL and other free and open source licenses. It was designed to run graphical applications on older PC hardware—for example, machines with...
can be put on BBCs. There have also been "BBC" releases of other free operating systems such as FreeBSD
FreeBSD
FreeBSD is a free Unix-like operating system descended from AT&T UNIX via BSD UNIX. Although for legal reasons FreeBSD cannot be called “UNIX”, as the direct descendant of BSD UNIX , FreeBSD’s internals and system APIs are UNIX-compliant...
.
Operation
The key of the bootable business card is that it runs completely from the CD and the system's memory (RAM), as several "Live" CD versions of Linux have been doing for years. One simply puts the CD into the drive, powers up the computer and ensures that the CD drive is selected for boot before the hard drive.Once booted, the operating system
Operating system
An operating system is a set of programs that manage computer hardware resources and provide common services for application software. The operating system is the most important type of system software in a computer system...
runs from the CD and out of the system's RAM. Because the business card form factor has such a small capacity the Linuxcare developers chose to use a compressed filesystem. This allows the typical BBC to contain about 100 megabyte
Megabyte
The megabyte is a multiple of the unit byte for digital information storage or transmission with two different values depending on context: bytes generally for computer memory; and one million bytes generally for computer storage. The IEEE Standards Board has decided that "Mega will mean 1 000...
s of software in only about 50 megabytes of disc space.
The original BBC and most of its clones and derivatives will scan the system for recognized filesystems, automatically "mounting" these up in read-only mode. This makes filesystems on any local hard disks accessible while minimizing the risk of inadvertent corruption, deletion or other damage to files on local drives.
A typical BBC contains a suite of networking, back-up and data recovery utilities, which is why they are valued by Linux system administrators as rescue tools.
Many BBCs use the cloop (compressed loopback) driver which provided a compressed read-only filesystem for Linux. Of course they typically have some of the system's memory (RAM) configured as a ramdisk (or perhaps several RAM disks). This typically leaves the CD-ROM drive dedicated for the duration of the system usage. However, some BBCs create a larger ramdisk and copy the entire system off the CD, thus making the drive available for other CDs or DVDs. This is useful because some PCs have only a single CD or DVD drive.
Once booted, these systems provide a UNIX/Linux command line prompt (generally as the root user). Some also provide some very compact graphical user interface
Graphical user interface
In computing, a graphical user interface is a type of user interface that allows users to interact with electronic devices with images rather than text commands. GUIs can be used in computers, hand-held devices such as MP3 players, portable media players or gaming devices, household appliances and...
(GUI) tools. The LNX-BBC includes a small X (X Window System) server and a web browser called BrowseX (among other tools).
At their core most BBCs are rescue and diagnostics tools for expert professionals, and normal user-operations are catered for better by Live CD distributions.
Alternatives
A number of Linux distributions run from Live CDLive CD
A live CD, live DVD, or live disc is a CD or DVD containing a bootable computer operating system. Live CDs are unique in that they have the ability to run a complete, modern operating system on a computer lacking mutable secondary storage, such as a hard disk drive...
s, operating in a similar manner to a bootable business card, notably including the Knoppix
Knoppix
Knoppix, or KNOPPIX , is an operating system based on Debian designed to be run directly from a CD / DVD or a USB key , one of the first of its kind for any operating system. Knoppix was developed by Linux consultant Klaus Knopper. When starting a program, it is loaded from the removable medium...
and Ubuntu
Ubuntu (operating system)
Ubuntu is a computer operating system based on the Debian Linux distribution and distributed as free and open source software. It is named after the Southern African philosophy of Ubuntu...
distributions. Similarly, Linux distributions can often be configured to run from a USB flash drive
USB flash drive
A flash drive is a data storage device that consists of flash memory with an integrated Universal Serial Bus interface. flash drives are typically removable and rewritable, and physically much smaller than a floppy disk. Most weigh less than 30 g...
, or a similar medium, such as a floppy disk
Floppy disk
A floppy disk is a disk storage medium composed of a disk of thin and flexible magnetic storage medium, sealed in a rectangular plastic carrier lined with fabric that removes dust particles...
. Some can be booted over a network.