[ Thanks to Jim
Lynch for this link. ]
“In the almost 20 years since Linux was first released
into the world, free for anyone to use and modify however they
like, the operating system has been put to a lot of uses. Today, a
vast number of servers run Linux to serve up Web pages and
applications, while user-friendly versions of Linux run PCs,
netbooks, and even Android and WebOS phones.“One incredibly useful way that Linux has been adapted to the
needs of modern computer users is as a “live CD,” a version of the
operating system that can be booted from a CD (or a DVD or, in some
cases, a USB drive) without actually being installed on the
computer’s hard drive. Given the massive RAM and fast CPUs
available on even the lowest-end computers today, along with
Linux’s generally lower system requirements compared to Windows and
Mac OS X, you can run Linux quite comfortably from a CD drive.“Live discs allow you to radically transform the nature of the
machine you’re working on — without modifying the installed
operating system and software at all. There are a number of reasons
you might want to do this. The most obvious is to test a new
version or different distribution of Linux before deploying it,
saving yourself the surprise of incompatible software or
nonfunctional hardware after installation. But even if your
business does not plan to deploy Linux as a desktop or server
operating system, there are still good reasons to have a live Linux
CD or two on hand.”