[kwlug-disc] question -- booting from multiple ISOs in USB stick?

[Jason Locklin]

On 26/09/15 07:14 PM, B.S. wrote:
> Are any of these persistent? i.e. you can make changes, create documents, etc., and when you shut down the state is written back to the stick?
>
> Not meaning to hijack the thread, but ... IIRC, all this stuff reacts differently on external drives (which behave exactly like internal drives, but slower?), than on sticks, it seems.
>
> So, if you used a small, 2.5", usb powered, external drive, would your life be easier? Perhaps even an SSD, for speed / robustness? e.g. Could use standard grub / multiple partitions?

Actually, no, there is no difference between the two types of physical 
hardware. The difference is booting ISOs vs. installed systems. For 
instance, the same dd command *could* be used to copy an ISO to a thumb 
drive or an external hard drive to boot from -- but this would only 
allow a single os at a time. Conversely you can install one or more 
systems to a thumb drive or an external hard drive, using GRUB 
(partitioning as normal). It's the same whether its one type of device 
or the other.

The trick is getting Grub to boot from a list of ISOs on a drive. The 
grub trick Bob mentioned or the windows scripts mentioned by Brian and 
CrankyOldButter should work on either device as well --but I gave up 
last time I tried to do it. -Jason