[conspire] making a FlashDrive look like a CD

[Rick Moen]

Quoting jose tav (j_tav at yahoo.com):

>  Hello Folks,I have a pain with LinuxMint on a Flash drive, which
>  after few two or three boots getting corrupted.The only way I know
>  how to alleviate a little bit the pain is by running Linux out of CD
>  drive. But then I got another kind of pain -toooo slowwww.
> 
> The best option out of two I can think of, would be to Install Linux
> on a flash drive with all the apps I will need and then "encapsulate"
> it,  a la CD so that Window's s^*(&% won't corrupt my system, in other
> words the machine start getting very sluggish, cursor jump around
> while typing, YES touchpad is set to inactivity. Also the BIOS get
> reset to allow ONLY windows to boot on power up.

> Yes Linux has the encryption  option, but I think it covers the
> Documents directory only. I used it only once, I got a little tire of
> he constant log-in.

> There you have Folks, what you think can be done, short of purchasing
> a prohibitive Macboot to "fix" the problem.

> Any tips, suggestions are welcome, and I will grateful for.
> Have a nice weekend!


Hi, Jose.  I delayed responding to your query because your question
raises other questions.  Specifically, I kept getting the uncomfortable
feeling that you may be seeking to solve the wrong problem.

Your second paragraph seems to suggest you suspect that your
installation of MS-Windows is corrupting the Linux Mint installation you
have on a flash drive.  Leaving aside that it's unclear what you mean by
'getting corrupted', I just don't see what you suggest as plausible.
Frankly, I don't even see how it would be _possible_.

That is, when you boot to Linux Mint, by booting from the flash drive,
you are not running any code of any kind on your system hard drive where
MS-Windows resides.  So, given that no part of MS-Windows gets executed,
there is no way that it can 'corrupt' the flash drive at that time, or
do anything at all, for that matter.

Of course, if you _also_ leave the flash drive attached when rebooting
to MS-Windows, _then_ it would in theory be possible for MS-Windows, or
some program run by MS-Windows (including MS-Windows malware) to write
(something) to the flash drive.  The obvious way to prevent that would
be to disconnect the flash drive before rebooting to MS-Windows.

Your account was so vague that I need to stop there, e.g., we're left
with no clear understanding of what the course of events was.

In a larger sense, you ought to concentrate on figuring out what --
ccording to you -- is writing to your flash drive without your
permission.  That is very abnormal behaviour, and, e.g., is not
something MS-Windows does on its own initiative.  So, something bad is
going on (according to your account), and you haven't figured out what
that thing is.  _That_ is what you should work on, figuring that out, 
not seeking to throw encryption at the problem.