Do any of you use other distros just for the tools?

[Silpheed2K]

Like for instance. GParted is bugged and is broken when it comes to certain functions of partitioning.
So while I was trying distros out. I noticed one distro had a special set of partitioning tools. (or they were special to me)
This distro was OpenSUSE. I don't really like the way OpenSUSE is structured too much but I got a 11.2 beta liveCD just for the partitioning tools because I feel they're top notch and free. They did what I needed where gparted failed me. If you're going to tinker around get an 11.2 (beta) liveCD because they fixed the minor bugs that were in 11.1.
(didn't calculate the max partition size slightly so it didnt max out the space it could resize the partition in 11.1 <left like 300MB unformatted on my several hundred gig drive>)

So are there any distros you use just for the tools it comes with? I'd like to hear your experiences.

as I said I'm not a fan of OpenSUSE; just the tools

[Adunaic]

Hmm.. Does really screwing up you install then using a livecd (from some other extremely bad distro.) that you have lying around to download a Fedora ISO count?

[beaker_]

Yeah I use to lug around 3 favourites (live cds), then grub4dos + a bunch of images, and now it's reduced to an F10 on a memory stick, custom spin of course.

[Dan]

Oh, yeah!

Gparted LiveCD -- General partitioning chores.
Puppy 4.x -- Booting and running on low-end gear, liveCD ops when I don't want to leave tracks, rescuing files, moving files, copying files, checking filesystems.
F11 LiveCD -- Checking HDD Health, re-installing a pooched GRUB.
MINT liveCD -- Checking system hardware compatibility, introducing the sceptical to Linux. Installing as an intro Linux system for those recent Windows converts who have no business trying to deal with the foibles of the Brown *buntu -- or heaven forbid ... fedora.
PCLOS 2007~2008 liveCD -- Getting into an otherwise inaccessible drive ntfs to fetch evidence ... er ... files.
Vector Linux 5.x SOHO -- Running on low-end systems on which the owner needs impressed with a little more flash and glitz than the stock Puppy.
Ubuntu Ultimate -- I boot this once in a while just to fiddle with the Brown *buntu and see what the yellow and orange fanboys are all raving about. <....>

Somehow ... OpenSUSE just never got back into my working picture after that damn little green traitorous lizard crossed enemy lines. <....>

<....>

funny enough.. OpenSuse doesnt like my hardware. it never shuts down properly plus i get whole heap of errors during boot

[Silpheed2K]

Originally Posted by Dan

F11 LiveCD -- Checking HDD Health, re-installing a pooched GRUB.

How do you check your hard drive health in fedora? I was wondering how would I ever know about file corruption or disk errors with ext3, let alone fragmentation.

[Dan]

When you boot the F-11 liveCD, (I prefer Rahul's Omega LiveCD, BTW) there is a disk check utility (palimpsest Disk Utility) which automatically runs, checking the health of all HDDs on the system.

[forkbomb]

gparted livecd
systemrescuecd

Bread and butter will take you far.

[beaker_]

you can install gparted onto a custom spin of fedora easy enough, but I haven't checked into the nt admin passwrd reset/blanking from system-rescue. Is there a package for fedora, or is this a loaded question?

[Evil_Bert]

SystemRescueCD, Mint LiveCD and F11 LiveCD ... for mostly the same reasons as mentioned above.

I have plans to use a security testing distro - I've yet to settle on which, though I'm leaning toward Backtrack. Of course, that'll be "when I get around to it".

[pete_1967]

Not quite what you are thinking of I guess, but I use BackTrack for pen testing.

[winux_wuver]

Not a distro, but I regularly use Ultimate Boot CD v3.3 as I like to use Ranish Partition Manager to delete partitions I no longer want, and then get a good feeling when hitting E to write zeros over it - more than once if I have the time. The disk is looking a bit dog-eared.

[troyatlarge]

Does using a distro "as" a tool count? I certainly have done that until tonight. At my work there is a network of computers all running microsoft. I was given a very old dell with 256M memory and told I could use it with Linux. I placed Puppy on it given its size. It made the old dust box snappier than many of the hot newer boxes on the network.

The problem is I failed to be able to print. All printers are on the network attached to microsoft computer except a stand alone cannon copy machine. Although I can see them all, I failed completely to print from puppy directly to any given printer. I may have to go to a slightly larger distro to manage this and simply hope I maintain the snappy performance of the dust box under Linux. It needs to be advanced enough that Samba simply fires correctly first try (I have download, printed, and turned into a 900 page book the new samba guide but am likely not to have it read by tomorrow!).