LiveUSB Graphics image with OpenBSD - carry your graphics packages on a memory stick

What is LiveUSB-Graphics?

It is trivial to a create a bootable USB stick with OpenBSD. I wanted to create one and realized that this will be of general use for anyone who likes a UNIX USB memory stick that they can carry with them on a keychain. This creation focuses on graphics application like xv, xpaint and inkscape.

You can now purchase a preloaded LiveUSB flashdrive from for just 49.95$

If you wish to have LiveCD/LiveDVD instead, please refer to our other LiveCD-Graphics project on sourceforge!

This USB image shall not touch your hard disk in any way. All the operations are done in the USB stick and main memory. Nothing will be written to your MBR or boot loaders!

Please make your choice, download and enjoy!

Quick Download links

Download 16 Gigabytes image(Compressed size less than 1G)

How to create your own LiveUSB Graphics with OpenBSD?

Really easy. Watch out. Everything is done with qemu by Fabrice Bellard. Just install that package and blindly follow the instructions below.

                # qemu-img create liveusb-graphics.img 15625000k

                # qemu-system-i386 -hda liveusb-graphics.img -cdrom install54.iso

That is it! You are ready to dd(1) now. See below.

Creating a LiveCD is more work because you need a read only OS. No such issue with writeable USB memory sticks.

You can login as user live and password live123 The root password is openbsd1729.

LiveUSB Graphics shot

These LiveUSB images are based on 5.4 release of OpenBSD made on November 1, 2013.

The following packages are installed.

DevIL-1.7.8p6       library for powerful image loading capabilities
GraphicsMagick-1.3.18 image processing tools with stable ABI
ImageMagick-6.7.7.7p2 image processing tools
aalib-1.4p5         ascii art library
abiword-2.8.6p7     free cross-platform WYSIWYG word processor
agg-2.5p4           anti-grain geometry graphics library
amide-0.9.2p16      Amide a Medical Imaging Data Examiner
animorph-0.3p0      morphing engine
aqsis-1.8.2p0       photorealistic 3D rendering solution
argyll-1.1.0.20100201p2 ICC compatible color management system
bruce-1.2.1p4       Python-based presentation tool
cadubi-1.3p0        ASCII drawing utility
cairo-1.12.14p0     vector graphics library
cairomm-1.10.0p1    C++ interface for cairo
cal3d-0.11.0p0      skeletal based character animation library
calcurse-2.9.2v0    text-based calendar and scheduling application
cfdg-2.2.2          Context Free Design Grammar
clutter-1.14.4p0    OpenGL-based interactive canvas library
colord-1.0.0        device color profile management daemon
colorls-5.3         ls that can use color to display file attributes
comix-4.0.4         gtk2 comic book viewer
ctl-1.4.1p0         Color Transformation Language interpreter
curl-7.26.0p3       get files from FTP, Gopher, HTTP or HTTPS servers
darktable-1.2.2p0   virtual lighttable and darkroom for photographers
dcmtk-3.5.4p1       DICOM toolkit
dcraw-9.17          digital camera RAW format conversion tool
devtodo-0.1.20p1    reminder/task program aimed at developers
dia-0.97.2p7        technical diagrams drawing tool
digikam-0.9.6p9     digital image kde application
digikam-doc-0.9.3p0 documentation for digikam
discwrapper-1.2.2p0 disc cover designer
djview4-4.9         portable DjVu viewer and browser plugin
djvulibre-3.5.25.3p0 view, decode and encode DjVu files
dpic-2011.12.09     pic-like interpreter for producing line graphics
dumpmpeg-0.6p1      dump frames from mpeg-1 movies
enblend-enfuse-4.0p3 blend seams in panoramic image mosaics
enjoympeg-0.4.1p1   mpeg-1 video player
entomologist-0.6p4  bug tracker client
exiftran-2.08p0     command line utility to transform jpeg files
exiv2-0.23          manipulate image meta-data such as exif and ipct
feh-2.9.3           lightweight image viewer
fet-5.14.1p2        automatically create timetables
ffmpeg-20130319     audio/video converter and streamer
ffmpegthumbnailer-2.0.8 lightweight video thumbnailer for file managers
figlet-2.2.5        generates ASCII banner art
firefox-22.0        Mozilla web browser
flash-0.4.10p0      open source standalone flash(tm) player
freeglut-2.8.0      open source alternative to glut
freeimage-3.15.2p0  c++ library for common image format
ftgl-2.1.3rc5p1v0   font rendering library for OpenGL applications
fxtv-1.03p5         capture utility for Brooktree-based cards
fyre-1.0.1p14       tool for producing computational artwork
geeqie-1.1v0        lightweight Gtk+2 based image viewer
gegl-0.2.0p0        graph based image processing framework
geomview-1.9.4p1    geometry viewer for OOGL file formats
gfract-0.33p10      fractal program with GTK interface
gif2png-2.5.2p1     converts GIF images to the PNG format
giftrans-1.12       handle GIF89a transparent option and interlace mode
gimp-2.8.4p2        GNU Image Manipulation Program
xfce-4.10           Xfce desktop meta-package (base installation)

In all the 3 variants you can always add and remove packages with the pkg_add(1) and pkg_delete(1) commands in case my choices do not agree with yours.

Once you download the 7z image, install p7zip and unzip the USB image.

                Install 7zip if not already present.
                # pkg_add p7zip

                Unzip the downloaded image with this command.
                $ 7z e liveusb-graphics.img.7z

Then verify the SHA1 checksums from the table below.

Installing LiveUSB to a USB stick on UNIX/Linux

You can burn this image to a USB stick with this command on OpenBSD

                # dd if=liveusb-graphics.img of=/dev/rsd0c bs=256k

Please be aware that your USB stick could be sd0 .. sdn depending upon in what order you insert into your computer.

You can burn this image to a USB stick with this command on Linux.

                # dd if=liveusb-graphics.img of=/dev/sdb bs=8192

Please check with dmesg and find out whether your stick is identified as sdb or sdc or whatever else.

Once you write the image you can test the USB stick without rebooting the computer with this qemu command on OpenBSD.

                # qemu-system-i386 -usb -hda /dev/rsd0c

Once you find that things work fine you can reboot. You can do something similar on Linux and Windows too.

If you are too lazy to burn it into a USB stick you could run this off a qemu emulator.

                # qemu-system-i386 -hda liveusb-graphics.img

                (If you want full networking you boot with)
        
                # qemu-system-i386 -net nic -net tap -hda  liveusb-graphics.img

Booting resumes from this point and throws up an xdm screen. Doing this saves this fstab into the USB image. Instead you can do better by copying it and using one image for qemu and another for USB burning.

If you wish to have LiveCD/LiveDVD instead, please refer to our other LiveCD-Graphics project on sourceforge!

In fact the easiest way to use LiveUSB is by burning the ISO of the sister project LiveCD-Finance and use the LiveUSB that it creates.

Installing LiveUSB to a USB stick on Windows OS

Should you not have access to any UNIX or Linux system you could always use this project to try out OpenBSD by burning to a USB stick from Windows using the free VMWare Player. It is a free download available for those who register on the VMWare website. You also require an ISO image of the LiveCD-OpenBSD project(see above).

Being a GUI tool I am not in a position to detail the process as a bulleted list. However I will guide you briefly and add screenshots when I get time.In case you are curious you could always drop me a mail and I shall respond(mail ID given at bottom of the page).

The idea is to connect to the USB subsystem when you create a new VM and use the downloaded LiveCD-OpenBSD ISO to boot and create a VM which is basically a hard disk image to install the ISO to.

But we instead install to the USB stick. When you create a VM in the final screen you can click at Options and add a USB controller. Then you go to the top menu and Connect to the USB stick in question.

As part of the booting process you will see that OpenBSD actually recognizes the USB stick as yet another hard disk and this happens by disconnecting the stick in the Windows host and connecting it to the OpenBSD guest(this happens automatically).

Now when you run the installer from the CD inside VMWare, you can choose the USB stick instead of the VMWare's hard disk file store as the installer shows the size of the disk to install to. This is bit tricky as my installer does not report the name of the disk. But you should not have much trouble with it. I suggest you always use a VMWare disk image as being very small(since you never use it anyway) like 1G or something and the USB stick you use will be either 4 or 8 Gigabytes. So you can always identify which disk is which from the size reported by the installer. You choose by pressing SPACE bar and then you type TAB followed by ENTER.

Here are screenshots to explain how to install LiveUSB from a Windows machine to a USB stick. If you are familiar with VMWare Player you can go the usual way till the final "Customize Hardware" button and then you have to add the USB controller. Then you can choose to install to USB stick after the CD boots.

VMWare Player LiveUSB

Please e-mail girish@gayatri-hitech.com for anything. This project is available on Amazon for just 49.95$.

You can now purchase a preloaded LiveUSB flashdrive from for just 49.95$

All updates are tweeted to https://twitter.com/LiveUSBOpenBSD.

Tweets by @LiveUSBOpenBSD