USB File Management Possible?

[jstokka]

here's a dumb newbie question...my hard drive crashed on my laptop...I'm running 10.04 off my flash drive. I download programs like flash and skype and they appear to have downloaded....but where? When I boot up again...I have to download flash again to get some site working....still can't find my skype download. Under my download folder it says I have 497mb available??

Q 1. Can I use a USB Hub with multiple drives instead of a HD?

Q 2. Is there a file manager that I can select drive to add folders or download programs to?

[surfer]

you seem to be running the ubuntu live version on your flash drive. if you install packages in there, they are lost.

what you could do is: boot from the flash drive as you did before and install ubuntu on a second flash drive. then boot from that second usb stick. this will then behave like a normal install (installed pakages will be persistent).

downside: flash memory has a limited number of writes it supports. an installed ubuntu will write a lot on scrach and /tmp.

instead you could install an ubuntu that is optimized for flash drives, ah, i'm sure google will help you with that...

[theozzlives]

You'd be better off buying a hard drive. USB Sticks only have a limited number of writes and are a lot slower. That being said, I have a Flash that has Ubuntu and ClamAV for scanning Windows machines. If you install a piece of software it should stay put.