Enabling USB support in VirtualBox on a Fedora host is rather easy, just follow these steps.

Create a group called usb

In F9 that is [System->Administration->Users and Groups] Click the groups tab and click the add group icon. Enter the group name usb and note the group id being assigned (usually something like 502).

Modify /etc/fstab (as root)

Modify /etc/fstab adding the line (this assumes the group id of 502, replace with the correct id):

Remount file systems

You can either reboot or run the following command to make the fstab changes take effect (as root):

Start VirtualBox

Start VirtualBox and you should now be able to activate USB devices using the USB icon in the lower right of the VM window.

Given that Fedora has made it so easy to put a live cd image onto a usb or other external drive to provide a bootable take anywhere OS.

First off, you'll need the Fedora Live CD or DVD iso image, they can be found on the Fedora home page http://fedoraproject.org/en/get-fedora

You'll also need to install some other packages available in the standard repos.

Install livecd-tools with your package manager.

Console mode is great for some tasks, but why live with 80x25 when by adding vga=775 to your grub line will give you 160x160 mode (using 1280x1024)... Simple and sweet.

Fedora 9 (F9 Sulphur) has been released. Here I will record my personal setup. Note, this is a work in progress and will be updated as I (slowly) configure my system.

My setup: Dell Inspiron 9400 (E1705)

• Audio device: Intel 82801G High Definition Audio Controller (rev 01)
• IDE interface: Intel 82801GBM/GHM SATA IDE Controller (rev 01)
• Video: nVidia Corporation GeForce Go 7900 GS (rev a1)
• Ethernet: Broadcom Corporation BCM4401-B0 100Base-TX (rev 02)
• FireWire (IEEE 1394): Ricoh Co Ltd R5C832 IEEE 1394 Controller
• Network controller: Intel PRO/Wireless 3945ABG Network Connection (rev 02)

On the usual Fedora (6,7,8) setup the NetworkManager will use the gnome-keyring to retrieve and store connection credentials. One nasty side effect is that on each boot it will require you to unlock your keyring before your wireless connection can be established.

To avoid this make your login password and keyring password the same, ensure that gnome-keyring, gnome-keyring-pam and pam-keyring are installed and make your /etc/pam.d/gdm file look like:

Upon restarting you should no longer be required to open your keyring.

On Fedora 6 - 9, and maybe other Linux distros, the PC speaker is quite loud and beeps at boot up. This can be disabled by adding the following to the end of /etc/modprobe.d/blacklist