Browsable CD -- HOW can we copy/capture several Drupal Sites to a CD??

You know what you are looking for, so keep following the trail.

There are a few (free) packages that are set up to help with this. Yes, you can try a WGET or something to mirror a static version, but you lose most of the Drupal goodness.

Easiest these days may be to try getting it on a USB stick
Portable XAMPP-onna-stick: http://portableapps.com/apps/development/xampp
http://swik.net/WAMP+portable
They are coming in cornflake packets nowadays.

Apache, and indeed XAMPP does not require actual installation, you can kick it from any media. MYSQL pretty much does need writeable media, but I believe there are ramdisk solutions or other mysteries folk have done.

I've done various incarnations of this throughout history, like a fully working transaction online banking system (demo, but with live database) running off CD back in 1998.
A few recent attempts (including interactive Drupal demos) have worked by creating a boot script that copied the MYSQL data files into the PC temp directory and launching Apache + MySQLd with a bat file that directs them to use those dirs. It works as desired, but is too flaky to describe as instructions. Lotsa little workarounds like checking the CD drive letter, then writing an apache httpd.conf on-the-fly :-}

I know there are other good projects doing CD-bootable websites, but can't speak for any specific distro.

.dan.
How to troubleshoot Drupal | http://www.coders.co.nz/

And I don't know whether it will work from a CD, but: I am very happy with WOS Portable (Website On a Stick). Awesome bit of programming, but it might work for one Drupal installation only.
You install the program on a USB stick, then import the database from a backup. (After having changed the url's in the MySQL dump to localhost.) This importing process can take some time. To speeden things up, you can copy all of the stick's content to a hard drive directory and do the job there.
So, it might not be impossible to copy it to a CD, also. Of course this would be a read-only version, and I have no idea wheter Drupal might encounter problems there.

http://www.chsoftware.net/en/useware/wos/wos.htm

Hi,

I have researched using DVD, since everybody has a DVD palyer. There is a lot of software available (open source and commercial) to convert video/audio formats. But copyrights must be understood. See creative commons as a point of deaprture.

I'm working on a concept that I have named ND (Newspaper DVD). My website will be up soon and I will be looking for newbies and interns for the ND project. But for now, here is a summary (which may suprise, if not astonish, you):

{begin quote from website text}

The ND (Newspaper DVD) Project.

I proposed this project recently shortly after it occurred to me that the future of the newspaper lies primarily with the DVD, and vice versa, that is, the future of the DVD lies within the news industry.

I suggest that in the very near future, publishing industry leaders will realize that the DVD is the answer to their space limitation dilemma. At first they will be in denial, but they will be inexorably drawn to the DVD by the availability of its massive, versatile, colorful, dynamic content and advertising space.

Hollywood movies (on DVD) have created the infrastructure. Everyone has access to DVD players, and knows how to use them. A computer and computer knowledge are not required (to view the DVDs). Just stick it in and watch. No costly cable or satellite subscription fees. No internet service fees. (A 2nd or 3rd DVD player costs less than $40.00, less than a month’s TV or internet subscription.)

With the DVD, the user can be selective. She can skip forward (or backward) thru the advertisements, only viewing (or re-viewing) items of interest. Basically, the DVD is a kind of long term, permanent TIVO. The advertisements will sit there (on the DVDs in the subscriber’s DVD rack) for future reference for weeks, months or years.

I view the rise of the DVD as a “C” change, a paradigm change, a coming revolution. I call it “The DVD Gold Rush of 2007”. The DVD, especially now with LightScribe technology and a unit cost of less then $0.98 per disk, iis truly an untapped goldmine. Anyone who has a computer and can write well (like some bloggers) can create and distribute their video clips, opinions and ideas inexpensively. The DVD is much more that a 21st century version of the printing press. It is technologically mature, economically accessible and a sophisticated digital medium. I will refer to this “new” DVD concept as the Newspaper DVD (as described herein) as an ND.

I envision that the ND content will include current local, regional, national and international news clips, blogs, web sites, movie clips, editorials, cartoons, ezine articles, music, classified ads and advertising video clips, as well as anything else currently carried by newspapers or on TV. Occasionally a telephone directory or the local real estate listings may be included (as a convenience because there is room for such things on DVDs).

I envision that clips (cuts) will be hosted (introduced and/or presented) by local, regional or national personalities. Copyright permissions will be under a liberal Creative Commons copyright license. Personalities will cut their inputs (clips, slices, skits and voice-overs) in the convenience of their own homes (or businesses) at their leisure using video cameras or audio recorders. Our ND editors/producers will receive their inputs (via email, DVD or video tape) and will trim and weave them together to build master NDs. The master ND will be replicated in appropriate quantities for distribution along with the newspaper (at no additional cost to subscribers).

I expect the public to adjust, over the next few years, to receiving their “newspaper” content via NDs rather than via print. This should be an easy adjustment since the ND is friendlier than a newspaper and is almost indistinguishable from TV. It talks and sings to you like TV. It provides colorful, dynamic content. But you are in control. You can conveniently move forward and backward, from entry to entry. And if you want to re-view something from yesterday (or earlier) just pop that day’s ND into you DVD Player.

I expect the print media to play an important role in introducing the ND. I expect the print media distribution channels to morph into primarily ND distribution channels over the next few years.

Over the next few years, I suspect that the public will come to prefer the ND over live TV. The ND is simply “better” than TV because it has permanence like newspapers yet also has the friendliness of TV, and a table of contents like DVDs.

How about the competition of the internet? Once you get over being enthralled with the immense range of access of the web, you begin to realize that an ND would often be preferable. Would you rather have Wikipedia on an ND or have to connect to the internet and root around to find and access what you are seeking? Would you rather have news and your soaps on an ND or TV? On an ND, of course. That’s why you TIVO. You want your TV stuff to make believe it’s an ND.

The internet is basically an entertainment and interactive shopping vehicle. It is nice for those things, but will always be relatively expensive not only in terms of recurring subscription cost but in terms of hardware and the knowledge required to operate that hardware (and software). Most internet surfers are just out there looking around, entertaining themselves. They do not utilizing the real power of the internet very often.

The marketing challenge presented by the internet is how to entice surfers to come and visit your internet web site (and return repeatedly). As most everyone who has tried knows, this is a monumental, recurring challenge. On the internet, surfers (potential customers) are allowed to wander aimlessly in cyberspace. With an ND delivered to her home (with her newspaper), the reader/subscriber plugs it in and, in essence, is trapped in her 700 megabyte ND space that we have constructed for her. If she likes something, she can pass the disk to her friends. A targeted, captive audience in a tailored media space is a marketing gurus’ dream.

Subscribers will be drawn to the ND initially by a” teaser” on the disk label. Once inside, the subscriber will be entertained and informed. Marketing executives (and particularly politicians) will pay dearly to become a part of an ND space and for the opportunity to expose their pitches (or propaganda, if you prefer) to a targeted, captive subscriber audience.

How much will NDs impact newspaper circulation and net profits? People who want the ND, will purchase (subscribe to) the publication. ND space will provide publishers with a new revenue stream (from the advertising embedded in the NDs). I don’t think it’s a question of how much NDs will enhance circulation and profits. I see it more as a question of how rapidly it will occur.

However, the success of the ND will depend mostly upon the creativity, knowledge and imagination and of the ND Masters (a term I derived from “webmaster”), who plan and produce NDs. The bottom line is: ND Masters are the key to the success of the ND.

Except where otherwise noted, content of this email is
Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License

{end quote}

stay tuned
donz@donricha.net

This may be a bit heavy, but you could use VMWare Server or Workstation to build a complete virtual machine complete with your fully functional drupal sites. Place the VMWare file on a DVD, and then you should be able to run the VM on any machine capable of running VMWare Player. The advantage of this method is that you're almost certainly sure that your sites will work and behave exactly how you configured it since the webserver environment isn't dependent on the client machine.

.

Okay, a disclaimer first: it's a shareware, and the guys who make it are friends of mine... I hope I don't break any forum rule with a somewhat commercial link.

Their software can create CDs with a "silent" AMP that launches in the background when you insert the CD (PC only at the moment, unfortunately).
You can read more about it at outsite-in.com.