is one of the "Venerables" of the distro universe. A swiss-army-knife of a distro directly derived from Debian, Knoppix began life in 2000 as the brainchild of Klaus Knopper and has gained a strong following. It packs a lot of punch with a huge number of default packages and its own set of utilities, including its respected CD re-mastering package. These days, Knoppix may seem a little dated in its design but it is still a strong contender for developers and those who like to build their own desktop from a solid, purely FOSS, base. See the Knoppix Main Page for details.