password; otherwise the system is rebooted, or in certain cases even re 

partitioned and destroyed. This type of client management architecture could be 

described as supporting self managing clients or stateless Linux. Red Hat is 

prototyping methods for supporting a stateless Linux client. They define some of 

the ideal properties of a stateless Linux client, as follows

7

:

 If you throw a computer out of the window, you should be able to recreate its 

software, configuration, and user data bit for bit identically on a new piece of 

hardware. 

 In any managed deployment from school workstation lab to enterprise server 

room, single computers should never be modified. Instead, all computers that 

need the modification should be modified in a single step. 

5.3.1  Summary

We have shown in this section that it is an oversimplification to simply lump all 

Linux clients within a traditional thin to fat spectrum. There is a multitude of tools 

and methods (like very sophisticated hardware detection) for Linux that support 

intermediate and/or managed client approaches. And they are diverse and 

growing. 

7  

From  

Introduction to Stateless Linux, Proposal for the Fedora Project , 

http://people.redhat.com/~hp/stateless/StatelessLinux.pdf

112 

Linux Client Migration Cookbook   A Practical Planning and Implementation Guide for Migrating to Desktop