The base SL distribution is basically Enterprise Linux, recompiled from source.

Our main goal for the base distribution is to have everything compatible with Enterprise, with only a few minor additions or changes. An example of of items that were added are Pine, and OpenAFS.

Our secondary goal is to allow easy customization for a site, without disturbing the Scientific Linux base. The various labs are able to add their own modifications to their own site areas. By the magic of scripts, and the anaconda installer, each site is to be able to create their own distributions with minimal effort. Or, if a users wishes, they can simply install the base SL release.

Scientific Linux Live CD and DVD 4.4 has been released for both i386 and x86_64

Many thanks go to Urs Beyerle from PSI for creating and documenting Scientific Linux Live CD 4.4.

The Scientific Linux Live CD/DVD is a bootable CD/DVD that runs Linux directly from CD/DVD without installing. It is based on Scientific Linux 4.4. It uses Unification File System (unionfs), allowing read-only filesystem to behave as a writable one and squashfs providing on-the-fly decompression that allows to store 2GB software on a normal CD-ROM.