Brion Vibber wrote: Brion is dead-on here, as usual. While a bootable knoppix disc is a great idea, the WP data residing on the disc needs to be kept in a format that can be read by multiplatform reader applications that are also on the disc. For instance, something like RealBasic [http://www.realsoftware.com/] will compile an application for both Mac and Windows, so if it can also live on the CD, I think the combination (Mac, Windows, Linux) is very satisfactory coverage. An alternative, of course, is Java - but I think sticking red-hot needles into our respective eyes might be more pleasurable. Cheers, Ivan.

Arvind Narayanan wrote: There is no necessity, I was merely throwing out ideas. I personally like the idea of one application that does all the work, but that may just be personal bias. Bundling MySQL is an option, but I don't think it's wise - we'd have to have binaries for each of the platforms on the CD, and make sure all the glue is also cross-platform, AND make sure we can do this without having to install anything on the user's computer. As far as cross-platform development goes, however, XUL is something to consider - it'd let us have the Mozilla guys deal with the cross-platform backend magic. Not to mention, if there existed an inconspicuous "Install Mozilla to Hard Drive" link on the CD somewhere, the CD might become a reasonably effective, completely inobtrusive method for open-source evangelism (i.e. after people use Mozilla to browse the wikipedia CD and realize the blessings of tabbed browsing and the like, they just might be willing to make it their browser of choice). Lots to think about here. Cheers, Ivan.

Actually, d'oh, I just checked the RealBasic page (I haven't read up on RB in a while). It turns out the new version, 5.5, supports compilation to OS X, Windows and Linux, and has reasonably good database functionality. Ivan. Brion Vibber wrote: