Hello

I've never done this, and need to perform the following task:
1. Take an ISO of a Linux distro built for a French speaking audience, ie. with the keyboard layout + all the strings in the UI translated in French for English-impaired users
2. Install the ISO on a host
3. Customize the install, by removing most of the apps and adding a few I need
4. Save this install into an ISO
5. Burn the ISO on USB keydrives that I can send users.

I read that several applications can do this, so before I go ahead, I'd like some feedback from experienced users about which to try and pitfalls to watch for.

As for the actual distro, since translating all the systems strings is a lot of work, very few distros are available in French and I'll probably end up using a mainstream distro such as Fedora or Ubuntu:

Remastersys (Debian and derivatives)
Reconstructor (Debian and derivatives)
Mklivecd (All Linux distributions)
Relinux

Thanks for any help.

Remastersys works pretty well. I've used it a number of times on Ubuntu and its derivatives as well as Debian. There are different versions for Ubuntu and Debian. Another program that works very well and is quite easy to use is MyLiveCD which is available on PCLinuxOS.