Pussy: potentially a Puppy with a perfect package manager

Message

Puppyt · #1381 Post by **Puppyt** » Mon 12 Mar 2012, 08:53

mdk wrote:this has been editted

unlike some lucky b$ggers I have slow internet and so chose

http://ftp.iinet.net.au/debian/debian-c ... andard.iso

is an aussie mirror and I assume motorcity is NOT from Detroit?

I've got a cripplingly slow/expensive service too, mdk - with BigSwamp 3G wifi.
Hidden in the fine print, our Aussie national Telco doesn't meter the bandwidth to the AARNET repositories - where some precious few Puppy Linux versions can be found. Have you tried http://mirror.aarnet.edu.au/debian/dists/ for your Debian/pussy scaffolding?

Puppyt · #1382 Post by **Puppyt** » Mon 12 Mar 2012, 08:57

...and while I'm here, a big THANKYOU to all for getting side-tracked on my earlier suggestion to try out Qupzilla. From what I understand, it's too big/inefficient with its QT requirements in this project - unless I guess a suite of QT apps were included to make it more-or-less cost-effective.
Thanks guys

jbv · #1383 Post by **jbv** » Mon 12 Mar 2012, 09:18

Puppyt wrote:From what I understand, it's too big/inefficient with its QT requirements in this project - unless I guess a suite of QT apps were included to make it more-or-less cost-effective.

G'day Puppyt, well you can decide.

I made what I call a .sqf "injection" file for QupZilla (complete with the QT Libraries) and you can find it here ... http://www.thepussycatforest.info/linux/custom-packages/jbv/ along with a LOT of other .sqf "injections".

Every injection has a readme, so you can just read that on-line and then decide if you want to look at it. If you do, then just download it, drop it into your live directory and it will be there in restart.

The only exception to this would be hotROXpussy, but once again, the readme tells you everything you need to know. What it does, and how to get it working. If you find any of the readme's obtuse or unclear, please give me feedback and/or ask here or via PM.

Regarding QupZilla ... My personal opinion is that it is 'hokay, but it isn't sumfim I'd be telling my mates was a must have. I didn't mess with it for long though, so perhaps I missed the real gems inside it as they didn't jump out at me. In a way it's academic now anyway. With the injection file provided it should pretty much work with any pussy or any future version of pussy (or any flavour of Debian), so it doesn't matter if you're the only person in the world that likes it, coz you've got it now

Cheers

motorcity · #1384 Post by **motorcity** » Mon 12 Mar 2012, 11:52

mdk wrote:
Code: Select all
apt-get install guvcview

Thanks mdk but several pages ago I reported issues with guvcview; on this machine it starts, you get both windows(controls & video - is just a black screen) then it immediately shuts down.
You are correct the webcam has a built in mic.

So taking your hint I tried pussy & guvcview on a much more capable computer, seems to work but it crashes MPlayer on playback attempt; bad usage of CPU/FPU/RAM

If anyone could confirm that guvcview works for them in pussy (regardless of resolution or audio) that would be helpful!
I believe I heard puppy linux needs special treatment to run guvcview also, but it could be drivers, but this looks like two different setups that don't work.
~motorcity

jbv · #1385 Post by **jbv** » Mon 12 Mar 2012, 12:52

Calling Linux / Debian pros - or just someone who knows ....

saintless wrote:Latest stable hybrid here (choose live option to boot. There is install option also, so be careful with your choice):
http://cdimage.debian.org/cdimage/relea ... so-hybrid/

Previous stable (much smaller with only live mode) here:
http://live.debian.net/cdimage/release/ ... 86/iso-cd/

What is the difference ? ... and please don't say that one is older

Latest Stable is HEAPS bigger.
Looking at the packages and everything seems to be specifically for v6 (squeeze)

Previous Stable is HEAPS smaller.
Looking at the packages and everything seems to be specifically for v5 (lenny)

Yet, surely a simple version change can't make that much difference.

Why would you choose one over the other?

If the basic premiss of Debian is stability and updatability, yet going from 5.0.x to 6.0.x has almost double the overhead, it leaves me wondering if the Debian folks are perhaps really moonlighting from Microsoft and Apple...

I've just checked and it is double

<fx:eeek>

So, what is the go here. Do you start with v5 Lenny, then get the latest release (5.0.9) with a 2.6.32 kernel and then patch it up to the 3.2 kernel and if you do what repository do you use for your file searching/retrieval? Lenny (Debian v5 = old), Squeeze (Debian v6 = current), or Wheezy (Debian v7 = not released)

If you start with v5 and latest (current Debian) kernel (2.6.32), then update all your support files, won't you basically end up with the same 280Mb stuff that you'd get if you just started with Squeeze? If not, what is the point of updating and what are you actually updating too?

If you use the Debian patches that they supply to use the latest 3.2 kernel, then where are you, other than confused and lost?

Can someone either explain this mess, or steer me towards some documents that can - thanks.

At first glance, it seems that pussy was built with v5.0.9
As v5 is reaching end-of-life, does that mean we're flogging a dead or dying pussy?

Thoughts, Comments, Guidance?

jbv · #1386 Post by **jbv** » Mon 12 Mar 2012, 13:06

motorcity wrote:If anyone could confirm that guvcview works for them in pussy (regardless of resolution or audio) that would be helpful!

Using hotROX pussy, I downloaded and installed it in about 3 minutes using synaptic which is on the desktop. When the download is finished.
A desktop icon auto-magically appears in the "applications" folder, and a menu entry is auto-magically created in the menu Debian-->Sound&Audio-->guvcview

Trying to run it on my machine and it errors immediately as I don't have a camera, but at least the error I get is right

It would only take you 3 minutes to grab hotROXpussy and try it yourself.

Cheers

mdk · #1387 Post by **mdk** » Mon 12 Mar 2012, 13:18

Puppyt

I did 2 tests
one a simple file download....same file and yours wins 32 sec versus 51 sec

test 2 checked out when did openssl get updated?
same date for my version 18 Jan but iinet took

now completely off topic internode's Ubuntu openssl took a month later, maybe they are employed by microsoft and take security really really seriously? LOL

so thank you

mdk · #1388 Post by **mdk** » Mon 12 Mar 2012, 13:36

jbv

forgive if you have got confused......join the club.

pussy is based on debian live not on any debian stable, testing or unstable

I am not an expert but I use unstable....it suits my personality or lack thereof LOL

The debian live system has to do things and is roughly equal to debian stable when you look at the /etc/apt/sources.list its pointing to squeeze

Debian live actually has a lot of scripts and the iso that pussy is based on is the fruit of someone running those scripts.

http://live.debian.net/

(OPINION) I think therefore that debian live has a delay and is based on debian stable but can be out-of-date if the next release occurs......does that make sense?

For a better explanation of debian names (not live) try

http://www.debian.org/doc/manuals/debia ... #s-version

I will take your word on the sizes as I don't care I run unstable or should say unstable runs me.

which reminds me
when you choose a distro....if you have dial up or slow internet never choose a rolling release but go for stable.

Normal people who like a bit of excitement choose testing and kinda get best of both worlds....patches and software that has been "tested" by the brave souls running unstable.

so much for debian.....linux mint might suit you if you are looking for nice documentation and friendly IRC and forum?

mdk · #1389 Post by **mdk** » Mon 12 Mar 2012, 13:41

motorcity

when you run that webcam..instead of menu ...open a terminal and run the command from the terminal please

copy and paste the output into a text file and submit as an attachment or upload it somewhere and link to it

eg there are heaps but .....http://paste.debian.net/ springs to mind

good luck

saintless · #1390 Post by **saintless** » Mon 12 Mar 2012, 14:20

motorcity wrote:If anyone could confirm that guvcview works for them in pussy (regardless of resolution or audio) that would be helpful!

Hi, Motorcity,
I will quote my self from page 84. There is attached picture also:

saintless wrote:
motorcity wrote:gucviewer doesn't seem to work out of the box
Guvcview should work fine with the extra version (not with the base one). See the attached picture. If you have web camera attached it should find it.
If you open it without web camera attached it will give an error can't find a device.

Click here for the picture.

BTW, my web camera is Vimicro with built in microphone.

saintless · #1391 Post by **saintless** » Mon 12 Mar 2012, 14:25

jbv wrote:Calling Linux / Debian pros - or just someone who knows ....
saintless wrote:Latest stable hybrid here (choose live option to boot. There is install option also, so be careful with your choice):
http://cdimage.debian.org/cdimage/relea ... so-hybrid/

Previous stable (much smaller with only live mode) here:
http://live.debian.net/cdimage/release/ ... 86/iso-cd/
What is the difference ? ... and please don't say that one is older

Hi, JBV,
I just quote what is on the Debian Live CD site:
http://live.debian.net/
My second link is named oldstable there. Click on oldstable -> i386 -> iso-cd and you will get to the same page I gave.
Maybe the reason is the kernel.

Cheers

jbv · #1392 Post by **jbv** » Mon 12 Mar 2012, 15:42

mdk wrote:linux mint might suit you if you are looking for nice documentation

Been there. Done that. Mint has the same basic issue as puppy and *nix in general. They have what seems like 6 or 7 versions that are all different, and while there are docs, you never really know what to look at. It took me half an hour of searching just to find the darn login details. When I finally got it running, I figured it was all just a huge waste of time. I think the only one I haven't looked at is ARClinux or whatever it is called. I stumble across their forum quite often while looking for info. While I can and do often find what I need there, from the forum it looks to be the same thing, just different.

saintless wrote:Guvcview should work fine with the extra version (not with the base one).

Which just goes to show the trouble you run into when you keep shoving stuff into .sqaushfs files while trying to fill a CD-ROM, and not caring about what you shove in, or how. Basically, that scenario should not occur.

saintless wrote:I just quote what is on the Debian Live CD site:

AAAaaarrrggghhh!!! That's what I hate about Debian (and Linux in general). A web page with 42 freaking links that all lead you nowhere, and tell you nothing.

Saintless, the real problem is that there have been architectural changes between v5 (lenny) and v6 (squeeze). Some of it is simple stuff, some of it is tricky. At the end of the day, this is why some stuff works and some stuff doesn't and you haven't got the faintest idea. The reason is usually because something underneath has changed. This is the architectural stuff I've been trying to get someone else to understand for the last 4 weeks. If you don't get this right, you're hosed.

Now, I think I understand why I'm having such grief with pussy. Pussy is really v5 (lenny) with a 2.3.x kernel - the same as the latest v6 (squeeze). Therefore you shouldn't be looking to use anything from v6 (squeeze) and all of the stuff you try to get, should be from v5 (lenny). One little problem with that. If I'm not mistaken v5 (lenny) is due to go EOL in the next 12 months, which means you're trying to build something on-top of an architecture that is already crumbling and dying. Squeeze still has stuff that ain't ready yet, so it's a catch-22 no matter what you do.

<fx: need emoticon of jbv beating head against wall - then getting drunk to ease the pain>

I thought that pussy was v6 (squeeze), but it isn't. It's all well and good to say something is Debian, but if you don't clarify what version, you may as well say it is Ubuntu for all the good it will do.

To me, starting now and heading down a v5 (lenny) path is not a smart thing do do. If I'm wrong, will someone please say so and show me something that helps me understand.

Cheers

SBP · #1393 Post by **SBP** » Mon 12 Mar 2012, 18:48

Hi I have followed your development with interest as I'm also interested in a small debian distro. As I understand that you might have to start all over again, I thought that you might consider building on voyage Linux (http://linux.voyage.hk). It is a small debian distro (the newest is build on Squeeze), which is read only so it will fit well on a USB or CF-card and has intact apt-get install.

All Debian packages can be installed without any problems, and it is only about 90 MB

saintless · #1394 Post by **saintless** » Mon 12 Mar 2012, 19:37

SBP wrote:Hi I have followed your development with interest as I'm also interested in a small debian distro. As I understand that you might have to start all over again, I thought that you might consider building on voyage Linux. It is a small debian district, which is read only and has intact apt-get instal.

Hi, SBP,

thanks for the link to Voyage linux. We might borrow some ideas from it. I don't think we will start all over again. Most likely the current version will continue develop and become official in time and something new will be born.

Cheers

mdk · #1395 Post by **mdk** » Tue 13 Mar 2012, 02:54

jbv

/me (understatement) you appear to be getting frustrated

lets play the blame game eh?

1) saintless that heartless soul should not have shown a link to old stable
let me try to explain in window terms

once upon a time w95 was the stable branch

along came w98 ....Yes I am selective in what really happened

its the new stable

and today w7 is the new stable

so today's old stable is vista

and why would you build a system based on vista?

and tomorrow's release is w8

got it?

so if you must go debian and no-one is forcing you to, either
go stable....go testing ...or ..go unstable

2) now you can update using a changed sources.list to go from stable to testing and or testing to unstable or stable direct to unstable

but you can't go backwards and even tho I know you don't really mean go backwards,
"heartless" mentioned a backward step and has confused you.

3) What I tried to stay earlier still remains but I did not realise how fixated you were on this old stable stuff.

so debian live will change its base

the current debian live is based on a stable name called squeeze

today the testing branch is called wheezy which becomes tomorrow's stable

and good sid is always unstable ......which should focus thy mind on what it is....
a very naughty boy....spank spank

So altho your remarks about why are sizes different it is not important.

4) let me try another analogy...bad example as I don't care what a car has

yesterday's ford had rear drive and leathette seating

todays has front wheel drive and real leather

do you want to drive yesterday's car?

ok some people do and pay lots to restore old cars for fun or profit but we are talking about the mums and dads market.

5) maybe all of us talking about something that is not truly "pussy" might need to do this in a different thread.

hang on....no mods seem to have intervened here so lets continue ...giggles

but maybe you are trying something and its not working heh?

I have already stated I had some issues with pussy files and its because of how the OP built them.

I am still not an expert but I can assure you.....get your head around chroot and to trouble-shoot......for your own needs.....combine everything you want into one squashfile.

altho pussy has layers........its harder to trouble shoot and I remember you advising that I changed squash 2 and did nothing to squash 4

got it?

I shall flog this dead parrot some more.

6) The 1-filesystem.squashfs in pussy is not the same as filesystem.squashfs in debian-live

thats where issues start from

go back to the original and chroot and build from there.

7) I am frustrated myself with own failings so may not be the best person to give advice but while the OP is not responding ......your distro is not bad but can improve.

I have rebuilt live's squash to include a 3.2 kernel but I have not documented and proofed all the steps......and even if I reveal all those steps here or by pm.....you won't like it......as I am a unstable fanboy and care little for people with old software.

but if you email me.....I will try to offer more advice on chroot if you need it.

saintless

Yes I am heartless so forgive me for using you as a pass the bucker.
I am human and the body is strong but the mind is weak

I blame that on believing that drinking aussie beer will make me more attractive to aussie beach babes

regards to all

motorcity · #1396 Post by **motorcity** » Tue 13 Mar 2012, 16:05

saintless wrote:from page 84.

Thanks saintless. Yes it is just me. Or just this old computer.

jbv wrote:only take you 3 minutes to grab hotROXpussy

You're right, I didn't time myself but it felt like 3. Of course, (isn't there always something!) guvcview doesn't work there either. It's got to do with this computer, not the OS.
BTW, I like everything I see so far about hotROXpussy! Loaded up the firefox sqf also and that makes it much cooler than standard pussy xtra.

sickgut · #1397 Post by **sickgut** » Tue 13 Mar 2012, 16:54

oldstable is lenny
stable is squeeze
testing is wheezy
unstable is sid

note that the name sid never changes, as sid always represents the absolute newest.

there are numbered versions aswell

the 4 series is etch
5 = lenny
6 = squeeze
7 = wheezy

there is no number equivelent for sid as that wouldnt work because its always being updated.

Then there are the debian live version numbers. This is different from regular debian version numbers, i havent been keeping track of these.

squeeze is the newest and most supported reliable OS that debian has to offer and it is the current flagship. The pussy alpha was created very shortly after debian moved to squeeze, debian version 6 and is the only version they support currently. Testing, wheezy isnt supported for end users it exists for expert users to report bugs etc, you report a bug but dont expect to get questions answered about it. Sid is a staging version and often it is incomplete, broken or doesnt work at all. Sid is a collection of bleeding edge (still probably many years old, bleeding edge in debian terms means that if i was to get my Ex pregnant and she was to give birth today, by the time the child is in highschool it will probably still be using applications that are current today and debian will still be calling them bleeding edge. Debian can literally be many years behind Ubuntu or other OSes) packages and its not meant to be an actual OS for people to use.

squeeze will probably be the current debian flagship for another year and a half or 2 years perhaps. Debian has been around a very long time (1993) and we are only on the 6th major release, thats only one release every 3 years and 2 months or so. Squeeze is hardly an an old horse and we arent flogging an old horse by basing pussy on squeeze

sickgut · #1398 Post by **sickgut** » Tue 13 Mar 2012, 17:27

jbv wrote:G'day,

A serious yet stupid question. If you have a computer with a Hard Drive, why would you bother with something like puppy/pussy and all of the hoops/issues associated with .sqf files?

For me, I intend to use a completely USB or Flash based configuration - for those who understand electronics/computers, think an "embedded system". Therefore it is imperative that I know the system will NEVER write back to the USB/Flash unless I instruct it to.

For me, it is worth the up-front pain, yet for a traditional (typical?) user, I can't see it.

Am I missing something?

Something I haven't considered or require, but would it be possible to unpack/explode the .sqf files into the appropriate place on a real hard drive, then replace the kernel with a real kernel, initrd etc and get a real/traditional desktop environment/configuration somewhat easily?

Cheers

pussy was created with n o mind to hdd install at all, its supposed to be run from a usb stick or live cd/ dvd

hdd support was something that was discovered later by nooby and john3voltas fairly early on after the pussy alpha release and nothing has really changed.

if you want a hdd install OS that will be used on only one system then there is no real advantage to a live system and therefore pussy.

ive found the cd/ dvd version perfectly fine on other peoples computers using the live-rw save file, i used pussy this way for months and found it to tick all the boxes for me.

hdd install is never gonna be noobish and officially supported and recommended without some major change, even tho most of us developers/ testers do end up running it like this on our home systems.
i see cdrom and usb live pussy more important than hdd installed

motorcity · #1399 Post by **motorcity** » Wed 14 Mar 2012, 01:31

sickgut wrote: hdd install is never gonna be noobish

I'm not really certain if that's good or bad. Actually, I have no idea if "noobish" is called for in my situation sickgut.
Here are some of my assumptions:
*Pussy is a miniaturized linux distro like Puppy, except it has a much more universal package management system. (witness hotROXpussy synaptic)
*Learning how you guys are squeezing and squashing an OS (any OS) down to it's component parts, could be very useful to a dedicated system.
*Pussy is no more inherently unsafe than any other linux because it is linux.
*Pussy should always be about portability; usb & dvd/cd & whatever comes next, the ability to plug-play-unplug-walkaway-plug & play, data & OS somewhere else is awesome!
Please note; I'm not trying to hijack this development or the conversation towards hdd install, it might leak out at times because of my outdated equipment and perhaps that leads to a question:
How dedicated should Pussy be to old stuff? I believe Puppy makes that something of importance, perhaps I'm wrong about Puppy? But is there a direction here where Pussy and Puppy differ?

saintless · #1400 Post by **saintless** » Wed 14 Mar 2012, 05:35

motorcity wrote: How dedicated should Pussy be to old stuff? I believe Puppy makes that something of importance, perhaps I'm wrong about Puppy

Hi, Motorcity,

Puppy has versions for old hardware, laptops, and new hardware. You can't run successful any Puppy on any hardware.

Maybe I'm wrong but I think your problem with Guvcview is more web camera related than old computer related. Try to use luvcview instead. It is also included in Pussy linux. Or try to install any other web camera viewer with apt-get or Sinapthic. There should be something which will work for you.

I still consider my self as linux noob but I don't agree with Sickgut that frugal hard disk install is difficult. Installing ubuntu driving me crazy with all the questions and waiting the installing process to finish. Installing Slackware with auto install all packages option is much more fun but the process is longer.

Installing Puppy linux is perfect and I'm sure the script it uses can be edited to do the same job for Pussy linux but I'm not the one who can do it yet.

Installing Pussy linux frugal - here is my way:

1. Install GeeXbox from here (if you don't have Grub already) - easy part:
http://www.geexbox.org/
GeeXbox is small multimedia linux distro and you can wacth almost any movie format when you boot in GeeXbox. Old versions take only 8 Mb of HDD space.
It should find your previous installed OS and include them in the Grub menu.

2. Copy the /live folder on the top directory on ext or vfat partition - easy part.

3. Edit Grub with the right boot code - the difficult part which will be much more easier if we have more working examples for Grub Legacy, Grub2, Grub4Dos, Lilo.

One advice to you, Motorcity, in case your troubles are really from old hardware. You can find older versions of Debian Live CD:
http://live.debian.net/archive/images/

Pickup one and make frugal install the same way as Pussy linux. Note there might be 2 vmlinuz and 2 imnitrd.img inside because you can choose different kernel. Use only one of them by renaming or move in another folder the other two.
Then boot to the command prompt and login as user with password live.
Then create root password:

Code: Select all

sudo passwd root

Then logout and login as root and run:

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apt-get update

Then install with apt-get squashfs-tools, xorg and choose a desktop that you like - jwm + Rox, xfce4, lxde etc.
Example:

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apt-get install squashfs-tools

Then delete all downloaded debian packages from /var/cahce/apt/archives and create a snapshot (squash file) with:

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mksquashfs /live/cow /live/image/live/any-name.squashfs

You will get a lot of crap in the snapshot but there is no easy way to remove it without having troubles later. JBV has posted a lot information about cleaning the snapshot here in the thread.
Make sure the filesystem squash will load before your custom in /live folder. Rename them as 1-filesystem.squashfs and 2-any-name.squashfs.
Instead of snapshot you can use live-rw save file but I think Xorg and Desktop should be in a squash file to have less troubles in the future.
Reboot the computer and you have your own small OS for your old hardware.

Cheers

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Pussy: potentially a Puppy with a perfect package manager