Puppy Linux Discussion Forum

[jemimah]

[mysticmarks]

In reguards to the Looping question: A union file system takes a basic boot image then "loops" in more file sytems. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UnionFS
The idea here is that this would be the skeleton key of computers. A elegantly simple yet robust methodology and application of one OS that has essentially scale factors based on the associated hardware. If you had an embedded refrigerator control PC that orders groceries go bad, you should be able to take a version of this and downsize to the appropriate scale. Make sense? A survival and survivable OS. Completely unique in purpose.

[sickgut]

if someone makes grub into a full OS that is instantly "there" on boot, (has anyone tried the grub space invaders game) and has a few simple linux commands like busy box then i would probably so excited, i would have a heart attack and die, then my stinking zombie corpse would log into here and dribble endlessly about it till i got banned.

grub is cool because you can boot any OS with it and the fact that there is a game called grub invaders or whatever (check ubuntu repos) means you can have commands and other things like graphics and sound without loading a full OS yet and it all goes away when you boot another OS
make it happen, plz

[Aitch]

/dev/loop

see Barry's response here....[2005!]

http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=2765

see also Vectorlinux dev tools, which were used in early puppy development, I believe - though they seem to be following Slackware now

http://murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=290

note 2005 comment by vector dev

[Puppyt]

As a non-programming end-user with a bit of a biological bent, what your description translates to me from "amorphous reiterative filesystem" is something like a digital amoeba that adaptively extends and retracts pseudopodia - that is, I/O resource allocation - as the user/context requires. The most efficient manner to code such activity in the natural world (I believe) is via fractals, or Mandelbrot sets, where the basic root formula is used in reiterative looping to massive effect in dictating energy allocation. Within limits, imagine an amoeba with unfurling and furling fern-frond-like legs... with the root formulae (reiterated loops) kinda what the philosophers Maturana and Varela refer to as "autopoiesis", or self-organization in the natural world...

And now I've just confused everyone...

I've always imagined archival engines/layered fs doing that sort of compression (along fractal lines) as a matter of course - but I'm probably over-thinking things.
Now I've probably muddied the waters, I'll just slide back under my primordial swamp-rock...

[nooby]

Here is something similar.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instant_on

"In computers, instant on is the ability to boot nearly instantly,
so one can get online or use a specific application
without waiting for a PC's traditional operating system to launch.

Instant-on technology is today mostly used on laptops, netbooks,
and nettops because the user can boot up one program,
instead of waiting for the PC's entire operating system to boot.

.... These machines had complete Operating Systems resident in ROM
similar to the way in which the BIOS function is conventionally provided
on current computer architectures. "

Examples
Acer InstaBoot Netbook (based on Splashtop)
Acer RevoBoot Nettop (based on Splashtop)
Asus Express Gate motherboards, notebooks, Eee Box (nettop), and EeePCs (based on Splashtop)
Canonical product announced in early 2010 [1]
Dell Latitude ON, Latitude On Reader (based on Splashtop), Latitude On Flash (based on Splashtop)
Google Chrome OS[2]
HP QuickWeb Probook notebook (based on Splashtop)
HP Instant On Solution Voodoo & Envy notebook (based on Splashtop)
HP Instant Web netbook (based on Splashtop)
Lenovo QuickStart (based on Splashtop)
LG SmartOn (based on Splashtop)
Mandriva InstantOn[3]
Palm Foleo
Phoenix HyperSpace[4]
Sony Quick Web Access (based on Splashtop)
Splashtop Inc. Splashtop[5]

etc

Another is this one?

http://apcmag.com/phoenix_puts_opera_web_browser_into_bios.htm
Phoenix puts Opera web browser into BIOS
Leigh Stark
07 November 2008

Soon, motherboards in all sorts of computers will allow you to browse the web without booting your OS at all.

Comment from Nooby.
Something must have come in between because 2008 is many years ago.

But it shows it should be possible.

[starhawk]

Hmmm so it can run on anything in my house that's computery, from the Palm Z22 PDA that I never use (crappy ARM SoC and not much of anything else -- no brawn, no brains!) to my permanently frustrating Dell Latitude CPi (300MHz P2, 64mb RAM) to my ASUS netbook (1.6ghz Atom, 2gb RAM) to the awesome high-power desktop I never use (Socket AM2 Athlon64, 3gb RAM, probably could run Win7Ultimate no problems)...

NICE

You could almost literally take over the world with that. The trouble there is that you'd either have to (a) charge money for it (because you always pay exactly what something is worth when you buy it in a store ), or (b) turn it into a virus. The other trouble is beating the incumbents -- MicroSucks and Crapple.

I'm no coder (by a long shot -- most of my experience is in a DOS language called QBASIC ) but I know how to put hardware together and I've an eye for artistic stuff... how can I help?

EDIT:

In explaining this to my mother (who was mildly impressed but I don't think understood it all), I realized something: not all programs will run on all hardware (e.g. OpenOffice compiled for x86, will not run on ARM). In order for programs to run on ANY hardware, you'll want to do some emulation somewhere -- have a common "program base" emulation layer (probably x86/IA32). That is, the software perceives a different set of hardware that it is compatible with, as opposed to the actual hardware underneath. The trick here is to do it with as little overhead as possible -- you're going to have serious performance issues no matter how you do it, but the translating has to be easy or your OS will be bloody slow.

As a small aside, I suspect that's why Android seems to need so much horsepower -- it's running all of its software on top of interpreted Java!

The other option, of course, is to do a "build everything from scratch, adapting the source code along the way" method, which will work on eg IA64 hardware that has some serious horsepower, but someone with eg m68k architecture is going to be waiting a week or two for their OS!

[greengeek]

In a way, I view this "scalable OS" as being something like Technosaurus' Puppy web desktop:
http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=32428
You start with a portal, and the scalable OS acts almost like a directory, or index, into other modules.

Obviously Puppy web desktop uses the internet as it's virtual machine, and a true hardware based OS would operate at a much lower level, before eventually inflating to the point of having the machine able to connect to a network/internet.

I still use a twelve year old Jornada 720 because of it's "instant-on" ability. It means I can view my pdf parts manuals 5 seconds after opening my toolbag (while the other techs are still pressing the poweron button on their PCs...)

It would be fantastic if a Puppy could be built with a superquick boot time, with the intention of being used for a single specific purpose, and discarding all other functions.

I think "goingnuts" pup'n'go project has a lot of promise in that regard, although I recall someone saying somewhere (possibly forum member "amigo"...) that Puppy, by it's very design, could not be made to boot quickly.

[amigo]

"run on anything in my house that's computery" Sounds nice, but it won't work. There is no such thing as binary code which will run on more than one architecture (except x86/x86_64 and other dual-arch 64-bit arches) -not even for a bootloader. So, there is no way to 'boot' something or run something which will find out what the architecture is and then boot/load the correct kernel for that system -never mind loading the rest of arch-specific OS because you'll never get that far.

The fast-boot systems rely on embedding the kernel and other needed parts of the OS into the BIOS chip -usually flash memory or a ROM chip. The fast boot is achieved because the BIOS memory is powered up from the moment the machine is turned on -and the fact that the system is kept to a very small size. A normal BIOS routine would only begin to load the kernel into RAM (which is 'external' to the BIOS/motherboard) after performing the normal BIOS routines.

It's not that Puppy can't be made to boot faster -it just means having to re-think the way it boots and especially the number of optional ways to boot it. The idea of embedding Puppy or any other 'normal' into a BIOS is not a good one. If you want to do that, then you need to put together an OS which is designed specifically for that purpose.

The idea of a modular system is great of course -the 'modules' are usually called 'packages'. If you want a minimal system that can be 'pimped' according to the users desires, then you have to find out exactly what is needed for that minimal system -you have to define 'minimal'. Most people who suddenly come up with this idea have absolutely no idea what is needed -don't even know where the kernel ends and the 'real OS' starts. If you think 'minimal' means just the desktop, browser and codecs for multi-media files, then you are *way* off the mark.

[Aitch]

I seem to recall several years ago, the idea being touted of a bios hack, that installs a simple redirector, which points the boot process to a new ram address to pick up the next bit of code to run
It seems to me that we are semi-imprisoned by the current mindset of how a computer starts with a semi-dysfunctional bios

Couldn't someone with more knowledge than me create a puppy-specific bios that does this? [amigo/techno/goingnuts/iguleder...others, maybe?]

Sorry, not intending to create work...just a thought...but please shoot me down in flames if it's crazy, but explain why,....thanks

puppyt....love the fractal swamp-thing

Aitch

[nooby]

How big are a standard version of a BIOS in MB or GB?
I mean are there space for something to add there?
What kind of memory is it? Flash memory?

[Aitch]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BIOS

It is rom, usually, but the motherboards usually go out of date, because bios updates are no longer produced

Aitch

[linuxbear]

Bios are often written to a PROM, (programmable read-only memory) else you would not be able to upgrade the code. The firmware usually does not require a lot of space as the function of running pre-OS diagnostics and finding and booting an OS does not require a lot of space. If, memory serves, BIOS was and still might be written in machine code which requires even less space than something like a mid-level language.

[greengeek]

But doesn't the bios simply pass control to the mbr, which in turn passes control to the bootloader, which passes control to the kernel? There is already plenty of hardware available that does not inhibit this pathway, so a bios hack would surely only be necessary if you wanted to create a "common bios" that all manufacturers agreed on as a means of allowing all devices to behave the same.

I doubt manufacturers want too much commonality - it hurts their financial bottom line.

But the idea of a rom based puppy for instant-on speed: yeah, that definitely appeals. Why would it not be possible to replace a ram dimm module with a rom that had puppy hard-coded? It seems that the main delay is loading standard ram modules with the code from disk, rather than a delay in transferring control out of bios.

[nooby]

Thanks Yes so suppose I buy a standard Laptop or Netbook or Desktop.

How many MB free on that EEProm is it for booting an OS on it?