Many questions about using Puppy.

Booting, installing, newbie
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fiskrond
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Joined: Mon 14 Aug 2017, 00:52
Location: Wales (UK)

Re: Grub, not Grub4Dos

#21 Post by fiskrond »

davids45 wrote:G'day nic007,

Thanks for your clarifications.

I was assuming that starting with a 4.2 Pup, it would only have Grub with the Universal installer as the in-built 'automatic' offering to enable dual booting after Pup-4.2 was installed via the Live-CD.

If I gather correctly, your method would avoid using Puppy's Universal Installer. So a better way to see how things work, of course.

Good luck fiskrond, let us know what you try and how you go.

David S
Okayy...
I've got PupWary_5.5 installed to the 9Gb partition.

The Grub that came with Pup_4.2 must have been easier to install as I bumbled my way through the install (OK to everything) but it gave me options of Windows/Linux when powering up the PC.

I thought I had messed up the whole PupWary installation, but when I went to re-install PupWary to the relevant HDD partition was informed that it was already installed.. overwrite y/n..
So, I over-wrote it and went through it again (fortunately this is so quick as to cause no stress)..

Current status:
Have re-set BIOS to boot from HDD..
Power on the PC... no boot options given... boots to Windows

So... need non-tech advice on getting GRUB to run from power-up

I am extremely grateful to all help from all posters so far by the way... (far more friendly than Ebay forums.. whole load of ego stuff going on there.. who's got the biggest white van mentality.. one poster answers question, 10 others use it as excuse to start a fight!!!)

Please remember I'm still on the teat (as it were)...
:-D

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nic007
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Re: Lin'N'Win vs. Grub4dos

#22 Post by nic007 »

mikeslr wrote:Hi nic007,

If I recall correctly, the method you propose for establishing a bootloader was that provided by Win 'n Lin --the first method I used 9 years ago. And you're correct about it being the safest because the Window's bootloader hasn't been overwritten; only its name changed which makes it easy to revert by deleting the renamed-grldr (now appearing as ntldr) and changing ntldr1 back to ntldr.

What makes just installing grub4dos 'unsafe' is that it would be difficult to later recover ntldr. The thing is, however, I've never had grub4dos fail to recognize and list Windows XP as an operating system, don't know of anyone who did; and can't think of any reason why I'd want to revert to ntldr even if I removed all Puppies and only ran XP.

9 years ago I had to use the method Lin'N'Win specified as I had no choice. But it's not something I'd recommend to noobs. Grub4dos does what its supposed to do --establish a boot-loader and a menu.lst of (almost every) operating system I've thrown at it other than on a UEFI screwed computer. It even creates an Advanced-Menu enabling me to boot into Puppy if I've screwed up while editing menu.lst. And that human error is more likely to occur while renaming grldr than ever having to revert to nltdr.

Indeed, on the several times I've written ntldr on this post, I've had to go back and correct it, having mistakenly typed nltdr.

Linux is about choice. I choose simple.

mikesLr
But if you install grub4dos it writes to the bootrecord and I have had to re-install windows at times because something went wrong and I couldn't get Windows started because I couln't fix the MBR. You right the method I propose does require renaming two files. Really don't know how this can be a problem since I've been using this method for over 10 years now. Really, if you want to rename the files to its original stateafter some disaster just pop in a puppy cd and do it (your windows os and original MBR at least will be intact). There is of course another method to do this without renaming anything and still not install grub4dos but it requires an additional step. In the latter case you do my method but instead of renaming any files , you add and entry for grub to your windows boot.ini. The disadvantage of this is that you will start with the windows bootup screen, then select grub to bring up the menu.lst (thus an extra screen but still you keep the original MBR intact). Anyways, choices as you say. Personally I don't like messing with the original boot record when doing dual-booting as I have had bad experiences before and it's not fun to re-install windows. I'm out of here, too many cooks spoiling the broth.

fiskrond
Posts: 35
Joined: Mon 14 Aug 2017, 00:52
Location: Wales (UK)

ffs...

#23 Post by fiskrond »

okay guys.. let's cool this one down and get back to getting me using Pup!

The stuff you are now talking about (various GRUB installs) is not helping ME in the slightest! Keep on track.. agreed! :roll:

STATUS
- PupWary installed to partition, is operative, I like it.
- Have supposedly installed the GRUB that came with the above
- Power-on takes me straight to WinXP
- Have previously installed Pup4.2.. the GRUB that came with that worked on power-up and gave me option of which OS to boot.

- I don't care which is the best.. I don't understand the detail you guys are arguing the toss about. I just want one that works... y'know.. just to GET ME STARTED!!

- If I sod it up... that's my problem.. I'll reformat HDD, re-install WinXP and go from scratch again.


Peace brothers! Common objective an' all that, aye! :-)

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bigpup
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#24 Post by bigpup »

PupWary installed to partition, is operative, I like it.
- Have supposedly installed the GRUB that came with the above
Specific details how you did the install of Grub?
Have supposedly installed the GRUB
tells Us nothing about what you did or if you did it correctly.
The things they do not tell you, are usually the clue to solving the problem.
When I was a kid I wanted to be older.... This is not what I expected :shock:
YaPI(any iso installer)

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Ananda98
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Re: ffs...

#25 Post by Ananda98 »

fiskrond wrote:okay guys.. let's cool this one down and get back to getting me using Pup!

The stuff you are now talking about (various GRUB installs) is not helping ME in the slightest! Keep on track.. agreed! :roll:

STATUS
- PupWary installed to partition, is operative, I like it.
- Have supposedly installed the GRUB that came with the above
- Power-on takes me straight to WinXP
- Have previously installed Pup4.2.. the GRUB that came with that worked on power-up and gave me option of which OS to boot.

- I don't care which is the best.. I don't understand the detail you guys are arguing the toss about. I just want one that works... y'know.. just to GET ME STARTED!!

- If I sod it up... that's my problem.. I'll reformat HDD, re-install WinXP and go from scratch again.


Peace brothers! Common objective an' all that, aye! :-)
Hello fiskrond

I am also a new user in Puppy Linux. I use Puppy Linux 4.3, in Pentium 4 1.6 Ghz, with 256 MB RAM and 40 GB Seagate hard-disk.
Before I write down more far, I want to say sorry because my English is poor... :-D
It maybe caused by wrong setting in GRUB. When I installed Puppy in the first time (full install), it won't boot. I tried to edit GRUB option, by selected Puppy 4.3 options in screen, and hit C.
I changed drive location where I installed Puppy, and it works!

Maybe this link will help you: http://puppylinux.org/main/How%20NOT%20 ... 0Puppy.htm
It tells how to do frugal install...

Thanks, and happy Puppy!

theru
Posts: 163
Joined: Thu 23 Jul 2015, 16:40
Location: Heers, Belgium

#26 Post by theru »

Would this be considered beginners friendly?

http://murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=61404

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davids45
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Installed Wary - what type of install?

#27 Post by davids45 »

G'day fiskrond,

Glad you can still persevere - the first million is the hardest, I'm told.

In case the other latest suggestions by others don't get you over this hurdle, ....

I'm happy to read you had had a dual boot option which by the look of things, you deleted when installing Wary.

May I ask how you are installing these Pups to sda3? Live-CD or usb? Copying the three files from a mounted iso of the Pup? Some other way - Puppy is as simple to install as Windows isn't. But how it's done can be relevant.

I think only the Live-CD or usb method can give a "Full" Install by using Puppy's Universal Installer (in the System menu?), which install despite its encouraging name, is not recommended when starting out with Puppy.

So, I'm hoping you are doing the clever-person's Frugal Install. Hence my asking of how you are doing the installs. Can you check what is in the root directory of sda3 - list a few of the files you see maybe?

Now (fingers crossed) to go back to where you had the dual XP-4.2 boot, don't touch your Wary, but I'd suggest you re-install Puppy-4.2 - Frugal again - also to sda3.

When/if you are asked 'do you want to install Grub' after the 4.2 Puppy OS files are copied to sda3, say yes again (if that's what you did before). You said you had Grub working before with 4.2 so repeat what you did before.

If Wary was a Full install and has taken over the sda3 partition, you can still add a Frugal 4.2 Pup since Frugals can live in a single Full Pup partition if there's room and 8GB is still plenty for these two.

If this works and you get back to booting to a menu list of 2 OS (Windows and a Pup), then we need to edit the missing Pup into the menu.lst so it too will appear as a boot choice.

But let's see if you can get just one Pup to show up, with XP as well still available.

Like I sort-of said at the start, the first Pup is the hardest, although maybe that should be the second Pup.

David S.

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mikeslr
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Questions and Suggestions

#28 Post by mikeslr »

Hi fiskrond,

After reviewing the two pages of this thread there are at least two obvious things we don't know.

1. We don't know whether your computer has a CD player, a CD burner, a DVD player, a DVD burner, USB-ports or the capability of booting from a USB-port. (The last, probably not, but it's best to ask). And this question occurs because,

2. We still don't know exactly how you installed any Puppy. Did you first burn it to a CD and run the CD to install it? Did you "unpack" a Puppy's ISO and copy its files? Something else?

Suggestions: While I know you're anxious to get started running some Puppy, its best to run any Puppy from Linux Ext Formatted partitions. They can run from NTFS and Fat32, but by doing so you sacrifice many options.

You don't need a separate partition for MAME. If you're intention is to run MAME from a Puppy by installing Wine and running it under Wine, your Wine installation will be in your Puppy's "Space" and MAME will be within that.

Perhaps think of it this way: Puppy as a Box. You put a folder named Wine in that box. You put Windows programs in that folder. [Ignore this if it will confuse you: You can also put wine next to the box, with a "tight connection" so that it works as if it's in the Box. And XP portables under wine will run the same way as under XP, from anywhere (except within the Wine Folder)].

Puppies have full access to every drive (hard or USB) connected to your system. However, unlike Windows, to access those drives you first have to "mount"/open them. Puppies only automatically mount the drive/partition on which it is located This is referred to as its HOME partition. If Wine or a program you want to run is located on a partition other than Puppy's HOME partition, you'd have to mount it first and every time before you could use it.

In short, you now have devoted (21 Gbs) more than half of your hard-drive to a partition which wasn't needed and, if used, will only complicate achieving your goal.

If you're going to straighten this out, best to do it before anything else.

Everyone has recommended that you create a swap file or partition. In reformatting your partitions, you should be aware that Puppy 4.2 may not be able to use Linux Ext4. All Puppies can use Linux Ext3.

So I'd recommend the follow hard-drive structure:

1st Partition: Leave it alone. 7 Gb NTFS for Windows XP.
2nd Partition: 32 Gb Linux Ext3.
3rd Partition: 1 Gb Linux Swap. [If you search, you'll find that the 'Rule of Thumb' for creating a Swap-drive is 2 times RAM. I've researched why. It was a 'guess' based on limitations on some other matter which hasn't been relevant for a decade. But the 'Rule of Thumb' stuck. Like people walking thru an open doorway when there are 5 other doors which no one thinks about opening].

If you're ambitious, I'd resize the 1st partition to 10 Gb, reducing the 2nd partition to 29 Gbs. Depends on how much unused space XP now has. It needs some just to function. And you may later find a program or two you want to install.

FYI: I only do Frugal Installs. I have yet to have a Puppy require more than 3 Gbs for its "Original Files" + a SaveFile into which I've "installed the Out house sink". However, when installing MANY programs into Wine I've had its container grow to 32 Gbs.

Wary (but not Puppy 4.2) can use SFSes. These are like Window's portable programs. You can load and unload them as and when you need them (can be automatically on bootup). Unloaded they require NO RAM. Loaded but unopened they require only a little RAM. They reside outside your SaveFile, so use little of its space.

For Microsoft Compatible Suite, you'll either want LibreOffice or WPS-Office. Both are available as SFSes. Only LibreOffice is available as an installable 'pet'. If you install it, it will need over 600 Mbs of your SaveFile --I think it is now up to 750 Mbs-- and, even when not in use, requiring some RAM, will reduce the amount of RAM you have for applications you currently want to run.

If you can get Wary to run on your computer, I can think of no reason to be messing around with Puppy 4.2.

Puppies come with gparted. As you've used Partition Wizard, you'll find gparted to be almost identical with one great advantage. If after using Partition Wizard you remain in XP and try to copy Puppy's files, Windows will screw things up by capitalizing letters which were "in small case" under Linux. Linux is case sensitive. A Puppy looking for a file named AbC, can't use a file named ABC.

mikesLr

fiskrond
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Location: Wales (UK)

Re: Installed Wary - what type of install?

#29 Post by fiskrond »

davids45 wrote:G'day fiskrond,

Glad you can still persevere - the first million is the hardest, I'm told.
LOL... my kinda humour... am into double figures though! :-D

In case the other latest suggestions by others don't get you over this hurdle, ....

I'm happy to read you had had a dual boot option which by the look of things, you deleted when installing Wary.
Each attempt I re-format and re-install WinXp so I know I haven't got any clutter from previous attempts..

May I ask how you are installing these Pups to sda3? Live-CD or usb? Copying the three files from a mounted iso of the Pup? Some other way - Puppy is as simple to install as Windows isn't. But how it's done can be relevant.
> Interesting factor.. hmm. Am booting from USB and then running the 'Install to IDE' from desktop icon.

I think only the Live-CD or usb method can give a "Full" Install by using Puppy's Universal Installer (in the System menu?), which install despite its encouraging name, is not recommended when starting out with Puppy.

So, I'm hoping you are doing the clever-person's Frugal Install. Hence my asking of how you are doing the installs. Can you check what is in the root directory of sda3 - list a few of the files you see maybe?

Now (fingers crossed) to go back to where you had the dual XP-4.2 boot, don't touch your Wary, but I'd suggest you re-install Puppy-4.2 - Frugal again - also to sda3.

When/if you are asked 'do you want to install Grub' after the 4.2 Puppy OS files are copied to sda3, say yes again (if that's what you did before). You said you had Grub working before with 4.2 so repeat what you did before.
> Not entirely sure what I did to get it to work..

If Wary was a Full install and has taken over the sda3 partition, you can still add a Frugal 4.2 Pup since Frugals can live in a single Full Pup partition if there's room and 8GB is still plenty for these two.

If this works and you get back to booting to a menu list of 2 OS (Windows and a Pup), then we need to edit the missing Pup into the menu.lst so it too will appear as a boot choice.

But let's see if you can get just one Pup to show up, with XP as well still available.

Like I sort-of said at the start, the first Pup is the hardest, although maybe that should be the second Pup.

David S.
I'm not really concerned about MAME... just want to overcome the challenge of getting a Linux OS installed just to see if I can do it... the hardware I've got in this box simply can't run Win to an acceptable functional level so would otherwise be scrap.

Noticeable difference when running Linux though!!!
Certainly beggers the thought of what Linux can do with some decent kit! :-)

fiskrond
Posts: 35
Joined: Mon 14 Aug 2017, 00:52
Location: Wales (UK)

#30 Post by fiskrond »

..just like to say thanks to all even if I haven't responded individually

am assimilating the info and processing into my understanding.. slowly

to put things in perspective... Terminator II (1991)...
circa 01:09 - 01:12
"Now rotate the two locking cylinders counterclockwise.."

:-D

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mikeslr
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#31 Post by mikeslr »

Hi fishkrond,

I think part of the problem you are having is your use of Puppy's Universal Installer. I think what's happening is that when you use it, it overwrites your previous boot-manager and boot-menu. It may also be installing its "current" Puppy to the partition where you had your previous Puppy. Either way, the result is you keep loosing your previous work.

So, I'm going to suggest that you DO USE THE package rufwoof provided and DISCONTINUE USING ANY PUPPY'S UNIVERSAL INSTALLER. Universal Installers are only necessary if you don't have a running Puppy. From a running Puppy, there's an easier, safer, way to do a Frugal Install.

However, before doing that, boot into Wary on your USB-Key and confirm that you can access the internet under it. Rufwoof's menu.lst was setup to boot wary and I'd rather suggest as few changes as possible. Especially since I've discovered, having downloaded Puppy 4.2, that trying to use it would cause additional complications. But I also downloaded and setup wary. I only have wifi, and wary didn't include drivers which recognized my adapter.

One other thing you can do in the meantime. Download rufwoof package to somewhere you can find it --perhaps XP's Download folder. Any Puppy can browse into Windows and copy files stored there. Then unzip it. Don't do anything else while in XP.

Let us know.

mikesLr

theru
Posts: 163
Joined: Thu 23 Jul 2015, 16:40
Location: Heers, Belgium

#32 Post by theru »

Lots of good advice here. If you don't mind I have just tested another method that uses a windows program to install puppy. No files are renamed and the mbr remains untouched.

I tested this with windows xp in virtualbox.

First I downloaded lick from here:

https://github.com/noryb009/lick/releases/tag/v1.2

Once downloaded I unpacked it and ran the gui version (lick-fltk).

Depending on where you want to install puppy it may or may not offer what you want. Because Windows by default doesn't see linux partitions you will only be offered the windows partition and the storage partition. Please bear with me for now as the puppy files can still be moved later on.

Let's select the storage partition.

At the top of the window you'll see a space where you can drop a puppy iso of your choosing. When you do that a name and id will be suggested which you are free to change. The installation will start when you press the install button.

A new folder will be created at the partition you chose and the necessary folders copied to that folder. It will also add a new bootloader (as far as I can see this involves the addition of 2 files to the windows partition, pupldr which is the bootloader and lickmenu.lst which is basically a text file telling the bootloader what can be loaded and where it can be found) and a new entry will be added to the windows bootloader. This allows you to choose between windows and puppy at boot.

If you prefer puppy to be completely on the linux partition this is still possible. You just boot from the pendrive and move the puppy folder created by lick to the linux partition. At boot all partitions are checked for that folder so as long as the folder isn't renamed or put in another folder it will be found at boot.

fiskrond
Posts: 35
Joined: Mon 14 Aug 2017, 00:52
Location: Wales (UK)

WHOOP!.. or should that be "WHOOOF!!!"

#33 Post by fiskrond »

Y'know what....
I've only gone and done an' got it!

8)

Am now running Slacko on Frank1 (of the 7>9 Frankenstein orphans in my cave)
.. I overcame previous installation issues by getting somewhat 'ruined' (hic & cough)... and thus not overthinking it....

for the life of me I can't figure out why I couldn't figure this out when I was stone cold sober...

...and I like what I have found!

:lol:

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