Pussy-Pie update:
Pussy for the Raspberry Pi is making progress. The server version is already available for download from the website:
http://www.thepussycatforest.info
The more Puppy-like OS that i am working on now uses the server version as a base and keeps all the servery type things intact while adding a proper usable desktop.
So far all the apps are installed and i am working on the cosmetic type stuff to tie it all in. The desktop will initially look very much like normal Pussy with it booting to JWM and giving the user the option of enabling ROX filer to handle the background icons etc and file managing. This is even more important on Pussy Pie than normal Pussy because the Rasp has so little resources.
Here is a list of the applications that Pussy Pie Desktop will have: (may call this one Pussy Pie Xtra, to keep in line with current naming of the different Pussies.)
mtpaint, leafpad, gpicview, mplayer + mplayer-gui, dillo, milkytracker, rosegarden, XFburn, xaos, cadubi, dosbox, basic256, squashfstools, mhwaveedit, ayttm, epdfview, fbreader, airstrike, hydrogen, audacity, jackd, dead-souls (a MUD text adventure game server ), and of cause the openssh-server, pure-ftpd, telnet server and lighttpd webserver.
There are some familiar apps in there and some that i thought would be interesting to add. Rosegarden/ milkytracker/ hydrogen/ audacity/ jackd (including jack2 and all the other tiny midi packages that it depends on) could be a very good and educational music suite for that revolves around the midi and mod formats. Depending on performance, i may subtract and or add to this lineup of music type apps. I have a midi keyboard and i will use it to test and set it all up well, the OS wont ship with badly configured jack/ rosegarden that is kinda fiddly at the best of times.
This may lean heavily on audio type things but the Rasp Pi is so restricting that its probably best to play to its strengths, because the problem here is trying to find things that it can actually run, and using the Rasp Pi as a useful midi and recording station for home studios is something the Rasp can actually do and do it *silently*. With no fans needed to cool it, the Rasp is silent and this is good for home studios.
I fear that the application selection will undergo many reviews as better drivers and utilities for the Rasp are released. For instance, when OpenGL actually works on debian and is accelerated then I will add some games and maybe release a dedicated games OS as well. When webcams are more available, then a webcam app will be added ... etc... you get the picture.
Many things in the Raspbian repos are not there, either they need to more time to compile the entire Debian repos for the Rasp, or there is some real compatibility issues somewhere. For example, i wanted to add DOSEmu but its not there, but DosBox is. Its not just a matter of performance that dictates what apps we can have working on the Rasp, but the actual availability of applications that have been compiled.
There are a couple of oddities that i am attempting to iron out as far as the disk footprint. Here are a couple of issues as an example:
xcalc: a calculator is always expected to be there, but for some reason this simple program depends on 50MB of other apps, this is strange.
Midori: while this is only a 18mb program, when i try to apt-get it, the dependencies total more than 100MB. In comparison, iceweasel the debian version of firefox only needs 20mb of space including dependencies.
due to the lack of a decent repo of static packages that have been compiled for the Rasp, i kinda have my hands tied with what i can install. If i was to install these and then delete the junky type dependencies from the filesystem manually, this would leave a broken and therefor an incompatible Raspbian OS in its wake, and apt-get will simply be very buggy or may be completely unusable.
There is also no solution for running a compressed filesystem using squashfs for the main OS (this is not a live system like other Pussies).
So 50mb is really actually 50mb. Whereas with other Pussies, 50mb of install programs really only took about 13mb after slimming them and then adding them to the compressed squashfs filesystem. And because all Rasp Pi users will be using SD cards, we need to keep a very small footprint.
well.... back to work
[Edit:] I forgot to mention that xarchiver and anyterm will be included. The anyterm server lets you designate a port number to run on and when you surf to that port using a web browser, it will provide you with a web to ssh shell interface. You can use it to provide access to the command line interface or a program that can be run at the console. The
www.thepussycatforest.info website uses anyterm to provide access to a text adventure game. This becomes a bit of a memory nazi with multiple sessions of this running at once, but its not meant for high traffic. Combining the dead-souls MUD server with anyterm results in a game that is embedded into a webpage that can be used as a chat room.