Puppy Linux Discussion Forum

lvds · Joined: 23 Jan 2007 Posts: 278 Location: Near the window

Hi,

I have been testing a lot of things lasts weeks and i would like to submit the following ideas. I haven't found the following in the wikki nor forums.

- I think a CE release must have a really reliable multimedia support and from what i have read last days, it takes MB of space to add the fine libraries for it plus the right codecs. Why not choose VLC instead of gxine+XMMS+mozilla libs+codecs ? ...Moreover a firefox/mozilla plugins exist of VLC.

- can we have a kernel with bootsplash support please ? So we could insert a graphic bootsplash.

- the games takes weight. I am not really ok with adding weight for not so good games, but i know of one or two which are very good and lightweight so we could use them in place of the old ones. The games i am thinking i have seen them on other puppy distro so i could be ok to add, there was PENTE from Gliezl distro (excuse me if i spelled it bad, Lady) , and a mahjong but i can't remember right now where i found them. Very good replacements instead of the old games IMHO.

Best regards
Laurent

WhoDo · Posted: Wed 07 Mar 2007, 04:50 Post subject:

lvds · Joined: 23 Jan 2007 Posts: 278 Location: Near the window

- About games: they have to be choosen very carefully, not just put as much as we can, or select them "because these 5 bad games weight less than this good one" ... (it is not what have been said, i am just pointing to common errors)

I recall there was a discussion where someone stated he would have very much prefered inclusion of Tuxpaint and gCompris (kids software) instead of old games usually unused by most of people ; and i agree, as a lot also have before me.

- About multimedia, i think whatever will be add in SFS addon packs, a few things have to be in the main pack, and multimedia is really the one pack needed not on a addon.

Let me explain, when you want to load a addon you need to insert the CD in the drive (or am i wrong ?!) so how will i be able to listen to a music CD if my puppyCE is yet using the CDROM drive ?!

As far as i have tested, VLC seems to be the best choice because of full features and weight comparison.

-I would like to say a word about window manager but it is not related to look and feel. I think one of the most important thing for a window mnager is to have a panel configuration so user can change everything, from look and feel, to menu customization, BY HIS OWN (not to rely on a community of programmers nor to wait for a next edition). I think as programmers we need to give back the freedom for customization to the end user. Set them free, they will love you for this beyond words.

To my knowledge i've only seen XFCE to have a complete configuration panel and i have not found the same possibilities for others window managers. If ICEWM should be choose, or whatever wndow manager, be sure to include a graphic configuration panel inside, this is very important.

- Another thing is a communauty is multi-lingual so a CE puppy should have a strong ability to switch from a language to another based on locales. Many of the distro i have tested have a locales script broken or not fully working or just simply doing nothing. Pizzapup have a nice one but this is not enough. Try to switch from english to french and you will still be in english for many softwares. But i know this is not a simple problem easy to solve.

I hope a CE work will tend to solve this in the most beautiful way one programmer could imagine. If we release a CE and every country have to modify it again to apply a lot of mods for internationalization, it would seem to me as a "small" communauty... The smart way would be to have a user choose for his language, and the localisation script connects to a server and download the correct translated files, and setup a few variables correctly. User would only have to remaster to burn a cd after that.

It reminds me to tell within ROX there is an option to select so ROX reacts to LOCALES variable instead of setting up a defined language. (Pizzasgood if you read me, you forgot this one)

I recall Xubuntu live-cd (or was it XFCE live-cd...) to have such a very good process of translation for the whole distro. One click, two minutes, and a few messages scrolling on my screen later and the whole distro was translated in french (include firefox and thunderbird etc.) It just was GREAT and makes everybody WOWed !!

Internationalization is one of the main signs of a complete community work. Something telling everybody that whatever country we came from we worked in harmony or at least with respect for each others. THIS is a community. Wink

Best regards,
Laurent.

puppyfan12 · Joined: 04 Dec 2006 Posts: 140 Location: Ontario, Canada

I've loaded up the beta1 release and thought we had better tackle the discussion of licensing issues before we hit an "official" release. I've started a new thread specifically for licensing issues.

cb88 · Joined: 28 Jan 2007 Posts: 1160 Location: USA

Puppy 2.15CE in virtualbox emulator.
keyboard and xorgwizard run then stops at this

1>Type 'xwin' to start Xvesa graphics sever.
2>cat: /ect/videomode: no such file or directory
3>cat: /ect/videomode: no such file or directory
4>Starting X with video mode and mouse psaux...
some time passes about 20-30 sec.
5>Exited from X. Type "xwin [fvwm95: jwm]" to restart X ([] mean optional).
6>(To shutdown PC type "poweroff', to reboot PC type "reboot')
7>
8>cat: /ect/TZ: No such file or directory

line 8 also appears just before the keyboard selection wizard starts.
I can start X by typing xwin but this is annoying.
might leave a noob bewildered. Has this occured out side an emulator?
this occured in the alpha as well. not in 2.14 or 2.12 that I recall.
not an issue after there is a pupsave.2fs file
but the error sill appears while puppy is loading.
hope this helps,
cb88

lvds · Joined: 23 Jan 2007 Posts: 278 Location: Near the window

...By the way, i forgot to tell i completely agree with Pizzasgood and others about Firefox instead of Opera. From what i have tested, installing Opera does not gain weight because it needs a lot of external things and libraries to give the same as Firefox.

the same is about gxine+xmms+mozilla libs+codecs+etc... versus VLC as VLC can do it all in one.

In the end if you couple firefox+vlc you have a killer app and a real gain in memory. Moreover it has to be added to the record that a lot of people uses extensions for firefox and will have hard time to live without them. Some extensions for firefox are especially good ones.

Best regards,
Laurent.

bobn9lvu · Joined: 11 Jul 2006 Posts: 173

iscraigh · Joined: 03 Sep 2006 Posts: 276

Has someone done a comparison of size between firefox and opera. If we have opera and have to add 2mb's of mozilla libraries to support gaim and GXine (someone mentioned already that it doesn't work in the beta). How much of a difference are we talking?. Forgive me WhoDo and others no disrespect intended at all, tough decisions have to be made and I appreciate the work you put in.

Side note: I use a plugin called media player connectivity, it allows me to auto launch external programs to play any media. I have not been able to get my daughters radio station to play any other way; thebeat.com

https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/446/

http://thebeat.com

Craig

Ted Dog · Joined: 13 Sep 2005 Posts: 973 Location: Heart of Texas

www.puppylinux.net will lose its server at the end of the month, due to lack of funds. If and when social security disability income [what a horrible disappointment] comes in I'll restart it. As some know, I have a rare M.D. and only help I get comes from the M.D.A which doesn't cover web-costs.
On a related note most of the puppylinux.us, info domains have been released, and should be available for reuse.

'Please support your local MDA spring fund drive'
Thanks to MU for his help with the websites puptrix.org is safe (prepaid) until Oct.

OK now back to the tread......

Pizzasgood · Posted: Thu 08 Mar 2007, 00:15 Post subject:

Okay, more complaints/suggestions from the critic (sorry, it's for our own good):

You changed the icons the easy way. How you did it, if the user changes them, it will overwrite the icon you used. Not good. You should change the icons in the rox icon theme instead. It should be inside the ROX-Filer ROX-App, so probably in /usr/local/apps/ROX-Filer/ROX/MIME/. Doing it that way will let users add custom icons with the simple right-click method without losing the built in icon if they want to revert.

Also, that folder is the same as the MIME folder of a ROX-Filer icon theme, so you could easily swap a complete icon theme into it, or swap it into an actual icon theme that other people can download (for installing in non-2.15 Puppies maybe).

Speaking of icons, you only changed a couple. When you look in the directory above, you'll see the rest. I know that's probably on the to-do list still though. By the way, you're welcome to the one I set up for Pizzapup if you want it. It's not quite the same style (more Tango-ish) but it's better than the defaults. If you don't plan to replace most of them, it would look better to have that for the unchanged icons than the standard ROX icons. That reminds me, I need to package that still. Let me know if you want it and I'll bump it up on the priority list.

The runaction for audio files is still madplay. AFAIK, most people find that annoying, because they can't stop it. I know I do. I'd say set it to xmms. Actually, if you keep both Gxine and XMMS, I'd suggest making a /usr/local/bin/defaultaudioplayer file and setting them to that (use defaultmediaplayer as a template).

The GTK-2 theme is very nice, but it's only for GTK-2. It leaves GTK-1 apps butt ugly. Maybe someone who knows about themes (Dougal?) can port it? Or at least set up a reasonably similar GTK-1 theme? If nothing else, some symlinks could probably make it load the default GTK-1 theme so it doesn't look so bad.

Now, for the IceWM themes:

Do we need 3 XP themes in PUPPY? One would do it. Silver is the most clean, then Olive. Blue is disgusting to begin with, and the theme is just plain messy.
XP logo in XP themes is unnecessary and annoying to some

Drop extra icons in:

WinXP-Silver
WinXP-Olive
Vista_Black

Drop WinClassic (I know you already offered that, just adding my vote)

Drop extra images in Velvet themes
Do we need 2 velvets?

Smooth-Feelings is too similar to Abby. Drop one. I'd vote to keep Abby.

There. That's enough for tonight. I still need to study for my exam tomorrow. It really does look pretty nice though. Especially with IcebergX, the original blue shining.jpg wallpaper, and the dark-blue XMMS theme.

Oh, and the green shining wallpaper is huge. JPG is lossy, so you can't really edit one and re-save it and hope to preserve detail. That's why I saved the original Gimp .xcf. I'll make a green version that isn't small sometime in the next week, and upload it, along with a .png of the original. I'd upload the .xcf, but it's 20MB.

WhoDo · Posted: Thu 08 Mar 2007, 00:53 Post subject:

craftybytes · Joined: 17 Nov 2006 Posts: 298 Location: QLD AUSTRALIA

WhoDo - as a puppyite on 56k dialup, I would have to set up my system to do a download of - v2.15CE "Viz" - or even the - v2.15CE "standard" - iso's to be able to do it over several hours UNINTERRUPTED..

However, with the present state of my telephone line ( debatable ) and my ISP link ( max 4 hour sessions ) - I don't think that this is going to be successful without a lot of hassles - SO - I ask will either or both these "iso's" be available on CD for us who are on dialup to purchase ..?

Please..PLEASE..

WhoDo · Posted: Thu 08 Mar 2007, 03:05 Post subject:

WhoDo · Posted: Thu 08 Mar 2007, 03:10 Post subject:

iscraigh · Joined: 03 Sep 2006 Posts: 276

Okay testing the beta now
Observations

-Gzine won't start efter installing missing mozilla libs
-when I open pet get I get only about 6 programs to install and it does not give me the option to update the list.
-software installer worked and looked good.
-Gaim unable to connect to MSN even after installing missing libs(had the same problem in litepup todd had a package of the missing libs that worked.)
-Opera does not include flash, flash at least should work out of the box.
I installed the flash .pup for opera and flash still does not work.
-Gtimer is not included anymore I used it to time my kids on the computer

I am pretty sure that I read Flash 9 would be included so I am going to assume that it just didn't make it in the beta. If I am incorrect then a working dot pup is a must.

I would say the same about java, if Opera is going to be the browser then installing java should only involve installing the dotpup. Perhaps an option when installing the java.pup asking which browser is being used and then putting the files in the correct places.

I will continue poking around

Craig