(old)Puppy Linux Discussion Forum

A Google search threw up Puppy today. There had been problems with my wife's laptop (Dell Inspiron 6400), running Windows 8. There were constant problems with the wireless connection, and even when this appeared to be good, loading pages from content-heavy websites (such as The Times {London}) was often very slow.

I decided to install Ubuntu, having done so successfully on my daughter's desktop, for similar reasons. However, when installed on the laptop, it failed to locate the network adaptor (Broadcom). Uninstalling it was not as easy as I thought it would be (where, for heaven's sake, is the Ubuntu folder, or the Ubuntu entry in Windows?), and I ended up restoring the disc image taken earlier.

I played safe with Puppy (Lupo-528) by running it from an optical disc. There was no problem with either the wired or wireless connection, and it loaded content-heavy pages quickly.

I shall now probably put it on a USB flash drive, and will later consider installing it on the hard drive.

All my wife really does on her laptop is to browse newspapers and retail store sites, and for this it seems to be excellent. No doubt it can do more than this.

I am considering using it myself for banking, given the security advantages.

Thank you, developers.

hey jonel

welcome aboard

it's just too good isn't it!!

Jonel wrote:I shall now probably put it on a USB flash drive,

Watch this video:
How To Do A USB Install Of Puppy Linux Slacko 5.3.2.4 FAST!
The method should work on almost any Puppy mehinks.
It worked well for me with Slacko.

If installing to an internal HDD..
I generally make a Frugal install to a partition on an internal HDD; don't like to use a full install.
I have pupsave files [+SFS] for 7 different Puppies, each in their own suitably named folders in the root of a partition on an internal HDD.

Hi Jonel, and welcome!
A very good choise, I run Lupu_5.2.8 myself, but the version named LupuPlus_5.2.8, which include a lot of extra drivers. As you already know, it will run on most PCs.

The drivers also exist in a separate .pet package, should the need arise: Drivers for Puppy 5.1-5.2.8 with 2.6.33.2 kernel

I am considering using it myself for banking, given the security advantages.

Running a puppy from a CD/DVD is probably the safest way you'll ever find, I do it myself, and I don't think you will find a person who disagree regarding safety.

tallboy

I have a Dell Inspiron 6400. (There's also an E6400 that I don't have!) Mine has seen some upgrades... it was a handmedown sort of gift from my father, and when he bought it he had put in a T2250 Core Solo (ack), 512mb RAM (ow), and a 40gb hard drive (I didn't know they MADE 40gb sata hard drives). Yipe.

It now has a 250gb HDD (bought on ebay for a song), 3gb RAM (heh heh), and a T7200 Core2Duo. Why 3gb RAM? I still use XP for a lot of my stuff (I'm working on it... I'm a "recreational user" of Puppy right now) and there's that 32bit address limit that I'd hit in either case. By the way, Dell specs say 2gb of RAM, BUT BUT BUT the chipset can take 4gb -- and Dell didn't change anything in the BIOS or motherboard config to stop people from putting more RAM in then the official spec says you can.

You can run basically (if not literally) any Puppy in existence (except for the very few machine-specialized Puppies) on that system. It's new enough for that. Quite honestly, if I was a Puppian at the level most folks here are -- I could've easily left it at stock --except for doubling the RAM-- and been quite happy with, say, Slacko 55 or similar.

But when I move to Puppy, I'm going to be using a GNOME Puppy made by one of the folks on this forum. It's nice besides, like many people, I started my Linux adventure with Ubuntu (version 7.04 to be exact) and that was back when it was GNOME 2. So I'll be using the GNOME 2.32 Puppy "PetitPois" by jejy69 -- once I finish making it English again (jejy69 is French).

I ma experimenting with Ubuntu 12.04 The issue that I have with puppy is that I cannot get a wireless connection with my printer and the compiled driver/tools script from the manufacturer is not Puppy friendly. 12.04 has drivers, but I am not sure if they will work yet. If it does not, it's back to 10.04 which is a little slow, but quite nice. I didn't like the unity interface on 12.04. There's Permanent task bar on top which I could not minimize and an interface which might be better, but I do not have time to learn it. I nuked unity and installed the new Gnome. I did not like that either: too slow and used too much of my limited computing power. I nuked Gnome and installed the Cinnamon window manager which is perky and easy to use. Cinnamon is also very familiar to folks who like the older version of Gnome.

It might be interesting for someone to do a Cinnamon Pup!

linuxbear wrote:I ma experimenting with Ubuntu 12.04 The issue that I have with puppy is that I cannot get a wireless connection with my printer and the compiled driver/tools script from the manufacturer is not Puppy friendly. 12.04 has drivers, but I am not sure if they will work yet. If it does not, it's back to 10.04 which is a little slow, but quite nice. I didn't like the unity interface on 12.04. There's Permanent task bar on top which I could not minimize and an interface which might be better, but I do not have time to learn it. I nuked unity and installed the new Gnome. I did not like that either: too slow and used too much of my limited computing power. I nuked Gnome and installed the Cinnamon window manager which is perky and easy to use. Cinnamon is also very familiar to folks who like the older version of Gnome.

It might be interesting for someone to do a Cinnamon Pup!

Greetings to you in Las Vegas, one my favorite places. I found that with Ubuntu 12.04, it was easy to setup my wireless printer (HP Photosmart 6180C). The drivers were built in. However, puppy Slacko 5.3.3, Lupu 5.2.8, Precise 5.5 etc, I wasn't able to set it up. I don't know enough to figure it out. Instead, I'd use Google Cloud print.

tallboy wrote:Running a puppy from a CD/DVD is probably the safest way you'll ever find, I do it myself, and I don't think you will find a person who disagree regarding safety.

I kinda concur, but there may be some security vulnerabilities in software Puppy Uses, but then again, Modern Puppy has modern and up to date packages and libraries, and with a properly configured firewall, you probably could have a hella secure pup.

Maybe I should work on a puplet designed for rockhard security, and stability.

dk60902 wrote: Instead, I'd use Google Cloud print.

Or you could go here for HP drivers.

linuxbear wrote:The issue that I have with puppy is that I cannot get a wireless connection with my printer and the compiled driver/tools script from the manufacturer is not Puppy friendly.

Is this your Lexmark S605? Lexmark has a newer version of their driver called lexmark-inkjet-legacy-1.0-1.i386.deb from here.

[Edit] I had good luck installing this package in various Puppies using debbi. The WIFI printer was auto-detected.

NeroVance wrote:Maybe I should work on a puplet designed for rockhard security, and stability.

I'm dangerously close to taking over this thread now, sorry about that, but yes, why not! I would suggest a very compact puppy with just the basic programs needed for everything you can do online, plus some applications like abiword, geany, gnumeric, homebank, and encryption. Making it simple, but very secure would attract a large community out there. When I say simple, I mean like something you can use to introduce your computer illiterate granny to online banking within a few minutes. It could be whitout dozens of confusing menu items, but still be able to satisfy the high fliers in the financial markets, by doing few things very good, in the best Linux tradition. There is no such distro out there now.

tallboy

rcrsn51 wrote:

linuxbear wrote:The issue that I have with puppy is that I cannot get a wireless connection with my printer and the compiled driver/tools script from the manufacturer is not Puppy friendly.

Is this your Lexmark S605? Lexmark has a newer version of their driver called lexmark-inkjet-legacy-1.0-1.i386.deb from here.

It looks like you can install it in Puppy just by clicking on the deb. The PPD files are in /usr/local/lexmark/v3/etc.

This package has Java content, so you may also need a JRE installed.

That's the one which wants me to make a hard usb connection and unplug then replug the connection and then take me through the install and configuration process all over again, not to mention the upgrades. The printer is already setup, I do not want to do it again. Besides, there are two dual-boot laptops and and a desktop that talk to it and I do not want to risk those working connections. The JRE driver for 10.04 just works and will find the wireless connection when you tell it to. The new driver is not the same. Also, even if I were inclined to go through this whole process and reconfigure 4 different machines with dual boot, I wouldn't. It would be easier to just nuke 12.04 I am not sure if the version for 10.04 will work on puppy as it is a compiled debian script which will demand a password. The answer seems to be that I will need to reinstall SuperOS 10.04 and then play with puppy on the side using the working 10.04 driver from Lexmark.