User Manual

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Puppy User Manual

Preface

Puppy linux is not a single distribution, but a collection of distributions built from Woof-CE. "Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum."

Introduction: Booting; Frugal Install
Finding and Downloading: If Coming From Windows; subjectx; subjectx; subjectx
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Introduction

Puppy can be installed in many different ways.

The most common methods are:
Live install to a CD, DVD, or USB flash drive

Frugal install to any type drive that is read/write capable.

Full install (not recommended to use, but it is available)

Consequently, the installer has many different choices which may be confusing to the new Puppy user. This document will attempt to clear that confusion such that you, the Puppy User can confidently install Puppy Linux to your medium of choice. in the desired manner.

Puppy operating system(OS) is made up of several special files, when used together, make up the complete Puppy OS. These files are in the form of SFS package files. They are actually the Puppy file system inside a file. If you looked at the contents of one of these SFS files. You would see a Linux file system, with directories and files inside of them.

The most common SFS files in a Puppy version:

main puppy version.SFS

adrv.sfs zdrv.sfs

fdrv.sfs

Depending on the Puppy version, could be more.

These are other files needed, but they are not SFS files.

initrd.gz

vmlinuz

Usually some type of boot loader files and programs. (theese are needed for live installs to a CD/DVD or USB flash drive)

All of these different files are provided in the Puppy Version ISO file. The Puppy version ISO file is a container file holding all of these individual files. Think of it as a box, with all these different files inside of it.

Using an ISO file to provide a Puppy version, was originally chosen, when there were only CD/DVD drives. An ISO file is an image file of what is on a boot-able CD or DVD that could be used to boot the computer from a operating system on a CD/DVD. This type of packaging as a way of offering a operating system, has been around for many years, and is well supported. Everything you need to do any type install of Puppy is provided in the Puppy ISO file.

A program designed for doing operating system installs, can be used to guide you through the process of the different ways of installing Puppy. There are many different programs that you could use. However, only the installer programs provided in a Puppy version,really understand how Puppy needs to be installed. So best if you use them for doing installs of Puppy Linux.

The live install is the one type of install, that about any installer program can do, using the Puppy ISO file as source.

A CD/DVD burning program can burn the Puppy ISO image to a CD or DVD.

Any USB installer program can use the Puppy ISO to write it's contents to a USB flash drive. Thus making it a USB live install of Puppy.

With the live Puppy CD/DVD or the live Puppy USB flash drive You can boot a computer to a working and fully operational Puppy OS.

This is a good way to try a Puppy version and see if it works OK and you like it.

Why are there so many versions of Puppy Linux?

First because there is no reason to only produce one version. What is in a Puppy version is up to the person(s) that produce it. So all the Puppy versions will be different as to what is in them for programs and features.
The other reason is no way can an operating system, that is 300 to 500 MB in size, have all the possible needed support software for every computer made. All the general common hardware in a computer is supported, but some computers need special software. Usually any Puppy version can boot a computer to a working Puppy desktop. But there may be some specific device that needs specific software not in the Puppy version. Installing what is missing or trying a different Puppy version, will usually get it working.

Think about it this way. You are using a Puppy version that was released two years ago and had what was needed to support the hardware at that time.
You just got a brand new WIFI adapter that just became available. It needs software drivers and firmware to run it. No way is this two year old Puppy, you are running, going to have the driver and firmware for it. A newer Puppy version may have it or you need to install the stuff into this Puppy you are using.

Every manufacture of computer hardware provides needed software for Windows or MAC operating systems and some do for Linux. If nothing provided for Linux. People hack (reverse engineer) a Linux version together and offer it for others to use.

Booting

Booting, in simple terms, is just your computer finding the files to execute the Operating System (OS). All Operating Systems need some way to boot. Puppy supports various methods of booting. Some require the editing of the special boot code at the start of the disk (MBR) so that the special Linux files can be found (kernel - vmlinuz and initrd.gz).

Frugal Install

By design, Puppy Linux runs in your systems Random Access Memory (RAM). Normally, a minimum of 512 MB (megabytes) of RAM is recommended to run Puppy but it will work with less. Don't worry, any machine built after 2003 is likely to have at least enough RAM. Due to this a Frugal installation is recommended. Really, it isn't installed per se´, rather the main files to get Puppy running (the kernel or "vmlinuz", an initial ram disk or "initrd.gz", a main puppy system file known as the "main sfs" usually named puppy_1.2.3.sfs or similar and perhaps a few others depending on puppy version) are copied to your disk then booted with a boot loader. It can be installed in almost any partition in almost any file system (eg: FAT32, NTFS, ext2, ext3, ext4). It can be installed inside an existing Installation of Windows, or other Linux such as Ubuntu or Fedora. A frugal install also works on all types of media³.
For technical information see How Puppy Works.

Finding and Downloading

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To Do

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