Damn Small Linux is back!

[Amol]

Hello puppy users !
Damn Small Linux is coming back.It is based on Antix this time: http://www.damnsmalllinux.org/
Amol

[Jasper]

I read the developers thoughts and he mentioned Puppy Linux.

I did notice a typo ...... I believe it should be en_GB .

[bugnaw333]

Too slow to download

[benali72]

If I read the DSL justification correctly, it seems the reason he gives for a DSL revival is that he wants a distro to fix on a 700 meg CD.

To me, that's not a compelling reason. Only really old computers depend on CDs ... even computers up to 20 years old have a DVD that holds 4.7 gig.

Not to mention all those older computers that can boot off a USB thumb drive -- which everyone who can uses instead of an optical disc these days.

I think DSL-2024 would be nice to have as another option. But I don't see its rationale as compelling. So I doubt it would get many users, certainly not as many as the original DSL did back around 2005 - 2006.

Just my guess....

[BologneChe]

@benali72
The current DSL is an Antix-based version. Honestly, for the little difference, I would choose Antix.

[benali72]

I agree, to me it makes more sense just to go directly to antiX and use it. Or if you have to go smaller with the download or disk space for installing, use Puppy.

It's cool if DSL-2024 comes out as another option, but I just don't see it getting wide use compared to established distros that already do what DSL-2024 will offer.

[wiak]

It's also not difficult to take any DebianDog or KL distro build recipe and cut it or expand it to any distro form desired. Size comparable anyway - maybe sometimes smaller depending on what is included of course. Debiandog has been usefully around since 2013 so well polished, fully debian-compatible, and comes with all the Puppy-like frugal install sfs addon type features. Can't think of any short-coming compared to what is otherwise out there really, so that's been available for 11 years now! Some distros still trying today to catch up - waste of dev time really when so relatively few to help out.

KL might have been waste of time too except brought some extra 'tricks' like ability to use sfs or uncompressed addon layers, multi-instance installs and ability to use root-filesystem of most any underlying distro including one that had normal full install such as Linux Mint.

Nostalgia is all very well, but continued innovation is more useful.

[mouldy]

Yea small is nice but worrying about a cd when a blank dvd usually cheaper (supply and demand) isnt very pertinent. The only practical need for ultra small iso is for people with either a very slow connection or very limited data. Hard to believe but last I looked there are still 1million dialup customers in USA, mostly in rural areas with no broadband and limited cell service.

But if you need an iso on a cd...

Retro Feature

With the new flash-knoppix script, it is now possible to create a mini-version (ca. 700MB) of Knoppix and also burn it on CD. The mini-edition consists of only the kernel, the graphical LXDE-GUI, tools for data rescue and the chromium browser. With this version, the user can more easily create own projects with a lean base system.

So there are options.

Now anybody else remember QNX demo disk w/gui (a gui system on a floppy really impressive) https://winworldpc.com/product/qnx/144mb-demo , and I remember some linux (text only) on a floppy disk (sorry cant remember what they called it). Toms? Whopping 1.44MB Yea a bootable operating system. The old 50MB DSL was bloated by those standards. Think Slitaz still offers a super small version 40MB?. And the usable version TinyCore is still around 300MB? But not only has the linux kernel grown exponentially, so have viable browsers. Can you still use some super basic browser, yea maybe, but you are kinda limiting yourself to very basic static html sites. Even if they can handle javascript, they are overwhelmed with all the scripts on most sites with no way to control them other than turning off javascript making the site unavailable.

https://bits.p1x.in/floppinux-an-embedd ... le-floppy/ So still people looking for ultra small challenge.

[rockedge]

Made a really experimental and useless FirstRib with @wiak's build script using Void Linux as the base that was boot-able at 8 M with no GUI or anything else really. Extremely basic and had almost nothing you could really do with it except start it up and some commands on the console.

I could imagine adding some components to make it more useful or be able to a specific job autonomously and installing it on embedded devices or camera's.

Maybe monitor some signal in a sensor......the Dev's at the ZoneMinder project are playing around with RADAR motion sensors that can "see" through walls............

Now there are sensors being produced for the smart home security using these boards...they are tiny and cheap.

This one costs around $4 -> Motion Sensor Doppler Radar Module RCWL0516 (101812)

[wanderer]

small still catches peoples attention

even at 700 mgs

which isnt damn small

wanderer

[Clarity]

small still catches peoples attention...

I want to 1st apologize ahead of time. I am not taking issue with your views here. But, I want to share a view that some/many on this forum may not have considered.

I am often in several University environments (No I am not a faculty member). And have done seminars to seniors for various technological things. I have helped hundreds of individuals over the decades or more.

I have NEVER had a student or senior expressed an interest in something small!

This does NOT mean you dont have a valid point. It means that the public including many international students have NO interest in anything about size. Everyone, without fail. express interest if applications and how to use their systems. Further NOT one has come to me about OS size...EVER! (On many-many occasions they have come to me with storage changes and storage upgrade desires).

Lastly, I have NOT seen 1, I repeat 1 person come to me for help with a 32bit system. Only time its seen is with RasPis.
I do recognize that members who have been around since the 1980s have gone thru these growing pains from 16bit to 32bit to 64bit on x86 architectures and the addressable storage issues of the past decades. Further we grew from dial-up to ISDN to wired to cable to fiber to satellite; available variously across the world even today.

BUT, today's people, except for nostalgia, dont blink an eye on the concepts often seen on the forum of its storage deliverables, aka 'size'.

I recognize that in many countries and locations within countries, access to the most modern of systems may not be available to match the larger scales of access available to modern countries. But, even the oldest of PCs since 1999 come equipped with DVD readers/writers.

Since dial-up has moved on in many parts of the world and cell service is ubiquitous, the discussions in the world center around the various plans that cell companies offer. Additionally many in the world have connections directly wired to their homes or have one of the expansive satellite services now spreading across the world.

I am an old-timer. I not only remember the bygone days, but have been close enough to technology advancements and peoples using this stuff to know, FROM MY EXPERIENCES, the sized discussion that continuously land on the forum may not be the issue many believe it to be.

I share my interactions and observations for review and to provide thought on what/why members come to the forum. It is NOT for size.

AGAIN, I am NOT saying your view is wrong in ANY way; rather, I am saying my experiences seen in the community of people I have interacted with as a helper/presenter brings no mention, ever. in decades on deliverable size. From this, it appears that is not something they concern themselves with. Their idea of size is about browsers...not the OS deliverables.

[wanderer]

hi clarity

i really appreciate you addressing this issue
and what you say is very very valuable

please repost it on the whats up in puppy world thread
so others can read it

i think everyone will be very interested

that is where i hope we all can discuss the future of puppy

i only posted this on the damn small linux thread so it would hide the corepup thread

wanderer

[stevie pup]

Lastly, I have NOT seen 1, I repeat 1 person come to me for help with a 32bit system.

I've just checked the MX Linux blog. To date there has been almost 40,000 downloads of their 32bit ISO's (23.2 version).

So for anyone to say there's no demand for 32bit I think is a little misguided. 40,000 suggests to me someone, somewhere is still using 32bit.

Just my thoughts and observations.

[BologneChe]

Lastly, I have NOT seen 1, I repeat 1 person come to me for help with a 32bit system.

I've just checked the MX Linux blog. To date there has been almost 40,000 downloads of their 32bit ISO's (23.2 version).

So for anyone to say there's no demand for 32bit I think is a little misguided. 40,000 suggests to me someone, somewhere is still using 32bit.

Just my thoughts and observations.

What the statistics does not say is how many downloads are made by user choice compared to a situation where the user has no choice. 32 bits will die just like 8 and 16 bits.

[FloraMae]

@benali72
The current DSL is an Antix-based version. Honestly, for the little difference, I would choose Antix.

Well, over the last few days I have tested a bunch of low-ram distros for curiosity and it seems AntiX is a lot laggier than DSL, at least it feels so. I don't know how they differ though.

Overall, I am back to Bookworm64 because it seems the "fastest" feeling distro I've recently tried that also meets my other requirements.

[BologneChe]

@benali72
The current DSL is an Antix-based version. Honestly, for the little difference, I would choose Antix.

Well, over the last few days I have tested a bunch of low-ram distros for curiosity and it seems AntiX is a lot laggier than DSL, at least it feels so. I don't know how they differ though.

Overall, I am back to Bookworm64 because it seems the "fastest" feeling distro I've recently tried that also meets my other requirements.

I tried Antix and DSL. Not convinced! The lightweight distribution best suited to my hardware was Bodhi Linux. You just have to get used to liking the green color of the desktop

[dimkr]

Some 'small' distros achieve their small size using extra compression, so they trade size for CPU and RAM consumption during decompression. Some also leave out important features like GPU acceleration (which increases battery life) and extra fonts (so browser has to download fonts).

'Small distro' is nothing but a marketing trick, the small size doesn't make such distros faster or more efficient, but people assume that smaller means faster and start believing it actually is without doing any measurements of CPU consumption, RAM consumption, power consumption and bandwidth utilization.

It's not surprising if BookwormPup64 feels faster, it uses zstd compression, unlike most Puppy releases. This makes it about 10% bigger but zstd is way faster to decompress compared to the alternatives. Yes, it's bigger but faster: don't let the 'small distro' marketing materials fool you.

[BologneChe]

@dimkr
Indeed, it is a mirage to assert that smallness leads to efficiency. In a pinch, I find that Solus Budgie is much more effective on my miserable equipment than many of the lightweight distributions offered.

[FloraMae]

Some 'small' distros achieve their small size using extra compression, so they trade size for CPU and RAM consumption during decompression. Some also leave out important features like GPU acceleration (which increases battery life) and extra fonts (so browser has to download fonts).

'Small distro' is nothing but a marketing trick, the small size doesn't make such distros faster or more efficient, but people assume that smaller means faster and start believing it actually is without doing any measurements of CPU consumption, RAM consumption, power consumption and bandwidth utilization.

It's not surprising if BookwormPup64 feels faster, it uses zstd compression, unlike most Puppy releases. This makes it about 10% bigger but zstd is way faster to decompress compared to the alternatives. Yes, it's bigger but faster: don't let the 'small distro' marketing materials fool you.

I'm the kind of person who would rather have something that feels faster than something that looks smaller. In my tests, DSL felt faster than AntiX but AntiX felt a lot slower than Bookworm64 despite using less ram. I didn't like the interface of DSL so didn't test it much. The Bookworm64 interface is overall pretty usable after getting used to it. I used to prefer XFCE but now I don't know.

[mouldy]

Puppy used to offer a full install option. Maybe still does and just hidden. Full install used to be suggested for very limited RAM computers. Then since few used it, nobody wanted to support it anymore so they hid it. I vaguely remember using very old Puppy like that on a P2 computer....

I played one time with just copying the directories from a booted frugal Puppy to their own partition, then came up with a bootloader entry that would boot. Worked, but Puppy runs as root so no dealing with login stuff. Now couldnt leave well enough alone, at time was playing with LXDE spin of Fedora 35 I think. It was amazingly small with a full install. It only does full install. Well copied directories to another partition using file manager and tried booting it. Yes it would boot but then it stopped me at login screen. Wouldnt accept the password from the original install. Advantage directly copying the directories like this FAR faster than sitting through some slow installer setup. I didnt mess with it further, but hey now know its possible with Puppy and maybe something like Fedora if you can get around the login stuff. Probably way to boot from live dvd and reset the login?? No idea why the login wouldnt work since this was in essence a complete copy of the original. Should had all the necessary files and settings. But maybe they stored the login info with a specific location that no longer matched? Next test would be to just dd the one partition to the other partition and see if it then booted. DDing it would be an absolute exact copy, but it would be on a different partition so would it still be confused at login screen?

[FloraMae]

Puppy used to offer a full install option. Maybe still does and just hidden. Full install used to be suggested for very limited RAM computers. Then since few used it, nobody wanted to support it anymore so they hid it. I vaguely remember using very old Puppy like that on a P2 computer....

I played one time with just copying the directories from a booted frugal Puppy to their own partition, then came up with a bootloader entry that would boot. Worked, but Puppy runs as root so no dealing with login stuff. Now couldnt leave well enough alone, at time was playing with LXDE spin of Fedora 35 I think. It was amazingly small with a full install. It only does full install. Well copied directories to another partition using file manager and tried booting it. Yes it would boot but then it stopped me at login screen. Wouldnt accept the password from the original install. Advantage directly copying the directories like this FAR faster than sitting through some slow installer setup. I didnt mess with it further, but hey now know its possible with Puppy and maybe something like Fedora if you can get around the login stuff. Probably way to boot from live dvd and reset the login?? No idea why the login wouldnt work since this was in essence a complete copy of the original. Should had all the necessary files and settings. But maybe they stored the login info with a specific location that no longer matched? Next test would be to just dd the one partition to the other partition and see if it then booted. DDing it would be an absolute exact copy, but it would be on a different partition so would it still be confused at login screen?

I've been around off and on and I remember the "full install". I didn't pay too much attention when I did this latest install but I do remember keeping a full install updated was a pain in the butt. A lot easier to keep a frugal install up to date.

I still don't know for sure what puppy flavors are best for low ram, but it seems a basic browser on bookworm64 can be done on 4GB of ram. With some tweaks to firefox-esr and keeping addon count down, it does ok enough for 4GB of ram. I have 8GB on this machine but since 4GB machines are still very common and cheap, I've been looking into what would be needed to have updated distro with an updated browser and not go over 4GB of ram.

Overall when factoring everything in, I am currently settling on bookworm64 with a tweaked firefox-esr.