Synaptic not working (F96-CE is not setup to use it) do not try to install and use it

[Luluc]

Synaptic installs, but won't run. It crashes with errors.
Are we even supposed to run synaptic on any Puppy Linux? Or is it just going to break stuff?

[ozsouth]

@Luluc - synaptic is only for those puppies designed for it. They will already have it. Such Debian-based pups are Bookwormpup & Vanilladpup.

[rockedge]

The latest Noblepup64 from woof-CE has both apt and Synaptic

[Marv]

@Luluc - If you are going to run synaptic or apt (I use it in Noblepup64 and VoidPup64) there are a couple of things to keep in mind.

To enable the use of the repos, you must run apt update or use the reload button in synaptic prior to doing a search or install.

Doing so creates some rather large package lists (100 MB or more) in /var. No problem in my non-savefile pups or if you run largeish save files or folders, but I sometimes use a small savefile for user customizations and I've blown a few of those up.

I put the attached file in /etc/init.d in those pups. It cleans up those lists at shutdown. A bit rude and It means rerunning update or reload on the next run after a reboot but has saved me several "oh xxxxs".

[Luluc]

@Marv

Thank you for letting me know. It's thoughtful.

But I have a different setup. After trying several puppies and dogs, it seems FossaDog is the only choice that ticks all my checkboxes. There is no save file, it's a directory. Besides, my /root directory is symlinked to a large partition. So running out of space is unlikely to be an issue. It could happen, but then it would be a much bigger issue unrelated to puppies and dogs. Besides, as I've been downloading a lot of packages for a new installation, I've acquired the habit of keeping an eye on /var/cache/apt and often keeping a copy of those packages in another partition so I can reuse them if necessary and save bandwidth. I have a monthly quota to look after.

Mind you, FossaDog's quick-remaster tool throws a lot of stuff away (too much stuff IMO) including caches so /var/cache/apt would be emptied on a new remaster, but I have actually removed that from the script. I have a list of other space wasters to keep an eye on.

[Trapster]

Apt can be used to clean itself

apt clean → cleans the packages and install script in /var/cache/apt/archives/

apt autoclean → cleans obsolete deb-packages, less than clean

apt autoremove → removes orphaned packages which are not longer needed from the system, but not purges them, use the --purge option together with the command for that.