How to install Puppy 9.5 to USB?

[MysticReverie]

Hi
I would like to use Linux Puppy 9.5 as a back up for my work. Just in case my hard drive fails, I was planning to use a Puppy full instalation on USB.

Problem is, it's too hard for me.

I made the bootable usb with rufus. But can't see any way to do a full install into my other USB. The menus make no sense at all to me.
Also my wifi isn't working, and when I tether my phone internet via usb, that's not working also.

Maybe I should try something easier?
I thought Puppy would be a good choice because most OS's hang when used from USB.

Any help please?
Thanks

[Flash]

Are you wanting to do a "full" install to a USB hard disk drive, or to a USB flash drive?
Does the Puppy version you want to use have another name besides 9.5?
How much RAM is in the computer?

[bigpup]

Forget full installs.
Puppy is designed to work best as a live or frugal install.
It is still the complete Puppy OS installed.
Some features of Puppy do not work in full installs.

The install of Puppy that Rufus did, to the USB, is what you want.
That is the way Puppy is designed to work on a USB as a live install.
All the files inside the Puppy ISO are copied onto the USB (live install)

The other type install you can do to a USB, is a frugal install, with a boot loader installed, to boot it.
Need to use programs in Puppy to do that.

Puppy works best as a live or frugal install on a USB.

The other issues we need some information.
Specific make and model of computer?
Is it a laptop or desktop?
What is the specific hardware make and model, that is used for network connection?

Also my wifi isn't working, and when I tether my phone internet via usb, that's not working also.

May need to add driver and firmware or you do not understand how to use the network wizards.

[GMBudwrench]

Also my wifi isn't working, and when I tether my phone internet via usb, that's not working also.

If you already haven't, try a different wifi tool in the network connection wizard - setup>internet connection wizard. I recently changed from my phone to a wifi hotspot. Simple Network Setup, which connected me to my phone couldn't find my hotspot wifi, Frisbee found it immediately.

[MysticReverie]

I'm using FossaPup
I have 6GB RAM
I have a ASUS M509D Laptop
I want to use if from a USB thumbstick, but not a demo, like a full version that remembers changes.
I already have the 'LIVE' version from Rufus, I can use that as a Normal OS? It will update and be 'persistant' if I make any changes?
If thats the case, whats the benefit of a 'Frugal' one?

The rest I have no idea.
I don't know how to try other methods, they are all Greek to me and PUP wont even find any active internet connection.
And the installation menu is totally confusing.

I'm not deeply into computers, Any guides for laymen? Thanks

What I'm looking for is to be able to do headset/video chats via browser, and maybe use a few apps like libre office, skype etc.
If this OS can manage that, I think it would be a good choice as it's so light

Another problem I had is when I tried it out from uSb, it asked if I wanted to save my changed to the USB, but then it asked what partition I want to save the changes too. I want to save it to the same USB as the Puppy system, and not on my HDD, that's the whole point of having the USB incase of HDD failure. So another question.. how to I save sessions directly to the bootable USB ?!?!? I don't know what partition it is.

[mikewalsh]

Hallo, @MysticReverie . to the 'kennels'.

Mm. Yes, I can see where you're coming from with this.

Most people know about hard drives having partitions, but to a great many of those same people, a USB stick is just a "USB stick". Most don't understand that a stick has to be partitioned and formatted in exactly the same way as any other storage medium.

Usually, USB sticks are formatted as a single FAT32 partition direct from the factory. This is the most universal file-system format on the planet, and is recognised by virtually every OS ever built.

-------------------------------

Puppy is pretty good at recognising where it's running from, and usually offers to create a 'save-file' in that same location. That location is usually marked as *Recommended* in the list of available locations when the save-file is being created at the end of your session prior to the very first shutdown.

(A save-file is necessary for saving any changes. It contains a complete Linux file-system inside it, which Puppy needs in order to work correctly. If this was saved directly onto the FAT32 file-system, it wouldn't be recognised.)

The frugal install + save-file is exactly the same as a 'full' installation, but is far more flexible. Puppy runs entirely from RAM, so long as you have enough of the stuff; this is what makes it so fast, because RAM is THE fastest component of any system. At boot, the first thing Puppy does is to create a 'virtual' file-system in RAM.....following which, it then copies the contents of the 'read-only', base Puppy main file into that virtual file-system.

The save-file makes it easy to recover from a major mistake, because you simply delete that one item and re-create a new one again.....unlike a traditional 'full' install, where you would have to completely wipe and re-install again. And because the 'base' Puppy files are all read-only, they can't be written to or otherwise corrupted.

Puppy is definitely worth persevering with. I remember my own first experiments with Puppy nearly 8 years ago; it was so alien, I broke things several times during the first couple of days, and kept re-installing it.....because I assumed that was what needed to be done. It was several months before I finally began to understand what a truly marvellous, flexible system Puppy really was.

Don't give up at the first hurdle. We're always here to help; if you're prepared to stick with it, you'll be very glad you did.

Mike.

[JASpup]

This can be a big discussion. Basics: frugal is a full version that remembers changes. We're all doing it unless we have a specific reason not to.

Frugal saves a PUPSAVE when you logout. It's a storage container for changes.

A novice USB thumb usually only has one partition and an internal HD several. The third letter is your device. Example:

Internal HD
sda1
sda2
sda3
sda4

USB
sdb1

Yes, these can be reversed. but your USB won't have four partitions, so the USB will be the loner. They are also indicated by size.

Save your session to the loner partition a little smaller than the advertised size of your USB.

Puppy can do everything on your wish list. This website and other users are your guide. http://wikka.puppylinux.com/HomePage

[wizard]

@MysticReverie

This method tested and working:

Install the fossa64 9.5 ISO using Rufus
File System = fat32

The Puppy USB has a full install using a method called "frugal" because of the efficient way it uses resources.
In order for your changes to be saved when you reboot, you need a save file. Make one by doing this:

Boot the computer from the Puppy USB drive (should be the only USB)
-click the sdb1 icon on the desktop
-click Menu>Exit>Reboot
-click Save
choose partition = sdb1
type = normal
file system = ext3
size = 512mb (can be changed later)
pupsave name = none
-click yes save button
swap size = 128 (minumum)

Reboot the computer to the USB drive, now any changes, added programs, and documents will be saved when you shutdown or reboot.

wizard

[mikeslr]

I always recommend testing any OS by first installing it to a USB-Key. Any OS. If there are problems when booted from a USB-Key, they'll also be there when you boot the OS from a hard-drive. And if those problems aren't solvable, you haven't wasted time a lot of time messing with the hard-drive and then having to undo the mess.
Running Windows rufus is an excellent tool --fast and efficient-- to get your chosen OS bootable from a USB-Key. But with Puppys, there's a simple procedure which isn't obvious. My recommendation, then is to 'start from scratch' using Windows, Rufus and the Fossapup64 ISO. You can re-use the USB-Key Fossapup64 is currently on. Rufus will re-format the USB-Key.
The procedure to use with Rufus, and the reasons for it, are spelled out here: viewtopic.php?p=40522#p40522
It only involves one & 1/2 simple changes from what you originally did.

P.S. If I didn't mention it in the post I linked to, the SaveFile or SaveFolder you create on first shut-down is where Puppys save the settings, changes, and applications you install. It is the equivalent of 'persistence' when running other Linuxes from a USB-Key. After creating a SAVE, on reboot Puppy will always use it and its contents will have priority over any files you had booting from a 'pristine' Puppy.
P.S.S. Regarding the 'wifi-tether' problem, do try GMBudwrench's suggestion. But if that doesn't solve the problem: (a) Menu>System>Pupsys-Info provides a great GUI for finding the information --such as that requested by bigpup-- we'll need to guide you to a solution; and (b) please start a new thread specific to that issue: Rules of thumb on this Forum, start as many thread as necessary, but one thread per issue. Make's it easier to keep track and to find the info for the next person having that, or a similar, issue.

[MysticReverie]

Thanks all for all kind guidance and advice.

I managed to get connected the internet via USB phone tethering.

I'm on Puppy now as I write this !

I also managed to create a save file.
I did not see any option to change the swap file size however - I've no idea what mine is by default.
By the way, is a 'Frugal' install faster or more economical than the boot method I have here? Or not much difference?

So, as your advice, I'll create a new thread abut getting the wifi adapter to work.

[wizard]

@MysticReverie

You can check your save file size by hovering your mouse pointer over this icon (looks line a little cylinder) that's in the right side of the taskbar. If you have plenty of storage it is green, ok storage is orange, low storage is red. You can also increase the size of your save file by right clicking the icon and choose Resize personal storage

savefileicon.jpg (884 Bytes) Viewed 659 times

wizard

[JASpup]

By the way, is a 'Frugal' install faster or more economical than the boot method I have here? Or not much difference?

Differences are explained here: https://puppylinux.com/install.html

and here: http://www.wikka.puppylinux.com/FrugalO ... stallation

[mikeslr]

There were several posts suggesting how to go from where you were --booting from a USB-Key-- to where you might want to be. But you didn't tell us where you ended up. We only know what you tell us. Did you end up with a Save on the USB-Key or the Hard-drive?
Sata Hard-drives are 10 to 15 times faster than USB-Sticks. SSD Hard-drives are even faster. When your Puppy booted from the USB-Key, it copied the files you 'burned' to the USB-Key into RAM, for the most part caching them. If you somehow/subsequently moved those files to a hard-drive subsequent boots to desktop would, consequently, be faster. The SaveFile you created to hold changes isn't copied into RAM, just mounted, read and its contents indexed in RAM. From a Hard-drive, this similarly would be faster; but might not be sufficiently faster that you would notice the difference.

When needed, Puppy will use any and all Swapfiles which were on your computer when you frugally installed that Puppy. Depending on how much RAM you have, it may never be needed. That's the case with 6 GBs of RAM. You can find out a great deal about your operating system from using Menu>System>Pup-SysInfo. Then Click Devises>Memory to see how much RAM and Swap is used. As on my system which doesn't use a Swap, it will show 0 swap is used. But if you want to get a good idea of how much of your RAM is actually available when you first boot-Iup open Pup-SysInfo and click Sys-Specs>Base Report.
In general, Web-Browsers are RAM-Hogs. With 6 Gbs of RAM, the RAM demands of pretty-much everything else can be ignored unless you are compiling programs or rendering video files: both RAM-intensive operations.
For more information about Swaps --including how to create them-- see this thread, viewtopic.php?p=36036
p.s. As I said, Web-Browsers are RAM-Hogs. But that not just because graphics and video on Web-sites require a lot of RAM. Those web-sites seek to avoid having to download/stream that data to you again by caching it on your computer. The way Puppys work, those caches would occupy RAM. There are several setting you can make to your Web-browser to limit that (and these is still recommended) but one of the least painful things you can do is run your choice of Web-browser as a portable. You'll find almost all available web-browsers in that format in this Section: viewforum.php?f=90.
After unpacking a tar.gz (Right-Click, select UExtract) move the web-browsers folder --within the extracted folder-- to /mnt/home: that's the drive/partition on which your SaveFile/Folder is located. Portables hold cache within their own folder on 'Storage' rather than 'in RAM'. They also locate your Profiles within their own folders. Profiles include your settings, bookmarks and addons/extensions.

[wizard]

@MysticReverie

After rereading your post, I edited my post above to correctly reference checking the SAVE file and not your swap file. You should be able to find your swap file in the /mnt/home directory. It will be named: pupswap.swp I've found that having a small swap file sometimes prevents browser crashes, don't know why, it just does.

wizard

[MysticReverie]

There were several posts suggesting how to go from where you were --booting from a USB-Key-- to where you might want to be. But you didn't tell us where you ended up. We only know what you tell us. Did you end up with a Save on the USB-Key or the Hard-drive?
Sata Hard-drives are 10 to 15 times faster than USB-Sticks. SSD Hard-drives are even faster. When your Puppy booted from the USB-Key, it copied the files you 'burned' to the USB-Key into RAM, for the most part caching them. If you somehow/subsequently moved those files to a hard-drive subsequent boots to desktop would, consequently, be faster. The SaveFile you created to hold changes isn't copied into RAM, just mounted, read and its contents indexed in RAM. From a Hard-drive, this similarly would be faster; but might not be sufficiently faster that you would notice the difference.

When needed, Puppy will use any and all Swapfiles which were on your computer when you frugally installed that Puppy. Depending on how much RAM you have, it may never be needed. That's the case with 6 GBs of RAM. You can find out a great deal about your operating system from using Menu>System>Pup-SysInfo. Then Click Devises>Memory to see how much RAM and Swap is used. As on my system which doesn't use a Swap, it will show 0 swap is used. But if you want to get a good idea of how much of your RAM is actually available when you first boot-Iup open Pup-SysInfo and click Sys-Specs>Base Report.
In general, Web-Browsers are RAM-Hogs. With 6 Gbs of RAM, the RAM demands of pretty-much everything else can be ignored unless you are compiling programs or rendering video files: both RAM-intensive operations.
For more information about Swaps --including how to create them-- see this thread, viewtopic.php?p=36036
p.s. As I said, Web-Browsers are RAM-Hogs. But that not just because graphics and video on Web-sites require a lot of RAM. Those web-sites seek to avoid having to download/stream that data to you again by caching it on your computer. The way Puppys work, those caches would occupy RAM. There are several setting you can make to your Web-browser to limit that (and these is still recommended) but one of the least painful things you can do is run your choice of Web-browser as a portable. You'll find almost all available web-browsers in that format in this Section: viewforum.php?f=90.
After unpacking a tar.gz (Right-Click, select UExtract) move the web-browsers folder --within the extracted folder-- to /mnt/home: that's the drive/partition on which your SaveFile/Folder is located. Portables hold cache within their own folder on 'Storage' rather than 'in RAM'. They also locate your Profiles within their own folders. Profiles include your settings, bookmarks and addons/extensions.

Thanks that's interesting info!

I was using just the standard USB that I created with Linux.
I tried to do a 'full' install from that onto another partitioned USB stick that also contained MX Linux. It messed up the booting a bit, but I can boot it when I enter boot menu at start.
I'm unsure if it even installed the 'full' Puppy though, or if it's just the same as the Rufus version lol. They seem the same, even the way it asked me to save things before first shut down. So I'm unsure if I actually managed a real install.
It's quite tricky knowing where to install it and even more tricky where to put the boot files. Perhaps I'm supposed to do something else too.. It's certainly not an automated process

As I say, I'd like to use a full USB OS as a back up, so I wouldn't want anything on my HDD connected to it.
MX Linux is very functional, but Puppy is even lighter and may have even less slow downs than MX.

After testing them both, I think bot are great. I'll try to install both onto 1 USB if I can manage.

Perhaps a full Puppy USB installation first, then a MX after that in on the other partition.

@MysticReverie

After rereading your post, I edited my post above to correctly reference checking the SAVE file and not your swap file. You should be able to find your swap file in the /mnt/home directory. It will be named: pupswap.swp I've found that having a small swap file sometimes prevents browser crashes, don't know why, it just does.

wizard

Thanks!
I don't think I created swap file yet, but as I've tested Puppy a bit, and am impressed with it, I'd like to do a full USB install as I mentioned above, then I can get tweaking and creating swaps etc., I hope lol

[bigpup]

You still seem confused by different install names.

Puppy is released in the form of a ISO image file.
The ISO is all the Puppy files inside of it.
The Puppy files are in the form of SFS package files.
The SFS's are specific sets of the Puppy OS files. (can be several hundred seperate files in a SFS package)
All of them together is the complete Puppy OS.

Puppy is designed to work by loading it's different SFS packages into memory, so the complete Puppy OS in running in memory.

Live and frugal installs are the complete Puppy OS.

Live install:
The Puppy ISO has everything in it to to make a boot-able OS, if burned to a CD/DVD, installed on a USB or SD card.
The complete Puppy OS files and a boot loader program to boot it.
All the files in the ISO are taken out and individually placed on the CD/DVD, USB, or SD card.
That is what Rufus did.

Frugal install:
This is taking all the files in the ISO (except the boot loader ones) and putting them into a directory(folder) on a drive (USB, Hard Drive, SD card, SSD drive, etc...)
Installing a separate boot loader to boot it.
(the boot loader in the ISO is only setup to boot live installs)
Can have multiple installs of different Puppy versions all in there separate folders.
Can install inside an already installed operating system, because all of Puppy is in a folder, the other OS only sees the Puppy folder as data stored there.
The two OS's never mix.

Both live and frugal installs, use a save file/folder to store anything that is a change. (settings, added programs, added files, etc....)

What other Linux OS's do is a full install.
All of the individual files are placed on a drive usually in different directories making up a complete OS file system.
Needs a dedicated partition to put everything on.
When booted, only needed stuff is placed into memory.
select a program to run and anything needed to run it, has to be read from the drive, and loaded into memory.

To do frugal installs you need to use the installer programs in Puppy.
Puppy versions usually have several installer programs.
When there was only bios computers, installing was simple.
When UEFI computers started showing up.
The old Puppy installers, do not correctly install to them a boot loader.
Recently, Puppy has now the Frugalpup Installer program, that can do correct boot loader installs to UEFI computers.
If you need help using the Frugalpup Installer.
Here is steps to using it. (Written for USB, but the same steps apply for any drive)
viewtopic.php?p=1887#p1887

[bigpup]

On the lower left of the Puppy desktop are drive icons for each drive and partitions for internal drives or ones plugged into the computer.

sda1 (first partition of internal drive)
sda2 (2nd partition)
sda3 (3rd partition)

sdb1 (1st partition of a different drive internal or plugged in).

sdc1 (another drive)

etc......

So, if you only have one internal drive and one usb drive plugged in.
The USB drive will be sdb1
Usually it only has one partition.

[MysticReverie]

Thanks very much
It's a bit clearer now how Puppy operates.

Well, I guess I didn't need to make a partition but I did.

I have a 17GB partition with MX Linux, and now have 11GB with Fossapup.

The amazing thing is, Fossapup automatically found the MX Linux swap files and is using them ! 1.5GB
(The swap files are on the same USB stick as everything else though so I'm not sure if that will make it slower).

I was going to redo installing both, but I think I may just leave it like this.

MX gets seen if I boot without entering boot menu, Puppy doesn't.
But if I enter boot menu on start up I can see Puppy that way.

Well, I think somehow I managed to do it right !? With a bit of luck.
Is there any way to check if this is a boot or frugal installation I have now? Maybe it doesn't matter anyway.
It seems to be running fast, less lag than MX Linux

[wizard]

@MysticReverie

Is there any way to check if this is a boot or frugal installation I have now?

There is NO difference between them, they are the same thing

wizard

[MysticReverie]

Ok
I'll pretend I fully understand that lol

Unfortunately my OS has gone bad anyway.

Booted up and the save file is almost full, plus all my changes don't seem to have saved.

I must have done something wrong.

I'll have to give it another go when I have time.

It's tough

Update:
I went back to basics. Uninstalled MX, deleted all partitions, just used Rufus to put Fossapup on there, made a folder for my files. That seems easier and just as effective lol.
As I didn't use Rufus in DD mode I can still use the thumbdrive as normal.

Perhaps I was making it unnecessarily hard for myself as a 'noob' (always a noob lol), but this simple method is not hard even for me. I'm pretty confident it's the snappiest USB OS I've used, due to the unique way it uses the RAM

[mikeslr]

Just so you know. When Puppy shuts down the first time (or if you haven't yet created one, every time) it will ask if you want to create a Save. If your system files are on a Linux formatted partition --or before reboot/shutdown you mounted a Linux Formatted partition-- you can select such partition for your Save. If you select a Linux Formatted partition you can create a SaveFolder. A SaveFolder has no fixed size. Initially it will only use a couple of bytes. As you save stuff into it, it will expand; using if needed the entire available space on that partition.
Or you can create a SaveFile on Linux, Fat32, ntfs and perhaps partitions employing some of the newer formatting techiques. A SaveFile has a specific size. A block of storage formatted as Linux Ext2, Ext3 or Ext4 will be created: you'll be asked to choose which. [I recommend Ext3 for USB-Stick; Ext3 or Ext4 for hard-drives]. You're also asked to select --using a slider-- how large. If I recall correctly, if you just press enter it will be 512 Mbs. That's probably what you did, and got.
With modern Puppys, especially when used by newbies who haven't yet learned all the "tricks" Frugal enables you to do*, I recommend at least 1.5 Gb. But --and this is why I'm writing-- even starting with a small SaveFile you're not stuck.

Menu>Utility>Resize Personal Storage enables you to increase the size of a SaveFile. You'll get to choose by how much (Resize can be run multiple times). It does require a Reboot. You can't make a SaveFile smaller. As I mentioned above, a SaveFile is a block of storage with a Linux format. It can, however, be deleted.

-=-=-=-=-
* tricks you should know about. Some are very easy. It just involves choosing --when they are available-- SFSes, AppImages and Portable application rather than installing pets or (yours being Fossapup64, also debs). Pets and debs are written to your Save, occupying space. SFSes, AppImages and Portables are like portables under Windows: they use no space in a SAVE. Look on the Additition Software Forum and the Fossapup64 Section for them; and some may be available via Menu>Setup>Quickpet.
You just place them in Storage and use they when you want. SFSes are SFS-Loaded and unloaded. If you execute a Save while they are loaded, they will be loaded when you boot-up, and remain loaded until unloaded. Loaded, but not opened, they only use a couple of mbs of RAM until you open them.
For most AppImages, you just file-browse to them and Left-Click them. The same is true with Portables, except that you have to file-browse into their folder and click either the binary or a wrapper. Some now have a script you can click to create a Menu entry. The specific threads for each of application will provide instructions.

[MysticReverie]

Thanks for the great tips
I actually created 4Gb space lol, and have 3GB left.
I don't intend on installing too many apps, so maybe that would be plenty, especially if I can use the APP images or Portables when I find them.
My video/picture etc. files are on the USB stick but not in the Puppy OS files of course, so they take up no space on the Puppy Save

[mikeslr]

"My video/picture etc. files are on the USB stick but not in the Puppy OS files of course, so they take up no space on the Puppy Save."
Here's another tip that you might use if their folder(s) are on the same partition as Puppy's Save. Open two file-manager windows: one to /root and the other so that you can see the picture's folder. Left-PRESS, hold, then drag the folder into /root and from the Popup-menu select Link(relative). Puppy will create a symbolic link, sort of like a Window's Short-cut in /root to the folder. Clicking the short-cut opens the folder. New video/picture files can be saved immediately to that folder just by selecting the short-cut in /root.
You can do that with any datafiles. Just create a folder in Puppy's Home folder (/mnt/home AKA /mnt/dev_save) [Left-Click the Desktop Drive Icon, to open a window to it, Right-Click an Empty Space, Select New>Directory and give it a name]. Then drag it to /root. And you can drag /root/my-documents folder from /root to /mn/home, select Move, then drag it back and select Link(relative). Things you then save to such folders using the applications which create them will be written immediately to the (now) /mnt/home/ folders. No need to use Puppy's Save.

[MysticReverie]

Thanks !
That sounds economical
A bit confusing towards the end though lol.
I'll read it slowly if I give it a try