If you are a MS Windows user and new to Linux or if you have used another Linux distribution you will find Puppy Linux does some things that are different.
Here’s some useful examples. Everyone knows if you click the Menu button in the left of the taskbar you get the main menu. In Puppy, if you right click in any empty space on the desktop, you will also get the same menu.
By default, Puppy uses single click mouse action, kind of like web pages, single left click on a folder/directory to open it, single left click on a file to open it. Read the topic: Single-Click-Or-Double-click on how to change the mouse/trackpad action.
Unlike Windows or large Linux distributions that install thousands of individual files on your drive, Puppy puts only a few compressed files that are like “Zip” files in Windows (this method is called a “Frugal” install for the efficient way it uses the computers resources). When Puppy boots up, the SFS files are copied into ram memory and Puppy runs completely from ram.. The original compressed files are “read only” so they always remain in like new condition. This goes a long way into making Puppy more stable, secure and bullet proof than other operating systems.
When you make changes, download files, add programs or create documents, etc. they are saved into another file/folder called the save file or save folder.
This all makes Puppy Linux more flexible to use than almost any other operating system. With its small size it can:
run completely from a CD or DVD drive
run completely from a USB flash drive
run completely from its ISO on a USB flash drive (using special tools)
run completely from a SD Card (if the computer supports sdcard boot)
run completely from an external USB hard drive
run completely from an internal hard drive in its own partition.
run completely from an internal hard drive in the same partition as MS Windows or another Linux (called dual booting).
run completely within a Virtual Machine
In addition, you can run more than one Puppy Linux in the same partition. If you like you can have configurations or Puppy’s for different purposes. Such as, web surfing, one for games, one only used for financial transactions, one for audio/video processing, one for graphics, etc.
Here are some Linux=Windows terms to help you:
Directory=Folder
Link=Shortcut
Root user=Administrative user
Background=Wallpaper
When you run Puppy you are the Root user. If you’re a Linux user who has used “sudo” in terminal commands, Root user does not require sudo.
Drive Identification:
Let’s start by defining drive partitions. Most computers have one internal (also called fixed) physical hard drive or solid state drive. Partitioning is when you divide the physical drive into separate spaces. It’s like taking a box and putting dividers in it to make separate compartments.
Windows uses letters to identify drives and partitions, if you have one physical drive with only one partition it will be C:, two partitions, C: and D:. If you plug in a USB flash drive it will be assigned letters accordingly.
Linux identifies drives with letters and numbers, which gives the user more information about the actual drive. If you have one physical drive with only one partition it will be sda1, two partitions, sda1 and sda2. If you plug in a USB flash drive with one partition it will be sdb1.
Puppy displays icons for the drives and partitions it finds in the lower left of the desktop.
- drive_icon.jpg (4.12 KiB) Viewed 4917 times
Here we have one hard drive with three partitions, sda1, sda2, and sda3, plus we have one USB flash drive with one partition sdb1.
If you click one of the icons it will open in the default file manager, named Rox. Opening a drive partition this way does two things, first it “mounts” the partition and second it shows the contents in the file manager. This brings us to the next topic.
Mounting/Unmounting drives:
When a drive is mounted the operating system sets up communications and creates a location in the file system that shows and accesses the contents. Windows and some other Linux’s automatically mount drives when they are attached. Puppy recognizes drives when they are attached (the icon will appear), but they are not mounted until you open them. USB drives must be unmounted before removing them (same as with Windows). Right clicking the drive icon will let you unmount it.
Need more help? Join the forum and post your questions in Beginners Help.