Is this board becoming bored?

[amethyst]

Goodness, this place is like an empty cemetery these days. Not much going on. Where are the posters?

[BologneChe]

Maybe people are busy with other things or they are at work. It is also spring in some regions of the planet; we take advantage of the sun and do work outside or others.
But maybe the users' Puppy set-up is optimal or they are interested in other distributions.
The reasons are endless...

But there is one question that comes to mind, what is the average age of Puppy users? Personally, I am 58 years old and I am still on the job market. I don't have much time to devote to discussion forums, but I'm still interested in them.

[ozsouth]

I'm an aged pensioner & have time to post, but I'm mainly responding to driver etc requests. As I mostly use my Chromebook,
I don't have many issues & challenges as I did in the past. New puplets & advances are sort of leaving me by the wayside.
I was concerned for @rockedge who said 95% of traffic was bots & the fun-factor was diminishing. Other leaders from the
past have felt the crushing weight of management too.

[mikewalsh]

This "age" business has been mentioned on here - and the old Forum - several times over the years.

It's probably worth mentioning that the simple reason why the younger generation aren't well represented here is simple; their generation

• grew up with, and more or less lives on their smartphones.They're used to living online whilst being active & mobile all the time.

• the smartphone is seen as a status symbol by many, so the cost of keeping up with the latest iPhone is discounted as just "one of those things".....but they daren't be seen without it, for fear of ridicule by their peers. And peer acceptance is SO important to them...

Our generation - 50s/60s/70s - grew up with computing before smartphones were around, and many of us, due to failing eyesight, etc., feel more comfortable with a decent-sized screen and a proper keyboard & mouse. Puppy on PC x86 (and latterly, x86_64) has been a viable reality for decades.....but Puppy on ARM is, even now, still kind of "experimental".

Remember, too, that the vast majority of folks are comfortable with what they know, and in most cases, see absolutely no reason to have to re-learn how to do something they already know, but in a different way.

On the original note, the forum has always gone through "quiet spells", as far back as I can remember.....and thinking about it, it IS usually during the spring/summer, when folks would rather be outside doing stuff. It happens.

Mike.

[Marv]

79 yrs old here, onboard with puppy since 2005 or so. At this point it's the sole operating system for us (4 or 5 people), barring Android or IOS on phones.

Still here but juggling a small orchard, garden, firewood cutting and fence maintenance, the usual auto and house maintenance and a relatively new to us 1 1/2 yr old pointer/dal mix who needs upward of 5 miles a day and a steady hand. I can still do everything but it definitely takes longer now. Still keeping pups, browsers and kernels up to date on 6 laptops, testing and fixing when I need to and can.

Not bored and the forum and puppy are important to me but I find I have neither the time or will for major explorations of the software pup sort right now.

Jim

[amethyst]

I must say that all the new developments surrounding Puppy is not really of any interest to me right now. I'm still using Xenial 32-bit as my daily driver. In fact, if I stick with Palemoon as browser, I can get along with Precise just as well (with some relatively basic upgrades to the system of about 10MB). Sometimes I also use Windows XP. I'll move on to newer things when it really becomes a case of necessity (maybe 2030-ish).

[geo_c]

Well, I guess I'm getting into the 'old-geezer' phase as I'm 58. But I'm far from bored with puppy. I'm booting up KLV-Airedale as they keep testing. This forum is probably my most valuable resource to keeping me productive and windows-free.

Also, I'm only now exploring IRC and shell-servers. I want to get into it, and I'm trying to figure out the most expedient way. I recently chatted a bit with someone on the IRCNow.org channels. These guys are apparently committed to training and recruiting people to set up IRC servers. So they train people on using OpenBSD shells.

I'm not sure if it's the way to go. I don't know anything at this point about shell server usage, and I'm a little concerned about opening up my pc to security risks.

I value the expertise and opinions here on the forum more than any other place on the web.

https://wiki.ircnow.org/index.php?n=Shell.Shell

[rockedge]

I am 60 years old, Class of 1980. I like the command line because it reminds me of those days in the mid 70's when I was filled with curiosity and driven to become one of those high priests in the environment controlled data centers where the mainframes lived. The road had a few twist and turns and I never quite reached those goals. But I always kept computers and programming and having ideas close by.

I have seen many really interesting things in computing on these Puppy Linux forums, many more ideas and recipes than I can ever get to try out.....but intend too.

Puppy Linux is a lot like Punk Rock and I refer to the TeddyBears song lyric sung by Iggy Pop :

I listen to the music with no fear
you can hear it too if you're sincere

[HerrBert]

I don't see a problem here at all.

The less activity on the forum indicates, that Puppy Linux just works.

I don't get the point of your claim...

[amethyst]

I am 60 years old, Class of 1980. I like the command line because it reminds me of those days in the mid 70's when I was filled with curiosity and driven to become one of those high priests in the environment controlled data centers where the mainframes lived. The road had a few twist and turns and I never quite reached those goals. But I always kept computers and programming and having ideas close by.

I have seen many really interesting things in computing on these Puppy Linux forums, many more ideas and recipes than I can ever get to try out.....but intend too.

Puppy Linux is a lot like Punk Rock and I refer to the TeddyBears song lyric sung by Iggy Pop :

I listen to the music with no fear
you can hear it too if you're sincere

It seems many of us are in this age group. I'm turning 58 next month.

[puddlemoon]

Puppy Linux is a lot like Punk Rock

So true!

I guess I'm in the middle somewhere at 46.... I grew up on punk rock and not computers. I feel my passion for puppy is somehow a continuation of that "rebellion", an act of non participation in a system designed for excess consumption.
This singular forum and irc represent the extent of my social media so I feel the sting when it is quiet, yet it also satisfies my hermit nature that it remains obscure... Perhaps the world at large is just not ready for such a leap in thinking. Would not be a first.
And yeah, the smartphone is like a universal spiritual solvent diluting everything it touches. A cursed blessing.

[ghoen]

No, according to mine personal opinion.
I an just lurking/following the developments originated by his masters voice Barry Kaulers .
Ok, my age is physical-wise 67, mental-wise 27 or something like this, following Puppy since 2014,.
It inspires my to experiment with and follow new developments , without any problems.
Ok, it is not mine main-os. But I see as a second main-OS (with capitals).

Greetings.
Questions???

[backi]

@HerrBert wrote:

I don't see a problem here at all.

The less activity on the forum indicates, that Puppy Linux just works.

-

There is something on to it.

[bigpup]

The less activity on the forum indicates, that Puppy Linux just works.

Totally agree.
Over the years Puppy is very much better at just working.

Topics now seem to be mostly about not understanding how to do something, how to run a program that they added to Puppy, wanting to do something in a different way, or just learning how Puppy works.

I go back to the old early days of Puppy development, when just getting to a working desktop was the big issue.
Nothing was auto setup as it booted.
Even had to guess at what the graphics resolution and refresh setting, would be, during the boot process.

[amethyst]

The less activity on the forum indicates, that Puppy Linux just works

Not so sure about that. There are so much development in terms of new flavours brought out that one would thought that many more questions will be asked. It also seems that it is mostly the old timers or those who have been on the board for a long time that are posting. These posters may be in the category that they do not need the help which a complete newbie will need. I don't know how many new users join the forum for the first time but the amount of complete newbies posting questions seems to be very small. That tells me that Puppy Linux is either not attracting complete newbies or those complete newbies who have joint, are for some reason not posting and asking questions like one would expect, which to me is strange...or they are just leaving for some reason after joining. Anyways, the drop in participation has been noticeable.

[greengeek]

... That tells me that Puppy Linux is either not attracting complete newbies or those complete newbies who have joint, are for some reason not posting and asking questions like one would expect, which to me is strange...or they are just leaving for some reason after joining. Anyways, the drop in participation has been noticeable.

I agree and suspect there are several reasons for this:
- The move of the developers to Github significantly destroyed the interaction between users and devs.
- General banter is often discouraged on the basis that some people are offended by non-mainstream views (quite odd to see this develop in the Puppylinux crowd). The off-topic section used to glow red hot till covid made it unacceptable for people to express their views.
- Some users here seem hell-bent on driving devs to recreate the Windows experience. But what's the point? I enjoyed the camaraderie more when there was a 'Puppy" way of doing things rather than a constant effort to turn Puppy into a windows clone. Puppy used to innovate and shrink software and do more with less. Not so much these days where total hardware bloat is the norm.
- Browsers have become so 'leaky' that it pretty much does not matter which operating system you use online these days - websites, security firms, criminals and governments can easily profile you, your machine, and your personality and intentions. Using Puppy only makes you stand out more rather than being a shield as it once was in the old days.

If i had to suggest one way to bring more life to the forum it would be to suggest that there is benefit in having a thread which has one single focus and fewer distractions: ie it would be great to see a group of devs pick one puppy and perfect it - never moving on to newer kernels, distro libs or whatever. That will sound silly to most - but it is surprising how many bugs and imperfections exist in some of the best puppies - never to be ironed out because the responsible dev has had to move on and modernise.

Of course it depends what hardware you have, and what exactly you do on the internet.

But i suspect that many Puppians have specific hardware they prefer and would prefer to stick with one Puppy that they can keep upgrading by plugging add-ons rather than by starting from scratch with a totally new offering.

Flatpacks and portables have been a great step forward in this regard.

I still love 32bit puppies and i plan to use them for as long as humanly possible. Would love to see more capable brains than me perfect a great 32bit pup - but in any case i am happy having fallen by the wayside and still clinging to (and improving) my version of Tahr32 6.0.6
Just wish the mainstream puppy users had not careened off into the distance so far and so fast

[amethyst]

If i had to suggest one way to bring more life to the forum it would be to suggest that there is benefit in having a thread which has one single focus and fewer distraction

I was wondering if all the new developments and flavours of Puppys (and other different branches) may not lead to some confusion. I mean, if a new user from say Windows-world (no experience with Linux or Puppy before) sign up here and see all the different "branches" of operating systems available, etc. it could be very confusing. It would be to me if I was a total newbie. Maybe they get such a shock and leave immediately without knowing where to begin or what to try out first.

[mikewalsh]

@greengeek :-

Heh. As usual, you make some valid and interesting points.

- Some users here seem hell-bent on driving devs to recreate the Windows experience. But what's the point? I enjoyed the camaraderie more when there was a 'Puppy" way of doing things rather than a constant effort to turn Puppy into a windows clone. Puppy used to innovate and shrink software and do more with less. Not so much these days where total hardware bloat is the norm.

Interesting choice of words. I suspect that modern Windoze users are perhaps more wedded to specific software than their forbears used to be. As for "hardware bloat", mm; times move on, Ian. There simply aren't the number of underpowered machines around anymore like there used to be. What to you may seem like 'bloat' is to many folks perfectly normal.....and to many others, definitely "inadequate", so they buy more hardware till they're "happy".

Case in point; I found out long ago that I like packaging/developing stuff for Puppy. But I felt stifled, and very restricted by the 3 GB DDR1 RAM in the old machine. I like having multiple applications open and working at the same time; with the arrival of this new desktop more or less coinciding with the start of the pandemic - and the subsequent lockdowns, etc - I had a build-up of "spare" cash that normally wouldn't be there. Determined that I would never be restricted by hardware limitations again, this is why I embarked on a hardware upgrade spree.....culminating in that 32GB of DDR4, a discrete GPU, and fast, high-capacity SSDs for storage.

Yes, I have gone OTT, I know that. It's probably fair to say that I'm perhaps losing sight of the needs of "real" Puppians; many of my recent 'portables' are getting larger & larger, it's true, though I do but re-package what others have already compiled/built. Yet I feel that out of all the devs, dimkr (or iguleder as you may better know him) is probably the most realistic of all; the Puppy experience/world/atmosphere as it used to be just does NOT exist anymore. Times have changed, the digital ecosphere has evolved way beyond what many of us recognize, and it's up to us to make the most of the new & - perhaps to some - "strange new world" we're beginning to find ourselves in.

If i had to suggest one way to bring more life to the forum it would be to suggest that there is benefit in having a thread which has one single focus and fewer distractions: ie it would be great to see a group of devs pick one puppy and perfect it - never moving on to newer kernels, distro libs or whatever. That will sound silly to most - but it is surprising how many bugs and imperfections exist in some of the best puppies - never to be ironed out because the responsible dev has had to move on and modernise.

Those "responsible devs" are only doing what's expected of them by most.....we've all had it drummed into us for decades that you MUST always run the very newest, bang up-to-date version of every piece of software you use, don'tcha know?

I still love 32bit puppies and i plan to use them for as long as humanly possible...

There we're in agreement. Out of courtesy to the developers, I keep up with the latest Puppies/ways of doing things.....but when it comes down to it, my two favourite "daily drivers" - one 64-bit, one 32-bit - are, respectively, 8 and 9 years old. Both can still run current browsers (one natively, one via a chroot), and both will do everything I want of them.

Why upset the apple-cart for the sake of change??

This community is no different to any other. There are those who must ALWAYS live on the "cutting-edge", and demand the very newest of everything all the time.....and there are those with long-established, "favourite" software/hardware that just "works" for them. And they're content with that.

Mike.

[mikewalsh]

If i had to suggest one way to bring more life to the forum it would be to suggest that there is benefit in having a thread which has one single focus and fewer distraction

I was wondering if all the new developments and flavours of Puppys (and other different branches) may not lead to some confusion. I mean, if a new user from say Windows-world (no experience with Linux or Puppy before) sign up here and see all the different "branches" of operating systems available, etc. it could be very confusing. It would be to me if I was a total newbie. Maybe they get such a shock and leave immediately without knowing where to begin or what to try out first.

That's a general complaint by all Linux newbies, whatever they choose to try. "Why is there SO much choice? This is weird; I don't like this.....I'm retreating back to the comfort of what I know".....which IS, of course, Windoze, where no choices are required of you, all the decisions have been made FOR you, and there is just the one, "official" way of doing things.

And many people find that very comforting. They peep around the corner into the Linux playground, and because they can't make sense of what they see, they back away screaming..!

Mike.

[amethyst]

If i had to suggest one way to bring more life to the forum it would be to suggest that there is benefit in having a thread which has one single focus and fewer distraction

I was wondering if all the new developments and flavours of Puppys (and other different branches) may not lead to some confusion. I mean, if a new user from say Windows-world (no experience with Linux or Puppy before) sign up here and see all the different "branches" of operating systems available, etc. it could be very confusing. It would be to me if I was a total newbie. Maybe they get such a shock and leave immediately without knowing where to begin or what to try out first.

That's a general complaint by all Linux newbies, whatever they choose to try. "Why is there SO much choice? This is weird; I don't like this.....I'm retreating back to the comfort of what I know".....which IS, of course, Windoze, where no choices are required of you, all the decisions have been made FOR you, and there is just the one, "official" way of doing things.

And many people find that very comforting. They peep around the corner into the Linux playground, and because they can't make sense of what they see, they back away screaming..!

Mike.

I think there should be one big welcoming message for newbies to the forum. When newbies click on this message there should be a recommendation which Puppy should be used first (the community can decide which one) with additional links and so on. The user can always explore the different flavours himself later on as he goes along. I'm making this suggestion due to possible confusion that a total newbie to the forum and Puppy may experience. Make it very simple for first time users (essentially taking the initial decision what to use out of their hands).

[mikewalsh]

@amethyst :-

Suggest this to wizard and rockedge, Nic. They ought to be able to make this work, and wizard now seems to be "in charge" of stuff for newbies anyway.

It's not a bad idea.

Mike.

[Feek]

I think there should be one big welcoming message for newbies to the forum. When newbies click on this message there should be a recommendation which Puppy should be used first (the community can decide which one) with additional links and so on. The user can always explore the different flavours himself later on as he goes along. I'm making this suggestion due to possible confusion that a total newbie to the forum and Puppy may experience. Make it very simple for first time users (essentially taking the initial decision what to use out of their hands).

In the "getting started and system requirements" section, in the "Making a CD or USB for your first boot" topic, there are recommended puppy versions for the first boot. It is true that this could be more visible at first glance.

I started with puppy 2,5 years ago. If I remember correctly, first of all I visited the main page of puppy linux (as a complete beginner). There I chose Bionicpup64 almost automatically, which was the latest official version at the time. The confusion came later (after I started visiting the old forum and saw a lot of derivatives, etc.)

[xenial]

I am nearly 50 years old,49 in fact and so im a flares 70s child who rode a raleigh chopper and felt posh about it lol.
if it ain't broke then don't try updating it
Puppy just works for me and i have half a dozen in thine kennel running smooth as silk.
I don't post so much because i am very much still learning the puppy ropes and if i have issues then the very helpful more experienced puppy users are here at hand.

[geo_c]

This all makes a lot of sense.

When I first discovered puppy, there was 4.11, and that seemed to be what was considered the 'working man's puppy.' Very soon Lucid came out, and it seemed a no-brainer that it was an 'upgrade' and would be the most sensible OS to run for someone who was new to Linux.

I can envision at the very top of the forum could be located the most current 'user-friendly' and stable pup download with clear instructions for one or two install methods explaining the frugal install as the 'official' method. I would guess at the moment this pup would be Fossapup, based on Ubuntu and very compatible with most hardware, also being close to the traditional puppy structure.

In that post would be suggestions for where to go next, perhaps links to all the portables applications available with encouraging instructions on how to use them,

In other words set the newbie up for quick success in running pup with their preferred browser, email, and so forth, while getting them familiar with pup's fantastic portability installation method.

Once successful, they would begin to be more curious about all the other developments and possibilities.

[wiak]

Goodness, this place is like an empty cemetery these days. Not much going on. Where are the posters?

I've been in that Puppy world of now long ago too. With my Pentium III, and later, even my Pentium M with RAM of any size from 64MB up to 768MB, until that last final top-up to 1024MB RAM(!!!) and over-the-top slow hard disk of 4GB. Tried Damn Small Linux, SliTaz, but only Puppy really fitted the need and could compete with the alternative world of Win98 or even WinXP!!! These were the days my friend - lots of us around in that situation way back then, so a busy forum to match that situation indeed. But...

By 2013, which is also a long time ago now (nine long years ago), times had changed - lots of machines around with 2GB or 4GB RAM as standard and loads of hard disk storage space already. And lots of nice small/medium Linux distros around for that 'new' generation of machines too (dare I mention DebianDog). That and browsers becoming increasingly functional, and accordingly huge, and also bloated. And then that other tricky to deal with issue: more and more apps needing to run in a sandbox and not as root user! When a market changes, only the faithful remain and blame those who lost faith when actually the market change determined everything. Reality is nothing to be sad about.

Such a suddenly active thread this one (in a but a couple of days).

Come gather 'round people, wherever you roam
And admit that the waters around you have grown
And accept it that soon you'll be drenched to the bone
If your time to you is worth saving
Then you better start swimmin' or you'll sink like a stone
For the times, they are a-changin'

Nostalgia is a powerful sentiment, but overall this thread evokes a feeling of sadness and loss that makes me think of an ever older "poem":

The curfew tolls the knell of parting day,
The lowing herd wind slowly o'er the lea,
The plowman homeward plods his weary way,
And leaves the world to darkness and to me.

Well, be sad if we have to, but better to accept change and move with the flow or we will all get depressed about nothing.

[user1111]

Our generation - 50s/60s/70s - grew up with computing before smartphones were around, and many of us, due to failing eyesight, etc., feel more comfortable with a decent-sized screen and a proper keyboard & mouse

At one end of the spectrum you have cli/text, just keyboard and screen, not even a mouse, I quite like that for the least eye-strain and being free from having to run other peoples code on your local system (java etc), and/or absence of blitz of multi-media (often adverts). mc serving as a file manager, text editor, menu system, where even without X mc can launch a framebuffer image viewer simply by pressing enter on the filename; Connect to BBS for the likes of Fido/Use net discussions/threads, or even view the likes of this Puppy board using lynx. And where being text based, the heart of the original Unix 'everything is file' concept, you can run textual interface nearly equally as well/quickly remotely as locally.

a.gif (488.39 KiB) Viewed 1514 times

At the other end, point/click/cloud. Where a simple click/press may have a cloud server dish up a gui desktop and services on a multi-media device such as a pocket phone. Where the young don't want to spend time setting things up, resolving issues ...etc. they just want something that works straight away via a single button press/click.

Puppy and other gui *nix systems sit between the two, are neither one nor the other. Strives to be a gui for everything, but that often requires time/effort to set up and maybe still not work as desired/intended. Was once up-there alongside other gui leading systems, nowadays is much more middle-ground, that today's youth have little patience for. Puppy has simply evolved into a old-dog, aka. old-timer, golden-ager, gramps, senior. Something that for many their grandad runs/uses.

[Clarity]

Even @BarryK appears to be trying as best he can to move forward in time. Change is the ONLY thing that is constant. As @wiak implies ... move forward or die-out.

Old timers, of which I am in that group, WANT A WORLD THAT NEVER EXISTED: One where change does not occur, IMHO.

I grew up HATING this term: "Kids these days ...". This one statement set the stage for me since being a teenager. It reflects the sayer NOT willing to change. So, I never became one who has ever used that term. And, I continue to admonish those who do.

I see a pathway, but am reluctant to suggest because some olds may not find my idea(s) acceptable as it means some slight changes to their traditional thought.

It affects all of us human, I know.

Edit: a typo

[geo_c]

mc serving as a file manager, text editor, menu system, where even without X mc can launch a framebuffer image viewer simply by pressing enter on the filename; Connect to BBS for the likes of Fido/Use net discussions/threads, or even view the likes of this Puppy board using lynx. And where being text based, the heart of the original Unix 'everything is file' concept, you can run textual interface nearly equally as well/quickly remotely as locally.
r many their grandad runs/uses.

This is pretty much what I've been doing the last few weeks, running mc, lynx, and nano. And realizing that while still in puppy xorg and running terminal, the tabs on the terminal give the same functionality of the multi-window system.

The eye opener was when I decided to boot straight away in the command prompt without loading X or the pupsave, and I realized that it's then a trick to navigate. I think one of the big obstacles for me not having the kind of text cli experience many do, is learning all the key bindings. I'm just figuring out the basics in mc and that's a little dangerous, as files can be lost.

This week I had some email correspondence with someone not yet 30 yrs old. He was asking about RSS and websites, which I'm not knowledgeable about, but I explained things to him about websites that are backward compatible, and the value of it. I sent him a screenshot of lynx displaying his college's student portal, (which surprisingly seems to be functional in lynx), and pointed to how it displays in lynx, the difference between bling and actual content. I explained how java graphics tend to slow down productivity.

After viewing the screenshot of his college portal in lynx, he replied, "I can barely comprehend all that with it looking so...broken down, I feel like I'd be more lost, but maybe that's just me."

I used to work at that college and I could never find what I was looking for on that front page using a modern browser, so I was a bit surprised at his response, as lynx looked so straightforward, every link on the page neatly listed vertically.

So I replied to him, "Yes looking at non-graphical information is different, but in my experience when interacting with a graphic heavy display, it's far more easy to miss that little link buried on a strip somewhere at the bottom of the page, or wait, no, maybe it was up at the top in a drop-down box off a tiny piece of text at the upper left corner, or no, isn't it located by hovering over that cryptic icon over there? Anyway...I give up." Then I told him that in a text display of html, all the links, text, data entry fields, buttons are of equal size, color-coded perhaps, and vertical and horizontal in sequence. Just select it. If it's there you'll see it. No tricks."

My point being is that every modern gui has it's learning curve, navigating the graphic menus, while navigating text applications requires learning key bindings. Fortunately there's no reason to choose one over the other, and puppy is a nice marriage of the two.

[ozsouth]

Concerns about our forums are not new - I stumbled across the link below from nearly 6 years ago
- interesting reading - hope @p310don doesn't mind me pointing to this.
https://oldforum.puppylinux.com/viewtop ... 68#p922168

[p310don]

Thanks for the stroll down memory lane @ozsouth !

It's been covered a lot here already, but Puppy isn't as finicky as it used to be. I don't know how many users there are, but if a user doesn't need help, then they don't need to forum, right?

@rockedge started this forum because there were a lot of issues with the old and outdated murga forum. I think Puppy lost a lot of "customers" because they couldn't join the community. Since John's demise, the loss of the murga forum and the move to this being the official forum, I think there has been a slow but steady growth of posts. We're not back in 2009 however...

Also, there are other options for your Puppy information, Facebook, alternate forums, linuxquestions etc.