Discussion, talk and tips
https://forum.puppylinux.com/
@mikewalsh
Today I tried this portable chrome on tahrpup64 to see if was working and images in browser sharpened and crisp. No way, too many missin dependencies I had no time to looking for this afternoon. Can you say on what puppy versions you tried this chrome portable? So I burn and try to see images in browser how look.
@Dingo :-
O-kay. Well; this should run fine in Fossapup64 (uses the 'LAUNCH_nl' script); Bionicpup64 ('LAUNCH'); Xenialpup64 ('LAUNCH'); jrb's lightweight spin of BK's Quirky64 'April' 7.0.1('LAUNCH').....and Tahrpup64 6.0.5.....though the last will need a few deps adding to use it.....chiefly the NSS stuff ('LAUNCH').
Mike. 
mikewalsh wrote: ↑Mon Feb 01, 2021 11:02 pm@Dingo :-
O-kay. Well; this should run fine in Fossapup64 (uses the 'LAUNCH_nl' script); Bionicpup64 ('LAUNCH'); Xenialpup64 ('LAUNCH'); jrb's lightweight spin of BK's Quirky64 'April' 7.0.1('LAUNCH').....and Tahrpup64 6.0.5.....though the last will need a few deps adding to use it.....chiefly the NSS stuff ('LAUNCH').
Mike.
Tried Bionicpup64... Wow! Images in chrome (and vivaldi) browser are very sharp and crisp! So, there are some kinds of issues beetween Xenialpup 7.5 CE and my intel HD4600 graphic card integrated in i5-4200M. Also charachters in terminal windows seem to be are sharper than in Xenialpup. This is a pity, since, for the rest, Xenialpup is very charming. I should start a dedicated thread in Xenial forum section. But is is a mistery why in palemoon on xenialpup64 with this laptop, images are ok and in chromium browsers not
Now then:-
Google-Chrome 88.0.4324.150 now available in 'portable' format. Link as per the usual location, in post #1.
Enjoy.
Mike.
Morning, all.
Google Chrome 89 was promoted to the stable channel yesterday, so without further ado, here's the new 'portable' version of v89.0.4389.72.
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Fixes, improvements, etc, as detailed HERE. This includes 47 security 'bugfixes', of which 8 carry the 'High' severity rating.
Details about new features, etc, can be found HERE.
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No changes in the portable's layout or format. This build process seems to be working very well ATM, so; "if it ain't broke", etc.....
The new version can, as always, be found at the main URL link in post #1. Posting from it now.
Enjoy..! 
Mike.
Evening, all.
The current upgrade came down the tubes yesterday - v89.0.4389.90.
Accordingly, here's the new 'portable' version.....to be found, as always, from the link in post #1.
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Fixes, improvements, etc - find 'em here:-
https://chromereleases.googleblog.com/2 ... op_12.html
Major releases will be coming more frequently before long; Google are switching from the former 6-weekly release cycle to a 4-weekly one instead. Enterprise users will be able to benefit from the extra stability of a special 8-week cycle.....just for them.
No rest for the wicked..!
https://blog.chromium.org/2021/03/speed ... cycle.html
This will commence as of Chrome v94, in Q3 later this year.
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Enjoy!
Mike.
Morning, boys'n'girls.
Chrome's just been updated again, so.....here's the new 'portable' version:-
v89.0.4389.114
(Thanks for the reminder, Oz..!)
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Bug-fixes, patches, workarounds, new features, etc, can be found here:-
https://chromereleases.googleblog.com/2 ... op_30.html
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Nothing new to report for this one; just more of the same.....reliable as ever. You can find the new version at the usual location in post #1.
Download; unzip; move it wherever you want. Click to enter, click 'LAUNCH' (or 'LAUNCH_NL' for very new Pups.....Fossapup, etc) to fire it up. Couldn't be simpler. (I've now included a "ReadMe" to explain the usage of the two launchers).
A big thank-you to all the usual suspects who've helped - indirectly or otherwise - with the development of this over the years. Y'all know who you are.
Enjoy.
Mike.
Right, gang. We're now up to Chrome 90.
Here, for the Chrome users among you, is v90.0.4430.72.....in 'portable' format.
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Bug-fixes, patches, workarounds, etc, can be found HERE, as usual.....including 37 security fixes.
From v90 onwards, HTTPS is now the default behaviour. Old-fashioned "HTTP" sites will flag up all sorts of warnings about being insecure & dangerous. And a new AVI decoder is now in use.
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The portable has had a couple of tweaks, too. Following on from my experiment with Vivaldi at the end of last week, the 'google-chrome' profile directory is now created at the top level, alongside the launch scripts, and sym-linked into position ready for startup. At shutdown, that sym-link is then removed.
The idea of this is to make it easier for those of you who want to use an existing profile. Rather than digging around in the depths of the internal 'spot' directory to set your profile directory up, just drop it into the top level, and the 'LAUNCH' script now takes care of locating everything correctly for you.
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The new 'portable' can be found at the usual location in post #1. Don't forget; "LAUNCH" is for Bionicpup64 backwards - this uses the 'internal' lib directory. "LAUNCH_NL" is for Fossapup64 and similarly new Puppies - these use the more up-to-date default libs they already come with OOTB. The 'LaunchReadMe' explains all this anyway.
Download; unzip; put it anywhere you want, though preferably outside the "save". Click to enter, then launch with the appropriate script.....
Thanks, as always, to everyone who's helped to hone this into what it is today. Couldn't have done it without you guys.
Posting from it now. Enjoy!
Mike.
Since the beginning of the year, I have been helping users, remotely with greater efficiency.
Chrome has a "remote desktop" feature which allow us to be able to assist, without getting out of our chairs.
It works from my Chromebook to their MS/Apple PCs. It also works when I use MS to assist same type PC users. SETUP video is here
BUT, I have tried setup in both FossaPup64 and in Slacko64. It will NOT install as seems to be missing components.
Question
HAS ANYONE gotten this feature operational?
Thanks in advance for any knowledge on howto.
Edit: Added Setup information, BUT doesn't work on PUPs.
@Clarity :-
Believe me, you're not the only one who's tried. I've tried this a few times over the last 18 months or so, in various different Pups, and it gets to the exact same point in the process every time, and.....just hangs. Won't go any further.
In Chromebooks, Chrome is a fully-integrated part of the OS, in very much the same way that the old Internet Exploder & Windoze File Explorer used to be tightly-integrated together. I've NOT bothered looking into the matter for one simple reason; I use the TeamViewer 'app' from the Chrome Web Store. Once installed, it fires up from the Apps page (which is a permanent fixture at the far left end of the Bookmarks bar). Works very well, too; every bit as well the Linux version of TeamViewer ever used to.
Because of Chrome's ability to open webpages, apps, etc, in their own window, I've set the Chrome TeamViewer webapp to open as a 'standalone' app from its own launcher on the desktop.
https://chrome.google.com/webstore/deta ... bejikcmkfo
This will work just as well from your Chromebook. Cross-platform compatibility is a big part of the reason I use so many online services/applications/utilities, etc......because they'll (mostly) work the same for anyone who's got a browser. (Google's "Duo" & "Meet" have largely replaced Skype for me.....and even on the odd occasions I DO 'Skype', I'm just as likely to use the web-app in Chrome as I am to use the portables I also maintain.....)
IF you manage to discover a way to get the remote Chrome desktop working, do let us know, please. I suspect it's all bound-up with the fact that it's probably designed for a standard, multi-user system; I know we can approximate this in Puppy via 'spot', but we still don't come anywhere near to the complex interaction between sudo 'groups', ownerships, exceptions through systemd, etc, found in most mainstream distros.
It may take some fairly intensive, single-minded investigating to figure out a Puppy solution to this one. And I find myself questioning whether it's really necessary, given that we already have a multitude of alternative solutions already in place.
Mike.
Hi Mike,
Don't know if you've seen this, so I thought I'd share this concerning another zero day exploit.
Good catch.
I don't always bother with every single point release, as y'all know, but I think I will with this one.
Chrome v90.0.4430.85 now uploaded.
Mike.
Hello @mikewalsh w
I found this post at the beginning of this thread. Is there, still, 2 versions: Run-as-Spot & Run-as-Root available?
P.S. Broken link in that post.
Afternoon, gang.
Newest version of Chrome was released yesterday, so here's Google_Chrome-portable v90.0.4430.212.
----------------------------------------------------
Fixes, workarounds, etc, detailed HERE. 19 security 'fixes' have been addressed.
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The usual big "Thank you" to all who've helped me to develop the 'portable' to its current state. Y'all know WHO you are....!
Enjoy.
Mike.
Thanks Mike
Evening, gang.
Now then; Chrome v91 has just hit the repos, so here's the portable version of v91.0.4472.77.
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Changes, fixes, workarounds, can be found here:-
https://chromereleases.googleblog.com/2 ... op_25.html
32 security issues have been addressed, of which 8 are 'High' severity.
------------------------------------------
One noticeable change in the GUI; there's now a prominent 'tab list' button, top-right, beside the window buttons. You can list currently-open tabs, as well as recent tab history.
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Coupla changes in the 'LAUNCH' scripts; I've added a pair of conditional statements to check for the existence of any 'leftovers' in the /chrome/spot/.config directory, prior to sym-linking the profile directory into position; the browser will fail to launch if there's anything remaining - which can happen in the event of an unexpected, sudden shutdown; the script doesn't complete correctly & remove the sym-link at shutdown if this occurs.
This should prevent that from happening. The reason for having the profile alongside the 'LAUNCH' scripts is to make it easy for those of you who wish to use an existing profile; just drop it in place before firing-up.
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You can find it at the usual location in post #1. As always, credits & thanks to all who've helped out with these over the years, either directly, or indirectly by giving me ideas! Y'all know who you are.
Enjoy!
Mike.
Morning, all.
The new version of Chrome for desktop has just rolled out the door, so here's the 'portable' version of v91.0.4472.101.
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Bug-fixes, patches, workarounds, can be found here, as usual:-
https://chromereleases.googleblog.com/2 ... sktop.html
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Everything seems to be working fine at the moment, so NO changes this time around. Remember; the idea of the profile directory sitting at the top level is to make it easy to re-use your existing one; just drop that in there, and the portable takes care of the rest.
As always, you can find the new release at the usual location in post #1. Any probs/queries, give us a shout.
Enjoy.
Mike.
Afternoon, gang.
Here's the newest version of Puppy's Google_Chrome-portable - v91.0.4472.106
(Day or two late with this, so.....sorry 'bout that!)
------------------------------------------------------------------
Bug-fixes, patches, 'workarounds', etc, can all be found here as usual:-
https://chromereleases.googleblog.com/2 ... op_14.html
------------------------------------------------------------------
Nothing to report so far as 'features' go, so obviously just improving and beefing-up of code routines. And, as stated in the previous post, everything is working A-OK in the 'portable', so I'm not going to mess around with it just for the sake of it.
You can find it at the permanent link in post #1.
Enjoy!
Mike.
.....and here's yet another update.
Puppy-portable version - v91.0.4472.114
I don't know WHAT they're playing at this week; it's just been update after update after.......well.
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Details here:-
https://chromereleases.googleblog.com/2 ... op_17.html
----------------------------------------------------
Find it at the usual location in post #1. Enjoy.
Mike.
I am sure it would be allright if you skipped one or two from time to time.
You are incredibly diligent, Mike.
I do/can not keep up with your updates. I am on 87.0.4280.141.
that much behind.
I use it sometimes, when necessary, but my main browser is palemoon.
It is great to have this tho.
@foxpup :-
Heh. It's two-fold really, mate.
One, because I'm a long-term user of Chrome.....ever since the first public 'beta' test-releases back in the late summer/early autumn of 2008, nearly 13 years ago. I'd been a staunch Firefox user up until that point, but the browser was going through a horrendous period of memory-leaks & crashing multiple times a day, seemingly whenever it felt like it.
Chrome had just been released; it was fast; it was nimble, and.....it just 'worked'. AND it was reliable. I pretty much fell in love with it, there & then.
Oh, Google & the Chromium Project have made their fair share of cock-ups over the years; it hasn't all been plain sailing. I've always kept a copy of Firefox around as a 'backup' (of sorts), but a lot of the time Chrome, even at its worst, has usually been better than Firefox on its good days. At least, until Quantum came along.
I use an awful lot of web-apps as desktop applications, making use of Chrome's ability to turn any web-page into an app running in its own window, which can then be set to fire-up from its own individual Menu Entry. You can't do this with FF; never have been able to.
Add to this fact that I make liberal use of a good bit of Google's cloud infra-structure; the way all their apps tie-in together and just function reliably makes my life one hell of a lot easier, I can tell you. Google probably have data on me as thick as a stack of Bibles by now; I have, after all, had a Google a/c for almost 20 years, since the very early days of XP. This has never bothered me in the way it does some people; I've long since learnt to live with Google's perceived 'nosiness', and having been with them so long means you DO occasionally get little rewards from them. It's one of the reasons why, instead of having 15 GB of free storage in my Drive, I in fact have 20 GB.
No, it just works for me.....and I have a fairly good understanding of its functionality by now. Though, TBH, I don't care what browser I run these days; there's very little to choose between them, and even Firefox is finally the browser it could have been years ago, were it not for the near-constant in-fighting & back-stabbing in the Mozilla camp. That bunch are their own worst enemies, much of the time.
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The other reason I keep up with releases more recently is because with ozsouth releasing a Chrome package, too, it's keeping me on my toes. And that's no bad thing, since I've always maintained that internet-facing items are the one thing that even Puppy needs to keep up-to-date.....if nothing else.
No peace for the wicked...!! 
Mike.
@mikewalsh
I've looked at chrome from @ozsouth as well at some time.
I am not sure why I decided yours - I think they are as good -
maybe just because yours is portable, although that is not needed by me.
Since Quantum I prefer Firefox for a big browser, but you are right, mozilla is not steady
and it is actually paid for by google, which doesn't help.
I am in the google environment as well, but I still try to keep some little secrets to myself . Just trying.
I almost always just accept/use the browser that comes with Puppy, and that is mostly lightweight, seamonkey or palemoon.
I still use dillo from time to time. It is still very nice for 'simple' fast browsing.
Another one I remember fondly is QtWeb. But sadly that has become unusable now.
@foxpup :-
Oh, yes. I, too, remember QtWeb with a certain degree of affection. It was the only decent, really lightweight browser that would run with the anciente Dell lappie's Pentium 4 without "bogging it down".
At the time I was using it, the final release was still fairly recent, and it worked well with all sites.....even YouTube. Sadly, not long after that, many of my regular sites started going through re-designs, employing a lot more heavy Javascript, and other crap. It's a real shame its developer gave up on it, because I don't think it would have needed much in the way of updating to keep it viable. But, that's so often the way of the open-source world.....
(*shrug...*)
Mike.
Running well so far with Tahr64 6.05 - runs first time. Machine compaq CQ61 Presario.
Starting with the 91st line of Chromium-Chrome, hardware video decoding stopped working. Most likely, this also applies to all Brave, Opera, Vivaldi, Yandex and whatever else.
Now Chrome has hard disabled the ability to turn on video decode in chrome://flags and chrome://gpu started showing "Video Decode: Software only. Hardware acceleration disabled".
I had to add this argument to the startup script: --enable-features=VaapiVideoDecoder
Code: Select all
#!/bin/sh
APP=/opt/chromium-ungoogled/chrome
#script to run $APP as spot...
ARGS="--enable-features=VaapiVideoDecoder"
[ "$1" ] && while [ "$1" ]; do ARGS="$ARGS \"$1\""; shift; done
if [ $(id -u) -eq 0 ]; then
[ $XAUTHORITY ] && cp $XAUTHORITY /root/spot/.Xauthority 2>/dev/null
touch /root/spot/.Xauthority
#following line is mostly there to catch any root:root files that may have got copied in...
find /root/spot \( -not -user spot -or -not -group spot \) -exec chown -h spot:spot {} \; &
export XAUTHORITY=/root/spot/.Xauthority
export XDG_CONFIG_HOME=/root/spot/.config
export XDG_CACHE_HOME=/root/spot/.cache
export XDG_DATA_HOME=/root/spot/.local/share
exec su spot -s /bin/sh -c "\"$APP\" $ARGS"
else #precaution
exec "$APP" "$ARGS"
fiNow it shows correctly: "Video Decode: Hardware accelerated"
@Grey :-
Thanks for that info. I've added it to my personal copy of Chrome, and will test this out over the next week or so. If I'm satisfied it's doing what it should (again!), I'll add it into the 'export' version.
(I have to swap modified wrapper-scripts into my own copy of Chrome, compared to the 'export' version, because I make use of the "--silent-launch" feature for fast start-ups. If I use it without modifying the wrappers, it bypasses my profile, and starts me off with a fresh one every time......and that's NOT what I want.)
Cheers! 
Mike.
Hi Mike.
With Tahr when I try to export bookmarks I get strange blocky gibberish when the dialogue comes up to save bookmarks.html. I gather this is a glib-schemas issue. There was a .pet for 32bit systems. As this is 64bit is there an equivalent .pet?
Hiya, Darren.
Um; well,no.....that's NOT a glib-schemas issue. That was about the browser crashing when you tried to upload/download anything to/from it, because of the 'FileChooser' dialog being MIA.
This business of the fonts all being replaced with little square boxes happens to me as well, with certain Puppies. Principally jrb's 'lite' spin on BK's Quirky64 'April' 7.0.1. Coincidentally, this is Tahrpup-era, too; there was summat a wee bit "iffy" going on around the time these two were built/released, but I haven't yet figured out what's causing it!
What's even weirder is that occasionally - and I can't work out WHY - the Upload/Download dialogs will show up just as they ought to, with fonts/text all behaving itself. Then a little while later, we'll be back to "business as usual" again; missing fonts, replaced with little square boxes!!!
I've been looking into this for some time, but haven't found a definitive fix for it yet. If, as & when I do, I'll definitely drop you a PM. Can't say any fairer than that.....
Mike.
Hi Mike,
Thanks for the reply.
@darry19662018 - To keep a copy of your chrome settings, you can save 3 files - just your
Preferences, Bookmarks & Login Data (passwords) files. Assuming you run-as-spot, they are in:
/home/spot/.config/google-chrome/Default
Upon restoring (to folder above), must ensure they are still part of spot group, by running in a terminal:
chown -R spot:spot /home/spot