mikewalsh wrote: ↑Mon May 31, 2021 6:12 pmMainstream repositories, and mainstream 'package managers', I have always found to be a complete & utter PITA to work with. You have absolutely no option BUT to slavishly follow the format laid out by the maintainers.....which to my mind, has always seemed to be as convoluted & awkward as they know how to make it
Sorry Mike, but I am certain you are talking absolute rubbish on this occasion. Puppy uses the same repos but via Package Managers that try to accommodate different repo formats via conversion format mechanisms, which is far from ever ideal or perfect. Kind of works for a lot of packages but 'depends'... Debian official dpkg/apt package management, on the other hand, is precisely designed for that repo format so works pretty much flawlessly for apps/utilities/whatever that have been officially packaged. Furthermore, if you really want to compile drivers or apps yourself and assemble sfs modules out of these, there is nothing to stop you. Hate to say it, but DebianDogs are a better system than the corresponding Pups - just compare the facilities/specs/overall-flexibility. If there is an exception to that, it would be the effort put in by Puppy to provide a user-friendly first-use frontend to new users - that side of Puppy is very impressive indeed so Puppy is probably a lot easier for first time users to get it basically working - more hand-holding, but once someone is a little bit at ease with Linux more generally, the pain of inferior package management and constant need to bolt on specially prepared sfs modules becomes annoying (to me at least).
Worst of all, from my own perspective, is lack of true multiuser capability (EDIT: actually the Puppy fudged package management is worst of all, really, when I think of it) - for most people that probably wasn't a big issue (unless trying to learn Linux admin, for which multiuser capability is essential), but in recent years larger apps simply are not designed to work as root user and the fudges used to get around that another waste of time. As for security, whilst DebianDogs default to logging in as root user for convenience (which I used to prefer) they also allow logging in as non-root user, which actually has advantages once you become comfortable with setting up your system to work from that standpoint (but you don't have to - you can stick with root in DD). Puppy is certainly no faster or more efficient running than a Debian/Ubuntu Dog. Oh, and you can use systemd with DD if you wish! (but don't have to - can use SysVinit or runit via dpkg/apt and so on) and even Puppy is moving towards using pulseaudio now albeit late, since pipewire going to replace that. Pipewire seems like an interesting 'alternative', and will replace Jack and pulseaudio sooner rather than later (and GStreamer and suchlike since for audio AND video...), and pipewire is no doubt available via DD official Debian/Ubuntu repos, and will likely work out of the box in DD whereas Puppy probably needing lots of under-the-hood tweaks to make anything like that work... sigh: watch out for issues needing multiuser, non-root user... pipewire, like Wayland is designed with security in mind... not that pulseaudio loves being run as user root either.
Puppy appears to be in trying hard to catch up mode. There are plenty of other fine wee Linux distros out there that make Puppy look unfriendly and tricky overall. You don't need me to list some popular ones. Puppy is a hobby, and a nice tradition, which is fun and fine, but pretending it is the best is a lot of rubbish. The best use I see still being made with Puppy is in fact by rockedge, who uses it for small efficient special purpose Zoneminder creations - could probably do just as well, in that sort of usage, with suitable DebianDog though. Reason I think that works so well for rockedge though is that official repo Zoneminder isn't crafted so well as the specially compiled and configured variants he makes (which fits in well with your own sfs modules type of system), but could be done on DD system if rockedge was familiar with that - but I think Puppy is fine for that kind of use anyway. I wouldn't myself use Puppy as a main desktop system (depends on your needs) but I would (and have) used DebianDog, which works perfectly well in all scenarios I know of.
So I guess I am saying that Puppy is a good first introduction to getting into Linux quickly, but sooner or later a move to a full multiuser system is better, and a DebianDog is one of these (but similar in so many ways to Puppy from sfs module handling capability/flexibility) - so I see Dogs as next step up: FatDog being an interesting and impressive alternative since it does many things very well indeed and remains very independent in terms of its underlying design (but non-techy types probably better with the likes of DebianDogs, which give full upstream package manager desktop experience). FatDog great for those who love experimenting with system under-the-hood innovations.
Anyway, this a long response to your 'remark' but this thread is about GeForce blah blah blah so moving on...
