I have been working with DOS/Windows computers since 1994, and it is my experience and my opinion that Puppy OS is not a finished product (perpetual BETA), at least as far as the GUI is concerned. I understand you have a different experience, but that is what it is for me. I have tried to run many other flavors of Linux and all of those I tried so far, were worse then Puppy.
Just off the top of my head.
I have gparted my internal drives 3 or 4 times and ran all the hardware checks I could find. After all this time, I still don't know how I can save my settings.
The ROX window that pop up is too small and I always have to enlarge it. The little marker which is used to "grab" the side of a window is too small and has an active space that is too narrow, and it makes it difficilt to grab the edge (I think it should be 3 pixels wider). The icons on the top menu are placed in the wrong order, and I can find no way to fix it. The path at the top of the file menus are blackened out so I can't read them. The highlighting in the file manager is too dark and prevents me from reading what is highlighted.
The drive letters keep incrementing for no apparent reason. This also means when I use audacity, my recent files list is often automatically deleted when I start the program. Similar problem wirh Libreoffice, practically every time I start the program, it asks me if I want to recover previously used files. In most cases this is because the drive letter has changed and Libreoffice thinks it should try to recover it. I always ignore these recovery requests at this point, but it is an annoyance.
I can't find a way to input a path in ROX, so when I want to copy a file from one drive to another, I have to first use Pmount to find out which drive I need to go to, and then I must manually go through all the folders, and subfolders, and subfolders, and subfolders, until I find the source folder that contains the desired file. And then I must repeat the process all over again to find the target folder: I have to first use Pmount to find out which drive I need to go to, Manually go through all the folders, and subfolders, and subfolders, and subfolders until I find the target folder. And if it is a group copy, I don't know if the target files are overwritten or not.
Some settings don't stick, for example, keyboard and mouse settings are lost periodically. the mouse settings are almost non-existent. I see only acceleration and threshold, and any changes I make there do not stick at all, so it is useless.
I can't find any search function in the file manager that is more than barely usable.
I have never experienced any OS that is so mouse intensive. My right forearm is in constant spasm due to excesive mouse use. If I boot and the mouse does not work, I just have to keep booting until it does.
There are many more problems, but like I said this is just off the top of my head.
Thanks!
geo_c wrote: ↑Mon Sep 11, 2023 12:42 pm
Governor wrote: ↑Mon Sep 11, 2023 7:40 am
If things would work the way there were supposed to, or at least when fixed, stay fixed, I would not need to ask.
I happen to have a challenging life, and very little, if any, spare time. I squeeze in when I can, my attempts to make the OS usable..... ..... I have begun keeping a file with "Puppy instructions and fixes" so I will have it for later use.
It is obvious to me that the Puppy OS is not a finished product (perpetual BETA), but I am doing the best I can.
Thanks!
I think the most sound reply to one of your issues was given by @bigpup here: viewtopic.php?p=98192#p98192
Puppies are certain kinds of operating systems that are fixed in time when they are created. Some upgrades are available along the way, but they are not rolling releases like some mainstream linuxes, windows, and macs.
There are always the mainstream linuxes, or this community's releases that are basically mainstream linux OS bases that utilize rolling updates, which are easier to update than windows or mac, in particular the Kennel Linux Void installs available on the forum.
Unfortunately none of these will work for you until your setup can dependably boot from a consistent drive/location.
The one question you have asked consistently since first using fossapup is "How can I save my settings?"
Almost all of your issues either stem from or are aggravated by this one fatal flaw.
Fossapup64_9.5 has worked flawlessly for me on at least 7 computers since it was first released, and my wife has used it for two years without any tweaks or fixes at all. She's completely computer illiterate. It's a very stable OS, not all a beta.
However, once you do get your hardware straight, there are more up to date puppies to use. Either F96, vanilladpup, etc... When that day comes, when your hardware is solid, I'd recommend starting with F96 because you are familiar with Fossapup.
