I started using Puppy in around 2007 with Puppy version 2.17, which was a great BarryK (non-woof-CE) creation. I kept looking for alternatives, or even equals... (so had many an install of TinyCoreLinux and Slitaz) but, truth is, nothing could match Puppy. My only gripe with Puppy was that it was not a fully multi-user system (though for most of my home use that was irrelevant). So I used Puppy as my main desktop for years (despite having been using Linux since 1991 and being very familiar with large Linux distros such as RedHat and Ubuntu), because Puppy is and was small to download, and FAST, and could be tweaked to do most anything (aside from multi-user...).
It wasn't until 2011 that a Puppy-like alternative (Pussy) appeared on the murga forum (similar size, similar frugal install capability, but with inherent multi-user capability). That was started by murga Puppy forum member 'sickgut' (whose last post on the forum and that thread was in April 2013)
http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewto ... 589#539589
Murga Puppy forum member 'saintless', who had contributed to sickgut's Pussy Linux developments, effectively took over where sickgut had left off and started the first thread of what we now know as the 'Debian Dogs' in December 2013.
The first of the DebianDogs were developed in tandem at that time: one using Debian live Squeeze and the other using Debian live Wheezy (and like Puppy, utilizing JWM or icewm and Rox and providing load/unload sfs capability and ability to run most murga forum member created gtkdialog-based Puppy apps).
Quite a number of murga Puppy forum members took an interest, including Fred (fredx181) and sklimkin (who also contributed a great deal as part of Puppy Russian team):
http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewto ... 005#743005
Fred quickly introduced some core Puppy components to make the first Dogs more pup-like (including gtkdialog, desktop_drive_icons+pup_volume_monitor and obshutdown) and shortly after developed and posted early modified versions that used Openbox and tint2 plus thunor and/or pcmanfm (+Rox). At the same stage Fred also provided an alternative boot method using modified Porteus initrd (which provides the changes=exit methodology probably most DebianDog users now use).
http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewto ... 523#744523
http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewto ... 684#747107
Saintless and Fred basically shared most of the main development effort thereafter and when saintless left the forum Fred continued his openbox-based side of things, producing many variants along the way (including some build-script variants starting with DebianDog Stretch). Sklimkin was however actually the first to mention creation of Dogs via debootstrap via chroot mechanism rather than cutting down existing live-iso versions the way saintless and Fred originally were. I believe Sklimkin also helped with porteus boot and sfs load/unload development.
Funnily enough, during these early DebianDog development days, I myself had almost no interest in main distro system-level development since my enjoyment tended at that time to come from hacking away at various bash/gtkdialog-type apps. However, as mcewanw, I had the somewhat contradictory feeling that gtkdialog as the principal Puppy/Dog utility creator should be ditched once and for all (and still do... which makes me question why I ended up spending so much complex time creating my gtkwialog fork of gtkdialog... sigh. Actually, I would not have done so had Pup/Dog distro creators not insisted on continuing to keep gtkdialog in):
http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewto ... 289#750289
http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewto ... 290#750290
Back to Puppy itself: I have to say that, following some work I did on a simple woof-CE frontend for myself, called makepup, I came to the conclusion that Puppy development, in terms of future innovation, had somewhat dried up with the woof-CE, its not exactly modular..., template build system. Furthermore, despite the original Puppy Package Manager being a clever piece of work, it was showing its age and many weaknesses. However, sc0ttman has since time come along with his Pkg package manager, which is an incredible effort that has definitely breathed new life into the perhaps becoming-tired Pup. Overall, Puppy, thanks to the excellent work done by its various version creators (such as 666philb, peebee, 01micko and more) certainly remains one of the most user-friendly wee installations to install (better than the Dogs in that user friendly installation area for sure) and I also learned tons over the years using it (and more so because of its excellent/most-helpful Puppy Linux forum).
Recently I've become increasingly optimistic that Puppy has entered a new area of innovation (though I'm still secretly hoping woof-CE will end up ditched and a new more modular build system created that allows flexible addons for different package manager choices and desktop managers without the hard job of hacking hard-coded internals of somewhat monolithic build scripts to include new code... Anyway, I believe that it is not current woof-CE that ultimately dictates Puppy Linux future development (though Pkg is now at least incorporated into woof-CE), it is the Puppy Forum and its members, so Puppy Linux itself should always have a bright future (and collaborations between projects helps to guarantee that).
It is not I think just Puppy lookalike alternatives that will be introduced via this forum from time to time, but probably, one day, that alternative to woof-CE build system that Puppy do-ocracy will surely one day result in. Woof-CE Puppy is great and fine for now (particularly with Pkg now growing in importance and use) but I look forward to 'New' Puppy coming one day soon (I hope)! 
wiak
to the "kennels"!
