Puppy Linux Discussion Forum

EDIT:- New, re-written build now available. The mess of sym-linking 'gymnastics' is gone, and in its place is the use of the XDG protocol, which automatically keeps all config stuff within the portable's directory.....because Zoom-portable now thinks its directory IS the user's $HOME directory. Much neater, tidier, and far simpler to work with!

PLEASE NOTE:- When it comes to update time, run the supplied updater script. DON'T use the app's built-in one, 'cos it'll all go to hell in a handbasket... This can be run from the Menu entry under 'Network', if you've added these via the 'Menu-Add' script. If you're running it purely AS a 'portable', just click on the 'updt' script in the main directory.....and make sure you've fully closed Zoom from the tray icon before doing so.

Download has now been re-located to MediaFire; see link below.

****************************************************************************

Morning, guys'n'gals.

Project now 'current' again - downloads from the link below

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Y'all must be getting fed-up with the seemingly never-ending procession of apps I keep giving the 'portable' treatment to! Here's another one I've been working on for a while, trying to figure out the best way to accomplish it. mow9902 gave me the idea a week or two back, when he discovered the AppImage builds for this, though I find the .deb download from their site seems to function better, and is easier to work with.

Zoom 'portable'

Once again, it's amenable to this kind of "treatment", because it's all contained within a single directory anyway. Unlike the 'portable-browsers', and Electron-based apps like Skype, which are built around a stripped-back Chromium browser, this is a completely unique, one-off build system....but the 'portable' treatment still works. And I'm of the firm opinion that 'portables' just fit so well with the Puppy 'ethos', and 'raison d'être'...especially given the way so many of us run multiple Puppies.

I've built it along the same lines as the recent 'Skype-portable' I put together the other day. The config stuff all lives within a dedicated sub-directory inside the main 'zoom' one, and is then temporarily linked across to where they would normally be created, and 'looked-for' - the 'user' directory, which for us is /root with Zoom.

Unlike the 'Skype-portable', however (which uses a separate, 'transfer' script), I've figured out how to make use of, and transfer, existing Zoom config files with the launch script. When you run the portable for the first time, it copies across your existing config files, followed by deleting the originals.....necessary for the final step before launching, which is to sym-link them temporarily back to where Zoom thinks they actually are, in /root (because a sym-link will never be able to take precedence over an actual file). Upon closing Zoom, the sym-links are then deleted, meaning everything is back within the portable directory, which is where we want them!

Second & subsequent runs then just simply sym-link, and delete again upon launch & shutdown.

If you've never used Zoom before, and the 'portable' is your first experience of it, the files are created as usual in their normal locations. At shut-down, they're copied over and the originals deleted, ready for the sym-linking trick next time you run it.....

-----------------------------------------------

If anybody's interested in this, you can always find a relatively new package at the following link:-

https://www.mediafire.com/folder/705vie ... video+chat

I will endeavour to keep this as up-to-date as I can. Hope it's useful for some of you. Enjoy..!

Mike.

Very nice! I've been using a version @step made for Fatdog mid last year. It still ran OK, but had been thinking for security it may be best to update to a current version. Problem solved. This portable version is excellent. Great job with the config file manipulation, it works a treat. Thank you.

@TerryH :-

TerryH wrote: Mon Jan 25, 2021 3:20 am

Very nice! I've been using a version @step made for Fatdog mid last year. It still ran OK, but had been thinking for security it may be best to update to a current version. Problem solved. This portable version is excellent. Great job with the config file manipulation, it works a treat. Thank you.

Ah, I'm pleased to hear it works OK for you. It was a bit of a 'nail-biter', this one; I've tried out more than one new thing at a time. and despite trying it in every combination of existing config files (or not) and save-file/folder (or not), I was still a little unsure about it. Just because it worked for me was no guarantee it would for anyone else.

One or two of the file-manipulation routines are a wee bit 'redundant'.....by which I mean that they still run regardless of whether the files actually exist or not. Doesn't seem to affect script functionality, though. I've been experimenting with the conditional "if....then....else" stuff, but I don't think I've QUITE got the hang of it yet..!

I shall persevere.....

Mike.

Hi Mike,

Glad I tried this in Fossapup64 first. Today I tried to run it in BusterPup64 and couldn't get it to run. I then tried it with SCPup64 and Slacko64 7.0. The first attempts complain about the copying, so I then manually copied the config stuff to /root & /root/.config and still wouldn't run. Running in a terminal (after manually creating the config stuff) didn't even return an error to see what was going on, just returned to the prompt. The 3 manually created config files were deleted, so it appears to start, then exits doing the clean up at the end. I also tried 2 DebianDogs(BusterDog64 and SidDog) and had the same issues.

I also tried it on Fatdog64 811 and it ran successfully.

On FossaPup64 and Fatdog64 I had a bit of a play and it will also run as spot, but as you will know, the configs aren't deleted at the end. So, it will create the configs when run as spot on these 2 pup/fatdog. I may edit the scripts to run as spot.

@TerryH :-

Heh. Oh, I'll be the first to admit, this was a far bigger pain in the ass to get working in portable format than Skype was. That, by comparison, was easy compared to this.....which, in a way, is a tribute to M$ who, for a change, have gone the right route and 'standardised' around the default Electron set-up. And that makes it really easy to work with.....not least because I have some small amount of experience with the thing.

No, I may withdraw this, I think. It's not really running as well as I'd hoped it would. Can't have success with everything, can we..? (*shrug*) To me, this is one 'app' that actually works better as one OS, one install. It doesn't like being 'shared'..!

Mike.

Thanks Mike! This is going to improve the quality of my life. I love the portable app approach. Ungoogled Chromium is by far the fastest Browser yet, I haven't figured out how to use sandbox so I can't download from it. But it's still great!

I tried installing Zoom in puppy from the quickpet manager, but ran into issues. This works right out the box. Great work!

@TerryH - I've found Zoom installs in ScPup64 seem to be missing 4 xlibs, so I made a .pet which makes mine work. Try at own risk. May help. Can uninstall via PPM if unsuccessful.

@ozsouth :-

Thanks for that, Oz.

I may as well mention here, more for Terry's benefit than mine or yours, that Zoom is in some respects like Skype. Prior to standardising on a re-built .pet package format (followed by SFS, and now 'portable' - which works really well), I often found that the Skype .debs would 'install', but then wouldn't run.....and starting from the terminal shows absolutely no clue. Error messages have been deliberately suppressed, I guess; which is annoying, 'cos it doesn't even give you a chance to try and 'fix' stuff..!

Zoom is sometimes like this. On other occasions, it's as talkative in the terminal as the Chromium browsers.....and that's "NOISY"...

Mike.

Hi Mike

Downloaded ZOOM portable, it launchs but it gives errors as seen in the screenshot.

@gabtech :-

Mm. Does it in fact run? Will it let you sign-in, etc?

Like I said, I'm going to withdraw this, until such time as I can get the problems ironed-out. For now, I'm going to recommend that Puppians install this as a proper install from the .deb package, here:-

https://zoomgov.com/download

(Please bear in mind that this really only runs successfully as a 64-bit app. To date, I don't know of anybody here that has had any success using the 32-bit version, despite that a 32-bit version is offered.)

I'm still hoping to be able to offer this as a 'portable', but not till I get the profile/config stuff 'sorted'. It may not be possible; many apps seem ideal for 'portable' treatment, since they're self-contained within a single directory.....but unless you can persuade them to write their profile/config stuff TO the 'portable' directory, you're whistling in the dark.

Mike.

ozsouth wrote: Mon Feb 01, 2021 10:40 am

@TerryH - I've found Zoom installs in ScPup64 seem to be missing 4 xlibs, so I made a .pet which makes mine work. Try at own risk. May help. Can uninstall via PPM if unsuccessful.

I installed the pet and it got zoom running, however its one step forward and then crash. My account logged in OK as it's in the profile. I then checked settings, video working OK. Then clicked test sound, zoom freezes and process has to be killed. Tried several times, same result.

As you went to the trouble of making the pet, it was worth trying. Thanks for your effort in helping to get this working, I hope others using ScPup64 can use it successfully. I have several installs I can use zoom on, so I'll use zoom with them when required.

Just a quick update for those of you interested in this:-

The current release, v5.5.0, is now in the Drive; I simplified the .config/profile stuff, and it all seems to work quite happily now. Link as in the first post.

----------------------------------------

@geo_c :- Glad you like it. Hopefully, the newly-fettled current version should work even better, now I've got the config stuff sorted out.

---------------------------------------

One thing I will add here; in addition to the two main config files, in /root/ & /root/.config/ - which respond well to being moved then re-symlinked - Zoom creates a 3rd config file at /root/.config/Unkown Organization. This point-blank refuses to respond to the normal Bash file-removal routine (no idea why!) It's no more than 8 kb in size, and appears to consist of the invitation "template" that the app sends on your behalf when you invite others to join in. That's all it is.

If, however, you 'cd' into the /root/.config directory, then you can remove it. It's similar to the Java-based 'Cruiser' atlas/world map thing, powered by OpenStreetMap, that Phil B. discovered a few years back, and which I made up into one-click-to-install packages. The only way you could start THAT was via the same approach.....'cd' into the directory, then execute. It wouldn't respond to a direct 'execute' command, with FULL $PATH. I seem to recall the older WINE-based TeamViewer packages acted just the same.

So; given that it IS only a 'template' (obviously created from your a/c details every time it fires up), I've allowed it to do this. The script merely removes it again at shutdown.

Anyways; sorted. Enjoy!

Mike.

@TerryH - I've since discovered that ScPup64's apulse isn't compatible with recent Zoom versions I've tried, but Fossapup64's is. I use browsers without apulse so I routinely remove it which avoids the issue. Zoom is certainly becoming more problematic. Hopefully Mike's new v5.5.0 above helps.

Thanks @mikewalsh

I zoomed two hours of music lessons yesterday on 5.4.9 without a glitch, so I'm hesitant to upgrade. I was able to launch no problem simply putting the portable folder in /home directory and adding a link to the launch script on the desktop. I suppose since these are portable, I can just add the new version and run from either, or would I run into config conflicts?

~geo

You know what they say.
If it is not broken, do not try to fix it!

bigpup wrote: Wed Feb 03, 2021 2:28 pm

You know what they say.
If it is not broken, do not try to fix it!

On the other hand, you know what they say about putting all your eggs in one basket.
Indeed, that there is another hand suggests preferences for having backup systems, and divisions of labor.

Mike makes portables and does a great job of keeping up with necessary changes. They are self-contained: nothing in one over-writes the files of the other or anything on your system. I always try the newest, keeping its predecessor intact until I'm satisfied that the new version works as well under MY SYSTEM as the old.
One thing you can do after you've unpacked the new is copy the profile folder from your old's folder into your new's folder. Suggest the following method: When you launch it for the first time it looks for the profile folder and if it doesn't find one creates one. Let it do that. There might be something --some incompatible addon, maybe-- in your old profile that would generate a problem. If everything is OK, delete that profile, copy the profile from the old and try again. If there's a problem you can always delete that profile and again start from scratch.

Note to those reading my posts: I'm incredibly lazy. I always look for some way to avoid work. The above may seem to be a contradiction. But copying a profile involves much less work than building one from scratch and it usually only takes two launches, one shut-down and a deletion --almost no work at all-- to insure against a misleading experience.

@geo_c :-

Bigpup's quite right, of course. It's one of my own tenets in so far as Puppy's concerned:-

You know what they say.
If it is not broken, do not try to fix it!

However, like many others, I DO take the view that anything that's "internet-facing" probably benefits from being kept up-to-date. There's no sense in exposing attack vectors unnecessarily.....and their respective devs ought to know, better than I, what needs 'fixing' in their apps; they're the ones with intimate knowledge of the code contained therein.

--------------------------------

With regard to not wanting to 'part' with a known, working set-up, well.....that's the whole idea of 'portable' applications. Having everything self-contained, they won't interfere with an existing one. And with the way that these Skype- and Zoom-portables only 'link' to the known profile/config locations, it shouldn't interfere with existing files; a sym-link will never overwrite 'real' files. In this respect, they work like an SFS; anything 'active' while the app is running will 'expose' the underlying, existing stuff once they shut-down.

Hope that clarifies things a wee bit.

Mike.

(EDIT:- If you're that uncertain, I would temporarily re-boot your Puppy with the

pfix=ram

...boot parameter, and just try the portable out that way. Like that, it can't possibly upset your working config, because the 'save' is not in use.)

Version 5.5 works great! Thanks Mike!

I just started dabbling in writing simple scripts. Having all the apps necessary to do my daily work has motivated me to take the next step. I'm anticipating the day when I never have to boot windows again.

~geo

Hi Mike,
many thanks having made a portable about this latest version !
One knows how usefull such an app it is by this times; and I remember my frustration when I could not connect to a meeting because I was running a too old Zooms version - it was about only one year ago ...

I have installed the zoom-portable in /root/my-applications/Zoom-portable in BionicPup64-8.0 (featured with lbQt5_8 flavour libs).
and I get a black window box when lauching ./LAUNCH from a terminal (as also comments about missing /root/.zoom folder etc... like already mentionned above in this thread).

Digging into the /root/my-applications/Zoom-portable folder, I found a /root/my-applications/Zoom-portable/zoom/zoom binary which reports for libQtCore.so.5 missing when I " ldd'ed " it ("libQtCore.so.5 not found") ;
as also for a few other libQt5 libs although they all are present in /root/my-applications/Zoom-portable - i.e. Qt5_12 flavour libs.

This tells that the zoom binary seems not finding its own-in-the-portable-archive-embedded libs.

Installing those «missing» libs from PPM seems to fix that question as doing in terminal #root: ldd /root/my-applications/Zoom-portable/zoom/zoom does not report any missing lib.

I'm surely missing something like having placed the archive into a wrong directory; or write a specific environment variable path (I for now am totaly ignorant about understanding how environment variables work; and how to define them )

Thanks in advance for any comment!
(My apologizes if my english writing needs being improved )
Charlie

@charlie6 :-

Hallo, Charlie.

I wouldn't worry too much about your English. You certainly write it a lot better than many of my own countrymen manage to; some Brit's written English is absolutely appalling!

Anyway; Zoom & Bionicpup64. Mmm....

mow9902 was having the same issue as you. I run several 64-bit Pups, but NOT Bionicpup64; for some weird reason, it just doesn't get on with my network card & router, despite trying many, many workarounds. Ozsouth did get me "up-and-running", however; this new Pavilion tower is one of the new breed of desktop PC that also has built-in wireless (which I still can't get used to! Laptop with wireless, yes; but a desktop with wireless? Huh? What's that all about?? )

Anyway; the thread about Zoom in BP64 is here:-

viewtopic.php?f=115&t=1495

Norgo suggested one workaround for the Qt stuff; mow and I both tried it, and we both found our webcams quit working! Mow kept on digging, and eventually unearthed a couple of "export" statements in a thread on the Qt developer forums that finally made everything work (yay!). I've been rejigging the launch scripts this afternoon, and if you'd like to download the 'improved' version, you'll see there's now two 'LAUNCH' scripts; the 'regular' one, and a second one specially for Bionicpup64, incorporating the 'fix' mow eventually discovered. I've just been trying it in a 'clean' run of Bionicpup64 with "pfix=ram", bypassing my save-folder (so it's like a 'new' install).

I'm pleased to report that it seems to work perfectly.

If you would care to try it out and let me have some feedback, that would be great.....let me know if it works for you, please. Link as in post #1.

(EDIT:- This is now v5.5.2.....as of about 8 pm this evening. Second upload today..!)

Mike.

@geo_c :-

geo_c wrote: Thu Feb 04, 2021 5:27 pm

Version 5.5 works great! Thanks Mike!

I just started dabbling in writing simple scripts. Having all the apps necessary to do my daily work has motivated me to take the next step. I'm anticipating the day when I never have to boot windows again.

~geo

↑ ↑ (Emphasis supplied.) ↑ ↑

Heh. I haven't booted into Windoze since the day XP went EOL (and I don't miss it, either!)

I've never yet found anything I need that can't, somehow, be catered to by Puppy.....even if some of the 'workarounds' DO seem slightly odd to some folks..! A lot depends on whether you're the sort of person who must have the exact same app (not always possible with Linux), or whether you can live with something that's "close enough".....

That day may be closer than you realise...

Mike.

Hi Mike !

mikewalsh wrote: Sun Feb 07, 2021 7:41 pm

...If you would care to try it out and let me have some feedback, that would be great.....let me know if it works for you, please. Link as in post #1...

version 5.5.2 has ran succesfully here the day before yesterday: I and wife could have had a zoom session with two other participants during quite two hours without a flaw!

before that session, I also have browsed the web about how to define libpath, env variables,...;
I also have examined if dependencies were all present as also the comments reported in terminal:

The command

root# ldd /root/my-applications/bin/Zoom-portable/zoom/zoom

keeps reporting not seeing the in-the-portable-archive-embedded-libQt5core.so.5 (Qt5_12 "flavour"): (right click on .../Zoom-portable/zoom/zoom and select ldd in the pop-up menu)

/root/my-applications/bin/Zoom-portable/zoom/zoom: /usr/lib64/libQt5Core.so.5: version `Qt_5.12' not found (required by /root/my-applications/bin/Zoom-portable/zoom/zoom)
linux-vdso.so.1 (0x00007ffe45b13000)
...
libQt5QuickWidgets.so.5 => /usr/lib64/libQt5QuickWidgets.so.5 (0x00007fcbbb784000)
libQt5Quick.so.5 => /usr/lib64/libQt5Quick.so.5 (0x00007fcbbb13b000)
libQt5Widgets.so.5 => /usr/lib64/libQt5Widgets.so.5 (0x00007fcbba8f4000)
libQt5Gui.so.5 => /usr/lib64/libQt5Gui.so.5 (0x00007fcbba18b000)
libQt5Qml.so.5 => /usr/lib64/libQt5Qml.so.5 (0x00007fcbb9b8e000)
libQt5Network.so.5 => /usr/lib64/libQt5Network.so.5 (0x00007fcbb9802000)
libQt5Script.so.5 => /usr/lib64/libQt5Script.so.5 (0x00007fcbb936c000)
libQt5DBus.so.5 => /usr/lib64/libQt5DBus.so.5 (0x00007fcbb90e2000)
libQt5Core.so.5 => /usr/lib64/libQt5Core.so.5 (0x00007fcbb8997000)
...
Version information:
/root/my-applications/bin/Zoom-portable/zoom/zoom:
...
	libQt5Qml.so.5 (Qt_5) => /usr/lib64/libQt5Qml.so.5
	libQt5QuickWidgets.so.5 (Qt_5) => /usr/lib64/libQt5QuickWidgets.so.5
	libQt5Network.so.5 (Qt_5) => /usr/lib64/libQt5Network.so.5
	libQt5Script.so.5 (Qt_5) => /usr/lib64/libQt5Script.so.5
	libQt5Quick.so.5 (Qt_5_PRIVATE_API) => /usr/lib64/libQt5Quick.so.5
	libQt5Quick.so.5 (Qt_5) => /usr/lib64/libQt5Quick.so.5
...
	libQt5Widgets.so.5 (Qt_5) => /usr/lib64/libQt5Widgets.so.5
	libQt5Core.so.5 (Qt_5.12) => not found
	libQt5Core.so.5 (Qt_5) => /usr/lib64/libQt5Core.so.5

... even after having defined the path where the libs are located using different ways: (I surely am missing something!):

root# export LD_LIBRARY_PATH=$LD_LIBRARY_PATH:/root/my-applications/bin/Zoom-portable/zoom/
root# ldconfig

root# echo 'export LD_LIBRARY_PATH=$LD_LIBRARY_PATH:/root/my-applications/bin/Zoom-portable/zoom/' >> /root/.bashrc
root# source /root/.bashrc 
root# ldconfig

root# cd /etc/profile.d
root# touch zoom_env_vars.sh
root# geany zoom_env_vars.sh 
root# ldconfig

where zoom_env_vars.sh script contains:

#libpath for Zoom-Portable
export LD_LIBRARY_PATH=$LD_LIBRARY_PATH:/root/my-applications/bin/Zoom-portable/zoom/

It seems zoom is using the libQt5 libs present in /usr/lib instead ...?!

So, I am very pleased your Zoom-Portable v.5.5.2 has worked as expected.

Many thanks again for your time ...as also for any comment!
Charlie

jJust thought I'd have a play with this portable on a couple of installations zoom-portable wouldn't run on. Running DPubBuster64, it complained about missing libxcb-xtest. I installed libxcb-xtest0 in ppm . The zoom-portable then ran OK. I then copied libxcb-xtest.so.0.0.0 to the portable directory and created a link libxcb-xtest.so.0.

I then logged into a BullseyeDog64 installation, which previously wouldn't run with the same error. The portable-zoom now runs in this Dog. Unfortunately, it still won't run in BusterDog64.

Edit: Re-visited zoom-portable in slacko64_7.0. When run it was failed libxcb-image not found. I couldn't find it using ppm, so copied it (libxcb-image.so.0.0.0 and created link to libxcb-image.so.0) from BullseyeDog64. Zoom-portable now runs in slacko64_7.0. Seems a mish mash of libs isn't an issue. It's becoming quite the patchwork appllication, zoomenstein.

I've been playing around with @01micko 's new slacko64_8.0_pre-alpha this afternoon. After I'd had enough of testing I thought I'd try my luck with zoom-portable on there. On first run it ran, sound worked, but no video. Testing gave a blank screen.

If I started a meeting the webcam LED light came on but still a blank screen. The error in the terminal showed libsensors.so.5 not found. So continuing my borrowing from other installs, I found this lib in weedog Arch64 and copied it to the zoom directory. Zoom-portable now works in the new slacko64_8.0. I went back and retested in slacko64_7.0 and it also works in that puppy also now.

Edit: checked with ScPup64 again, still won't run getting qt error/s

Hi, y'all.

New version of Zoom (v5.5.4 (7938.0228)) now available in 'portable' format. You can find it HERE.

D/l'd; unzip; move the portable app directory anywhere you want - preferably outside the 'save'. Click to open, click 'LAUNCH' to fire it up.

Enjoy!

Mike.

I'm confused about what's going on at that link. There are no download options, and one Zoom directory is empty while the second has two copies of every sub-directory.

I've been zooming on your last portable update about 15hours per week. Runs smoothly, though joining a meeting seems buggy, I would attribute it to Zoom itself rather than the portable version. While joining the meeting it will often just sit there spinning, and the client on the other end says zoom shows me joining but doesn't let me in. i just restart the app once or twice and then it goes, everything is smooth sailing after that. So again, I think it's just Zoom and not the install per se. Eager to see if the latest version gets rid of that issue.

Thanks Mike. I finally took the plunge and formatted my last Windows 10 hard drive to ext4 and put nice frugal installs of Fossa and Jackalpup on it. It's blazing fast. I'm 100% Puppy from here on out.

mikewalsh wrote: Mon Mar 01, 2021 10:00 pm

Hi, y'all.

New version of Zoom (v5.5.4 (7938.0228)) now available in 'portable' format. You can find it HERE.

D/l'd; unzip; move the portable app directory anywhere you want - preferably outside the 'save'. Click to open, click 'LAUNCH' to fire it up.

Enjoy!

Mike.

@geo_c :-

The odd stuff at the link is now fixed. Mostly caused by the Debian 'test' version I put together for Terry to try out.....still didn't fix his issue, though! So; it's gone.....

I took the plunge & went all-Linux shortly after XP's EOL, mid-2014.....then, after a year or so of "distro-hopping", went all-Puppy in spring of the following year. Best move I ever made...there's nothing Windows can do that Puppy can't, and Puppy is a lot more fun!

Mike.

mikewalsh wrote: Tue Mar 02, 2021 10:42 am

@geo_c :-

The odd stuff at the link is now fixed. Mostly caused by the Debian 'test' version I put together for Terry to try out.....still didn't fix his issue, though! So; it's gone.....

I took the plunge & went all-Linux shortly after XP's EOL, mid-2014.....then, after a year or so of "distro-hopping", went all-Puppy in spring of the following year. Best move I ever made...there's nothing Windows can do that Puppy can't, and Puppy is a lot more fun!

Mike.

Puppy is a lot of fun. I did some Zoom work today and that join-meeting bugginess seems to be gone. I guess they fixed it in this update. Thanks Mike.

Mornin' all
I installed the one from Quickpet in Fossa 9.5 last night and it launched, however it said it required an update and I made the mistake of installing it. Got a bunch of flickering boxes I couldn't read. I will uninstall that one and try portable later today when I have my hands on the laptop.

Side note, I was unable to download the newer one, kept getting a loop when I clicked download anyway.

Edit, I got it, I selected download all and that worked.

peppyy wrote: Wed Mar 03, 2021 12:09 pm

...
Side note, I was unable to download the newer one, kept getting a loop when I clicked download anyway.
Edit, I got it, I selected download all and that worked.

I've have that problem trying to download anything from Mike's google-drive & recently IIRC without regard to which web-browser I was using: endless 'spinner' or silence and if I click the browser's download icon which should show progress it reads "Canceled".

I think it this phenomena has to do with the privacy and security add-ons being used. I found the same solution as you:

Select Download All

When that's done, google AFAICT zipps the package. And the browsers then find no objection to handling it.