MultiSession DVD and pup_save ?

Discuss anything specific to using Puppy on a multi-session disk
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trapster
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MultiSession DVD and pup_save ?

#1 Post by trapster »

I recently acquired a P4 2.8g x 512 ram x 40g hd for nothing.
The guy recently could not boot into windows and had some pictures he HAD to have off the disk.
I told him I could see what I could do so he gave it to me to play with. Puppy to the rescue!

Booted with a disk and it immediately saw his hard drive. Copied all his files and he is as tickled as a pig in shi...(dung).
In the mean time he bought a new 'puter so he ended up giving me this one for my "efforts".


Anyway......this one has a DVD burner so I am trying the multisession DVD thing.
So far so cool. All my changes are saved and everything is working great.

I do have one question. When I boot with the DVD, freememapplet shows I have 513 (whatever, don't need to know what) and I am trying to import (copy) about 650mb of emails and it won't let me because of "running out of room".

How do (or can) I make a pup_save file on the hd that the DVD will use? Is there a way not to boot into ram so I can use all 4.7gb of the DVD disc?
A little confused with this disc thing. (I haven't even thought of the .sfs file method yet)
trapster
Maine, USA

Asus eeepc 1005HA PU1X-BK
Frugal install: Slacko
Currently using full install: DebianDog

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Flash
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#2 Post by Flash »

Use Puppy's Gparted to create a swap partition on the hard disk, say about 1GB. Multisession Puppy will see the swap and use it. (A much better solution if you can afford it is to increase the amount of RAM. Max it out if you can. Swap memory is far slower and uses more power, yet is far less reliable than RAM.)

As for using an e-mail client, multisession Puppy will load all the e-mails into RAM when it boots, including ones you thought you deleted if you didn't do it right, and then save them back to the DVD in the next session. This wastes a lot of space on the DVD, not to mention using up all your RAM just to hold the e-mails. I suggest you switch to Yahoo mail or Gmail if you're using multisession Puppy.

Also a similar problem with the browser cache. Go to SeaMonkey's Edit -> Preferences -> Advanced -> Cache and change the cache location to /tmp so that the cache contents aren't saved to the DVD when you shut down, and reloaded into RAM when Puppy boots.
[url=http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=69321][color=blue]Puppy Help 101 - an interactive tutorial for Lupu 5.25[/color][/url]

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trapster
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#3 Post by trapster »

Thank for the info but let's skip the mail example. How would I "install" a 600mb file? Would it still tell me I have no room on a 4.7gb DVD?
Does creating a swap just give me that much more room to install programs?
Do I just keep increasing swap to make more room?
trapster
Maine, USA

Asus eeepc 1005HA PU1X-BK
Frugal install: Slacko
Currently using full install: DebianDog

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yim
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#4 Post by yim »

trapster

don't know if it helps any, but I use multisession 95% of the time, I just create a partition on the hard drive and mount after booting download straight to the drive and you're in business, that way you don't waste any ram holding all that info, works with flash drive too, seen some nice 8gb sticks out now

yim

oh yeah, seems to work better if your going to copy from one media to the other that "copy" is more reliable than moving hope that helps[/u]

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Flash
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#5 Post by Flash »

Well, as I understand it, multisession Puppy has no pupsave file. Everything is in RAM plus swap (if any) all the time, period. When Puppy loads from a multisession DVD (or CD) into a computer with no swap memory, there is nothing but RAM for Puppy to load into. I don't think Puppy will load only partly from a multisession DVD (or CD) in a RAM-challenged computer, like it will from a regular CD. I could be entirely wrong. If I'm right, you need enough RAM (plus swap memory) to hold everything, including applications you have installed, all your saved e-mail and your browser's cache.

I assume you mean how would you install a 600 MB swap file? I don't know. I've always used a swap partition, never a swap file. They are essentially the same idea, but a swap file is placed in a different part of the HD filesystem and I believe Puppy has to be taught how to use it. Other people have reported success using swap files, but I've never tried it. If you want to install a swap partition, I think you can do it with Gparted. I have used Partition Magic 8 to do it, but not Gparted as far as I can remember. Again, I could be wrong. My hard disk crapped out a while back and I haven't bothered to replace it. I figure a USB flash memory stick is far more reliable if I have something I want to save separate from the multisession DVD.
[url=http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=69321][color=blue]Puppy Help 101 - an interactive tutorial for Lupu 5.25[/color][/url]

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trapster
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#6 Post by trapster »

Ok....if I have no hard drive....I can only save files up to the size of the ram + swap?
What do I do with the other 3.5gb of DVD space????

(Me thinks my frugal is much betterer.)
trapster
Maine, USA

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Béèm
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#7 Post by Béèm »

Trapster,
Every time you shutdown the session is saved and eating up space from the 3.5GB you're talking about.
After a n° of sessions there is no room anymore and you are asked to put in a new DVD.
I had this situation when using puppy in multi-session CD mode.
Nice reading material. :wink:
Time savers:
Find packages in a snap and install using Puppy Package Manager (Menu).
[url=http://puppylinux.org/wikka/HomePage]Consult Wikka[/url]
Use peppyy's [url=http://wellminded.com/puppy/pupsearch.html]puppysearch[/url]

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Flash
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#8 Post by Flash »

If I may confuse the issue some more, no hard disk means there can be no swap memory. You could put a swap partition on a USB flash drive and get Puppy to use it. A few people have reported doing that but it's not usually done because flash memory only lasts around a million write cycles. It's much better to add RAM if you can. Swap is a last resort.

The idea is for the session that is saved when you shut down to be only what is new (like an incremental backup). Used right, a session on a multisession DVD might be quite small. Back when I was testing the multisession DVD idea to satisfy my own curiosity, I saved well over a hundred sessions on a DVD. There was room for more but it takes a long time for so many sessions to load so I quit adding them.

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#9 Post by trapster »

It also seems to load slower with each new boot as it loads all the previous saved "folders(with dates)" (?). Can the earlier dated folders be deleted or do they all have some info saved that's critical?
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sky king
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Too many multisession saves?

#10 Post by sky king »

I think this deserves a bump. New users like me would like to use a multisession CD or DVD, but as boot instances build up, there get to be a lot of dated files that fill up the CD. The boot times increase, and pretty soon you have to start all over, I think. Maybe there's a way to meld all these saved files together somehow as one on a rewritable CD, then delete all the old ones.

Maybe the answer is to make your own remaster when the CD fills up? A script that makes the dated files into a pupsave?

Anyway, a new user may have lots of fun until the CD fills up or the DVD boots too slow, then just goes somewhere else. My solution has been to boot from live CD, install to USB, and not save to CD at first shutdown, not use multisession. I should be backing up the pupsave file occasionally, will work on best way to do that.

Which brings up my other wish, a button to create a new pupsave, not only on first shutdown. A dialog with choices, even links to efficient help pages, would be good. If I were still using multisession and the CD filled up, I would probably decide it's time to try saving to the HD or USB, not losing my setup that I'd been refining for a month or so. Or my present setup that I'd like to create a pupsave on the HD instead of USB (effectively a backup pupsave).

Maybe there is a feature I don't know about to simplify this stuff. I'm positive there are ways to do it all, it's just not noob friendly. My dos pesos.

Just before I hit the submit, I read the next to last post about swap. I put a swap partition on my USB flash card, it rarely gets used, and I'm not worried about millions of writes to it. I'll report if that causes me trouble.

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