I'm a little confused by the differences between Puppy 2.0 and the various community editions that will be developed.
Puppy 2.0 will work with small amounts of RAM (which interests me - that was my first question on the old forum!) It will also have improved multi-session capabilities. I assume there will be a slightly different choice of applications between the two.
For a given legacy laptop/desktop how would we choose which to use? Presumably Puppy 1.0.9 will stay with 2.4.x kernels which will support older hardware? What about presence/absence of USB ports, DVD-RW drives, SATA disks, touchpads, winmodems. Not to mention different screen resolutions/drivers?
Is there going to be a matrix/flowchart of some kind?
I'm not asking for myself, I'm lucky enough to have reasonable broadband so I can just download and burn two images and see which one works. I've also been playing with the distro long enough to know how good it is. I'm thinking more of people on dial-up who have never played with Linux before. They'll download one or the other which may or may not work on their hardware. They may not come back to try the other version.
I'd be sad to see Puppy1.x.x disappear as I'm sure there will be some old legacy laptops which it can re-animate but how do we point newcomers in the right direction?
Differences between Puppy 2.0 and Puppy 1.0.9
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Lobster
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1.09 and Puppy2
Puppy 1.09 is part of the transition process from Barry as main developer. Barry has announced his semi retirement. I feel his input will still be invaluable. I certainly hope his "contact by laptop" continues when he goes walkabout later this year. So 1.09 is where we try and improve the 1.08r1 2.4 kernel based Puppy with Barry as a developer. It is therefore more of a team effort.
Puppy2 is very much led and lead developed by Barry with input from others.
So in Puppy2 Barry makes all the decisions. This is very fast and efficient.
With 1.09 Nathan is the lead developer but (for example) he would prefer to use Opera but the group concensus was to use Firefox. Barry is one of the developers on 1.09 but is more active with Puppy2 which is the clear priority.
Now the differences from the end users viewpoint:
1.09 is based on 1.08r1 and the 2.4 kenel. It is designed to be stable and fast and address some of the issues that have concerned developers. For example Barry has always concentrated on a WORKING OS - the look of it has been secondary. It was very easy to incorporate decent, clear icons into 1.09 and this was done. This may influence Puppy2. For many Firefox is preferred and Geany editor is preferred - so these are in 1.09. XDG menus which will allow new Window managers for Puppy to have access to the menu structure in a similar way have been added.
So the big difference is an organisational one. 1.09 is an experiment and in the future, that experience will be most useful. It is also designed to be stable and released by 15 May 2006.
Puppy2 may be in its second beta by then - we shall see.
Puppy2 will be using the 2.6 kernel and if that is problematic for some computers then the 1.09 series will be available and may be continued to a 1.10 version. Idealy the 2.4 kernel could be swapped into Puppy2 but this might not be possible.
What we are trying to do is make the changeover gradual and seamlessly.
I hope that makes sense. It is how I understand the process. Others may offer you another perspective and I hope they will.
Puppy2 is very much led and lead developed by Barry with input from others.
So in Puppy2 Barry makes all the decisions. This is very fast and efficient.
With 1.09 Nathan is the lead developer but (for example) he would prefer to use Opera but the group concensus was to use Firefox. Barry is one of the developers on 1.09 but is more active with Puppy2 which is the clear priority.
Now the differences from the end users viewpoint:
1.09 is based on 1.08r1 and the 2.4 kenel. It is designed to be stable and fast and address some of the issues that have concerned developers. For example Barry has always concentrated on a WORKING OS - the look of it has been secondary. It was very easy to incorporate decent, clear icons into 1.09 and this was done. This may influence Puppy2. For many Firefox is preferred and Geany editor is preferred - so these are in 1.09. XDG menus which will allow new Window managers for Puppy to have access to the menu structure in a similar way have been added.
So the big difference is an organisational one. 1.09 is an experiment and in the future, that experience will be most useful. It is also designed to be stable and released by 15 May 2006.
Puppy2 may be in its second beta by then - we shall see.
Puppy2 will be using the 2.6 kernel and if that is problematic for some computers then the 1.09 series will be available and may be continued to a 1.10 version. Idealy the 2.4 kernel could be swapped into Puppy2 but this might not be possible.
What we are trying to do is make the changeover gradual and seamlessly.
I hope that makes sense. It is how I understand the process. Others may offer you another perspective and I hope they will.
Last edited by Lobster on Wed 26 Apr 2006, 21:03, edited 1 time in total.
Puppy2 simply is still alpha, and will require more testing until it is stable.
This can last some weeks - or even some month, depending on the results.
The whole concept is much more advanced than Puppy1, but this complexity also opens the doors for new unknown problems.
While barry concentrates on that, Puppy 109 is the attempt to add an enhanced version of 108 meanwhile.
It also allows supporters to use a stable base to test new concepts like the xdg-menus.
If they work reliable, they should make it in Puppy2, too.
Mark
This can last some weeks - or even some month, depending on the results.
The whole concept is much more advanced than Puppy1, but this complexity also opens the doors for new unknown problems.
While barry concentrates on that, Puppy 109 is the attempt to add an enhanced version of 108 meanwhile.
It also allows supporters to use a stable base to test new concepts like the xdg-menus.
If they work reliable, they should make it in Puppy2, too.
Mark
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BarryK
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Yes, Mark's comments sum it up very nicely.
This is a first go at a community edition, so it's getting experience at doing it,
plus others get more input rather than me having total control.
There is going to be a lot of cross-polination going on, plus down the track
quite likely there will be a puppy2 community edition.
This is a first go at a community edition, so it's getting experience at doing it,
plus others get more input rather than me having total control.
There is going to be a lot of cross-polination going on, plus down the track
quite likely there will be a puppy2 community edition.