Google Chrome 64-bit packages - [CLOSED]

Browsers, email, chat, etc.
Message
Author
User avatar
Mike Walsh
Posts: 6351
Joined: Sat 28 Jun 2014, 12:42
Location: King's Lynn, UK.

#271 Post by Mike Walsh »

@ albertox:-

Umm. Mm-hm.

I always did have 'issues' with up-to-date Chrome in Tahrpup64. It's part of the reason why I switched to doing my development/packaging work in Xenialpup64.....it never gave me any problems.

Tahr64 was 666philb's very first 64-bit Puppy. Naturally, it was a learning curve, not only for him, but for the rest of us, too. By the time Xenial Xerus 16.04 LTS was released, Phil had learnt a lot of 'tricks' from his first 64-bit attempt, with the result that Xenialpup64 has just been that much smoother, and more stable, from the outset. We all learn from our mistakes.....it's how the human learning process works.

Not being funny, but I would definitely suggest upgrading to Xenialpup64. 'Trusty Tahr' went EOL on the 30th April (day before yesterday), so is now unsupported. (I mean, Puppies are in fact 'timeless', as we all know.....but even Puppies have to move on in order to be able to run newer software.)

I vaguely recall the problem in Tahr64 being something to do with the available version of GTK-3.0; newer versions wouldn't 'play nice' with the system libraries, etc (and too many things needed upgrading to make it worthwhile 'fixing').

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

Try this. I assume you're trying to run the newest version I've just published, yes? If so, run

Code: Select all

/home/spot/chrome.sh
.....in the terminal, and let me have the output, please. (There'll be a lot of it; the Chromium 'clones' are incredibly 'verbose' and 'noisy' in the terminal; part of the reason is that this is where debug info comes from for the developers).


Mike. :wink:

albertox
Posts: 6
Joined: Wed 03 Apr 2019, 05:06
Location: Planet Earth , for now :)

#272 Post by albertox »

Thank you Mike for your reply.

Yes, I'm currently running your latest chrome V.74.0.3729.108, but I also had the same issue with the previous version. Please find attached a file containing the output, but please don't busy yourself a lot with this issue. It's not really that important.

You know, I have fallen in love with Puppy, and I think I probably have most of the popular Pups installed on USB sticks, TahrPup, Slacko, Xenialpup, Bionicpup, LxPup, Dpup Stretch-7.5 and Fatdog64. I have a bit of a convenience reason for using Tahrpup64. It's the highest Pup version which could fit on a 250MB SD card I pulled from a dead old camera. My favorite laptop HP EliteBook can boot from SD card, so this works great as having two drives, and I don't need to dual boot with Windows, or should I say Windoze as I have seen you call it in some posts :)
.
Attachments
chrome.zip
/home/spot/chrome.sh output
(934 Bytes) Downloaded 412 times

amn87
Posts: 32
Joined: Mon 28 Mar 2016, 16:14

Bionicpup compatibility.

#273 Post by amn87 »

Will it work in Bionicpup64 without having to mess around with missing dependencies etc? If yes which is better the .pet or .sfs from a RAM consumption POV?

User avatar
Mike Walsh
Posts: 6351
Joined: Sat 28 Jun 2014, 12:42
Location: King's Lynn, UK.

Re: Bionicpup compatibility.

#274 Post by Mike Walsh »

@ amn87:-
amn87 wrote:Will it work in Bionicpup64 without having to mess around with missing dependencies etc? If yes which is better the .pet or .sfs from a RAM consumption POV?
It should fire straight up. It's self-contained, as far as dependencies are concerned. And Bionicpup64 was the Puppy that prompted the relocation from /root/spot to /home/spot, bringing it more into line with Big Brother's "requirements".

The browser will use exactly the same amount of RAM in the un-packed, i.e., running condition. The .pet package or SFS are simply different ways of installation, though the SFS is recommended; these are big browsers, occupying something like 340 MB of RAM simply 'ticking-over'. By using the SFS, you can unload it when not required, thereby freeing-up RAM for other uses.

The .pet package will permanently occupy space in your save-file/folder. I built those for certain of Barry's experimental OSs, where they cannot apparently make use of SFSs, since they're installed in 'full' mode. For everybody else, the SFS is the method I recommend.


Mike. :wink:

RickGT351
Posts: 289
Joined: Tue 27 Sep 2011, 22:02
Location: Auckland, New Zealand

#275 Post by RickGT351 »

I have got Debian Dog on a flashdrive but it's as slow as a wet week
dancytron wrote:/offtopic

If you are looking for another good platform for Chrome, take a look at Debian Dog 64. Main advantage is that you can install it straight off the Chrome website and it automatically adds the repository so that you can keep it updated via apt-get like any other application. You can then run it as root with a simple script.

I did an explanation of how to do it, I'll add the link as soon as I find it.

edit:here it is

http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewto ... 150d32909c

User avatar
Mike Walsh
Posts: 6351
Joined: Sat 28 Jun 2014, 12:42
Location: King's Lynn, UK.

#276 Post by Mike Walsh »

Afternoon, everybody.

The current stable version of Chrome - Google_Chrome-75.0.3770.80-amd64 - is now available for download, from the location referenced in post #1.

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

Changes and updates in this release are as explained here, on the regular Chrome blog page.

42 security issues have been addressed since the previous release.....2 of which were considered 'High Severity'.

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

The glib-compile-schemas compile command now auto-runs at boot time. Downloads/uploads, therefore, work as they should.

The 'Spot2Root' file permissions changer has also been updated, and has been re-written to remove the need for the intermediate 'Spot2Root' directory in /usr/share.

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

Credits (as usual) :-

Battleshooter - for help with the self-contained NSS libs'n'stuff several releases back.
belham2 - for cobbling together the 'launch' script that is now employed.
And further back, 01Micko (the 'head honcho'), and iguleder - both of whom have indirectly helped keep this thread going for as long as it has, with references & links.

Thanks must also go to OscarTalks and peebee, for suggestions and assistance over the last couple of years.

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

Any problems, you know how to get in touch.....preferably on the thread, so 'issues'/'fixes' are made available to all.

Enjoy.


Mike. :wink:

cmonnnnnnn
Posts: 5
Joined: Wed 19 Jun 2019, 16:55

when will we get chrome in bionic pup?

#277 Post by cmonnnnnnn »

It seems to run fine in my xeniapup live CD sessions But when I decided to try bionic Pup I find that Google chrome will not run. Experimenting with puppy is a great way to learn about Linux. I'm not fluent, but I understand a lot of the technical issues . Debian does not allow apps to run under root. I thought xenia pup was Debian-based . In addition to being able to use chrome I like to learn, so why does it work in one distro and not the other?

Elsewhere in the forum is a link to another amazing user who posted installation files for chrome, but they are old, and don't run on my system. When I have tried to install Google chrome, it has only installed. The name "Google chrome" into my Internet menu, and I don't know how to eliminate remnants of that failed attempt. So any other time I tried to install, . I get the failure message that Google chrome is already installed .



I think it's easy to make a strong case for chrome as an important browser in the ugly world of the Internet . A lot of streaming services demand chrome, , in particular, YouTubetv , which is one of the reasons I disconnected my cable TV, but they won't support chrome . Sometimes I can slip Firefox pass them and see some of the hundreds of movies. I have on DVR , but Firefox ? Gimme a break
. :-(

Chromium is NOT chrome... no native HTML5, and no access to android apps on the play store . Not everybody has a smart phone, but a lot of people need to use such apps that so many businesses. Send us to . Hell, I use it to refill my medications at the pharmacy . :-) Chrome matters, Even though I'm anything but a Google fan .


I'm curious to know if anyone on behalf of the puppy development team can say with conviction, yes or no? Will I ever be able to use chrome, if I decide to use bionic pup Or should I just move on to something else .
I'm saddened, at some of the posts I have read. Not just here, but across all of the sites that turn up. When I search for "chrome and bionic pup" a lot of the responses seem to be based on a personal dislike for Google's chrome, and a dismissive wave of the hand, I seriously want to note here that I'm being sarcastic To say that . :-) this Makes me feel like a conservative on Facebook. :-) LOL just a joke folks, but actually a pretty good description of what this feels like
.
I don't know enough about Linux to build my own files, and I'm no longer motivated to continue to learn, but I will credit puppy for inspiring me to learn a lot about Linux that I never thought I would know
.
Please help ? If the only alternative is Firefox, I'm not sure there are any useful alternatives.

Thanks much and hope I don't offend or sound like a newbie complainer. I've seen a lot of those in this form since the early 80s, and I never want to be like that :-)

John

User avatar
Mike Walsh
Posts: 6351
Joined: Sat 28 Jun 2014, 12:42
Location: King's Lynn, UK.

#278 Post by Mike Walsh »

Hallo, cmonnnnnnn. And Image to 'the kennels'.....

Well, now. First thing I need to know; are you running 64-bit Bionic, or 32-bit Bionic? I've just booted a pristine copy of Bionicpup64-8.0, and loaded the SFS package of Chrome 75 into it. I'm posting from it now.

You are aware that Chrome has been 64-bit only for quite a while, yes?

If you're running the 32-bit version of Bionicpup, Chrome cannot run, because it's the wrong architecture. I do, however, have an available package of Iron 69, from SRWare, that will run in 32-bit Bionic, and do everything that Chrome can, because it uses the Chrome 'binary' (it's not really a 'binary', but I call it that for convenience).

If you specifically want Chrome, then make sure you're running the 64-bit version of Bionicpup, and you shouldn't have any problems. The SFS package is the recommended one to use, because you can load/unload it 'on the fly', while Puppy's running; this way, it only occupies space in RAM while it's operational.

You can find a link to the current Puppy Chrome packages back on page #1, post #1 of this thread. These packages have had to be built in such a way that they will work with Puppy's '/root/spot' model; if you've attempted to use the .deb package, direct from Google's download page, not only will it not run, but it also messes up printer permissions in Puppy, too.

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

With regard to the recalcitrant Menu entry, it's quite easy to get rid of. First, go into Menu->Setup->Puppy Package Manager. Click on the 'Uninstall' button. Scroll through the list of installed packages till you find the Chrome entry, and uninstall it. Wait till the PPM has done its thing, then close it. Have a look and see if the Menu entry for Chrome has gone.

If not, then follow these steps:-

Open ROX (the 'Files' icon on the desktop). Click the arrow, far left of the Menu bar; this takes you up a layer, into the file-system proper. Navigate through to/usr/share/applications. Look for the Chrome .desktop entry. Delete it.

Then, open a terminal, and type the word

Code: Select all

fixmenus
Hit 'Enter'. Wait till it's finished, then close the terminal. Now, re-start 'X'.

The Chrome menu entry should now be gone. I believe you can also accomplish the same thing by the use of the 'Re-build Menu' entry in the log-out GUI, but I've always just done this the way I've been used to, via the terminal. The end result is the same.

Hope that helps.

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

Personally, I agree with your views on Chrome. I'm a long-term user, having started with the initial public 'beta' release back in Autumn of 2008. I fell in love with it then, and have seen no reason to change my views. I used to be an ardent Firefox user, but at that time FF had serious issues with constantly crashing at the slightest excuse, and I went right off it. That is, until Quantum came along; it's turned out to be everything FF could have been years ago, were it not for the constant in-fighting and back-stabbing in the Mozilla camp.

TBH, I use both equally as much now.....along with Palemoon, which is a great, lightweight browser for Puppy on old, RAM-challenged hardware.

I also tend to agree with you about the Google ecosphere in general. I'm not keen on the way in which they seem to have their fingers in every 'pie' out there.....but I willingly admit, I DO make frequent use of certain of their services. The 'Save to Drive' extension in Chrome being a good example, since it ties my browser and my cloud storage together beautifully; the 'Drive' is where I keep all the Puppy packages I share with the community, so ease of access is paramount. And one of our Forum members has put together a 2-pane file manager which lets you organise your Drive stuff without needing to even open the browser; it simply makes use of a long-standing API Google have had available for years for just this purpose, accessing it via 'wget' in the terminal to set-up the initial connection.

Just so you're aware (:lol:), there's lots of Puppians who are convinced that Google is the devil incarnate. Makes for some lively, heated debates on occasion! :D


Mike. :wink:

User avatar
peebee
Posts: 4370
Joined: Sun 21 Sep 2008, 12:31
Location: Worcestershire, UK
Contact:

#279 Post by peebee »

Hi Mike

An oddity for you......

I tried Google_Chrome-75.0.3770.80-amd64 in ScPup64-19.06

The missing dependency on GTK3+ was easily fixed, however.......

when running via your wrapper I got:

# ./chrome.sh
/home/spot/google/chrome/chrome: error while loading shared libraries: libpng12.so.0: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory

Checking the Chrome binary libpng12 was not shown as a dependency and the actual dependency on libpng16 is satisfied:

# ldd /home/spot/google/chrome/chrome | grep png
libpng16.so.16 => /usr/lib64/libpng16.so.16 (0x00007f9c8428b000)

and indeed running the binary directly with:

# run-as-spot /home/spot/google/chrome/chrome

worked fine.

Looking at your wrapper chrome.sh I can't see where the dependency on libpng12 is coming from???

Any ideas?
Thanks
peebee
ImageLxPup = Puppy + LXDE
Main version used daily: LxPupSc; Assembler of UPups, ScPup & ScPup64, LxPup, LxPupSc & LxPupSc64

User avatar
Mike Walsh
Posts: 6351
Joined: Sat 28 Jun 2014, 12:42
Location: King's Lynn, UK.

#280 Post by Mike Walsh »

Morning, peebee.

Hm. That's an 'odd one', indeed. It's not happening for me, either in my own install of Xenialpup 64, or in 'clean' frugals of Xenial64 & Bionic64.

I can investigate, certainly, but I'm not quite sure where to look, in all honesty. I wonder if it's a peculiarity of your own Pups?

(Mind you, don't forget I'm not as good at this coding stuff/bash scripting as you are. That wrapper script is a slightly modified version of the one belham2 came up with a while back when all this 'run-as-spot' stuff initially cropped up, back around 62/63? It continues to work on my own machine, so I continue to use it....

Not very scientific, I know..!)

I don't use any Slackware-based Pups at all now, with the exception of Slacko 560, though I do recall they're rather more fussy with this png stuff. Not much else I can say at the moment, and I haven't had any real complaints as such from other Puppians for quite a while on the thread., so it's hard to say whether or not anybody else has noticed it...

Mike. :wink:

User avatar
peebee
Posts: 4370
Joined: Sun 21 Sep 2008, 12:31
Location: Worcestershire, UK
Contact:

#281 Post by peebee »

Updated 18-jul-2019

Hi Mike

Less "bells and whistles" than your builds.......

https://sourceforge.net/projects/lxpup/ ... s/download

but includes its own copy of GTK3 so runs on ScPup64, LxPupSc64 and also BionicPup64.......

Cheers
peebee
Last edited by peebee on Thu 18 Jul 2019, 18:04, edited 1 time in total.
ImageLxPup = Puppy + LXDE
Main version used daily: LxPupSc; Assembler of UPups, ScPup & ScPup64, LxPup, LxPupSc & LxPupSc64

User avatar
Mike Walsh
Posts: 6351
Joined: Sat 28 Jun 2014, 12:42
Location: King's Lynn, UK.

#282 Post by Mike Walsh »

'Kayyyy....

Why leave the /usr/bin/google-chrome-stable sym-link to the standard /opt/google/chrome/google-chrome launch script? You look to be using a modified Chromium launcher.....you could have removed both, and saved a bit of weight! :)

Nicely done, all the same. Cheers for the link.


Mike. :wink:

User avatar
Mike Walsh
Posts: 6351
Joined: Sat 28 Jun 2014, 12:42
Location: King's Lynn, UK.

#283 Post by Mike Walsh »

Hello, all.

The current stable version of Chrome - Google_Chrome-76.0.3809.87-amd64 - is now available for download, from the usual location referenced in post #1.

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

Changes and updates in this release are as explained here, on the regular Chrome blog page.

A total of 43 security 'fixes' have been addressed with this release.....5 with the 'High Severity' tag.

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

The glib-compile-schemas compile command now auto-runs at boot time. Downloads/uploads, therefore, work as they should.

The 'Spot2Root' file permissions changer has also been updated, and has been re-written to remove the need for the intermediate 'Spot2Root' directory in /usr/share.

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

Credits (as usual) :-

Battleshooter - for help with the self-contained NSS libs'n'stuff several releases back.
belham2 - for cobbling together the 'launch' script that is now employed.
And further back, 01Micko (the 'head honcho'), and iguleder - both of whom have indirectly helped keep this thread going for as long as it has, with references & links.

Thanks must also go to OscarTalks and peebee, for suggestions and assistance over the last couple of years.

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

Problems, issues, woes, etcetera.....drop us a line, here on the Chrome thread, please. Y'all know where to find me... :D

Enjoy.


Mike. :wink:

User avatar
666philb
Posts: 3615
Joined: Sun 07 Feb 2010, 12:27
Location: wales ... by the sea

#284 Post by 666philb »

hi mike,

do you happen to have google-chrome version 73?
Bionicpup64 built with bionic beaver packages http://murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=114311
Xenialpup64, built with xenial xerus packages http://murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=107331

User avatar
Mike Walsh
Posts: 6351
Joined: Sat 28 Jun 2014, 12:42
Location: King's Lynn, UK.

#285 Post by Mike Walsh »

Hello, Phil. I am sorry; I've only just found this. I'm slipping.....

Um. Yes.....and no. Bit cryptic, I know, but I'll explain....

I don't tend to keep actual packages of previous versions, no. However, I do keep a directory with around the last half-dozen or so 'working' Google-Chrome main directories ; I'm not quite sure why, but it seemed like a good idea at the time..!

Google themselves, as I'm sure you're aware, only keep the very newest version on the servers. Older builds usually get 'binned' straight away. There are sites here & there which will hang onto recent .deb packages, but I don't like using those; they mess up permissions in Puppy, and necessitate mucking around with the /initrd/pup_rw layer. The 'official' Puppy builds are way better for your Puppy's health!! :lol:

I can very soon assemble one for you. What d'you want; .pet or SFS? Let me know, and I can have it uploaded within the hour.....my 'build-process' for these is fairly well 'automated' by now!

Is this owt to do with hardware acceleration & your NVidia graphics card, by any chance?


Mike. :wink:

User avatar
Mike Walsh
Posts: 6351
Joined: Sat 28 Jun 2014, 12:42
Location: King's Lynn, UK.

#286 Post by Mike Walsh »

@ Phil:-

You'll find a link for Chrome 73 on the other thread. Hope it's useful.


Mike. :wink:

User avatar
Mike Walsh
Posts: 6351
Joined: Sat 28 Jun 2014, 12:42
Location: King's Lynn, UK.

#287 Post by Mike Walsh »

Evening, fellow Puppians.....

The current stable version of Chrome - Google_Chrome-77.0.3865.75-amd64 - is now available for download, from the regular location as referenced in post #1.

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

Changes and updates in this release are as explained HERE, on the regular Chrome blog page.

A total of 52 security 'fixes' have been addressed with this release.....1 'Critical', and 8 with the 'High Severity' tag.

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

The glib-compile-schemas compile command now auto-runs at boot time. Downloads/uploads, therefore, work as they should.

The 'Spot2Root' file permissions changer has also been updated, and has been re-written to remove the need for the intermediate 'Spot2Root' directory in /usr/share.

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

1 item that I feel bears mentioning, for the paranoid amongst you. With the next release ( Chrome 78 ) through to Chrome 80, Google will be trialling a new feature, called 'Keep-awake'. Now, this sounds a bit drastic, given that it will give websites the ability to over-ride your screensaver, monitor settings, etc, and thus keep the screen 'active' for as long as they like. Google's explanation for this is that it gives web activities that take a long time to complete - complex calculations, on-line video-editors, lengthy uploads/downloads, etc - the ability to keep your focus on what's going on.

The downside to all this is that 'shady' websites may decide not to relinquish the 'WakeLock' API when requested to do so. And 'cryptocurrency miners' will, in all likelihood, see this as the perfect opportunity to keep things going for as long as possible. Wholesome stuff like that!

Google say that this is only a trial period, to see what feedback from app/extension developers is like, and whether there is in fact any real call for it. Interestingly, the code that enables all this has been available for at least 18 months.....

Watch this space. I'll try and keep you all updated on this thing's progress (or otherwise).

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

Credits (as usual) :-

battleshooter - for help with the self-contained NSS libs'n'stuff several releases back.
belham2 - for cobbling together the 'launch' script that is now employed.
And further back, 01Micko (the 'Chief Puppian'), and iguleder - both of whom have indirectly helped keep this thread going for as long as it has, with references & links.

Thanks must also go to OscarTalks and peebee, for suggestions and assistance over the last couple of years.

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

Any problems, or other little 'niggles', this is the place to post 'em. You know where I am!

Have fun.


Mike. :wink:

User avatar
Mike Walsh
Posts: 6351
Joined: Sat 28 Jun 2014, 12:42
Location: King's Lynn, UK.

New release - 78.0.3904.70-amd64

#288 Post by Mike Walsh »

Now then, boys'n'girls:-

The current stable version of Chrome - Google_Chrome-78.0.3904.70-amd64 - is now available for download, from the regular location as referenced in post #1.

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

Changes and updates in this release are as explained HERE, on the regular Chrome blog page.

A total of 37 security 'fixes' have been addressed with this release.....3 with the 'High Severity' tag.

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

The glib-compile-schemas compile command now auto-runs at boot time. Downloads/uploads, therefore, work as they should.

The 'Spot2Root' file permissions changer has also been updated, and has been re-written to remove the need for the intermediate 'Spot2Root' directory in /usr/share.

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

With this release ( Chrome 78 ) through to Chrome 80, Google are trialling a new feature, called 'Keep-awake'. This will give websites the ability to over-ride your screensaver, monitor settings, etc, and thus keep the screen 'active' for as long as they like. Google's explanation for this is that it gives web activities that take a long time to complete - complex calculations, on-line video-editors, lengthy uploads/downloads, etc - the ability to keep your focus on what's going on.

Google say that this is only a trial period, to see what feedback from app/extension developers is like, and whether there is in fact any real call for it. Interestingly, the code that enables all this has been available for at least 18 months.....

I'll try and keep you all updated on this thing's progress (or otherwise).

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

Credits (as usual) :-

battleshooter - for help with the self-contained NSS libs'n'stuff several releases back.
belham2 - for cobbling together the 'launch' script that is now employed.
And further back, 01Micko (the 'Chief Puppian'), and iguleder - both of whom have indirectly helped keep this thread going for as long as it has, with references & links.

Thanks must also go to OscarTalks and peebee, for suggestions and assistance over the last couple of years.

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

Any 'issues', or feedback, or whatever, drop me a line here. We'll see what we can do.

Enjoy.


Mike. :wink:

belham2
Posts: 1715
Joined: Mon 15 Aug 2016, 22:47

#289 Post by belham2 »

Hi ya, Mike!

Hey, I've got two questions, and if I overlooked this then please forgive these old eyes.


[Background]
Netflix went and recently axed "officially recognizing" my Chrome (version 64), a version that you had made (and I helped with the script) a few years back.

I had stubbornly refused to change/update this Chrome since it ran so well and its only job was to run Netflix. No web-surfing whatsoever. But, alas, I open it now, and Netflix informs me:

"Sorry, chap, you are sh#t out of luck as this browser version is no longer supported".

Well, I've been running this Chrome on an old 2004 Compaq Presario Pentium-dual core laptop loaded with Xenialpup64. Even just starting this laptop up, with nothing loaded into Xenailpup64 except what Phil originlly put stock into it, this poor ole' Pentium chip---despite 4GB ram----barely keeps up. I threw a newer and more fat (read: bloated) Chrome browser on there to continue to use it only to watch Netflix, and now the laptop is really struggling, often stuttering in the middle of a Netflix show.


So, sigh, my questions are thus:

1) Is there any way for us to watch Netflix in a 32-bit pup, especially say something like Racy and/or Precise? If so, my problems would be solved as this laptop still loves Racy & Precise, even loves Radky's 32-bit creations.

2) I've tried all my Slacko-64bit woof builds, which don't seem to run to well on this laptop (driver and device problems). But, that said, have you had any other luck with any old 64-bit pup OSes, that maybe are a touch leaner than the fat Pup OSes we have today, in watching Netfix on them??


Thank for any reply/help. Never realized how addicted I've become to watching documentaries and shows/movies on Netflix---that is until it all was gone. :roll:

User avatar
Mike Walsh
Posts: 6351
Joined: Sat 28 Jun 2014, 12:42
Location: King's Lynn, UK.

#290 Post by Mike Walsh »

Morning, belham2.

Um; o-kayyy..... Well, you're not going to like what I have to say - you being such a staunch Chrome man an' all - but if that lappie prefers 32-bit stuff, and you want to watch NetFlix, then there's really only one way forward. Well; possibly two.....

I'm in very much the same kind of boat as yourself. This old Compaq Presario desktop tower is 64-bit, yes.....and it's dual-core, yes. But this is extremely early 64-bit tech; first-gen Athlon64 X2, from around 15 years ago. In terms of instruction sets. etc, an Atom would run rings around it, so; 32-bit Pups just seem to fly on here, where the 64-bitzers are , shall we say, sedate (in terms of performance).

I keep Xenialpup64 on here myself, more or less solely for putting the Chrome packages together. I don't think so many people download 'em any more, 'cos Phil and peebee have now got apps in place that allow the user to download the latest Chrome and run it correctly, without all those permissions problems. But, until I hear otherwise, I'll keep on building them. I don't like to let folks down....

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

Personally, I tend to use one of two browsers for NetFlix these days. Either the Iron browser - which you can get as a 32-bit release.....or Firefox; specifically, the FF68esr long-term support release.

I haven't been able to get NetFlix running in anything newer than v69; from that point onwards, SRWare must have made some coding changes. Despite putting everything in exactly the same place, NetFlix insists it can't 'see' the Widevine modules. Apparently, the Widevine stuff now has to be updated via an internal browser process; and, in Puppy at least, that process simply doesn't show up anywhere, so you can't follow the 'recommended update procedure'. It doesn't function. Period.

Which leaves, I'm afraid, Firefox. :shock: Although I don't mind either using, or recommending it these days. Quantum is finally what FF could have been years ago, if it weren't for all the back-stabbing and in-fighting in the Mozilla camp. They've finally pulled their fingers out, and produced a browser that's easily the equal of Chrome at long last. I've got so I no longer care which of the 'big two' I use for watching NetFlix these days; both are equally as good.

(I'd prefer to be able to watch it in Palemoon, but according to the current compiler, New Tobin Paradigm, on the Palemoon Forums, that isn't even a remote possibility. They switched to using the UXP build-system for Palemoon from v28 onwards, and DRM simply doesn't even figure in the mix with that.)

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

So; for you, I'm going to recommend trying Radky's DPup 'Stretch' 7.5 for the OS, and my 'portable' FF68esr package for NetFlix. It works on ye elderly Dell lappie - well, sort of! :lol: Stretch runs sweetly, but that old Pentium 4 really struggles with DRM-encoded stuff, which, frankly, doesn't surprise me. Despite Intel stating that the P4s were built to be 'multimedia-ready', they've always been crap at it. I can watch YouTube vids with the GTK-YouTube Viewer - just about! - and if I need a fix of NetFlix, I retire to my room & fire up the big Compaq.

You know where to find the 'Stretch' thread, I expect. You can find my FF68esr 'portable' here:-

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1fW0VU2 ... sp=sharing

D/l; unzip it. Put the resulting 'firefox32' directory anywhere you like. Fire it up using the 'ff' script inside; you can drag this to the desktop & tart it up with an icon if you want.

First run creates the 'profile' sub-directory inside the main 'firefox32' one, and writes the profile to it. Second and subsequent runs will always use this profile, so long as you fire it up with the script.

Credit goes to Fred for the inspiration for FF68esr-portable.

For NetFlix, go into 'Preferences', and ensure the check-box is ticked for 'Enable watching DRM content'. As soon as you tick that box, FF fetches and installs the newest Widevine components. Next time you fire the browser up, it's all set to go. Honest!

Sorry to recommend FF for this, but I too have had to swallow my pride! I always used to be a staunch FF user, but around 2008, when Chrome was first released, FF was having all sorts of memory-related and crashing issues. It gave Chrome the break it needed, I guess. I used Chrome happily for years, but they've been pissing around with it so much this last 24 months or so that I'm getting rather cheesed off with it all. And it's not as if there aren't other 'solutions' around for NetFlix now.

Let me know if that works for ya, please.


Mike. :wink:

Post Reply