(old)Puppy Linux Discussion Forum

Puppy Stardust 001

Stardust 002 is release here

This is not built of woof
This is not a remaster
This is Puppy 4.3.1
...
Refined by the Stardust-generator-script.

Focus is desktop flow and user easiness.
- Desktop in DeepThougt taken to next stage.
- Cleanup in apps, menus and kilobytes.






BE AWARE!!!!
If you have Puppy installed, you MUST run this with the prefix 'puppy pfix=ram'. Else, the Stardust desktop will not install.

Download
username: puppy
password: linux
pup_stardust-001.iso (98Mb)



The following list shows many items that is taken out of the iso. But, it is not as critical as it seems. Most of these are tiny apps, and you have not been aware of many of them. Simply because other apps do the job.

The main programs that I have trashed is Geany and Isomaster which I think is developer tools. Also, Nicoedit and Pburn is doing their basics.

Aqualung has left, and Pmusic is back. Pmusic has evolved in both features and speed, so It is more a matter of longterm strategy. I hope it will be possible to build more around ffmpeg in the future. We could hopefully get rid of lidsnd, libsamplerate and maybe libxine...

Gadmin-Rsync is out as well, since it crashed on first run. I don't think Pbackup fill the backup issue completely. It would be wonderful if there exists a tiny but complete backup suit.

If you see something that you would have changed, added or removed, I will be very glad if you mentioned it. Because of my limited time, it would be best if you deliver the patch.... My knowledge of network/internet tools is close to zero, so these are nearly untouched.

It is easy to see possible improvements
- service manager
- icon theme in vector graphics for space saving.
- jwmconfig doesn't manage swallowed apps.
- alternative multimedia tools using ffmpeg.
- hunt more files we don't need.
- upgrade gui in some of the scripts.
- extend the control center.
- ...

This is meant to be a full featured user-oriented Puppy....Though, I have to admit that the biggest modem drivers is removed.

In the eager of removing files from the iso, I feel sure some should have been left...



So what's added
- Stardust desktop environment - including pcc (Puppy control center) and Pwidgets
- Pwireless2
- ATI drivers
- Pmusic



And what does the Stardust-generator change
- Install desktop at first startup rather than keep it in the iso to save space
- snap desktop icons - medium grid
- simple Pmount facelift
- Xlock is fixed
- start pCD instead of defaultmediaplayer when click on audio-CD icon
- seamonkey buttons
- defaulttexteditor is changed from geany to nicoedit
- defaultaudioplayer is changed from aqualung to pmusic
- Updated P-series
- start timidity (if exist) daemon when alsa starts
- Net-setup goes to Pwireless2 for wireless configuration



And of course, something had to leave
*** Programs ***
- ptooltips - tool to show tooltips in gtkdialog - not longer in use
- gtklogfileviewer - Does any script use anymore ???
- aqualung
- libmad
- madplay
- burniso2cd
- cdp
- cgtkcalc
- e3
- gcolor2 (color chooser)
- gdmap
- geany - for developers
- gexec
- gfnrename - maybe better than PRename, but this is bash and easy updated.
- gtkdialog markup editor - devx ???
- Isomaster - developer app, and Pburn does the basics
- Net-setup (old version)
- pcdripper
- Pdisk - could maybe be in use by some wizard
- picpuz
- pictureviewer
- pmirror/mirdir
- pmwget (PMirrorget)
- PuppyPdf - Abiword does exactly the same
- Pwireless
- rsync / gadmin-rsync - crashes on first run
- tile
- waveplay - linked to aplay
- xAutoconnect - Pwireless2 should do the job
- xcalc
- xclipboard
- Xconsole
- xfontsel
- ycalc
- zfind
- sfconvert/sfinfo

*** Trimming ***
- cdrkit - Pburn has very few dependencies
- libsnd (only mhwaveedit (aqualung) use libsnd)

*** Control panel has ditched some ***
- countrywizard
- XserverWizard
- wizardwizard
- And plenty of menu items

*** Graphics ***
- All wallpapers
- some Gtk-themes
- All Icon-themes
- many mini-icons

*** misc ***
- some apps NOT in control center has also lost their place in the menu
--> sfs-version-converter - warnings pointing to it is changed.
--> Pstopwatch - Ptimer should be enough.
- some documentation files
- some audio files
- the biggest modem drivers
- many fixed fonts

I downloaded Puppy Stardust 001 and ran it live for a good bit earlier tonight. It is a really nice looking release.

Does stardust have a md5 sum posted?

BE AWARE!!!!
If you have Puppy installed, you MUST run this with the prefix 'puppy pfix=ram'. Else, the Stardust desktop will not install.

That is a good warning. I would explain the reason . . but have not had my vitamin injection.
OK I'll try . . .
basically if you do not do this
the standard Puppy and Stardust will interact and save over each others save files
result = mashup (with lumps)

Even though Stardust looks good and Barry has mentioned it on his blog, the removal of Geany (a good decision for most users incidentally) and iso2cd is too much for me. I use both these programs.
One clever and useful thing is the removal of wallpaper for the tiny wallpapers as used in 4.2.

One of the first things people learn is how to add their own wallpaper.

As a barebones 4.3.1, this would make a great starter kit for specialised puplets.

Good luck with it Sigmund

hello

i tried stardust from a usb stick and no problems.

the pwireless2 was nice and the display is nice.

the program ran itself, i just waited and everything

worked.

nice.


timremy

Hi Sigmund

Stardust is one very nice puplet for it's 98MiB. .

The look and feel is very modern yet old school... does that make sense? I particularly like your Seamonkey theme.

One problem. I used the Control Panel to change the wallpaper and the file browser opened up in /root/.pwidgets. I did add the weather widget before hand. Would that cause it?

Isn't Pwireless2 a nice app? Once it matures it will be wonderful, it connects with no fuss. I congratulated jemimah on her work and the inclusion in this puplet. It is also in dpup (next version).

Ok, enough for now, maybe more later.

Cheers

Mick

Hi Zigbert,

I just ran stardust-001 on this DELL 610 laptop. Most things look good. I was particularly impressed with the way Pburn is integrated into the system, so it appears as an option for opening ISO files.

Like Lobster, I have the habit of using burniso2cd regularly. With the option of burning multi-session, and the possibility of opening with a right-click, Pburn can be considered a complete replacement. Now, if only we could verify multi-session disks.

We're still resolving some issues with Pwireless2 and the connection wizard. If I hadn't been through it already, I would have been confused. When I configured wireless through the right-click option on the applet, it handled the Intel2915abg wireless well.

On this 1400x1050 screen, the side panel takes a lot of space. I'd like to be able to reduce that. (Under gkrellm I can change the width through the GUI. It also offers other flexibility, while limiting the number of processes. Admittedly, the appearance doesn't appeal to everyone.)

I was surprised that the gradient produced visible contours with 16 bit color. With 24 bit color, there were no contours on the main desktop, but the side panel still showed distracting lines.

Now, we get into something else. After seeing contours with 16 bit color, I rebooted without saving and used 24 bit color. When I went to shutdown and save, I got corrupted text console I couldn't use. This problem has showed up before for some problematic graphics chips. Here's what it's configured as: This laptop has a modern Intel chip set, but still has a 4:3 aspect ratio screen. (A "915" wide screen would be 1440x1024.)

Regards,

prehistoric

Fail: cant get my network printer to work nohow. Otherwise, love it, but without a printer..................?

zigbert:
I saw this last night and downloaded it about 30 minutes after you posted. First impressions are it's a very welcome addition. I can see you've put a lot of thought and hard work into it. Thank you.

First niggle..it keeps saying it can't detect my wireless card, after a reboot or even restart of x-server. Probably because the card is lying in a draw in my desk.

IMHO I wonder how many will ever use Secure ssh telnet, DidiWiki, and PPLOG.

I really like the Control Centre. As a result could the Menus in Setup be simplified by deleting all those Wizard entries.

Sorry but I don't like your Ptimer. Firstly I find the 3 secs delay from starting the Stopwatch to it starting to count problematic. I've never known any stopwatch do this before. When I tell it to start I'd like to do just that.
Secondly if I set an alarm and then do a stop watch countdown the displays go a bit berzerk.
Thirdly if I set countdown to countdown for X seconds, I don't expect it to count down 3 secs and then count up for X seconds.
Sorry to be blunt but am just giving you one person's opinion FWIW.

I agree with prehistoric that the pwidgets panel takes up quite a bit of screen real-estate. This is on my 1024x768 display. I hope it will be possible to change this.

But overall, as I said above, I think this is an excellent piece of work for which many thanks.

Dave

adi:
From my download (which is setup and working fine) I get an MD5 sum of

3972AE2FE11E2CAE54401E7269A7C2B2

Hopefully you'll have the same but if not hopefully someone else here will be good enough to confirm mine (or otherwise).

HTH
Cheers
Dave

adi wrote:Does stardust have a md5 sum posted?

3972ae2fe11e2cae54401e7269a7c2b2 pup_stardust-001.iso

Lobster wrote:the removal of Geany (a good decision for most users incidentally) and iso2cd is too much for me

I use geany daily as well, but I don't find it too hard installing it
Prehistoric answered the love of iso2cd.

prehistoric wrote:Like Lobster, I have the habit of using burniso2cd regularly. With the option of burning multi-session, and the possibility of opening with a right-click, Pburn can be considered a complete replacement. Now, if only we could verify multi-session disks.

01micko wrote:I particularly like your Seamonkey theme.

ttuuxxx made those initially for Puppy 4.2.1

01micko wrote:I used the Control Panel to change the wallpaper and the file browser opened up in /root/.pwidgets.

I thought I have fixed that, - must have slipped my typing

prehistoric wrote:Now, if only we could verify multi-session disks.

I still believe one smart puppy-dude fixes this some day...

prehistoric wrote:the side panel takes a lot of space. I'd like to be able to reduce that.

I guess you are aware of the different panels. They don't need to as mature as the default. It is also possible to use Pwidgets without any background panel. The size of the widgets are of course also possible to reduce, but you need to edit the config files. Available from menu.

prehistoric wrote:This laptop has a modern Intel chip set, but still has a 4:3 aspect ratio screen. (A "915" wide screen would be 1440x1050.)

Does the intel915 chipset work well on Puppy 4.3.1. Tempestuous has patched the 915 driver. See http://murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=32462

DaveS wrote:cant get my network printer to work nohow.

If this works in Puppy 4.3.1 blame me. I have removed some files that I shouldn't Any terminal output that tells what's wrong/missing?

davesurrey wrote:First niggle..it keeps saying it can't detect my wireless card, after a reboot or even restart of x-server. Probably because the card is lying in a draw in my desk.

The message is produced by Pwireless2, and I hope jemimah will deal with this. It is under heavy development. Please tell about this in the Pwireless thread.

davesurrey wrote:IMHO I wonder how many will ever use Secure ssh telnet, DidiWiki, and PPLOG.

Do others have opinions about this?

davesurrey wrote:Sorry but I don't like your Ptimer.

I have to admit I agree fully with you. Please point me to an alternative, and I'll be glad to trash Ptimer/pStopwatch.

Zigbert,

I'm now running stardust 001 on a "disposable laptop", i.e. one without sensitive data or resale value. This is a Dell D600 with no disk drive. (I may even have blown the interface during some experiments.) I boot off a USB flash drive which stays in my pocket when not in use.

I just set this up for a friend who is a photographer. He is used to Firefox, and wants to use GIMP, so these are on his desktop, and very little else. After setting up the firewall, I decided to remove the connect icon. (Too much confusion between that and pwireless2 for a neophyte. ) I've set the wireless profiles for my network and what I believe is the one he uses. I'll test that tonight.

Possible bugs:

I was not able to remaster or save to CD. I need to swap drives and check that this is not the problem. The drive on which I burned the CD (multi-session) is supposed to be identical. I was able to use the universal installer to put the system on the USB flash drive and created a pupsave file.

When you removed the network time synchronization application, the corresponding button on the puppy control panel naturally stopped working. If you don't restore that application, you need to bring up a message explaining what is missing. This might be a general answer for a number of options not always installed.

The battery bar pwidget in the side panel does not update properly. It gets a value at the time it is installed, and just seems to sit there afterward. I noticed the jwm applet at 86% while the battery bar read 97%. I also had trouble setting up the Sun pwidget, which may be inexperience. (Photographers are specially interested in times of sunrise/sunset.)

Opinions:

zigbert wrote:

davesurrey wrote: IMHO I wonder how many will ever use Secure ssh telnet, DidiWiki, and PPLOG.

Do others have opinions about this?

I agree. These are simply not things typical non-technical users even ask about. Technical types have their own ideas about how to accomplish these functions. These should be packaged, not stuck in every puplet.

For a release 001, this is a very good puplet.

prehistoric wrote:... I also had trouble setting up the Sun pwidget, which may be inexperience. (Photographers are specially interested in times of sunrise/sunset.)...

The Sun pwidget was the result of my stumbling scripting , ask away, and I'll try to help...

rgds /
MHHP

zigbert wrote

Please point me to an alternative, and I'll be glad to trash Ptimer/pStopwatch

Zigbert I hope you weren't offended by my honest comments about Ptimer. Not suggesting you trash anything. I was just trying to contribute some personal feedback.

I was under the impression that Ptimer/Pcountdown was yours so it would be the natural thing to feedback user comments to the developer.

If you seriously are not happy with the app and really do agree with what I wrote I would have thought you would be able to change things. But of course it's up to you.

JFYI as a countdown timer 01micko's PCountdown Timer gives me (and I accept this is my singular opinion) all I need and more. (see http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=47834)

And gstpw is a small simple stopwatch. (see comments on Barry's blog 11 oct09)
Sorry, no idea about an alarm clock as I never use a PC for that.

HTH
Dave

MinHundHettePerro wrote:...The Sun pwidget was the result of my stumbling scripting , ask away, and I'll try to help...

rgds /
MHHP

Could you confirm that it is able to handle west longitudes? Does it always require a sign? Can it handle a + sign, even if this isn't necessary?

I got the local latitude and longitude, but after several experiments I wasn't at all sure which way was considered positive. I'm also confused about the sign of the offset from GMT. About half the time people use the offset, and half the time the correction to apply. Whatever I did, it resulted in an empty display for both sunrise and sunset times. No matter what the machine thinks, I'm sure I saw the Sun today.

(It might be better to use radio buttons for N/S and E/W, then users can be sure of the direction. I'm also a little unsure about why I might want to use an arbitrary timezone anywhere on earth instead of my own. Why not default to the local timezone and let users increment/decrement from there? )

prehistoric wrote:Could you confirm that it is able to handle west longitudes? Yes, and those would require a negative sign. Does it always require a sign? No, same as with ordinary numbers, (+) can be omitted. Can it handle a + sign, even if this isn't necessary? Yes

I got the local latitude and longitude, but after several experiments I wasn't at all sure which way was considered positive. Sorry, if it got confusing/non-standard, but in my atlas, Greenwich lies on the 0-deg meridian and the positive side from that takes me eastwards, and consequently, a negative longitude, with respect to Greenwich, then takes me westwards. I'm also confused about the sign of the offset from GMT. About half the time people use the offset, and half the time the correction to apply. Here, it would be the time-offset from UTC. Negative if the time of the clock has occured in Greenwich and not yet in the place in question. Whatever I did, it resulted in an empty display for both sunrise and sunset times. No matter what the machine thinks, I'm sure I saw the Sun today. Lucky you, I might have gotten a glimpse of the sun here for just a few, wee moments over the last few weeks .

(It might be better to use radio buttons for N/S and E/W, then users can be sure of the direction. Could have been a better way to go about it, but, if I recall correctly, the site which, given the co-ordinates, is poIled for sun-rise/set times utilises a -/+ offset from Greenwich, as well as the conventional +~N / -~S offsets in latitude with respect to the equator. I'm also a little unsure about why I might want to use an arbitrary timezone anywhere on earth instead of my own. Why not default to the local timezone and let users increment/decrement from there? ) Perhaps, because I, myself, never set my computer's timezone, I just set its clock to the time here in my timezone .

hth/fwiw /
MHHP

Thanks for the pburn info Sigmund
OK had to have a look

I resized the font and this happened to the control panel


Que = queue

I was disappointed that the nvidia button did not work - but I appreciate this is a cut back 4.3.1

Being script based the control panel is very useful for future Pups
and this is a good showcase for it.

Hope you keep polishing Stardust and the control panel
as an alternative to the Puppy dpup panel which is written in c++

Thank you Zigbert for this Puppy derivative. The Graphite theme is subdued and elegant and a pleasure to work with... it is easy on my eyes.

The Puppy Control center is nicely done providing a centralized access to system utilities much like Yast in SuSE and the Control Panel in Windows.

You have done some great work!

There is one problem that I have experienced with Stardust and Barry's 4.3.1 as well. When I use the Puppy Universal Installer to install to a flash drive the boot from the flash drive hangs at loading kernel modules. Building the flash install from an iso using Bootflash does not have this problem.

By the way for anyone looking for the BootManager to install sfs, it is now part of the Control Center.

Robert Wishlaw

zigbert wrote:Puppy Stardust 001

This is not built of woof
This is not a remaster
This is Puppy 4.3.1
...
Refined by the Stardust-generator-script.

So basically your doing like what I did with 2.14X, manually editing the sfs files and rebuilding the sfs's, and then building a iso image. I like the control better that way also.
I would of never droppend geany for nicoedit, nicoedit isn't that small when you add vala/genie, gtksourceview2, your talking around
vala 1479kb pet (Once you remove the dev files from the 1.5MB pet)
gtksourceview 207kb pet
nicoedit 88kb pet
-----
nicoedit is 1774kb wow, ok sure there is MU's browser gui that uses Seamonkey and vala, and his pdf editor, but at what cost?
geany is only around 600-700kb depending which version you use. Leafpad/Beaver is just as good as nicoedit, Nicoedit fails in size due to the deps, and also that it doesn't have tabs, who wants 8 open pages? I would rather tabs any day.

or if you want a better small editor teagtk @142kb pet is excellent
http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewto ... 12a3f0be15

or codebrowser @ 178kb pet http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewto ... 15f8a6c67d

Not trying to complain, just try to save some space and add more user usability to it

ttuuxxx

MinHundHettePerro wrote:

prehistoric wrote:...
I got the local latitude and longitude, but after several experiments I wasn't at all sure which way was considered positive. Sorry, if it got confusing/non-standard, but in my atlas, Greenwich lies on the 0-deg meridian and the positive side from that takes me eastwards, and consequently, a negative longitude, with respect to Greenwich, then takes me westwards. For sites in the Americas, people often assume West longitude is positive. This also matches the apparent motion of the Sun, which passes through the meridian of sites at increasing west longitude as time increases. My point is that there is more than one convention in use, except on E/W. ...No matter what the machine thinks, I'm sure I saw the Sun today. Lucky you, I might have gotten a glimpse of the sun here for just a few, wee moments over the last few weeks .You sound like a friend of mine who lived near Stockholm. The darkness bothered him, so he moved to Lund.
...I'm also a little unsure about why I might want to use an arbitrary timezone anywhere on earth instead of my own. ... Perhaps, because I, myself, never set my computer's timezone, I just set its clock to the time here in my timezone . Aha! That reveals the Mark of the Beast! You must use Windows when not on Puppy.

-------
Added: The confusion about the Sun pwidget wasn't the problem. Even with correct data, the predicted times of sunrise and sunset do not appear. I'm afraid something is broken in pwidgets on both my D600 and D610. There are times when the Pwidget GUI seems to freeze, and will not update information. I'm afraid this fits in with the Battery bar applet not updating. More when I clearly identify the problem.

My earlier comment about distracting lines in the side panel background does not apply to the fadebar_right background, which I recommend.
-------
Comment on ttuuxxx's suggestion: I'm not interested in the kind of wars which take place between coders over text editors, these depend on habits of use at odds with the way non-coders use text. (Personally, I suspect that the hands of people using EMACS differ from mine in either number or length of fingers.) I do think tabs are important for saving screen real-estate. Geany is satisfactory, though teagtk sounds nice. (I have no experience with it.)

When I've built systems from scratch, I used Scite for a graphical text editor. For the really low-level stuff of bootstrapping a source build, I've been quite satisfied with nano on a console. Almost anything is better than editing on a keypunch, or an ASR 33, (excepting one infamous editor, of clearly demonic origin, perpetrated along with DOS.)