Success! I've been using Linux since 1999, and Puppy every day for a couple of years now, but I'm an absolute "noob" when it comes to webcams and things like that, so I was anticipating some difficulties. I did have to overcome a couple of minor ones--but within a short time after my webcam + microphone (Logitech Webcam Pro 9000) arrived yesterday, I was seeing and hearing, and being seen and heard by, Micko almost halfway around the globe. (This was with Skype on Puppy 4.3.1; I'll try Linphone pretty soon, I hope.) Maybe other video-telecommunications "noobs" will be interested to read a bit about it.
After plugging the webcam into a USB port, I went to the Skype download page for Linux (
http://www.skype.com/download/skype/linux/choose/) and selected the "Static" binary package. Using the "Utility --> XArchive archiver" menu item in Puppy, I opened the "skype_static-2.1.0.81.tar.bz2" tarball and extracted it to a new directory under /mnt/home, so as not to clutter up my pupsave file. Following the easy directions in "[How to] Install Skype on Puppy" (
http://murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=45612), I made a /usr/share/skype symlink for the new directory, and added a desktop icon to run the "skype" executable located in that directory. I clicked the icon, read some legalese, accepted the agreement, got myself a Skype username and password, and signed into Skype.
The first time I tried making a test call, it didn't work because my microphone, under "Sound Devices" in the Options menu, was set to "Default device." It should have been set to "USB Audio Default Audio Device." Fortunately, this was a pretty obvious guess, as it was the first USB item listed. After I fixed that, the test call worked; the video test also worked with no problem, since the webcam was automatically detected as the only video input device; I check-marked "Start my video automatically when I am in a call" under "Video Devices" in the Options menu; and I figured I'd try calling home to Australia. (I mean, home for Puppy, not for me; I've never been there, I can't give a very good imitation of "Strine" talking, and I've been led to believe that "Oz" is an emerald city that you get to by way of a yellow brick road).
Micko PM'd me his Skype username, and the call went through--except, at first, for the sound from me. For some reason, the microphone had been reset to "Default device" again. This would have been easy to fix if it had been easy to find the Options menu again. Unfortunately, for someone like me who is accustomed to big desktop icons and conspicuous menus, the tiny Skype icon in the bottom left corner of the main Skype window was not a very obvious choice for where to look. Fortunately, Skype lets you chat in text as well as talk; for want of sound, I typed some chat lines back and forth with Micko (since lip-reading didn't work too well) while wondering what to do. When I finally figured out that the tiny, inconspicuous icon was the "Main Menu" icon, and saw that "Options" was one of the items in the main menu after I clicked the tiny icon, I reset the microphone to the correct device, and the sound worked!
Compared to some of the difficulties I've faced (and not always surmounted) with other apps for Linux over the years, that was really, really easy, and well worth it. Thanks to Micko, to the Puppy and Skype developers, to "Cowboy Frank" for recommending the Webcam Pro 9000 (
http://cowboyfrank.net/webcams/Logitech ... iption.htm)--and, not least, thanks to my daughter who is going away to college, and some friends of our family who are moving to another state, for motivating me to get a videophone setup!
David McClamrock