How to Create an SFS from filezilla-project.org download

[mikeslr]

Hi All,

Edit: The following didn't work under Tahrpup. See http://www.murga-linux.com/puppy/viewto ... 405#879405 which provides details about creating an SFS using Ubuntu Tahr debs obtained via Puppy Package Manager. I'll leave the balance of this post since the next official version of filezilla may again be usable, and may still be usable running other Pups.


3.5.3 was the last version of FileZilla available to Puppies. Stimulated by Blackfish's interest in obtaining a current version which would run under LxPup Precise-retro, I decided to investigate. The resulting FileZilla SFS is version 3.9.0.6 and should work in ANY Pup whose Glibc is more current than Lupu 5.2.8. Ran on Ubuntu based Pups from Precise thru Tahr, Slacko 5.7, and Carolina with updated kernel and Glibc. Attempting to start it via terminal in Lupu discloses that required Glibc version is not met.

I know it can locate files on my computer and reach a host on the web and download from it. But I don't know if it can upload to a website as I don't have a current account with a host. Let me know if you were able to use it to upload files to a website. So I'll know whether to delete just the "ALMOST CERTAIN" in the title, or this entire post.

This is not the way I usually build SFSes, and I was surprised that the resulting SFS did anything. But the fact that woof enables the building of Pups using the binaries of “any

[mikeslr]

Hi All,

Edit: If you've created an SFS following the instructions I linked to in my first post's edit, you can still create an filezilla3 folder on /mnt/home and access it using the attached pet.

After building the SFS, Right-click an empty space on /mnt/home and Select New>Folder. Name it FileZilla3. Note the capital F and Z. Then Left-Click your FileZilla.SFS, click View, Click Show All, simultaneously hold down the Ctrl-Key while pressing "a" --for All. All files will be high-lighted. Click-And-Hold any highlighted file and drag it into the FileZilla3 folder. All the other files will be dragged along. Select Copy.

Returning to original post:

It occurred to me that since the FileZilla downloaded direct from the FileZilla-Project appeared to function in any Puppy whose Glibc was high enough,
(1) there was little reason not to run it as an External Application (=from a folder on your Home Partition); and
(2) I could save you a lot of time and effort by providing a pet to do so.

Running an application from a Program Folder uses less computer resources than via an SFS, and doesn't use up one of the (usually only) 6 slots for SFSes.

It will take you about 2 minutes after the downloads complete.

Step 1: Open your web-browser to https://filezilla-project.org/download.php?type=client, and ignoring that the offered file is “for

[Blackfish]

This is all starting to make sense. Workin' on it.

Now, there's "rox" and there's "Rox". Does it matter which I use?

[mikeslr]

Hi Blackfish,

AFAIK, there's only one Rox. Sometimes I'm just careless about capitalizing words.
It's menu>Filesytem>Rox-Filer file manager. With jwm as window-manager, there's a desktop icon, usually at the top-left, with the name either "Files" or "home" --not sure of the capitalization as I installed Openbox-- which will open rox to /root. When open, click the up arrow on the tool bar to take you to /, the top of the tree. You'll see all the folders which hang from it. So it's click a folder to enter it; click the up-arrow to exit to a folder's "parent." The "home" icon takes you back to /root -- your home folder.

Rox's tool bar has other icons which call various tasks. If you hover over them tool-tips will appear.
One I find handy is the bookmark tool. If you press the icon it will show you which bookmark's you already made, and offer to add the current folder to your bookmarks. I usually bookmark /mnt/home [the partition on which your PuppyOS resides]; /usr --where files and folders installed by the creator or you reside; /usr/share --from which the application and backgrounds folders can be opened without scrolling; and /usr/share/pixmaps --where I usually add icons. The applications folder, as its name suggests, is where you'll find the .desktop files used by the Menu creation module. The backgrounds folder holds wallpapers.
Try right-clicking any desktop icon. Among the optioned offered is "backdrop". If you select it, you can drag and drop any jpg onto the window which opens changing your wallpaper to that jpg. But it easiest if you stored any wallpapers you like in /usr/share/backgrounds. That's where other wallpaper selection applications will look for them.
A couple of other "Rox tricks" you'll find handy are the icon on Rox's toolbar to change the view of files in the folder. Right-clicking turns thumbnail view on and off. Left-clicking shows hidden files.
Play with the icons on Rox's toolbar to see what they do. There are other file-managers with nice features; and Rox is perhaps as unlike Window's Explorer as you can get. But once you used to it you may appreciate why I think Barry K made a wise choice in using Rox-filer as Puppy's default file-manager.

mikeslr

[Blackfish]

Yes, I found Rox very cool. I have been using Puppy for a few months now and never knew Rox did all that stuff. I found out about it by opening a terminal, striking control+tab-tab. When that opens, you can see all the commands in alphabetical order. I looked up Rox and noticed there were two: rox and Rox. I typed them both into separate terminals and checked them out. Rox is definitely cool. I was messing around in there for a half hour. A new toy! rox is just plain ol' plain ol'.

[rufwoof]

I run a frugal version of Puppy (Thin Slacko 5.3.3t) with no savefile.

Despite using Puppy for around 9 months only recently have I played around with Rox a little more.

IMO a continual puppy savefile is just a slow way to do a full install. Savefiles are better used for short periods when you want to make some changes, are testing those changes until you're satisfied and then remaster to create the fixed image (that you can boot without a savefile from).

My core (fixed) puppy is minimalistic and weighs in at around a 60MB puppy sfs. That provides a fixed unchanging desktop that is the exact same each time its booted, so you can play around to your hearts content installing apps etc and then just reboot to clear those changes out.

When I find a program that I like I was keeping it as a sfs and loading that as/when required. A problem however is that in having no savefile any program config changes are lost when you reboot. To circumvent that I've started using RoxApps. i.e. install the program onto the HDD and run it from there. As part of the program installation/loading in that manner I copy whatever configuration file(s or directory) the program creates/uses under /root to the HDD and when the program is loaded/run as part of the start up I delete the /root copy of the configuration file(s) and symbolic to the one on the HDD so that any program config changes are preserved across reboots.

For instance if a program 'myprog' creates a file /root/.config/myprog.cfg in which configuration changes are recorded then I copy that to outside of puppy space - perhaps /dev/sda1/myprog/myprog.cfg and then delete/symbolic link to that from the /root/.config directory.

I've started to combine various programs into the same ROXApp directory on the HDD and have added (drag/drop) that RoxApp directory onto the desktop so that I have a right click option to launch various programs/tasks.

So to get to the chase, perhaps you could install (extract) the filezilla tar content to within a roxapp directory and add (or create) a desktop icon for that RoxApp directory such that it became a right click/select of that desktop icon launch choice.

In my case I keep a SFS of the program (such as Libre office) in the appdir and the launch code does the sym linking etc and then sfs_loads that sfs (so it populates puppy menu etc). For that purpose I create a cut down version of sfs_load that doesn't to any prompting (nor copying of the sfs).

My understanding is that a rox app directory needs to be made executable and contain AppInfo.xml and AppRun files

AppInfo is the right click menu items that are added when the icon is right clicked and the option parameter associated to each menu item is passed to AppRun if that item is clicked.

My AppRun is generic and simply calls another script in which all of the symbolic link creating, program loading etc is performed/coded. So far in my case I have a sound setup launch choice, libre office install and firefox install choices. For firefox I'm using shinobar's portable firefox, so that preserves all changes outside of puppy space (bookmarks etc) across reboots - and updates to the latest version of firefox as/when released (help, about, check for updates).

AppInfo

Code: Select all

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<AppInfo>
  <Summary>Libre Office</Summary>
  <About>
    <Purpose>ROX Wrapper for Libre Office</Purpose>
    <License>GPL: http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl.txt</License>
    <Version>1.0 - Ruf Woof Nov 2014</Version>
    <Homepage></Homepage>
  </About>
 <AppMenu>
    <Item option="Sound">
    <Label>Install Sound Card</Label>
    </Item>
    <Item option="">
    <Label>Install Libre Office</Label>
    </Item>
    <Item option="Firefox">
    <Label>Install Firefox Portable</Label>
    </Item>
  </AppMenu>
</AppInfo>

AppRun

Code: Select all

#!/bin/sh
PROG=loadprogs
APP_DIR=`dirname "$0"`
APP_DIR=`cd "$APP_DIR";pwd`; export APP_DIR
BIN="$APP_DIR/$PROG"
exec "$BIN" "$@"

A minimalistic fixed (no savefile) remastered version of puppy that I like and boots the exact same each and every time (no savefile), together with other apps being loaded as SFS's as/when required, and where changes to those programs (configuration changes etc) are preserved across reboots, and not storing any data files (docs etc) inside puppy space but on the HDD instead (preserved across reboots) works well for me.

Sorry for the long descriptive posting - but I thought images of the code and longer description might help others who like me might not be aware of what Rox can do.

[LazY Puppy]

Maybe you might be interested to have a look at this:

Modularity Package incl. RoxApp Builder

Information in thread: A vote for a modular use of Puppy Linux

[rufwoof]

Maybe you might be interested to have a look at this:

Modularity Package incl. RoxApp Builder

Information in thread: A vote for a modular use of Puppy Linux

Thanks Lazy Puppy. Interesting thread. I intend to also have a look at the low compression remastering mentioned in the thread. Currently I use max compression so it will be interesting to compare speeds.

My RoxApp sfs/apps menu is starting to grow. Recently been installing a PXE server so other family members might net boot Puppy.

[rufwoof]

Just tested out the low compression mksquashfs provided in that other thread. For my no save ram boot being fixed I simply added a new RoxApp apps menu item

<Item option="mksquashfs">
<Label>Install low compress remasterpup2</Label>
</Item>

and in the loadprogs script that AppRun calls I added code to replace /usr/sbin mksquashfs and remasterpup2 with versions that are appropriate for the low compression choice. i.e. a CASE script statement of

Code: Select all

 (mksquashfs) 

    # Install a low compression version of mksquashfs
    yaf-splash -bg orange -text "Replacing mksquashfs with a low compression version" &
    X3PID=$!
    if [ ! -f /usr/sbin/mksquashfs.orig ]; then
      cp /usr/sbin/mksquashfs /usr/sbin/mksquashfs.orig
      cp /usr/sbin/remasterpup2 /usr/sbin/remasterpup2.orig
      cp $APP_DIR/.mksquashfs /usr/sbin/mksquashfs
      cp $APP_DIR/.remasterpup2 /usr/sbin/remasterpup2
      chmod a+x /usr/sbin/mksquash.fs
      chmod a+x /usr/sbin/remasterpup2
    fi
    sleep 2
    kill $X3PID
    exit;;

Flew threw remastering. initrd.gz (into which I insert puppy sfs) now 116MB compared to 79MB for high compression, but frugally booted doesn't seem any slower, if anything quicker.

[rufwoof]

For that RoxApp launcher I've extended the code so that right click brings up the rox menu as normal whilst left click brings up an alternative of a gtkdialog selection method.