Slack-woof working

Well basically. I get the desktop, but there are issues to sort out and I'll work on those over the next couple of days.

In response to comments made to my previous post, I have been thinking about what Woof is and what it isn't.

I don't think that I want to promote Woof as a separate distro. The way it seems to be firming up is Woof is a "Puppy builder" where the user can choose to build from Ubuntu, Debian or Slackware binary packages.

So, Woof is just another way to build a Puppy. The Puppy development team could decide to use it to build a future version of Puppy if they want, say Puppy5, if it becomes mature enough.

Or, anyone could build their own puplet from it.

Mixing packages from various distros, upgrading from a distros repositories, and similar questions, too early to say anything.

I'm thinking that I can't support Woof building from more than 3 distros. Currently I have Ubuntu, Debian and Slackware. Each one involves some special-case handling. The Slackware packages for example have post-install scripts that in some cases do things that really stuff up Puppy, so I have to handle that as special cases in the package-templates.

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Comments

SMP
Username: playdayz
With Woof, the downloaded kernel would/could be SMP, am I right? Easy way to support multi-core. That is good, imo. thanks.

Kernels
Username: BarryK
"The way it is working right now, is a selection of kernels is offered, from whatever exists in directory pet_packages-5 on ibiblio. I currently have the Puppy412 kernel there, plus a smp 2.6.27.4 kernel. I plan to compile a later kernel and upload that soon. In Woof Unleashed, the '1download' script downloads kernels it finds in the above-mentioned location, then '3builddistro' asks which one you want to use. It is intended that the build will work with any kernel that you choose. The kernel pet package has all the modules in it too, so it's a complete package.

OS philosophies
Username: Sage
"If you haven't checked out Tiny Core Linux yet, then strong recommend it. Super fast. 10Mb d/l. Plenty of cloudy apps to choose.

Great direction!
Username: WhoDo
"Great decision, Barry. I think woof will be the "killer app" of the Puppy world, and maybe even the Linux universe!:cool: As a tool to replace Unleashed/createpuppy it frees everyone to pursue their favourite trail with a Puppy approach and opens Puppy up to the brave GNU world of applications built for other major distros.:n_n: There was some speculation that woof would supplant Dingo, and I was worried that a typical Puppy-style release could lead to a refocussing of development on the Dingo series, as it did with Chihuahua/Lassie. Your decision here makes it clear that the next generation of woof-based Puppies will be a whole other breed of Puppy and not just the next generation.:happy:

ubuntu "and" debian???
Username: davesurrey
"It seems Woof will be a winner even if it would onlysupport one distro but now it may support three that's great news. I can understand the logic (and history) behind chosing Slackware but why both Debain and Ubuntu? They are so closely connected. If a third can really be entertained why not some other major distro ...Fedoro or whatever?? Thereby starts an interesting debate. Dave

ubuntu "and" debian
Username: davesurrey
"Yes, I know...it's Fedora! Typo

Puppy Kernel
Username: Dougal
"Is the lzma compression in the 2.6.25.16 kernel a patch? (it was merged at some stage) I tried compiling it with gzip compression and it wouldn't build.

lzma patch
Username: BarryK
"If I recall rightly, the kernel source that I uploaded, as used in 4.1.2, has the lzma patch. However, I recall it misbehaves if you change the pre-compile config settings. I think you have to tick all the compression modes, gzip, bzip2 and lzma.

2.6.27.4 Source sfs
Username: 01micko
"Hi Barry As you know gposil is working on the dpup build. In his 'retro' version (was the main version, but now he is in k2.6.30.5 fo that, wise choice ;) ) he is using k2.6.27.4, a stock woof kernel .pet. The problem is we can't find the kernel source .sfs. All the others are at puppylinux.com bar that one. Can you point me to it please? Googling has not turned it up. Thanks Mick

2.6.27.x
Username: BarryK
"01micko, I don't seem to have kept anything of 2.6.27.4. I recall that I used a squashfs patch but later on I couldn't find the same patch and others didn't work. The last one I worked on was 2.6.27.29, and I think I had a squashfs that worked, but I tried to patch "ext4dev" so that it would load as "ext4" but that didn't work, just broke ext4 support. I do have all the patches, instructions and 3rd party drivers that I used for 2.6.27.29, so someone else could tackle it, but they would have to live with ext4 filesystems being named 'ext4dev' -- unless there's some way to have an alias name for a filesystem.

2.6.27.4
Username: 01micko
"Thanks Barry It was alpha 4 I think of upup where you used that kernel, the Ubuntu kernel... So, compiling drivers shouldn't even be necessary. There should be Hardy (I think it was at that stage) drivers all over the web.. just finding the good ones!

2.6.27.4 modules
Username: BarryK
"No, you can't use the Ubuntu modules. The Ubuntu kernel does not work with Puppy. I patched it and configured it differently so it works with Puppy, and kernel modules are not interchangeable with the Ubuntu kernel. Though, some might work.

Tags: woof