What is a "frugal" install?

[RickyVaio]

But the funny thing is that the "full" install is inferior to the "frugal" install, in general. In low ram situations it could perform better, but a frugal install should automatically not load into ram when you have less than a certain threshold (128MB, last I checked. May have increased since then), in which case they'd be about the same. But the frugal still wouldn't use as much space as a full install, and it's easier to back up or replace, and less messy.

I'm curious about that one... Which one is faster, a frugal install or a full install? Or is it the same? After toying with a frugal install (the wiki was very clear as to how to do it) I did a full install on my PII/192 MB RAM notebook. I'm trying to figure out which one is faster... I was under the impression that in any install all the OS was still copied to RAM... but I may be wrong... if it's not: can it be done? Is it worth it?

Thanks
RickyVaio

[Pizzasgood]

It's not copied to ram with a full install.

Which is faster depends. With a Frugal install, everything will be in ram, but it will also be compressed. So the speed depends on how long it takes to load the data from the ram and then decompress it. On any modern machine, that's probably faster than loading the uncompressed data from the harddrive. Chances are if you can load to ram, it's fast enough.

Now, if you have so little ram that Frugal doesn't load into ram, it's closer. It's possible that loading the uncompressed data would be faster than loading the compressed data and then having to decompress it. I don't know the numbers though, so I don't know which specs you'd need for that to happen.


Another thing to consider is that there are different speeds. There's loading speed (click an icon, wait, then the app runs), and there's executing speed (running the program, for example: framerates, painting in GIMP, crunching numbers, etc.). The loading speed is the only one that will be different. Execution will be the same, other than that less ram will be availible to the Frugal install (unless it doesn't load to ram).

[RickyVaio]

OK, thanks.
I've been playing around with a frugal and a full install on the same machine and the loading time of SeaMonkey (useful because it's a big app) is about the same... or say, 6 seconds vs 5 seconds... not a big deal.

Thanks for the info

[Arcflup]

I find the frugal install to be marginally quicker but the great advantage of a frugal is that if you screw it up you can recover your system simply by copying a backup of your pup_save file over the screwed up one, provided you have made a backup of course.

[yamawho]

Hi all 1st post here.

I've been playing with puppy 2.16 most of the day.
After attempting to install it on the hdd twice, once with option 1 and 2nd with option 2, it just doesn't boot.

The way I got it going was to create one ext2 partition on a 8 gig hdd, then save to it when shutting down. I don't know what kind of install this would be ...

I also made a few directories on the hdd and figured out how to get to them.

I noticed that the changes like icons or changing wallpaper are saved. How does the system handle files saved in my docments when shutting down.
So far I have downloaded stuff and transfered it to the hdd before shutting down. If the save file is 512mb, what happens if you download a large pdf or the TV show and don't save it to the hdd ... does it get deleted ?

[Pizzasgood]

It should pop up an error message saying you ran out of disk space if you try downloading something too big. Otherwise, the file you download will probably get truncated or something. The "freemem" applet on the taskbar shows how much space you have left in the save-file (it's a slight misnomer, since it only shows actual ram usage in certain situations).

As for what type of install you have, if you're running from the CD it would be a LiveCD "install."

[jonyo]

Changes are saved (docs & stuff) auto on shutdown after chosing to save (to a save file somewhere) stuff on the first shutdown.

Save file size can be increased to...a known of ~ 1 gig. Some of us have gone to ~ 1.5 gigs with no probs. (start>utility>resize personal storage file)

Make a copy of your save file so that if you mess up, you don't have to start aaalll over again (don't ask how I know ). You can rename the copy of the saved file so pup doesn't recognize it on boot. I make a saved folder & put the known to work saved file copy in there. Sorta an easy way to restore when or if messin up & tired of tryin to sort things out. Save, or copy the save file often!

Hi all 1st post here.

I've been playing with puppy 2.16 most of the day.
After attempting to install it on the hdd twice, once with option 1 and 2nd with option 2, it just doesn't boot.

The way I got it going was to create one ext2 partition on a 8 gig hdd, then save to it when shutting down. I don't know what kind of install this would be ...

I also made a few directories on the hdd and figured out how to get to them.

I noticed that the changes like icons or changing wallpaper are saved. How does the system handle files saved in my docments when shutting down.
So far I have downloaded stuff and transfered it to the hdd before shutting down. If the save file is 512mb, what happens if you download a large pdf or the TV show and don't save it to the hdd ... does it get deleted ?

[yamawho]

I am enjoying 2.16 very much.
I was able to use linneighbourhood to connect to my FreeNAS (network attached storage) device. I do get an error every time I transfer something but the file seems to be OK.

[edoc]

I find the frugal install to be marginally quicker but the great advantage of a frugal is that if you screw it up you can recover your system simply by copying a backup of your pup_save file over the screwed up one, provided you have made a backup of course.

Please remind us of what a *complete* BACKUP looks like.

I *thought* I had made one the last time I upgraded and was sorely
disappointed to discover that I was missing critical Seamonkey
(E-mail archives, address book, Internet bookmarks, etc.) and some
other files and folders.

I want to wipe my laptop HDD and *then* do a Frugal Install of 2.16

I need to be able to *selectively* restore *some* files and folders but *not all*.

I am thinking that my ROOT and USR folders are necessary.
What else, please?

[cliff_the_kilt]

There is an error in the 2.13 manual (as mentioned by msumner above)

It is 2 lines above the burnccdc notes, and appears as garbled/overwritten text or link

What should it be?

Also, I get a whopping error in using the Install to Hard Drive script:

for example, I select a pre formatted 1.6GB partition for Puppys kennel, using a frugal install option.
hda7

MUT sees this partition ok, and is VFAT

but after selecting this partition, the script tries to install to hdb5

Not only a different partition, but another drive entirely!!!!

It then cannot find autoexec.bat to modify and gets into a helluva mess

I apologise if this has already been posted about, but I could not find it using a search

[BarryK]

The original question about what is a frugal install is also answered here:
http://www.puppylinux.com/hard-puppy.htm

[edoc]

The original question about what is a frugal install is also answered here:
http://www.puppylinux.com/hard-puppy.htm

You need to have a running Puppy to use the Universal Installer, so it is required to boot up the live-CD. When Puppy is running, look in the "Setup" menu and you will find an entry "Puppy Universal Installer".

Go to the Puppy download page to download the Puppy live-CD ISO file.

Is there anything you need to know before installing to hard drive?
Well, you should consider the types of partitions in your hard drive. Also, the Universal Installer supports two types of installation to hard drive:

Type 1: Also known as a "frugal install". The files vmlinuz, initrd.gz, pup_xxx.sfs and zdrv_xxx.sfs are copied to a partition. This partition may already have something installed on it and that will not be disturbed. This can be any type of partition, MSDOS, Windows (FAT, NTFS) or Linux (EXT2, EXT3 or REISERFS). For most people this is the recommended option.

QUESTION:

If one saves vmlinuz, initrd.gz, pup_xxx.sfs and zdrv_xxx.sfs one may copy
them back to restore the prior install. True?

What is one wants to do a selective install?

Does saving the entirety of ROOT and USR capture everything one might
want?

I am especially thinking of documents, pictures, E-mail archives and addresses, Web bookmarks, and also device-specific drivers and special
apps.

[hayden]

In case anyone else runs across this old thread, the computer I am writing this on has a 117Mb FAT32 partition. I do not know what the maximum is. I think 4Mb is the size limit for a SINGLE file. Any thumb drive bigger than 2Gb is probably formatted FAT32.

[edoc]

I have learned a LOT about Puppy since then!

I try to keep everything that I can out of the Savefile and as necessary make a symlink, e.g. for the Mozilla Profile for Seamonkey -- which can get huge.

[Henry]

I've been using Puppy exclusively for years (currently QNop12) with live-CD. But when I try to do a frugal install (even using Barry's universal installer) ii's not successful.

I just dug up Guest Too's instruction earlier in this thread and followed it carefully:

if you have copied the files from the cd to hda1 ... Puppy is installed on the hard drive

now you need to install a boot loader to start Puppy, if you don't have one installed

make a directory (folder) on hda1 called boot

make a directory in /boot called grub

make a file in /boot/grub called menu.lst (that's LST,not one-st)

put something like this in menu.lst: (it's the "something like" that worries me. Henry )

title Puppy
root (hd0,0)
kernel /vmlinuz root=/dev/ram0 PMEDIA=idehd
initrd /initrd.gz

your Grub boot loader is now configured , , ,

you can install Grub by copying the files in /usr/lib/grub/i386-pc to the /boot/grub directory ... /boot/grub will probably be in /mnt/home ... you actually only need the stage1 and stage2 files, and the stage1_5 file for the file system that /boot/grub is on ... but you might as well copy them all ... though stage2_eltorito is definitely not needed

now, to actually install the Grub boot loader to the mbr (first sector of the hard drive) you would type this in an rxvt console window:

grub
root (hd0,0)
setup (hd0)
quit

Grub (Grand Unified Boot loader) should now be installed and configured , , ,

I tried copying the files from the CD both directly to /mnt/home/ and to a subdir /mnt/home/qnop12frugal/

I have only Linux and only one partition, sda1 (fat32).

After I restart I do get the grub menu. Puppy is the only choice, as expected as it's my only operating system. When I choose it I get:
Error 11: Unrecognized device string.

I reckon I'm close, but . . . Thanks

[edoc]

Here is a selection from the GRUB on one of our laptops:

Code: Select all

# Linux bootable partition config begins
  title Puppy Linux Insidious Pup Frugal (on /dev/sda2)
  root (hd0,1)
  kernel (hd0,1)/insidiouspup/vmlinuz pfix=fsck PMEDIA=idehd PDEV1=sda2 psubdir=insidiouspup acpi=noirq nosmp vga=normal video=640x480
  initrd (hd0,1)/insidiouspup/initrd.gz
  # Linux bootable partition config ends

I tried copying the files from the CD both directly to /mnt/home/ and to a subdir /mnt/home/qnop12frugal/

What files did you copy, please?

[Henry]

Files I copied:

file:///mnt/home/qnop12frugal/ATAHD
file:///mnt/home/qnop12frugal/initrd.gz
file:///mnt/home/qnop12frugal/qrky-120.sfs
file:///mnt/home/qnop12frugal/vmlinuz

(The first is a zero size file; qrky-120.sfs was of course already on /mnt/home/ )

I'll study your grub code.

Thanks!

[rcrsn51]

Error #11 is a syntax error in your menu.lst. Please post your version here.

[Henry]

Error #11 is a syntax error in your menu.lst. Please post your version here.

I'm making some revisions now. Will send it shortly.

Thanks

[James C]

FWIW, here's the menu.lst for my frugal indtall of Quirky 140.

title Quirky 140 frugal in sda7
rootnoverify (hd0,6)
kernel /puppy140/vmlinuz pfix=fsck pdev=sda7 pmedia=idehd psubdir=puppy140 nosmp acpi=force
initrd /puppy140/initrd.gz