never a dull moment with Linux...
just when I thought I was getting somewhere finding my way around Puppy, installed a few things, changed desktop appearance, installed Flash player in Palemoon and chnged preferences, installed openvpn packages, started using spreadsheets - all pretty cool.
but then today, after booting my Puppy flash drive as usual, I find that Puppy has reverted to its original state. All my modifications lost and Puppy system gone back to the start with the settings screen showing (the one that asks for time zone, language, keyboard layout) just like the first time I ever booted the stick.
(I next booted the stick using the file checking option and a whole heap of stuff scrolled down the screen too fast for me to really see what was going on but there appeared to be lots of errors among which 'wrong directory count' or somesuch message appeared?)
I have no idea what might have led to this because because the shut down prior to the crash ran normally.
Speaking about shutdown - sometimes there is an uninterrupted shutdown the screen ends up blank and the power indicator light switched off, all good. At other times it appears I don't get a full shutdown, the final line on the screen says:
'reboot: power down'
sometimes after a period of a few minutes it disappears and all lights go out, other times I just have to yank the USB out of its socket to shut off the system.
as always, any advice welcome.
Flash drive Puppy settings didn't take
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RetroTechGuy
- Posts: 2947
- Joined: Tue 15 Dec 2009, 17:20
- Location: USA
This is really one of the things that I like about Puppy. A "backup" is as simple as copying the savefile to a new name (and/or drive). I periodically clone my entire drive to a 2nd (backup) drive.musher0 wrote:If you didn't use a pupsave file or folder, it figures...
No backup anywhere either, eh?
Tsk, tsk...
The "syncbackup" tool handles this nicely.
[url=http://murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=58615]Add swapfile[/url]
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[url=http://wellminded.net63.net/]WellMinded Search[/url]
[url=http://puppylinux.us/psearch.html]PuppyLinux.US Search[/url]
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RetroTechGuy
- Posts: 2947
- Joined: Tue 15 Dec 2009, 17:20
- Location: USA
Using savefiles, I always modify my boot sequence to (for example):s243a wrote:The boot process probably didn't find your save file or folder probably due to a corrupted file system. I think the command to fix it is fsck.
Also note that using ext4 file system helps to avoid these issues.
Code: Select all
kernel /Sulu/vmlinuz pmedia=atahd psubdir=Sulu pfix=fsck
initrd /Sulu/initrd.gz[url=http://murga-linux.com/puppy/viewtopic.php?t=58615]Add swapfile[/url]
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[url=http://puppylinux.us/psearch.html]PuppyLinux.US Search[/url]
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[url=http://puppylinux.us/psearch.html]PuppyLinux.US Search[/url]
thanks guys
I didn't make a backup because I'd used Puppy for only a very short time and didn't imagine it would fail so quickly.
I'll start back from the beginning and make a save file/backup from the start.
(Here's something you won't like - it would never happen in Windows.)
Puppy is brilliant, the concept is great, but clearly it has issues and remains difficult for many users - such a shame, if it ran easily and reliably the whole world would use it, but I'll keep persevering....
I didn't make a backup because I'd used Puppy for only a very short time and didn't imagine it would fail so quickly.
I'll start back from the beginning and make a save file/backup from the start.
(Here's something you won't like - it would never happen in Windows.)
Puppy is brilliant, the concept is great, but clearly it has issues and remains difficult for many users - such a shame, if it ran easily and reliably the whole world would use it, but I'll keep persevering....
I wouldn't know since I never tried running windows off a USB.I suspect I wouldn't like it though. Anyway, to make it more friendly to new users a warning could be added about installing/saving to ext2 file systems.bushrat wrote:thanks guys]
(Here's something you won't like - it would never happen in Windows.)
Puppy is brilliant, the concept is great, but clearly it has issues and remains difficult for many users - such a shame, if it ran easily and reliably the whole world would use it, but I'll keep persevering....
I love how people think a USB flash drive will last forever and never have problems.
Several things could be happening.
Bad flash drive that is going bad.
Reboot just to make sure it still does not find the save. Sometimes it just does not boot correctly.
Sometimes Puppy boots so fast, that the USB drive does not get fully mounted, before trying to load from it.
Initially a bad install of Xenialpup 7.5 even if it seemed to work OK.
Unetbootin uses fat 32 for the format of the USB flash drive.
That is OK only if it is a freshly done formatting.
If the drive ever got used by Windows. Fat 32 formats will get fragmented. Puppy will install and use it, but the fragmentation will cause problems.
Before installing Puppy.
A fresh new formatting should make the file system perfect, with no errors, fragmentation, corruption, etc....
Several things could be happening.
Bad flash drive that is going bad.
Reboot just to make sure it still does not find the save. Sometimes it just does not boot correctly.
Sometimes Puppy boots so fast, that the USB drive does not get fully mounted, before trying to load from it.
Initially a bad install of Xenialpup 7.5 even if it seemed to work OK.
Unetbootin uses fat 32 for the format of the USB flash drive.
That is OK only if it is a freshly done formatting.
If the drive ever got used by Windows. Fat 32 formats will get fragmented. Puppy will install and use it, but the fragmentation will cause problems.
Before installing Puppy.
A fresh new formatting should make the file system perfect, with no errors, fragmentation, corruption, etc....
The things they do not tell you, are usually the clue to solving the problem.
When I was a kid I wanted to be older.... This is not what I expected
YaPI(any iso installer)
When I was a kid I wanted to be older.... This is not what I expected
YaPI(any iso installer)
I'm pretty sure that you can also use linux file systems with Unetbootin.bigpup wrote:
Unetbootin uses fat 32 for the format of the USB flash drive.
That is OK only if it is a freshly done formatting.
If the drive ever got used by Windows. Fat 32 formats will get fragmented. Puppy will install and use it, but the fragmentation will cause problems.
Before installing Puppy.
A fresh new formatting should make the file system perfect, with no errors, fragmentation, corruption, etc....
That indicates the file system is corrupted.I next booted the stick using the file checking option and a whole heap of stuff scrolled down the screen too fast for me to really see what was going on but there appeared to be lots of errors among which 'wrong directory count' or somesuch message appeared?
Should try booting this way several times.
If the fsck can fix the corruption, it will stop giving errors.
It sometimes takes several runs of fsck to clean it all up.
With the format being fat32, Puppy is using a save file.
Save files can fill up and not be able to hold more.
The tray personal storage icon will warn when the save file is getting full.
That is when you have to UN-install stuff from the save file or make the save file bigger.
Resize personal storage file program can be used to make the save file bigger.
Biggest thing that eats up space in the save file is browser caches.
If the browser is not setup to clear the cache on shutdown. That cache keeps growing and growing.
The things they do not tell you, are usually the clue to solving the problem.
When I was a kid I wanted to be older.... This is not what I expected
YaPI(any iso installer)
When I was a kid I wanted to be older.... This is not what I expected
YaPI(any iso installer)
Correct.s243a wrote:I'm pretty sure that you can also use linux file systems with Unetbootin.bigpup wrote:
Unetbootin uses fat 32 for the format of the USB flash drive.
That is OK only if it is a freshly done formatting.
If the drive ever got used by Windows. Fat 32 formats will get fragmented. Puppy will install and use it, but the fragmentation will cause problems.
Before installing Puppy.
A fresh new formatting should make the file system perfect, with no errors, fragmentation, corruption, etc....
But I thought he used Unetbootin running in Windows and Windows can not do Linux formats.
So, I assumed it was formatted fat32.
If it was a new USB flash drive, it should have already been formatted fat32.
The things they do not tell you, are usually the clue to solving the problem.
When I was a kid I wanted to be older.... This is not what I expected
YaPI(any iso installer)
When I was a kid I wanted to be older.... This is not what I expected
YaPI(any iso installer)
It depends on what software you have on your windows machine:bigpup wrote:Correct.s243a wrote:I'm pretty sure that you can also use linux file systems with Unetbootin.bigpup wrote:
Unetbootin uses fat 32 for the format of the USB flash drive.
That is OK only if it is a freshly done formatting.
If the drive ever got used by Windows. Fat 32 formats will get fragmented. Puppy will install and use it, but the fragmentation will cause problems.
Before installing Puppy.
A fresh new formatting should make the file system perfect, with no errors, fragmentation, corruption, etc....
But I thought he used Unetbootin running in Windows and Windows can not do Linux formats.
So, I assumed it was formatted fat32.
If it was a new USB flash drive, it should have already been formatted fat32.
https://sourceforge.net/projects/ext2fsd/
Re: Flash drive Puppy settings didn't take
Removing the USB stick while it's being written to (like during a shutdown) is a sure way to corrupt the savefile. I'd have to think that's what happened in this case (although taking that long to shut down is not normal, and points to some additional issue).bushrat wrote:... other times I just have to yank the USB out of its socket to shut off the system.
My approach is to add additional programs/tweaks one at a time, test things for a while, and if all goes well - make a backup of the savefile using the Pupsave Hot Backup utility. Then continue on doing the same - if along the way something breaks, I'll simply roll back to the last good savefile and continue on from that point (hopefully figuring out what broke previously, and trying again).
Bob
If it has never happened to you.(Here's something you won't like - it would never happen in Windows.)
You are very, very, lucky!!!
I lost count of how many times I had to do a complete reinstall of Windows to fix a completely messed up system.
I will say Windows 10 is better at correcting problems, but not perfect.
Why do you think they have system restore!
That is nothing but a good backup.
System Restore is a feature in Microsoft Windows that allows the user to revert their computer's state (including system files, installed applications, Windows Registry, and system settings) to that of a previous point in time, which can be used to recover from system malfunctions or other problems.
The things they do not tell you, are usually the clue to solving the problem.
When I was a kid I wanted to be older.... This is not what I expected
YaPI(any iso installer)
When I was a kid I wanted to be older.... This is not what I expected
YaPI(any iso installer)
Yikes! It's even better to use the shutdow button on your machine if you must.bushrat wrote:... other times I just have to yank the USB out of its socket to shut off the system.
IIRC the 'reboot: power down' is okay, I have it also. But the minutes' wait to shutdown is not. Then do a reboot with pfix=fsck, a few times.
thank you all...
I don't know where to start actually so I've made another Puppy USB stick from scratch.
The new flash drive has never been used, it's 16GB, it's 4 weeks old, it's formatted FAT32 and with a bit of luck it won't do the crazy tricks the other one used to do, but I still have a nagging doubt about the actual installation.
I followed bigpup's method for installing Puppy with UNetbootin, to the letter, but again no luck with that. I still had to perform extra unzipping on the Puppy files after UNetbootin was supposed to unzip everything. There is no way UNetbootin will produce a recogniseable boot module at boot on my machine, no way whatever, unless I do further manual unpacking using 7-zip or similar. After the manual unzipping Puppy fires up good as gold no file errors (I use the file check option at boot) but what that's led to is my USB stick now holds about 1.7GB of Puppy files/folders. The stick is 16GB so I couldn't care less how much space the files take up so long as Puppy boots itself correctly.
Also with this stick I got a clean shut down no hanging at 'reboot: power down' but then the original stick used to shut down cleanly before it eventually went wonky....
A quick aside on Windows - I have never in all the years of using Windows ever used a 'restore point' never. Yeah, I know that's not recommended neither is having no swap file either - but that's the way I have always run Windows and not once in more years than I can remember have I ever had a Windows crash - at most if something went wobbly a reboot always fixed the problem. I'm not trying to say one system is better than another - though if I had to take sides I'd be on Puppy's side, it really is a gem which is why I'll persist until I get the little bastard running....
so for now I'm back installing stuff and when I've done a few more things I'll clone the stick so I won't have to start from scratch again.
you all appear resigned to Puppy failure occasionally? mmm.... but when it runs its performance is brilliant, everthing is faster and runs smoothly. I guess if you just wanted to stick with the native Puppy apps (the ones that install themselves such as Flash Player, PaleMoon etc) you wouldn't go far wrong. I'll be sticking to the Puppy apps once I better understand the file system it really remains a challenge for me.
See ya.
I don't know where to start actually so I've made another Puppy USB stick from scratch.
The new flash drive has never been used, it's 16GB, it's 4 weeks old, it's formatted FAT32 and with a bit of luck it won't do the crazy tricks the other one used to do, but I still have a nagging doubt about the actual installation.
I followed bigpup's method for installing Puppy with UNetbootin, to the letter, but again no luck with that. I still had to perform extra unzipping on the Puppy files after UNetbootin was supposed to unzip everything. There is no way UNetbootin will produce a recogniseable boot module at boot on my machine, no way whatever, unless I do further manual unpacking using 7-zip or similar. After the manual unzipping Puppy fires up good as gold no file errors (I use the file check option at boot) but what that's led to is my USB stick now holds about 1.7GB of Puppy files/folders. The stick is 16GB so I couldn't care less how much space the files take up so long as Puppy boots itself correctly.
Also with this stick I got a clean shut down no hanging at 'reboot: power down' but then the original stick used to shut down cleanly before it eventually went wonky....
A quick aside on Windows - I have never in all the years of using Windows ever used a 'restore point' never. Yeah, I know that's not recommended neither is having no swap file either - but that's the way I have always run Windows and not once in more years than I can remember have I ever had a Windows crash - at most if something went wobbly a reboot always fixed the problem. I'm not trying to say one system is better than another - though if I had to take sides I'd be on Puppy's side, it really is a gem which is why I'll persist until I get the little bastard running....
so for now I'm back installing stuff and when I've done a few more things I'll clone the stick so I won't have to start from scratch again.
you all appear resigned to Puppy failure occasionally? mmm.... but when it runs its performance is brilliant, everthing is faster and runs smoothly. I guess if you just wanted to stick with the native Puppy apps (the ones that install themselves such as Flash Player, PaleMoon etc) you wouldn't go far wrong. I'll be sticking to the Puppy apps once I better understand the file system it really remains a challenge for me.
See ya.
@RetroTechGuy
Thanks for comments - I'm not trying to poke fun at you but your code instructions might as well be in Chinese - newcomers to Puppy just don't know anything at that level of detail.
Thanks for comments - I'm not trying to poke fun at you but your code instructions might as well be in Chinese - newcomers to Puppy just don't know anything at that level of detail.
oh, I get what you are doing in general but I'm not close to being able to play with that yet....Using savefiles, I always modify my boot sequence to (for example):
Code:
kernel /Sulu/vmlinuz pmedia=atahd psubdir=Sulu pfix=fsck
initrd /Sulu/initrd.gz