Puppy is a version of the Linux Operating System that is intended to run on personal computers. The use of this system is to offer the security that is not what it should be with the Microsoft Windows operating systems. Puppy is to be used to browse the Internet when the 'reliability' of URLs is in question. When Puppy is used properly, no harm will come to your computer or its contents, no matter how malicious are the intentions of the writers of the webpages that you happen to visit. Your usernames, passwords, account numbers, etc. are not available to be stolen.
Puppy is used in lieu of the Windows environment. The User may conveniently go back and forth between operating systems by restarting the computer, and choosing which operating system is to be used. This is accomplished by inserting the Puppy Boot disk in the compact disk drive (to run Puppy), or not (to run Windows.)
Any Internet use that involves banking or any financial transactions should not be performed in the Windows enviornment. Use Puppy instead for this purpose.
For Users who do nothing but browsing and 'doing email', Puppy could supply all of the computer needs of the User.
In any event, we want to keep intruders from reading or modifying anything on your disks. I can keep any damage to my computer files from happening because, on the desktop computers that I have in my office and home, there is a switch on each computer with which I can turn off the power to the hard drives installed within the computer. Furthermore, I can make the attached drives completely unavailable by removing the plug to them (USB and/or Firewire) before booting Puppy. By unplugging the drives, it makes it completely impossible for any Internet (browsing or email) intruder from touching anything on these drives.
However, at times, we would all like to save our sessions and all of the installation steps that we have performed. This can be accomplished easily by using a USB Flash drive that is available for a very low cost. Any device capacity above 2 GBytes in capacity will do the job nicely.
Puppy can be run in two separate modes. The first, that we will call the "Live Mode", or simply, "Live". This mode does not use any disks in the computer. The second mode we call "Frugal". In this mode a single disk is used to store information from session to session. For full security, the Live mode is used. It should be noted that Puppy asks the user if the "session is to be saved". To stay in the Live mode, the user answers no. If the user answers yes, the Live session becomes a Frugal session.
Puppy Linux is distributed by the Tulsa Cassandra Society by the use of one Compact Disk (CD). The disk is called the Puppy 5.7.1 BOOT Disk. This disk contain files that are all invariant under program execution; i.e., each file is not changed in any way while Puppy is running.
The User Manual for Puppy is found here: Puppy Linux Click on "Manual-English" on the right side of the screen.
Things to do in Windows before booting Puppy for the first time.
Let us turn our attention to the task of running Puppy for the first time.
Let us assume that the computer has at least 384 MBytes of RAM and that you have a USB disk - with nothing on it. Also, we assume that without our doing anything with Puppy disk, when the power is turned on, some version of the the Microsoft Windows operating system will boot properly.
There are a few things that we must do before we boot Puppy for the first time. These are:
1) If you have a desktop computer, check the proper operation of the uninterruptible power supply (UPS) that powers the computer. If it does not function properly, repair it. If one is not there, go buy one and install it. If your computer is a laptop with battery power, the UPS is not manditory.
2) Power up the machine. Quickly hit F2, DEL, or whatever your machine tells you to execute the BIOS Setup program. Hit the Boot key. Change the boot sequence (if necessary) so that USB is first, then CD, then floppy, then hard drive. Save your settings and boot Windows.
The Puppy Boot disk is used for every boot operation with Puppy. In a machine with Windows installed and the BIOS boot sequence has been set so that the CD is examined before the hard drive, when the power is turned on and when the Puppy BOOT disk is present in the CD drive, Puppy Linux will be booted. When a disk is not present in the CD drive when the power is turned on, Windows will be started. It is that simple.
3) If you want email in Puppy, Execute the Mozilla Thunderbird program, select "Address Book" . Then, "Tools>Export". Choose a name and save your address book as a .ldif file.
4) Again. if you want email in Puppy, Execute the Mozilla Thunderbird program, click on your account folder name. Click "View Settings for this Account". For future reference, write down your email address, your pop3 (or imap) server name, and your smtp server name. You will need this information during the Puppy installation.
6) Insert the Puppy BOOT disk in the CD drive.
7) Shutdown Windows.
The initial boot of Puppy Linux
Make sure that the Puppy BOOT disk in the CD drive and the drawer is closed.
Turn on the power to the computer. Puppy should boot. After a short time period it should ask you a sequence of questions with regard to your nationality, type of keyboard, mouse, etc. Take all of the defaults (by hitting "Enter"), unless you have a really good reason not to do so . Choose 1024x768 as the screen resolution (you will be able to change any of these things later)
After this you should see a desktop with a lot of pretty icons. If you do, Puppy Linux is booted and ready for use at this time. However, there are a few additional tasks that we need to perform after initial bootup, that is, if we want to do any useful work. So, perform the following tasks:
1) Connect to Internet:
Click the "Connect" Icon.
The Internet Connection Wizard will start.
the Current Setup/Status section will show the connection
methods that Puppy finds that are available. It will
probably show something like:
* no modem detected
* Available network interfaces:eth0
Since it found eth0, Select "Internet by network or wireless lan"
The Puppy Network Wizard will appear.
Select the button for the eth0 interface.
The Configure network interface eth0 window will popup.
Press the "Test eth0" button.
Select "Auto DHCP"
The network wizard will attempt to configure eth0 with auto DHCP
If successful, a popup will appear,
It will now ask whether or not that you want to keep this
configuration for the next boot, click "yes".
The Configure network interface eth0 window will reappear.
Click "Done".
2) Configure the firewall, if desired.
Click the "Connect" Icon.
The Internet Connection Wizard will start.
Look for "Set up a firewall and click icon to left of text.
The firewallntallshell will appear.
In the shell, the first option (automagic) default install
without questions should be highlighted.
Press the enter key on the keyboard.
Text indicating that the firewall is being installed
and checked will appear.
Press the enter key on the keyboard to finish.
3) Install (if you wish) the NoScript addon to your Puppy browser. The NoScript addon is to give you the control over who and when scripts may be run on your computer by webpages that you visit. To install this addon, click here: NoScript Addon
4) Install (if you wish) the BetterPrivacy addon. The BetterPrivacy addon will, at the end of your browsing session, remove the 'Super Cookies' that are stored on the computer by programs that use the Adobe Flash animation software. As with regular cookies, these 'Super Cookies' are viewable by all websites we visit. There may be situations during which you would like to prevent websites from seeing that a certain bank has set cookies on your system.
5) Make make sure that all of the above tasks have been completed, click the "Browse" button on the desktop. Enter "www.google.com" and make sure that the Google page is presented. If so, you are now connected to the Internet.
6) If you want email capability in Puppy, Click the "Email" button on the desktop. Enter what you need to set up an email account. Here you will enter your email address, and the names of the pop and smtp servers that you want to use. If you do this wrong, you will not have email.
8) Set up a printer by clicking "Install" then selecting the CUPS printing Wizard. You must know the model number of your printer, because you will be asked for it.
9) Execute "Menu>Shutdown". You will be asked if you want to save your current session. If you do, mount a thumb drive in a USB port, or turn on a hard drive. It will ask you for a name for the file. The name of your computer will do. Puppy will create a file with an extension ".2fs". It will ask you how big you want this file to be. Answer: 1 GByte is recommended. Puppy will save this huge file in e:\ (the root directory of the USB flash drive.) Puppy will then shut down. It will not ask the questions, described above, again.
The second boot of Puppy Linux
1) insert the Puppy BOOT disk in the CD drive. Hit the reset button or turn the power off, then on. This will boot Puppy.
As a sanity check, click the "Console" button. At the command prompt type: "gcc" If it says something like, "no input files found" the Gnu compilers are installed, else it will say "bash command not found." Again, at the command prompt type "wine" if it gives you a menu, wine is installed. The response, "bash command not found" means that it has not been successfully installed.
After all this is said and done, let us now check the speed of your Internet connection. Click here: DSL speed test
[Warning: the Write icon (AbiWord) should not be used if you have any hope of taking files elsewhere.] Use the LibreOffice suite of programs instead. With LibreOffice, the equivalents of Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and others, are available from the menus.
Routine booting of Puppy in the Live Mode.
When you, the User, boot Puppy, the desktop will appear. Perhaps, you will be asked some of the questions already described, above.
To browse the Internet, click the Browse button on the desktop. A full version of the Mozilla Firefox browser will spring into action. Firefox will function precisely as it does in Windows. There is nothing new to learn.
Just before the browser session is ended, it is suggested that the User select History>Clear recent History from the Firefox menu. When this is done, there are no cookies or any mention of browsing history left on the computer, even if the Frugal Mode is being used.
To execute any of the LibreOffice Suite of programs (the equivalent of the Microsoft Office - Word, Excel, PowerPoint, etc.), click the menu button on the lower left of the desktop, selecting the category of program and then clicking on the LibreOffice program name.
At any time, the User may insert a USB thumb drive in the computer. Puppy will recognize its presence by showing a disk ikon on the desktop. When the User clicks this ikon, a window will appear that is quite similar to an Explorer window of the Windows Operating System. The User is free to 'drag and drop' files to and from the USB drive. All of the files are completely compatible with The Windows Operation System.
Let us say the the User has placed a Windows program on the USB drive. Lets call it myprog.exe. To execute this program in Puppy, the Console button on the desktop is clicked. Then, the following line is typed: "wine /mnt/sda1/myprog.exe". Depending upon what disks Puppy finds on the computer, "sda1" may be a different name, but Puppy will tell what to use by the label of the disk ikon on the desktop. In the event that windows are employed in myprog.exe, the word "wine" should be replaced by the word "wineconsole"
The entire complement of the Gnu compilers is available during the Puppy session. Describing the use of these programs is beyond the scope of this document. But, clicking the Console button on the desktop makes all of these programs available through the command prompt well known to the users of such programs.
Routine booting of Puppy in the Frugal Mode
When you boot Puppy, if you have previously moved yourself from the "Live" mode to the "Frugal" mode, you have saved files on a hard drive or a USB thumb drive, Puppy will find the files and use them to boot you back to where you were just before you shutdown the previous session. In the event you have the Puppy files in two or more places, Puppy will ask you which files that you want to use.
If you have not saved the Puppy files in a previous session by your responding "no" to the question asked when you last shut down, you are running a "Live Session". This is the prefered mode when the user wants full security.
All of the capiabilities described for the Live mode are available in the Frugal Mode.
6/22/14