STR takes the quirky side of Puppy Linux out for a walk.
Technology is constantly advancing and in recent years we’ve seen processors move from single core to multiple cores and for their physical size to shrink considerably. Linux distros have also grown over this time with a typical install now weighing in at around 4GB.
But what about older tech? Do we throw it away or can we recycle it with a lightweight Linux distro? Enter Quirky, a radical fork of Puppy Linux – an excellent lightweight distro in its own right with a 140MB download – which is a test bed for new ideas, hence the name Quirky. It started out as a pet project for Barry Kauler back in 2009, the original creator of Puppy Linux and the goal of the project is to be as small as possible.
Quirky stays true to the ideals of Puppy; being made for older PCs and optimised for use on USB drives and media cards and as it stands, Quirky is a 110MB download. On the face of it, there are very few cosmetic changes when compared with Puppy Linux.
The real differences are under the hood, where Quirky has made some unconventional choices. For instance, the downloaded image is a single partition or drive, which has been tuned using F2FS to ensure a snappy response on elderly kit. It also only installs in full, dispensing completely with loading initrd.gz into memory for a temporary root file system.
On the desktop, you will find low resource versions for most of the common applications: For instance, LibreOffice is replaced by Abiword and Gnumeric word processor and spreadsheet software. The desktop is ably represented using JWM (Joe’s Window Manager); a lovely light window manager that isn’t used nearly enough.
There are tools for both wired and wireless internet connectivity and a wide range of wireless chipsets are supported. But what’s most striking about Quirky is that it is easier to use than Puppy, a bold statement indeed as Puppy is a breeze.
Quirky but clever Quirky can be installed onto a variety of media and is especially suited to flash memory, such as USB and SSD drives.
The installation method requires a little knowledge of partitioning and setting up a disc, but it is straightforward.
We had a couple of niggles when using Quirky. First, we couldn’t follow the instructions that would copy the image to a USB drive, no matter what we did it failed to work, so in the end we used ddto copy the image across. It’s not a major issue, but it could be a bumpy ride for some users.
Second, the other issue was setting the default screen resolution, which was 800×480 on an original Eee PC. The closest we could manage without editing config files was 640×480, but for those of you with a standard resolution your mileage may vary.
However, a great feature is the ability to save your current machine setup so that when you next boot up, you will not have to configure all of your hardware and software again.
Even with these issues, we still think Quirky is great. While it’s not for all users: Those that need to re-purpose old kit, but still require the latest kernel will find this a very worthy distro for their toolbox. The choices made by Kauler are radical but they’ve paid off and created a quick and lightweight cutting-edge distro. In fact, you could say the lineage of Puppy Linux proves a good pedigree for this distro.
Technology is constantly advancing and in recent years we’ve seen processors move from single core to multiple cores and for their physical size to shrink considerably. Linux distros have also grown over this time with a typical install now weighing in at around 4GB.
But what about older tech? Do we throw it away or can we recycle it with a lightweight Linux distro? Enter Quirky, a radical fork of Puppy Linux – an excellent lightweight distro in its own right with a 140MB download – which is a test bed for new ideas, hence the name Quirky. It started out as a pet project for Barry Kauler back in 2009, the original creator of Puppy Linux and the goal of the project is to be as small as possible.
Quirky stays true to the ideals of Puppy; being made for older PCs and optimised for use on USB drives and media cards and as it stands, Quirky is a 110MB download. On the face of it, there are very few cosmetic changes when compared with Puppy Linux.
The real differences are under the hood, where Quirky has made some unconventional choices. For instance, the downloaded image is a single partition or drive, which has been tuned using F2FS to ensure a snappy response on elderly kit. It also only installs in full, dispensing completely with loading initrd.gz into memory for a temporary root file system.
On the desktop, you will find low resource versions for most of the common applications: For instance, LibreOffice is replaced by Abiword and Gnumeric word processor and spreadsheet software. The desktop is ably represented using JWM (Joe’s Window Manager); a lovely light window manager that isn’t used nearly enough.
There are tools for both wired and wireless internet connectivity and a wide range of wireless chipsets are supported. But what’s most striking about Quirky is that it is easier to use than Puppy, a bold statement indeed as Puppy is a breeze.
Quirky but clever Quirky can be installed onto a variety of media and is especially suited to flash memory, such as USB and SSD drives.
The installation method requires a little knowledge of partitioning and setting up a disc, but it is straightforward.
We had a couple of niggles when using Quirky. First, we couldn’t follow the instructions that would copy the image to a USB drive, no matter what we did it failed to work, so in the end we used ddto copy the image across. It’s not a major issue, but it could be a bumpy ride for some users.
Second, the other issue was setting the default screen resolution, which was 800×480 on an original Eee PC. The closest we could manage without editing config files was 640×480, but for those of you with a standard resolution your mileage may vary.
However, a great feature is the ability to save your current machine setup so that when you next boot up, you will not have to configure all of your hardware and software again.
Even with these issues, we still think Quirky is great. While it’s not for all users: Those that need to re-purpose old kit, but still require the latest kernel will find this a very worthy distro for their toolbox. The choices made by Kauler are radical but they’ve paid off and created a quick and lightweight cutting-edge distro. In fact, you could say the lineage of Puppy Linux proves a good pedigree for this distro.