Puppy is mainly a distro for live mode use.
I would first use it from a puppy live cd,
and would recommend the Icepuppy 14 variation,
which is quite complete, and can easily be
used as a normal user spot when entering
the internet. I think this is safer then as root.
See my explanations here :
http://kmeleonbrowser.org/forum/read.php?11,116835
Download the iso from here :
http://smokey01.com/pemasu/IcePuppy-014/icepuppy-014.iso
Burn the iso to a cd in iso mode (not just copying the file).
After booting puppy should find your eth0 ethernet connection
automatically.
If it doesn't, try the internet connection wizard in
the menu "Setup".
To update the included Firefox browser go in the menu
"Setup"->"Setup Puppy"->"Puppy Package manager"
and enable on the top "ubuntu-lucidupdates-main"
and search for firefox - where you find a further
updated FF 3.6.17.
You can search also for the wine emulator(wine1.0_1.0.1).
As an alternative you can also download FF 3.6.26 on your
own and install it in the folder /opt, where you could also
install a K-Meleon version.
To use the internet, you can start a browser or any
other application as user spot.
Clicking on the console icon on top of the desktop
will open a terminal. Typing there :
xterm -e su spot
will open a terminal with the user rights of the user spot.
There you can type then the path to the browser, for example:
firefox
if it is in the system, or if unpacked in /opt :
/opt/firefox/firefox
for K-Meleon :
wine /path-to-K-Meleon
If you get an error message about /tmp is not writable,
type in the console (as root)
chown -R root : spot /tmp
(no space before and after : ),then push the Enter key
and then type
chmod -R 775 /tmp
and push the Enter key.
The programs can of course also be started from
added icons or an adapted menu.
After having installed everything that you want,
you can remaster the live cd. Look in the menu
"Setup" for "Remaster Puppy live-Cd".
If you want to install your system (in live mode)
on an USB stick (at least 2 GB, better 4 Gb),
you can use the included script in the menu "Setup"
called "Puppy universal installer".
I hope that you succeed.
I would in any case test distros as live cds before
trying to install them.
Regards
Fred