 DistroWatch Weekly |
| DistroWatch Weekly, Issue 132, 2 January 2006 |
Happy New Year and welcome to the first issue of DistroWatch Weekly in 2006. An unusually high number of interesting releases have kept us busy during the Christmas break. We'll take a quick look at FoX Desktop Linux 1, a nice-looking distribution designed in the style of Mac OS X. We'll also discuss the increased acceptance of non-free software packages in Mandriva, point you to a resource about updating a SUSE 10.0 installation, and reveal the processor architectures that will likely see full support in Debian "etch". A quick tip to make it easier to switch between open applications on KDE and some end-of-year statistics complement the issue. Finally, our December 2005 donation goes to the Cacti project. Happy reading!
 Join us at irc.freenode.net #distrowatch
Content:
- Miscellaneous news: Christmas releases, Mandriva and Skype, SUSE's YOU, Debian shelves architectures
- Tips and tricks: Switch between open applications with Komposé
- First Looks: FoX Desktop Linux 1
- Donations: Cacti receives US$375
- Statistics: The best distribution?
- New additions: NepaLinux
- New distributions: AlienDrive Live CD, BinToo GNU/Linux, Cosmogonia Linux, fNux GNU/Linux, FrogDev LiveCD, Hacao Linux, Phantomix Live CD, Trinity Rescue Kit
Christmas releases, Mandriva and Skype, SUSE's YOU, Debian shelves four architectures
Christmas was different last year. While previously most distribution maintainers had a healthy habit of taking a break during the festive season, the number of releases within the last few days of 2005 was astonishingly high. Granted, some of them came from countries where Christmas is not widely celebrated (e.g. ASP Linux in Russia, Pardus Linux in Turkey), but several distributions developed in Europe and Americas also produced new releases. In fact, one of the best-known Linux companies, Mandriva Linux, released a new set of test ISO images right on Boxing Day! For some reason, BSD projects were especially busy, with a major new version by NetBSD released just before Christmas, but MirOS, DragonFly BSD, FreeSBIE and m0n0wall all put out new ISO images last week. Is this never-stopping work a sign of increasing competition among Linux distributions and other free operating systems? Whatever the reason, it seems that we can look forward to a very busy 2006 here at DistroWatch! Hope you can join in the fun!
* * * * *
 In a pre-Christmas interview with Yahoo France, François Bancilhon, the Mandriva CEO, defended his company's decision to mix free and non-free software in the commercial editions of Mandriva Linux. That's what the market dictates, he claimed, and that's what he believes is the best for the users. The commercial editions have been shipping with Acrobat Reader, Flash, Java, RealPlayer and proprietary graphics drivers for some time now, but the recent addition of Skype for Internet telephony is a new application. The CEO also talked about the acquisition of Conectiva, the company's current financial status, and breakdown of revenue by geographical regions. He considers China and Russia as the most important Linux markets of the future, perhaps hinting at a potential future acquisition or two in those countries. Several big domestic contracts that the company received recently should assure a healthy growth of Mandriva for some time to come. The full interview (in French) is available here.
 In recent issues of DistroWatch Weekly we talked a bit about keeping your distribution up-to-date with new packages. The users of SUSE Linux have had this task simplified considerably since the launch of openSUSE and the updates can now be installed from within YOU (YaST Online Update). Although YOU was always a useful utility to perform package management tasks on SUSE, its ability to add third-party repositories used to be limited (and poorly documented), so many users preferred APT over YOU. Luckily, this is now changing. If you don't know how to use YOU to update your SUSE installation, this article at Novell's Cool Solutions explains the process in detail and provides screenshots to illustrate the steps.
 The controversial decision to drop certain less popular processor architectures from the development of Debian's "etch", the project's next stable release, is now taking effect - after a two-month architecture re-qualification period. Despite the hard work of all involved, four architectures have not met the set criteria and are likely to be dropped from "etch"; these are: ARM, Motorola 68k, S/390 and Sun SPARC. The good news is that the increasingly popular AMD64 architecture will be included and officially supported for the first time - together with Alpha, HPPA, i386, IA64, Mips, Mipsel and PowerPC. See this mailing list post for further information. Debian GNU/Linux "etch" is currently scheduled for release in December 2006.
* * * * *
Switch between open applications with Komposé
If you are anything like me, you probably run several applications at the same time, spread across multiple virtual desktops. In my case, it's KMail, Liferea, Konsole, Firefox, Opera, Kate, gFTP, The GIMP, Amarok, RealPlayer and GKrellM that are permanently ready for input or display on one of the four KDE desktops. Although I have them organised in a logical manner, with each virtual desktop given a self-explanatory name, it sometimes may take several mouse clicks and serious concentration to bring up the correct application window with as few mouse clicks as possible.
Is there anything that can simplify the process of switching between different programs? Obviously there are other people who face a similar problem and that's why they invented Komposé. Komposé, which labels itself as a full-screen task manager for KDE, is a clever application that takes a screenshot of all your currently open windows, then groups them into one for easy access. Click on any of window presented and you'll be taken straight to that application. As always, a picture is worth a thousand words, so here you go:
KDE's Komposé allows you to access all open applications from one convenient place
(full image size: 558kB, resolution: 1280x1024 pixels)
Once you start Komposé, it will take screenshots of all currently open windows on all of KDE's active virtual desktops, then place an icon into the system tray. You can activate it in one of three ways: 1) by clicking on the icon, 2) with a (configurable) shortcut key combination, and 3) by moving the mouse pointer to one of the corners of the screen (also configurable). Komposé can be further configured to group application windows in a certain order and to display them with various effects.
Once you start using Komposé, you'll wonder how you've ever managed without it. A great time-saving tool worthy of a presence on every KDE user's desktop.
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| First looks: FoX Desktop Linux 1 |
First looks: FoX Desktop Linux 1
When you install dozens of Linux distributions every month, the first impressions of a product become very important. With FoX Desktop Linux 1, these were a lot better than those of most other new distributions I installed in recent months, so I decided to spend more time investigating this new product. The brainchild of Glauco Zuccaccia from the town of Montefiascone near Rome, Italy, FoX Linux has been in development for over a year. Although the English pages of the distribution's web site are somewhat less fluent, don't let that stop you from trying out FoX - it is certainly one of the more interesting efforts of the past year.
For system installation, the developers have wisely resisted the temptation to re-invent the wheel and stayed with the tried and tested Anaconda. Once installed and the system rebooted, the user will be presented with a good-looking KDE desktop, all dressed up in a Mac OS X-like desktop theme. This is what makes FoX Desktop an interesting alternative to the major Linux distributions - not only it is nicely designed, it also gives an impression that much thought has gone into creating a pleasant working environment for the user.
FoX Desktop 1 - a nice distribution with a Mac OS X-like KDE desktop theme
(full image size: 371kB, resolution: 1280x1024 pixels)
But that's not all. Upon investigating the KDE menus, I came across an item called "FoX Control Center". This is a collection of shortcuts to KDE modules or custom-made applications for administering various aspects of the computer. I was particularly intrigued by the tab called "Security Center", which offers a number of useful options, including password management, cryptography, firewall configuration, and authentication. All the buttons are accompanied by brief descriptions of their functions so even non-expert users can configure many important security aspects of their distribution with relative ease.
Also available in this application is a software management tab. FoX, derived from Fedora Core, uses the RPM package format with a difference - it employs a package management tool called "smart". This works both from the command line and from within a graphical application that can be invoked by pressing the Remove/Install button in the FoX Control Center (you might have to close the KSmartTray icon first if you get an error message). There is also an option to upgrade the entire system to a new version.
FoX Desktop 1 ships with an innovative control center
(full image size: 99kB, resolution: 1280x1024 pixels)
FoX Desktop Linux 1 is based on Fedora Core 4, but it includes many up-to-date packages. The Linux kernel is at version 2.6.14, and it also offers the very latest KDE 3.5.0 and related applications, such as amaroK 1.3.7 and K3b 0.12.10. Firefox 1.5 and OpenOffice.org 2.0.1 are also included. KDE, the only available desktop environment, has been slightly customised, while the Konqueror file manager comes with interesting default settings and several common folders in the user's home directory. It is clear that the developers have attempted to tailor the product to better suit recent Linux coverts and non-technical computer users.
So what's the business model? The freely downloadable edition of FoX Desktop Linux is labelled as "Lite", while a "Professional" edition is expected to be released shortly. Details of the differences between the two are a bit sketchy at this time, but it looks like the users of the Professional edition will be able to take advantage of extra drivers, add-ons and software via "PowerUP". FoX's PowerUP is a custom application that promises, for what it's worth, to "easily increase the power of your system". Details about the pricing have not yet been announced.
Overall, I found FoX Desktop Linux to be a very pleasant operating system with powerful security features, good custom system administration utilities, intuitive package management with "smart", and a great-looking desktop theme emulating the style of Mac OS X. Worth a try, especially if you are new to Linux or if you enjoy the look and feel of the Mac.
For more information about the FoX Desktop Linux please visit the distribution's web site at FoxLinux.org.
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| Released During the Last Two Weeks |
Debian GNU/Linux 3.1r1
The first security and critical bug-fix update to Debian GNU/Linux 3.1 "sarge" has been released: "This is the first update of Debian GNU/Linux 3.1 (codename 'sarge') which mainly adds security updates to the stable release, along with some corrections to serious problems. Those who frequently update from security.debian.org won't have to update many packages and most updates from security.debian.org are included in this update. Upgrading to this revision online is usually done by pointing the 'apt' package tool (see the sources.list(5) manual page) to one of Debian's many FTP or HTTP mirrors." As usual, this Debian update brings no major package upgrades, but it does incorporate security fixes into existing packages. See the release announcement for a detailed list of changes.
BeleniX 0.3
The developers of the BeleniX have released a new version of their OpenSolaris-based live CD: "A new version of the live CD has been released, containing several new software packages and enhancements. The highlights: Perl Curses hard disk installer ('hdinstaller' utility) that can dump the contents of the CD to a Solaris2 partition; enhancements to speed up the booting process; based on OpenSolaris build 27 with the new 128-bit ZFS filesystem; included a very minimal package file registry in /pkgs to support an ISO remastering tool; a missing driver in earlier releases caused Creative SB audio cards to not work, this has been fixed; included the 'ae' driver from Masayuki Murayama so the network now works in VMware...." Read the full release announcement on the distribution's home page.
NetBSD 3.0
NetBSD 3.0 has been released: "The NetBSD Project is pleased to announce that release 3.0 of the NetBSD operating system is now available. NetBSD is widely known as the most portable operating system in the world. It currently supports 57 different system architectures, all from a single source tree, and is always being ported to more. NetBSD 3.0 continues our long tradition with major improvements in stability, performance, networking, security, also includes support for two new platforms (iyonix and hp700), and many new peripherals." More details can be found in the release announcement.
Linux Netwosix 1.3
Linux Netwosix 1.3 has been released: "After the second Netwosix release of 2004, Netwosix 1.2, Linux Netwosix 1.3 continues its tradition of reliability, stability, and security. This is the present-release for Christmas 2005. Among the many program updates and distribution enhancements you will find a stable, complete and cleaned GNU/Linux box for your network security related jobs. Linux Netwosix 1.3 uses the latest 2.6.14.4 stable kernel bringing you advanced and reliable performance. We could consider the latest release like a good GNU/Linux alternative to *BSD secure systems." Read the release announcement for full details.
FoX Desktop 1
The first stable version of FoX Desktop Linux, a Fedora-based desktop-oriented distribution optimised for modern processors, is now available: "After a lot of work by the FoX Linux Team, FoX Desktop 1 has been released. This is the first stable version of FoX Desktop, based upon Fedora 4, recompiled for better optimization. Here are the best features of FoX Desktop 1: FoX Desktop repository for updates and software installation; a tool that finds updates; a new Fox Control Center completely redesigned for better usage; a better looking style; 'smart' is the default software manager; many users can use the system simultaneously through graphical interface." See the complete release announcement for additional information.
Kurumin Linux 5.1
An updated version of Kurumin Linux has been released. Version 5.1 is a minor update, except for the replacement of XFree86 with X.Org 6.8.2 with support for the 3D desktop; other changes include an update to KDE 3.4.2, addition of Nmap, amaroK media player and Synergy (for sharing a single mouse and keyboard between multiple computers), update to OpenOffice.org 2.0.0 (Brazilian Portuguese edition), various bug fixes, script updates and application upgrades. The development of Kurumin Linux 6.0 has also started and the first alpha release should be available in early January. Find out more in the release announcement and changelog (both links in Portuguese).
The ever pretty Kurumin Linux desktop
(full image size: 1,080kB, resolution: 1280x1024 pixels)
Pardus Linux 1.0
Following the release of a live CD edition earlier this year, the developers of Pardus Linux have now announced the first official release of the Pardus installation CD. Developed by the Uludağ Project in Turkey and designed for desktop use, the distribution is an interesting effort providing several custom utilities, including a nicely designed graphical installation program, a configuration manager, and a control panel. It uses a unique package management called "PiSi". Although developed primarily for Turkish speakers with several Turkish utilities and a dictionary, the system installer and user interface also support English. See the release announcement on the distribution's home page for further details about Pardus Linux.
MirOS #8
MirOS is an operating system based on OpenBSD, but with a number of notable differences (listed at number one is "no hot-tempered head developer"). A new version has been released: "The MirOS Project is proud to announce the immediate release of MirOS XP, consisting of MirOS BSD #8 and the MirPorts Framework. This release is the first in the MIRBSD_8 branch and still highly experimental in some parts, especially ports, but has been thoroughly tested and deemed stable." For more information and a detailed list of changes please see the release announcement. A bootable ISO image of MirOS #8, inclusive of the sources and ports tree, is available for download via BitTorrent: MIR51223.ISO (image size: 354MB).
Puppy Linux 1.0.7
Puppy Linux 1.0.7 has been released. What's new? "The big news is the move from the Xvesa Kdrive X server to the sophisticated X.Org X server (6.8.1). However, Xvesa is retained as a fallback. The Xorg Video Wizard has been written from scratch to give a very pleasant experience setting up and modifying X.Org. Gaim is upgraded from version 1.0.2 to 1.5.0. Puppy has the full set of plugins supplied with the source package. There is now a very nice little program to graphically view the sizes of directories and files, called Gdmap. Xarchive archiver replaces guiTar, and there is a desktop icon called PupZip that is a drag-and-drop frontend to Xarchive...." More details can be found on the project's news page.
KANOTIX 2005-04
The first news item of 2006 is the announcement of the much awaited new release of KANOTIX, a live CD with a reputation for having the best hardware auto-detection and auto-configuration on the market. Released in the dying minutes of 2005, KANOTIX 2005-04 features: "kernel 2.6.14.5 with numerous patches; udev 0.079 and new hardware recognition (hwsetup-ng) - no kudzu based recognition anymore; new graphical installer with update feature; ACPI and DMA are activated by default; kernel optimised for modern CPUs - i586 and x86_64; X.Org 6.8.2 for full support of NVIDIA and ATI cards; KDE 3.4.3; Firefox 1.5; OpenOffice 2.0.0; Unionfs support; AMSN 0.95 instant messenger with video support...." Read the rest of the release announcement for further details.
m0n0wall 1.21
m0n0wall, a tiny firewall and server based on FreeBSD, has been updated to version 1.21: "m0n0wall 1.21 released! m0n0wall 1.21 greatly improves the captive portal (better and more RADIUS options, file manager, stability), updates all components to the latest version and fixes several bugs." The release is based on 4.11-RELEASE-p13. Other changes include stability improvements to mini_httpd, captive portal RADIUS improvements, and various package updates (PHP 4.4.1, Dnsmasq 2.23). See the release announcement and changelog for a complete list of changes.
* * * * *
Development and unannounced releases
- Magic Linux 2.0-rc2, the release announcement (in Chinese)
- VectorLinux 5.1-rc1 (SOHO edition), the release announcement
- rPath 0.99.3, the release announcement
- Mediainlinux 4-rc5, the release notes
- NepaLinux 1.0-beta, the press release
- ASP Linux 11-beta, the release announcement (in Russian)
- Mandriva Linux 2006.1-0.3 (Cooker snapshot), the changelog
- RR64 Linux 3.0-beta0, the changelog
- STX Linux 1.0-rc3, the release announcement
- Guadalinex 3-rc1, the release announcement (in Spanish)
- Linux Netwosix 2.0-rc1, the release announcement
- Berry Linux 0.66
- Mutagenix 2.6.14.2-2
- DragonFly BSD 1.4-rc2
- Ututo 2006-test2
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| Upcoming Releases and Announcements |
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Summary of expected upcoming releases
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| Web Site News |
December 2005 donation: the Cacti project receives US$375
 We are pleased to announce that, based on the reader feedback during the past few months, the recipient of our December 2005 donation is the Cacti project.
If you've never heard of Cacti, it is a web-based front-end to RRDTools (Round Robin Database Tool), a data storage and graphing utility. Cacti is written in PHP and uses MySQL to gather data, create graphs and populate them with data. It is often used for generating graphs about network traffic and performance monitoring, such as CPU or memory usage (see screenshots). Cacti is the brainchild of Ian Berry and the project has been around since 2001. Besides creating a great open source application, Cacti also deserves a donation "for having such a super clean website that many other open source website should follow," as put by one of the readers who nominated the project for the donation.
As always, our monthly donations programme is a joint initiative between DistroWatch and two online shops selling low-cost CDs and DVDs with Linux, BSD and other open source software - LinuxISO.co.uk and LinuxCD.org, each of which contributed US$50 towards this month's donation. Both stores have an excellent selection and latest releases at very reasonable prices. Next time you need to order your favourite Linux or BSD CDs, get them from LinuxCD.org or, if you are in the United Kingdom, from LinuxISO.co.uk.
This is the PayPal receipt for the donation to Cacti:
Dear DistroWatch.com,
This email confirms that you have paid iberry -at- raxnet -dot- net $375.00 USD using PayPal.
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Total: $375.00 USD
Item/Product Name: Donation to the Cacti project
Buyer: DistroWatch.com
Message: This is a donation by DistroWatch.com as part of our monthly donations programme to support open source software development. Keep up the good work!
Here is the list of projects that received a DistroWatch donation since the launch of the donations programme:
Since the launch of the DistroWatch Donations Programme in March 2004, we have donated a total of US$6,230 to various open source software projects.
* * * * *
Which is the best?
With the end of the year 2005, let's take a brief look at the changes in the popularity of Linux distributions as measured by our Page Hit Ranking statistics. As you can see from the table below, Ubuntu Linux was a clear winner over the last year, with SUSE, MEPIS, Damn Small Linux and FreeBSD all climbing in the ranking. Of those distributions that dropped only four have shown declining numbers of page hits over the last year - these were KNOPPIX, Gentoo, Slackware and PCLinuxOS. Among the new entries in the top 20 there are Kubuntu (the highest ranked newcomer at number 14), CentOS, KANOTIX, Puppy Linux and, perhaps surprisingly, PC-BSD.
As always, don't read too much into the numbers. They are provided for entertainment only and they almost certainly don't correlate with market share figures.
* * * * *
New distribution additions
* * * * *
New distributions added to the waiting list
- AlienDrive Live CD. AlienDrive Live CD is a new i686-optimised distribution, but that's about all the project's web site tells us about it. It seems to be based on SLAX.
- BinToo GNU/Linux. BinToo GNU/Linux (the word was created from "Binary" and "Gentoo") is a new Gentoo-based distribution, currently in early alpha.
- Cosmogonia Linux. Cosmogonia Linux is a new Italian live CD distribution based on Fedora Core.
- fNux GNU/Linux. fNux GNU/Linux is a new linux distribution project which intends to grab "some of the best ideas around". It is currently in the planning stage with a rough feature list.
- FrogDev LiveCD. FrogDev LiveCD is a Gentoo-based, laptop-oriented live CD distribution localised into French.
- Hacao Linux. Hacao Linux is a new Vietnamese live CD based on Puppy Linux.
- Phantomix Live CD. Phantomix is a Knoppix-based live CD. It is configured to use the Tor and Privoxy software for anonymous Internet communication. Using Tor can help anonymise web browsing and publishing, instant messaging, IRC, SSH, and other applications for better privacy and security on the Internet.
- Trinity Rescue Kit. Trinity Rescue Kit 3.0 is a Mandriva-based bootable Linux distribution aimed specifically at offline operations for Windows and Linux systems such as rescue, repair, password resets and cloning. It has custom tools to easily recover data such as deleted files, clone Windows installations over the network, perform antivirus sweeps with two different antivirus products, reset windows passwords, read and write on NTFS partitions, and edit partition layout.
* * * * *
DistroWatch database summary
That's all for today. See you next Monday!
Ladislav Bodnar
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| Archives |
| • Issue 1112 (2025-03-10): Solus 4.7, distros which work with Secure Boot, UBports publishes bug fix, postmarketOS considers a new name, Debian running on Android |
| • Issue 1111 (2025-03-03): Orbitiny 0.01, the effect of Ubuntu Core Desktop, Gentoo offers disk images, elementary OS invites feature ideas, FreeBSD starts PinePhone Pro port, Mint warns of upcoming Firefox issue |
| • Issue 1110 (2025-02-24): iodeOS 6.0, learning to program, Arch retiring old repositories, openSUSE makes progress on reproducible builds, Fedora is getting more serious about open hardware, Tails changes its install instructions to offer better privacy, Murena's de-Googled tablet goes on sale |
| • Issue 1109 (2025-02-17): Rhino Linux 2025.1, MX Linux 23.5 with Xfce 4.20, replacing X.Org tools with Wayland tools, GhostBSD moving its base to FreeBSD -RELEASE, Redox stabilizes its ABI, UBports testing 24.04, Asahi changing its leadership, OBS in dispute with Fedora |
| • Issue 1108 (2025-02-10): Serpent OS 0.24.6, Aurora, sharing swap between distros, Peppermint tries Void base, GTK removinglegacy technologies, Red Hat plans more AI tools for Fedora, TrueNAS merges its editions |
| • Issue 1107 (2025-02-03): siduction 2024.1.0, timing tasks, Lomiri ported to postmarketOS, Alpine joins Open Collective, a new desktop for Linux called Orbitiny |
| • Issue 1106 (2025-01-27): Adelie Linux 1.0 Beta 6, Pop!_OS 24.04 Alpha 5, detecting whether a process is inside a virtual machine, drawing graphics to NetBSD terminal, Nix ported to FreeBSD, GhostBSD hosting desktop conference |
| • Issue 1105 (2025-01-20): CentOS 10 Stream, old Flatpak bundles in software centres, Haiku ports Iceweasel, Oracle shows off debugging tools, rsync vulnerability patched |
| • Issue 1104 (2025-01-13): DAT Linux 2.0, Silly things to do with a minimal computer, Budgie prepares Wayland only releases, SteamOS coming to third-party devices, Murena upgrades its base |
| • Issue 1103 (2025-01-06): elementary OS 8.0, filtering ads with Pi-hole, Debian testing its installer, Pop!_OS faces delays, Ubuntu Studio upgrades not working, Absolute discontinued |
| • Issue 1102 (2024-12-23): Best distros of 2024, changing a process name, Fedora to expand Btrfs support and releases Asahi Remix 41, openSUSE patches out security sandbox and donations from Bottles while ending support for Leap 15.5 |
| • Issue 1101 (2024-12-16): GhostBSD 24.10.1, sending attachments from the command line, openSUSE shows off GPU assignment tool, UBports publishes security update, Murena launches its first tablet, Xfce 4.20 released |
| • Issue 1100 (2024-12-09): Oreon 9.3, differences in speed, IPFire's new appliance, Fedora Asahi Remix gets new video drivers, openSUSE Leap Micro updated, Redox OS running Redox OS |
| • Issue 1099 (2024-12-02): AnduinOS 1.0.1, measuring RAM usage, SUSE continues rebranding efforts, UBports prepares for next major version, Murena offering non-NFC phone |
| • Issue 1098 (2024-11-25): Linux Lite 7.2, backing up specific folders, Murena and Fairphone partner in fair trade deal, Arch installer gets new text interface, Ubuntu security tool patched |
| • Issue 1097 (2024-11-18): Chimera Linux vs Chimera OS, choosing between AlmaLinux and Debian, Fedora elevates KDE spin to an edition, Fedora previews new installer, KDE testing its own distro, Qubes-style isolation coming to FreeBSD |
| • Issue 1096 (2024-11-11): Bazzite 40, Playtron OS Alpha 1, Tucana Linux 3.1, detecting Screen sessions, Redox imports COSMIC software centre, FreeBSD booting on the PinePhone Pro, LXQt supports Wayland window managers |
| • Issue 1095 (2024-11-04): Fedora 41 Kinoite, transferring applications between computers, openSUSE Tumbleweed receives multiple upgrades, Ubuntu testing compiler optimizations, Mint partners with Framework |
| • Issue 1094 (2024-10-28): DebLight OS 1, backing up crontab, AlmaLinux introduces Litten branch, openSUSE unveils refreshed look, Ubuntu turns 20
| | • Issue 1093 (2024-10-21): Kubuntu 24.10, atomic vs immutable distributions, Debian upgrading Perl packages, UBports adding VoLTE support, Android to gain native GNU/Linux application support |
| • Issue 1092 (2024-10-14): FunOS 24.04.1, a home directory inside a file, work starts of openSUSE Leap 16.0, improvements in Haiku, KDE neon upgrades its base |
| • Issue 1091 (2024-10-07): Redox OS 0.9.0, Unified package management vs universal package formats, Redox begins RISC-V port, Mint polishes interface, Qubes certifies new laptop |
| • Issue 1090 (2024-09-30): Rhino Linux 2024.2, commercial distros with alternative desktops, Valve seeks to improve Wayland performance, HardenedBSD parterns with Protectli, Tails merges with Tor Project, Quantum Leap partners with the FreeBSD Foundation |
| • Issue 1089 (2024-09-23): Expirion 6.0, openKylin 2.0, managing configuration files, the future of Linux development, fixing bugs in Haiku, Slackware packages dracut |
| • Issue 1088 (2024-09-16): PorteuX 1.6, migrating from Windows 10 to which Linux distro, making NetBSD immutable, AlmaLinux offers hardware certification, Mint updates old APT tools |
| • Issue 1087 (2024-09-09): COSMIC desktop, running cron jobs at variable times, UBports highlights new apps, HardenedBSD offers work around for FreeBSD change, Debian considers how to cull old packages, systemd ported to musl |
| • Issue 1086 (2024-09-02): Vanilla OS 2, command line tips for simple tasks, FreeBSD receives investment from STF, openSUSE Tumbleweed update can break network connections, Debian refreshes media |
| • Issue 1085 (2024-08-26): Nobara 40, OpenMandriva 24.07 "ROME", distros which include source code, FreeBSD publishes quarterly report, Microsoft updates breaks Linux in dual-boot environments |
| • Issue 1084 (2024-08-19): Liya 2.0, dual boot with encryption, Haiku introduces performance improvements, Gentoo dropping IA-64, Redcore merges major upgrade |
| • Issue 1083 (2024-08-12): TrueNAS 24.04.2 "SCALE", Linux distros for smartphones, Redox OS introduces web server, PipeWire exposes battery drain on Linux, Canonical updates kernel version policy |
| • Issue 1082 (2024-08-05): Linux Mint 22, taking snapshots of UFS on FreeBSD, openSUSE updates Tumbleweed and Aeon, Debian creates Tiny QA Tasks, Manjaro testing immutable images |
| • Issue 1081 (2024-07-29): SysLinuxOS 12.4, OpenBSD gain hardware acceleration, Slackware changes kernel naming, Mint publishes upgrade instructions |
| • Issue 1080 (2024-07-22): Running GNU/Linux on Android with Andronix, protecting network services, Solus dropping AppArmor and Snap, openSUSE Aeon Desktop gaining full disk encryption, SUSE asks openSUSE to change its branding |
| • Issue 1079 (2024-07-15): Ubuntu Core 24, hiding files on Linux, Fedora dropping X11 packages on Workstation, Red Hat phasing out GRUB, new OpenSSH vulnerability, FreeBSD speeds up release cycle, UBports testing new first-run wizard |
| • Issue 1078 (2024-07-08): Changing init software, server machines running desktop environments, OpenSSH vulnerability patched, Peppermint launches new edition, HardenedBSD updates ports |
| • Issue 1077 (2024-07-01): The Unity and Lomiri interfaces, different distros for different tasks, Ubuntu plans to run Wayland on NVIDIA cards, openSUSE updates Leap Micro, Debian releases refreshed media, UBports gaining contact synchronisation, FreeDOS celebrates its 30th anniversary |
| • Issue 1076 (2024-06-24): openSUSE 15.6, what makes Linux unique, SUSE Liberty Linux to support CentOS Linux 7, SLE receives 19 years of support, openSUSE testing Leap Micro edition |
| • Issue 1075 (2024-06-17): Redox OS, X11 and Wayland on the BSDs, AlmaLinux releases Pi build, Canonical announces RISC-V laptop with Ubuntu, key changes in systemd |
| • Issue 1074 (2024-06-10): Endless OS 6.0.0, distros with init diversity, Mint to filter unverified Flatpaks, Debian adds systemd-boot options, Redox adopts COSMIC desktop, OpenSSH gains new security features |
| • Issue 1073 (2024-06-03): LXQt 2.0.0, an overview of Linux desktop environments, Canonical partners with Milk-V, openSUSE introduces new features in Aeon Desktop, Fedora mirrors see rise in traffic, Wayland adds OpenBSD support |
| • Issue 1072 (2024-05-27): Manjaro 24.0, comparing init software, OpenBSD ports Plasma 6, Arch community debates mirror requirements, ThinOS to upgrade its FreeBSD core |
| • Issue 1071 (2024-05-20): Archcraft 2024.04.06, common command line mistakes, ReactOS imports WINE improvements, Haiku makes adjusting themes easier, NetBSD takes a stand against code generated by chatbots |
| • Issue 1070 (2024-05-13): Damn Small Linux 2024, hiding kernel messages during boot, Red Hat offers AI edition, new web browser for UBports, Fedora Asahi Remix 40 released, Qubes extends support for version 4.1 |
| • Issue 1069 (2024-05-06): Ubuntu 24.04, installing packages in alternative locations, systemd creates sudo alternative, Mint encourages XApps collaboration, FreeBSD publishes quarterly update |
| • Issue 1068 (2024-04-29): Fedora 40, transforming one distro into another, Debian elects new Project Leader, Red Hat extends support cycle, Emmabuntus adds accessibility features, Canonical's new security features |
| • Issue 1067 (2024-04-22): LocalSend for transferring files, detecting supported CPU architecure levels, new visual design for APT, Fedora and openSUSE working on reproducible builds, LXQt released, AlmaLinux re-adds hardware support |
| • Issue 1066 (2024-04-15): Fun projects to do with the Raspberry Pi and PinePhone, installing new software on fixed-release distributions, improving GNOME Terminal performance, Mint testing new repository mirrors, Gentoo becomes a Software In the Public Interest project |
| • Issue 1065 (2024-04-08): Dr.Parted Live 24.03, answering questions about the xz exploit, Linux Mint to ship HWE kernel, AlmaLinux patches flaw ahead of upstream Red Hat, Calculate changes release model |
| • Issue 1064 (2024-04-01): NixOS 23.11, the status of Hurd, liblzma compromised upstream, FreeBSD Foundation focuses on improving wireless networking, Ubuntu Pro offers 12 years of support |
| • Issue 1063 (2024-03-25): Redcore Linux 2401, how slowly can a rolling release update, Debian starts new Project Leader election, Red Hat creating new NVIDIA driver, Snap store hit with more malware |
| • Issue 1062 (2024-03-18): KDE neon 20240304, changing file permissions, Canonical turns 20, Pop!_OS creates new software centre, openSUSE packages Plasma 6 |
| • Issue 1061 (2024-03-11): Using a PinePhone as a workstation, restarting background services on a schedule, NixBSD ports Nix to FreeBSD, Fedora packaging COSMIC, postmarketOS to adopt systemd, Linux Mint replacing HexChat |
| • Full list of all issues |
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| Random Distribution | 
Phaeronix
Phaeronix was a Gentoo-based live CD with GNOME, Reiser4-enabled GRUB, automatic hardware detection with NVIDIA 3D support - all ready for multimedia, Internet, and Arabic.
Status: Discontinued
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| Star Labs |
Star Labs - Laptops built for Linux.
View our range including the highly anticipated StarFighter. Available with coreboot open-source firmware and a choice of Ubuntu, elementary, Manjaro and more. Visit Star Labs for information, to buy and get support.
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