 DistroWatch Weekly |
| DistroWatch Weekly, Issue 302, 11 May 2009 |
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Welcome to this year's 19th issue of DistroWatch Weekly! With mobile computing being the next operating system battleground, it's hardly surprising that many industry players are focusing on these increasingly popular devices. One of the most promising among them, Moblin, has been through some major changes recently, both in terms of ownership and development goals. Read our feature story for the roundup of its recent past and probable future to learn more about the project. In the news section, Debian ditches the GNU C Library in favour of the more flexible Embedded GLIBC, Fedora finalises all features for the upcoming Leonidas release which includes delta support for RPMs, Slackware switches to packages compressed with LZMA compression mechanism, and the Ubuntu community looks to create yet another derivative based on the LXDE. Finally, don't miss our tips and trick section which provides a step-by-step guide of upgrading a stable Mandriva Linux 2009.1 to the latest Cooker, Mandriva's bleeding-edge development branch. Happy reading!
Content:
 Listen to the Podcast edition of this week's DistroWatch Weekly in OGG (30MB) and MP3 (26MB) formats (many thanks to Sonny Chauvin)
 Join us at irc.freenode.net #distrowatch
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| Feature Story (by Caitlyn Martin) |
The future of Moblin
 Back in February Chris Smart took a first look at Moblin V2 alpha 1 and found it to be a very promising distribution for netbooks. In the three months that have passed since Chris wrote his feature on Moblin a lot has changed, both in terms of the code and in terms of who is directing the future of Moblin. It's time to take a look at the flurry of Moblin news over the past three months and also to look at what we can expect from the netbook-specific distro in the coming weeks and months.
A brief history of Moblin
Intel launched Moblin in July 2007, just one month after ASUS announced the Eee PC. Version 1.0, based on Ubuntu, was released in April 2008 to coincide with the first release of Intel's Atom processor. The original version targeted Mobile Internet Devices (MIDs) which was probably fortunate since that release actually wouldn't run on netbooks, including those with Intel Atom CPUs. Intel originally hoped that Moblin powered devices would reach market by summer 2008 but they never materialized.
In July, 2008, a year into Moblin development, Intel announced a major reworking of Moblin. The Ubuntu kernel was replaced by one from Fedora, the RPM package management system was adopted, a new GUI was developed, and a new set of GNOME mobile applications were slated for inclusion in the next release. For version 2 Intel all but started from scratch, this time targeting netbooks and nettops as well as embedded devices.
In August of last year Intel acquired OpenedHand, a company specializing in embedded Linux. OpenedHand developed Clutter, a framework for simplified GUI development. Clutter is designed to offer improved graphics and fluid movement, and is now part of Moblin. In October, 2008, Novell began contributing to the Moblin project.
Recent developments
The first alpha of Moblin 2 was released in January and this was the version Chris Smart reviewed so favorably. In March a second alpha was released which offered faster boot times. Phoronix benchmarked alpha 2 and found that the actual boot time was 16 seconds on a Samsung NC10 netbook with a solid state device (SSD) for storage. From a user's perspective booting seems even faster since X was loaded in just three seconds and Xfce 4.6 was running at seven seconds. Alpha 2 also added support for MSI Wind netbooks, an updated version of Clutter, a release candidate of GNOME 2.26, and a 2.6.29rc7 kernel. Alpha 2 is still the version currently available for download on the Moblin website.
At the beginning of last month Intel turned over control of Moblin to the Linux Foundation though Intel remains heavily involved in the development of the distro. Imad Sousou, director of Intel's Open Source Technology Center stated: "Big corporations are not good shepherds of open-source projects." A week later Sasou announced that future releases of Moblin would boot in just two seconds. The ultra-fast boot process is needed by auto manufacturers for embedded computers in cars, a market targeted by Intel for Moblin. Sasou also stated that parallelisation, or initializing multiple components at the same time, which is used by other distros to achieve fast boot times, isn't good enough for Moblin: "Parallelised bloat is still bloat."
Last week Moblin was in the news again as Novell announced a major commitment to the distribution, including a version of SUSE Linux based on Moblin. SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop (SLED) is already available on some netbooks by HP, Lenovo and MSI but has been plagued with serious configuration issues on some netbook models. According to a report on DesktopLinux.com published on Thursday, the new SUSE product "appears to be more of a 'SUSE-fied' version of Moblin rather than a 'Moblinized' version of SUSE".
Guy Lunardi, Novell's director of client preloads, stated: "It's very possible you will see Novell going to market with OEMs on pre-installations on netbooks as early as a few weeks after the final release of Moblin 2.0." He added that the new Moblin version of SUSE could "be compelling to disenchanted Windows users who are finding it to be too slow."
What's next for Moblin?
A third alpha release of Moblin 2 is imminent according to a report on The Register published last Thursday. A project roadmap, including a schedule for beta releases, is expected to follow soon after. This roadmap should provide the first clues on whether there are any changes in Moblin's direction now that the Linux Foundation is in charge. The big question is whether Moblin will be expanded to support more than just Intel processors and graphics chipsets. The Register believes this change is "inevitable" if Moblin is to survive. They believe ARM, PowerPC and possibly even MIPS processors will have to be supported. VIA Technologies, an Intel competitor in x86 space, is still actively developing netbook/nettop chipsets as well.
Moblin faces stiff competition on netbooks from Ubuntu Netbook Remix, Xandros Presto, and Linpus Lite. Google has also gained a lot of mindshare for its Android embedded Linux distribution currently used on smart phones. The first ARM CPU powered netbook running Android was announced late last month. Major netbook manufacturers included ACER, ASUS and HP are already testing Android on netbooks and Dell is reported to be readying trials of their own.
With so many changes in a relatively short time and no successful track record of marketing, some see bleak future for Moblin. Others see real potential, particularly in light of the Novell partnership. The current alpha version supports Intel Core Duo processors as well as the Atom, so it should be possible to give Moblin a try on some desktop systems. In addition Moblin provides KVM and VMware images, making it possible to use the distro on a virtual nettop. After trying Moblin 2 alpha 2 the only thing I can be certain of is that it is an interesting distribution with some unique and compelling code.
Moblin's early alphas use a standard Xfce desktop, but this will be replaced with a custom interface in the final release
(full image size: 462kB, screen resolution 800x600 pixels)
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| Tips and Tricks (by Ladislav Bodnar) |
Running Mandriva "Cooker"
 Once upon a time, Linux was a highly technical operating system that few outside of computer engineering circles dared to use or even heard of. In those days, even a stable release was often a challenge to install, but once the system was brought under control, many technical users were quick to jump onto the next challenge - installing a new beta version, keeping up with the changes in the development trees, and interacting with the developers on mailing lists and bug reporting facilities. Although those days are gone and nowadays most distributions are comparatively easy to install and use, there is no reason why some of the more confident Linux users shouldn't try running a development tree of their favourite distribution.
This has many advantages. Firstly, the user will feel more involved with his or her preferred project by running exactly what the distro's developers use on their system (remember, free and open source software is all about sharing, rather than just consuming). Secondly, by running the development tree, users can greatly contribute towards the stability of individual packages and the entire distribution by reporting bugs and talking to the developers on the mailing lists. And thirdly, using the development tree will mean that you'll be running the absolute bleeding edge of what the open source software world has on offer. Of course, there is one big disadvantage - your system can break at any time. Although it is often possible to fix any problem with some online help, it is often faster to re-install the system from scratch and continue from there.
Two weeks ago, Mandriva announced that its development tree, called "Cooker", had undergone a major post-release update, with many bleeding-edge packages now available for those who dare to run them on their computers. Most notably, the KDE desktop has been upgraded to the first beta release of version 4.3 (labelled 4.2.85). This is an excellent way to try out the next major update of the popular desktop and to contribute towards its smooth release, scheduled for 28 July 2009. The question is, how do you upgrade to Cooker? It's actually very simple. Once you decide that that's indeed what you want to do (preferably on a test system), just follow these steps:
- Remove the existing repositories: # urpmi.removemedia -a
- Add the Cooker repository: # urpmi.addmedia --distrib --mirrorlist 'http://api.mandriva.com/mirrors/basic.cooker.i586.list'
- Optionally add the PLF repository: # urpmi.addmedia --distrib --mirrorlist 'http://plf.zarb.org/mirrors/cooker.i586.list'
- Update the package list: # urpmi.update -a
- Update all installed software: # urpmi --auto-select
- Repeat steps 4 and 5 daily to ensure that you are always in sync with the Cooker development.
* Note: Commands in steps 4 and 5 can be combined into one command: # urpmi --auto-update
I upgraded my Mandriva 2009.1 installation (on a test machine) to the latest Cooker over the weekend and encountered few problems. Sometimes, depending on how fast the mirrors synchronise with the main server, you might end up with some dependency issues or other errors, but these often "automagically" correct themselves the following day. While the usual warnings apply, don't be paranoid over running a bleeding edge system - remember that this is all that Mandriva developers and active contributors run on their computers year after year! Who knows, maybe you can even become a contributor or you can adopt an "orphaned" Mandriva package yourself!
You can run a very early build of Mandriva Linux 2010 with just a few commands
(full image size: 960kB, screen resolution 1280x1024 pixels)
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| Miscellaneous News (by Chris Smart) |
Debian ditches glibc, Slackware switches to TXZ, Fedora adds delta package support, Ubuntu eyes LXDE, interviews with Jonathan Thomas and Linus Torvalds, Marble Live CD
 Unbeknownst to many outside the Debian embedded developer community, the project has long been struggling with the GNU C Library. The main issue has centred on disagreements with the upstream developer who is a Red Hat employee. Aurélien Jarno posted on his blog that Debian has now ditched GLIBC. He writes: "I have just uploaded Embedded glibc (eglibc) into the archive (it is currently waiting in the NEW queue), which will soon replace the GNU C Library (glibc). The eglibc is a variant of glibc which stays source and binary compatible with the original glibc." He goes on to provide reasons for the change, citing a more friendly upstream (especially with regard to embedded architectures), better support for embedded architectures and support for building with -Os, among others. He concludes the post by saying: "We do not use some of these features yet, but this upload is a first step. From the user point of view, the package names are unchanged (except the source package and the binary package containing the sources) so no transition is needed." While eglibc is currently backwards compatible with the original glibc, how might this change over time? Hopefully this will be a good move for Debian and help further improve the popular distro, especially on embedded architectures like ARM.
* * * * *
 With Fedora 11 now just a fortnight away, all 52 features for the new release have been marked 100% complete and the release looks dead on track. One such feature is Presto, a plugin for Fedora's update manager which makes use of RPM deltas. This greatly reduces the amount of data required when users perform updates, as only differences to the previous update are downloaded. It's not a new idea by any means and other distros have had it for years, but it's still a nice update to include in the new release and one which will be of great benefit to all. Users who pay for the amount of data they download and those not connected via fast connections will be the biggest winners. The major catch is that although now complete, the feature is not enabled by default and requires users to install the package to activate it. The command, yum install yum-presto should do the trick. Josh Boyer: "We'll probably still have a few hiccups here and there, but the infrastructure is now in place." Either way, it's a step in the right direction for one of the world's most popular distributions.
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 Slackware, the oldest surviving Linux distribution, has made a small but important change to its packages - switching the compression from gzip to xz. Patrick Volkerding's announcement in the change log says it all: "This batch of updates includes the newly released KDE 4.2.3, but more noticeably it marks the first departure from the use of gzip for compressing Slackware packages. Instead, we will be using xz, based on the LZMA compression algorithm. xz offers better compression than even bzip2, but still offers good extraction performance (about 3 times better than bzip2 and not much slower than gzip in our testing). Since support for bzip2 has long been requested, support for bzip2 and the original lzma format has also been added (why not?), but this is purely in the interest of completeness -- we think most people will probably want to use either the original .tgz or the new .txz compression wrappers. The actual Slackware package format (which consists of the layout within the package envelope) has not changed, but this is the first support within Slackware's package tools for using alternate compression algorithms." Now that Slackware supports packages with different compression algorithms, it firmly puts the idea of having a standard suffix for all Slackware packages (such as "package.slk") to bed.
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 Another day, another Ubuntu derivative. This time it's LXDE, a lightweight desktop environment, which is causing a stir in the Ubuntu community: "Lightweight X11 Desktop Environment (LXDE) is an extremely fast, high-performance and energy-saving desktop environment. LXDE uses less CPU and RAM. It is especially designed for cloud computers with low hardware specifications like netbooks, mobile devices or older computers." With Ubuntu's foray into cloud computing, perhaps this desktop makes sense for the project. Not content just to support the desktop environment, however, the community is looking to create yet another derivative. Mario Behling writes on the LXDE blog: "As a first step Mark [Shuttleworth] invited us to become a self-maintained project in the Ubuntu community. This means we will be able to manage LXDE inside Ubuntu, ultimately offering an Ubuntu derivative, ergo Lubuntu." Indeed it may not be long before we see "Lubuntu" as the URL lubuntu.org already re-directs to the LXDE project page. This new environment is a hot competitor to Xfce, the current lightweight desktop champion. But as we have seen in recent weeks, the Xubuntu implementation is not exactly lightweight. Hopefully the community will let this new LXDE derivative stay true to its roots and not burden it with heavy, resource-hungry services.
* * * * *
 Enjoy travelling the world without leaving the comfort of your computer home? Then check out Cornelius Schumacher's Marble Live CD, a live media booting straight into Marble, a popular virtual globe and world atlas application similar to Google Earth, but open source and released under a free license: "Marble is one of my favorite applications. I especially like it in combination with OpenStreetMap. Free software and free maps, a brilliant combination. But I also love the historical map or the moon view. Marble is also great as a demo application. It's easy to grasp and makes an attractive showcase. To make demonstrating Marble a bit easier, I thought it would be nice to have a Marble live CD." Created with SUSE Studio, the CD includes Marble 4.2.3 with additional data from Blue Marble. For further information and download links please visit the author's Marble in a Box page.
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Two interesting interviews have made it into this week's DistroWatch Weekly. The first is with Jonathan Thomas, student and Kubuntu developer. The interview centres on the Ubuntu development cycle as they discuss the recent 9.04 release. The next release of Ubuntu will be 9.10, which the interviewer suggests should be a more KDE-centric release. Thomas replies: "I think I'd give it the same amount of work even if it was named 'Giggling Gnome', but I think that the K in there is pretty neat." The other interview is with Linus Torvalds, the father of Linux who follows up on part one of his interview for Linux Magazine. In this part, source management system, Git and the Linux kernel come under spotlight. Git has an undeserved reputation of being hard to learn as it has thousands of internal commands. But Linus Torvalds says that's a red herring: "I went through a totally ridiculous example of a few people working together, and noting every time we used a new git command. I think we ended up with something like fourteen commands being used. And even that's more than most end developers will ever need. That list of fourteen commands was for the whole 'multiple people working together, including the person integrating things' workflow." From the Git logs, Linus shows the number of commits to the kernel numbers 27,143. Of those, only 88 are patches that he himself authored.
* * * * *
Finally, in this Windows-dominated world, it is always a pleasure to come across a public computer proudly running Linux. The following picture was taken in a supermarket in Ecuador and published by EcuaLUG (web site in Spanish).
A cash register running Red Hat Enterprise Linux as spotted in a hypermarket in Ecuador
(photo courtesy of EcuaLUG)
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| Released Last Week |
Canaima GNU/Linux 2.0.1
Canaima GNU/Linux is a Debian-based desktop distribution created mainly for use in Venezuela's government departments, but also available to general public as a desktop operating system. Version 2.0.1 was released yesterday. Some of its characteristics include: Modified bootsplash and desktop theme with Canaima artwork and logos; inclusion of OpenOffice.org 3.0.1 with a Spanish (Venezuela) dictionary; additional Impress templates and support for extended picture gallery; addition of OpenOffice.org Presenter; addition of XChat, a software package facilitating access to the distribution's IRC channel; updates to Freemind, an application for creating mind maps; update to OpenProj, project management software; update to the Pidgin instant messenger; update to Firefox 3.0.10 with support for Flash and GStreamer plugins. Please read the release announcement and release notes (both links in Spanish) for further details.
BSDanywhere 4.5
Stephan Rickauer has announced the release of BSDanywhere 4.5, a live CD consisting of a base OpenBSD system plus a graphical desktop (Enlightenment 17): "We are pleased to announce the immediate availability of BSDanywhere 4.5 - Enlightenment at your fingertips. Here's a quick summary of the changes since 4.4: Upgrade base system to OpenBSD 4.5 and packages accordingly, please see the OpenBSD site for a list of changes since 4.4; contains official, standard, unmodified OpenBSD kernel - previously, we had to ship a slightly modified version of the OpenBSD kernel to make the boot off CD media less cumbersome, but thanks to OpenBSD developer Kenneth Westerback, this has been improved in OpenBSD 4.5; last but not least, we have great new artwork, provided graciously by Tim Saueressig." Here is the complete release announcement.
Parted Magic 4.1
Patrick Verner has released Parted Magic 4.1, a specialist live CD containing a collection of software for managing hard disks: "This version of Parted Magic fixes some bugs and adds some new features and programs. There was a scripting error that caused DEB packages not to load in some situations, mkfstab was moved later in the booting process to stop the new fstab from being overwritten by the one from the 'Save Session' package, and 'partimag' user was added by default for PartImage. The fstab daemon now detects device mapper RAID partitions while removing the unmountable mirrors from /etc/fstab. GParted and mount-gtk correctly display and mount these partitions. Added support for new package extensions .tbz, tlz, txz. Numlock is set to 'on' in and outside of X by default." Read the rest of the release announcement for additional details.
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Development, unannounced and minor bug-fix releases
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| Upcoming Releases and Announcements |
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Summary of expected upcoming releases
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| DistroWatch.com News |
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New distributions added to database
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New distributions added to waiting list
- MONOMAXOS. MONOMAXOS is an Ubuntu-based distribution and live DVD designed mainly for Greek speakers, with English also available as an optional language. It includes support for many popular media codecs and can be set up as a standalone media centre (with XBMC).
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DistroWatch database summary
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And this concludes the latest issue of DistroWatch Weekly. The next instalment will be published on Monday, 18 May 2009.
Ladislav Bodnar, Caitlyn Martin and Chris Smart
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| Archives |
| • Issue 1155 (2026-01-12): MenuetOS, CDE on Sparky, iDeal OS 2025.12.07, recommended flavour of BSD, Debian seeks new Data Protection Team, Ubuntu 25.04 nears its end of life, Google limits Android source code releases, Fedora plans to replace SDDM, Budgie migrates to Wayland |
| • Issue 1154 (2026-01-05): postmarketOS 25.06/25.12, switching to Linux and educational resources, FreeBSD improving laptop support, Unix v4 available for download, new X11 server in development, CachyOS team plans server edtion |
| • Issue 1153 (2025-12-22): Best projects of 2025, is software ever truly finished?, Firefox to adopt AI components, Asahi works on improving the install experience, Mageia presents plans for version 10 |
| • Issue 1152 (2025-12-15): OpenBSD 7.8, filtering websites, Jolla working on a Linux phone, Germany saves money with Linux, Ubuntu to package AMD tools, Fedora demonstrates AI troubleshooting, Haiku packages Go language |
| • Issue 1151 (2025-12-08): FreeBSD 15.0, fun command line tricks, Canonical presents plans for Ubutnu 26.04, SparkyLinux updates CDE packages, Redox OS gets modesetting driver |
| • Issue 1150 (2025-12-01): Gnoppix 25_10, exploring if distributions matter, openSUSE updates tumbleweed's boot loader, Fedora plans better handling of broken packages, Plasma to become Wayland-only, FreeBSD publishes status report |
| • Issue 1149 (2025-11-24): MX Linux 25, why are video drivers special, systemd experiments with musl, Debian Libre Live publishes new media, Xubuntu reviews website hack |
| • Issue 1148 (2025-11-17): Zorin OS 18, deleting a file with an unusual name, NetBSD experiments with sandboxing, postmarketOS unifies its documentation, OpenBSD refines upgrades, Canonical offers 15 years of support for Ubuntu |
| • Issue 1147 (2025-11-10): Fedora 43, the size and stability of the Linux kernel, Debian introducing Rust to APT, Redox ports web engine, Kubuntu website off-line, Mint creates new troubleshooting tools, FreeBSD improves reproducible builds, Flatpak development resumes |
| • Issue 1146 (2025-11-03): StartOS 0.4.0, testing piped commands, Ubuntu Unity seeks help, Canonical offers Ubuntu credentials, Red Hat partners with NVIDIA, SUSE to bundle AI agent with SLE 16 |
| • Issue 1145 (2025-10-27): Linux Mint 7 "LMDE", advice for new Linux users, AlmaLinux to offer Btrfs, KDE launches Plasma 6.5, Fedora accepts contributions written by AI, Ubuntu 25.10 fails to install automatic updates |
| • Issue 1144 (2025-10-20): Kubuntu 25.10, creating and restoring encrypted backups, Fedora team debates AI, FSF plans free software for phones, ReactOS addresses newer drivers, Xubuntu reacts to website attack |
| • Issue 1143 (2025-10-13): openSUSE 16.0 Leap, safest source for new applications, Redox introduces performance improvements, TrueNAS Connect available for testing, Flatpaks do not work on Ubuntu 25.10, Kamarada plans to switch its base, Solus enters new epoch, Frugalware discontinued |
| • Issue 1142 (2025-10-06): Linux Kamarada 15.6, managing ZIP files with SQLite, F-Droid warns of impact of Android lockdown, Alpine moves ahead with merged /usr, Cinnamon gets a redesigned application menu |
| • Issue 1141 (2025-09-29): KDE Linux and GNOME OS, finding mobile flavours of Linux, Murena to offer phones with kill switches, Redox OS running on a smartphone, Artix drops GNOME |
| • Issue 1140 (2025-09-22): NetBSD 10.1, avoiding AI services, AlmaLinux enables CRB repository, Haiku improves disk access performance, Mageia addresses service outage, GNOME 49 released, Linux introduces multikernel support |
| • Issue 1139 (2025-09-15): EasyOS 7.0, Linux and central authority, FreeBSD running Plasma 6 on Wayland, GNOME restores X11 support temporarily, openSUSE dropping BCacheFS in new kernels |
| • Issue 1138 (2025-09-08): Shebang 25.8, LibreELEC 12.2.0, Debian GNU/Hurd 2025, the importance of software updates, AerynOS introduces package sets, postmarketOS encourages patching upstream, openSUSE extends Leap support, Debian refreshes Trixie media |
| • Issue 1137 (2025-09-01): Tribblix 0m37, malware scanners flagging Linux ISO files, KDE introduces first-run setup wizard, CalyxOS plans update prior to infrastructure overhaul, FreeBSD publishes status report |
| • Issue 1136 (2025-08-25): CalyxOS 6.8.20, distros for running containers, Arch Linux website under attack,illumos Cafe launched, CachyOS creates web dashboard for repositories |
| • Issue 1135 (2025-08-18): Debian 13, Proton, WINE, Wayland, and Wayback, Debian GNU/Hurd 2025, KDE gets advanced Liquid Glass, Haiku improves authentication tools |
| • Issue 1134 (2025-08-11): Rhino Linux 2025.3, thoughts on malware in the AUR, Fedora brings hammered websites back on-line, NetBSD reveals features for version 11, Ubuntu swaps some command line tools for 25.10, AlmaLinux improves NVIDIA support |
| • Issue 1133 (2025-08-04): Expirion Linux 6.0, running Plasma on Linux Mint, finding distros which support X11, Debian addresses 22 year old bug, FreeBSD discusses potential issues with pkgbase, CDE ported to OpenBSD, Btrfs corruption bug hitting Fedora users, more malware found in Arch User Repository |
| • Issue 1132 (2025-07-28): deepin 25, wars in the open source community, proposal to have Fedora enable Flathub repository, FreeBSD plans desktop install option, Wayback gets its first release |
| • Issue 1131 (2025-07-21): HeliumOS 10.0, settling on one distro, Mint plans new releases, Arch discovers malware in AUR, Plasma Bigscreen returns, Clear Linux discontinued |
| • Issue 1130 (2025-07-14): openSUSE MicroOS and RefreshOS, sharing aliases between computers, Bazzite makes Bazaar its default Flatpak store, Alpine plans Wayback release, Wayland and X11 benchmarked, Red Hat offers additional developer licenses, openSUSE seeks feedback from ARM users, Ubuntu 24.10 reaches the end of its life |
| • Issue 1129 (2025-07-07): GLF OS Omnislash, the worst Linux distro, Alpine introduces Wayback, Fedora drops plans to stop i686 support, AlmaLinux builds EPEL repository for older CPUs, Ubuntu dropping existing RISC-V device support, Rhino partners with UBports, PCLinuxOS recovering from website outage |
| • Issue 1128 (2025-06-30): AxOS 25.06, AlmaLinux OS 10.0, transferring Flaptak bundles to off-line computers, Ubuntu to boost Intel graphics performance, Fedora considers dropping i686 packages, SDesk switches from SELinux to AppArmor |
| • Issue 1127 (2025-06-23): LastOSLinux 2025-05-25, most unique Linux distro, Haiku stabilises, KDE publishes Plasma 6.4, Arch splits Plasma packages, Slackware infrastructure migrating |
| • Issue 1126 (2025-06-16): SDesk 2025.05.06, renewed interest in Ubuntu Touch, a BASIC device running NetBSD, Ubuntu dropping X11 GNOME session, GNOME increases dependency on systemd, Google holding back Pixel source code, Nitrux changing its desktop, EFF turns 35 |
| • Issue 1125 (2025-06-09): RHEL 10, distributions likely to survive a decade, Murena partners with more hardware makers, GNOME tests its own distro on real hardware, Redox ports GTK and X11, Mint provides fingerprint authentication |
| • Issue 1124 (2025-06-02): Picking up a Pico, tips for protecting privacy, Rhino tests Plasma desktop, Arch installer supports snapshots, new features from UBports, Ubuntu tests monthly snapshots |
| • Issue 1123 (2025-05-26): CRUX 3.8, preventing a laptop from sleeping, FreeBSD improves laptop support, Fedora confirms GNOME X11 session being dropped, HardenedBSD introduces Rust in userland build, KDE developing a virtual machine manager |
| • Issue 1122 (2025-05-19): GoboLinux 017.01, RHEL 10.0 and Debian 12 updates, openSUSE retires YaST, running X11 apps on Wayland |
| • Issue 1121 (2025-05-12): Bluefin 41, custom file manager actions, openSUSE joins End of 10 while dropping Deepin desktop, Fedora offers tips for building atomic distros, Ubuntu considers replacing sudo with sudo-rs |
| • Issue 1120 (2025-05-05): CachyOS 250330, what it means when a distro breaks, Kali updates repository key, Trinity receives an update, UBports tests directory encryption, Gentoo faces losing key infrastructure |
| • Issue 1119 (2025-04-28): Ubuntu MATE 25.04, what is missing from Linux, CachyOS ships OCCT, Debian enters soft freeze, Fedora discusses removing X11 session from GNOME, Murena plans business services, NetBSD on a Wii |
| • Issue 1118 (2025-04-21): Fedora 42, strange characters in Vim, Nitrux introduces new package tools, Fedora extends reproducibility efforts, PINE64 updates multiple devices running Debian |
| • Issue 1117 (2025-04-14): Shebang 25.0, EndeavourOS 2025.03.19, running applications from other distros on the desktop, Debian gets APT upgrade, Mint introduces OEM options for LMDE, postmarketOS packages GNOME 48 and COSMIC, Redox testing USB support |
| • Issue 1116 (2025-04-07): The Sense HAT, Android and mobile operating systems, FreeBSD improves on laptops, openSUSE publishes many new updates, Fedora appoints new Project Leader, UBports testing VoLTE |
| • Issue 1115 (2025-03-31): GrapheneOS 2025, the rise of portable package formats, MidnightBSD and openSUSE experiment with new package management features, Plank dock reborn, key infrastructure projects lose funding, postmarketOS to focus on reliability |
| • Issue 1114 (2025-03-24): Bazzite 41, checking which processes are writing to disk, Rocky unveils new Hardened branch, GNOME 48 released, generating images for the Raspberry Pi |
| • Issue 1113 (2025-03-17): MocaccinoOS 1.8.1, how to contribute to open source, Murena extends on-line installer, Garuda tests COSMIC edition, Ubuntu to replace coreutils with Rust alternatives, Chimera Linux drops RISC-V builds |
| • 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 |
| • Full list of all issues |
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| Random Distribution | 
ForLEx
ForLEx was a lightweight Debian-based Linux live CD which boots into an LXDE desktop. The distribution's primary goal was to provide several useful utilities for forensic analysis.
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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