 DistroWatch Weekly |
| DistroWatch Weekly, Issue 969, 23 May 2022 |
Welcome to this year's 21st issue of DistroWatch Weekly!
Over the past week or so we've seen the release of new versions of Fedora, Red Hat Enterprise Linux, and several clones of Red Hat's distribution. This sudden splash of releases continues to form ripples as we begin this week with a look at Fedora 36 Workstation. Read on to learn what Jeff Siegel thought of this latest release. Then, in our News section, we continue the focus on Fedora as Fedora Magazine publishes tips on how to upgrade Fedora's Silverblue edition. We also learn that Fedora 34 is nearing the end of its supported life. Meanwhile, in another corner of the Linux ecosystem, the Proxmox team has pushed updates to the project's Backup Server edition, offering new features and off-line recovery options. We also report on Canonical looking to improve the state of gaming on Ubuntu while HP plans to ship laptops with Pop!_OS installed on them. In place of a Questions and Answers column this week we shift our focus to a community project which is resurrecting the Unity desktop environment. Unity was the flagship desktop for Ubuntu for several years until Canonical stopped developing it, but now a small team is trying to breathe new life into the desktop. We share early impressions of the new version of Unity. What do you think of Unity making a comeback? Is it a desktop you want to see grow and evolve or some which doesn't hold any appeal? Let us know in this week's Opinion Poll. We're pleased to share the details of last week's releases and list the torrents we are seeding. We wish you all a wonderful week and happy reading!
Content:
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| Feature Story (by Jeff Siegel) |
Fedora 36
The first rule of criticism is never to judge something before you taste it or listen to it or whatever. This applies whether you're reviewing restaurants or music or Linux distributions; an open mind is all - otherwise, what's the point?
But Fedora 36? It has rarely been more difficult for me to keep an open mind, and the more I worked with it, the crankier I got.
Know, first, that the distro was released three weeks late, missing two new release dates in the process. That's so late that it was launched just a week before Fedora 34 hit end of life. If I ran my freelance writing business like that, I'd be working as a greeter at Walmart. This is Fedora, which is affiliated with Red Hat, a company owned by IBM, and not a three-person volunteer effort making time to code around jobs and families and all the rest. Where's the professionalism one expects from one of Linux's most important and respected distros?
Know, second, that the delays didn't seem to do much to make Fedora 36 that much better or more interesting. Yes, Wayland is the default display protocol, and it worked seamlessly, as did PipeWire for sound. I wouldn't even have known either was there unless I was looking for problems.
Otherwise, Fedora 36 is adequate at best, and certainly not the very pleasant surprise that was Fedora 34. And I had high hopes, given how well Fedora 34 worked. But there are still a variety of nicks and scrapes, the distro equivalent of a broken shoelace - it works, certainly, but you get awfully tired of having to knot the lace every time it breaks.
Getting started
Fedora 36 will be supported for a year (more or less). System requirements are a 2GHz dual core processor, 2GB of memory, and 15GB of hard drive. Recommended: a 2GHz quad cord processor, 4GB of memory, and 20GB of hard drive.
The distro comes with GNOME 42 as the desktop, system-wide dark mode, new fonts, a new screenshot and screen recording tool, and Linux kernel 5.17. There are also a variety of changes aimed at Fedora's core audience of coders and system administrators - tool chain updates and a reconfigured RPM structure among them. Still, that so many are making such a big fuss about system-wide dark mode and the font change speaks to how little else is new or interesting.
Fedora 36 -- Launching a GNOME session
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Default software includes the Firefox web browser, version 100; the GNOME video player, called Videos; the Rhythmbox music player; the Cheese webcam tool; GNOME Contacts and Calendar apps; GNOME's Document Viewer for PDFs; and Fedora's Boxes virtual machine manager. LibreOffice handles office chores (though Draw and Base don't come installed), while GNOME's Terminal and Text Editor handle their respective chores. There isn't, again, an email app, and more - aggravatingly, much more - about that later, as well as the default GNOME Software Center.
The less said about running Fedora 36 on VirtualBox the better. It took nearly 10 minutes to install, and crashed the first time I tried to open Firefox. I finally got it working, but it was slow and laggy. Trying to update the software was so problematic that I moved on to installation on a laptop using the dreaded Anaconda installer.
Fedora 36 -- Installing Fedora in VirtualBox
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May I quote DistroWatch guru Jesse Smith here? "Trying to navigate Anaconda is always a slow pain compared to most other graphical installers. It feels as though it was designed by a drunk committee."
In this case, that meant going through three distinct screens to overwrite Xubuntu on my HP laptop - and all I was trying to do was a typical installation, without encrypting the disk or setting up new partitions. But I had to click here and go there, all the while trying to understand why the box in the upper left corner - even though everything else for clicking was in the lower right corner - was the one that would select the disk for overwriting and installing. Contrast that with Ubuntu's Ubiquity installer, which is linear and sensible and doesn't require a hard think that makes you question why you're bothering with this.
Working with GNOME
A new installation brings up the GNOME 42 desktop, which is a new version of the GNOME Shell desktop, and with all that means. Adding extensions like GNOME Tweaks and Dash to Dock (labeled Dash to Dock for Cosmic for v. 42) make it less counter-intuitive, but it still involves using the upper left corner of the screen when those of us who are right-handed feel more comfortable working with the right side of the screen. The search bar at the top of the window under the title bar does seem improved from my Fedora 34 test -- type in "word," and it finds LibreOffice Writer, for example.
The system identified my Canon MX-922 printer, and scanning and printing worked as they were supposed to work. So too did Wi-Fi, and the wireless connection was so solid that I didn't notice it again. Battery life was actually amazing - even at about two-thirds on the icon, I still had about five hours left for a machine I bought used a couple of years ago.
On the other hand, even though I was able to add my Nextcloud account at setup, I was distressed to learn that I had to use a GNOME extension to add it to the top panel. Clicking on Files, the file explorer, to access Nextcloud was just another broken shoelace. The new screenshot tool is clunky, with the user interface covering up the screen where you want to take the picture. And the lace broke again when I tried to play a couple of videos and found out that the H.264 codec wasn't installed.
Which brings us to the GNOME Software Center. Linux's trials and tribulations with software center apps are as well documented as they are much debated. The software center in Fedora 36 is another example of how buggy these things remain, and the problems have nothing to do with its reliance on Flatpaks instead of Ubuntu's Snaps or DNF vs. APT. Frankly, I don't care which system developers use; just make one of them work. (And I can't shake the sneaking suspicion that both Flatpaks and Snaps, regardless of security and sandboxing, are an attempt to bring Apple's hyper-controlled software ecosystem to Linux.)
Fedora 36 -- Trying to find Thunderbird in the software centre
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Case in point: Trying to install Thunderbird. It didn't show up when I searched the software center, even though it was supposed to be there. I was able to install it using DNF, and then it showed up in the software center as installed. But when I tried to uninstall it from the software center, no luck. I got a prompt saying it was uninstalling, and then nothing happened. After I uninstalled it using DNF, it showed up in the software center as grayed out.
The Flatpak experience was a touch less irritating, but only a touch. Maybe I'm missing something, but if the Flatpak repository is enabled in the software center and Flatpak is installed, why is it necessary to install the Flatpak runtime environment to install Flatpaks? I can see this, sort of, if Fedora's intended audience is grade school children and we have to stop them from adding apps willy nilly. But coders and system administrators? If they can't be trusted, who can? And, of course, I had to use the command line to install Thunderbird since the Flatpak version wasn't in the software center, either. Though there were three versions of Chrome, plus Chromium.
Updates, updates, updates
The software center was close to useless for updates. If I hadn't been testing the distro for this review, I would have used DNF for updates even though I much prefer using a GUI. First, even when the computer had been restarted, the software center showed all updates were current. Sometimes, if I let it sit, it would eventually connect to whatever it connects to and tell me there were updates. And sometimes not.
Fedora 36 -- Checking for package updates
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Or, after I learned to think like a drunken committee, I would click the reload button in the upper left corner and it would reload and let me know if there were updates.
And whoever designed the software updates screen that displays after a reboot was joking, right? It looks almost exactly like the Windows screen after an installation reboot, complete with "Do not turn off your computer" and spinning wheel.
Fedora 36 -- Applying software updates
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Boot times are stunningly slow. How does 20 to 25 seconds sound, every time, and another 5 or 6 second after signing in? I spent about 15 minutes rebooting the HP, reboot after reboot, assuming I was somehow doing something wrong. How could a post-modern distro from Fedora take so long to boot? But it came up 20 to 25 seconds every time.
So yes, I was cranky, cranky, cranky after a week or so of using Fedora 36. No, it won't be my daily driver, and I do wonder how others - who depend on Fedora to make a living - will be able to use it without being cranky, either. There's a theory that pops up every so often among some of us who use Linux that the idea of constant distro and software updates has little do with improvements, and is more about reminding the world about the product. Call it the Google approach, what with more than 100 versions of Chrome in 14 years - or a new instance of Chrome every seven weeks or so. I'd much prefer quality over quantity. Maybe Fedora 37 will offer that.
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Hardware used for this review
My physical test equipment for this review was an HP EliteBook Folio 9480m laptop with the following specifications:
- Processor: Intel Core i5-4310u, 2.6GHz
- Storage: 240 GB SSD
- Memory: 8GB of RAM
- Networking: Intel Wireless 7260 802.11ac dual band Wi-Fi+Bluetooth
- Display: Intel Haswell-ULT Integrated Graphics
When he is not testing out new versions of Linux distributions, Jeff Siegel can be found writing about all things related to wine at Wine Curmudgeon.
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Visitor supplied rating
Fedora has a visitor supplied average rating of: 8.2/10 from 256 review(s).
Have you used Fedora? You can leave your own review of the project on our ratings page.
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| Miscellaneous News (by Jesse Smith) |
Upgrading Fedora Silverblue, Fedora 34 nears its end of life, Proxmox offers new backup features, Canonical seeking to improve gaming on Ubuntu, HP plans to ship laptops with Pop!_OS
Last week the release announcements section of DistroWatch belonged to Red Hat and its associated distributions (such as Fedora) and its many clones. Now that this new wave of versions has been published, some people may be looking to upgrade. Fedora Magazine has published step-by-step instructions which guide users through upgrading Fedora's Silverblue branch from previous versions to version 36. "Fedora Silverblue is an operating system for your desktop built on Fedora Linux. It's excellent for daily use, development, and container-based workflows. It offers numerous advantages such as being able to roll back in case of any problems. If you want to update or rebase to Fedora Linux 36 on your Fedora Silverblue system (these instructions are similar for Fedora Kinoite), this article tells you how. It not only shows you what to do, but also how to revert things if something unforeseen happens."
Meanwhile Tomas Hrcka has announced Fedora 34 will reach the end of its supported life on June 7th, less than a month after the launch of Fedora 36. "Fedora 34 will go end of life for updates and support on 2022-06-07 No further updates, including security updates, will be available for Fedora 34 after the said date. All the updates of Fedora 34 being pushed to stable will be stopped as well."
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The Proxmox distribution is a Debian-based server project which is available in a number of specialized editions. The distribution's "Backup Server" edition is getting some new features, including a read-only maintenance mode for the safer recovery of data. "We have a new namespace feature which allows you to simplify backup management from multiple sources on-premises, remotely, and in the cloud, by organizing backups into 'namespaces' within a single datastore. The new 'read-only' and 'offline' maintenance modes allow for safer maintenance work on a datastore." The project's announcement offers additional details.
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Canonical is seeking to hire a new developer to help improve the state of gaming on Ubuntu. With the help of Valve and projects like Proton many previously inaccessible games now run on Linux, often through compatibility layers. Canonical is hoping to improve game performance and expand the number of games available to Ubuntu users. "We want to make the widest selection of games 'Just Work' on Ubuntu, and we are creating a team to focus on performance, compatibility and user experience for gamers. We want to create a platform that makes it easy for players to find the games they want, use the devices they own and share those experiences with friends."
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People who like the Pop!_OS distribution will be happy to hear HP plans to sell laptop computers with Pop!_OS pre-installed. As Beta News reports: "Rumors have been swirling lately that HP was planning to release a laptop running the Pop!_OS operating system. Today, System76's CEO Carl Richell shared on Twitter that this is absolutely happening -- a 14-inch developer-focused notebook called "Dev One." While this is good news for the Linux community overall, it is quite curious. After all, System76 doesn't just maintain the Pop!_OS operating system, it sells computers running the distribution too. In other words, HP and System76 are competitors in the hardware business." Information and pricing for the new Dev One laptop can be found on this HP web page.
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These and other news stories can be found on our Headlines page.
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| Software Review (by Jesse Smith) |
A return to Unity
Unity was the name given to Canonical's custom desktop environment which it developed for the Ubuntu distribution. Unity turned out to be an ironic name because every chapter of the desktop's life was marred in controversy and debate. Canonical decided to create Unity, it seems, in the wake of the GNOME developers dropping GNOME 2 and starting the new (and itself controversial) GNOME Shell desktop.
With a community as large as Ubuntu's was at the time there was no way forward that didn't result in a lot of people being unhappy. People who loved the classic GNOME 2 desktop (which was later carried on as MATE) wanted Canonical to continue supporting the GNOME 2 desktop, despite it being abandoned for a time upstream. People who loved GNOME 3 wanted Canonical to adopt the new GNOME Shell, despite early problems with the new desktop environment. The company instead decided to forge their own way, for a time anyway, and created Unity 7 for desktop machines and Unity 8 for mobile devices with the intention of making it a convergent interface in the future.
Eventually, of course, Canonical stopped working on both Unity 7 & 8 and shifted its focus to shipping a highly customized GNOME Shell desktop, a move which reignited debates on which desktop was the best for the popular Linux distribution.
Unity of the past
Unity, by the way, received mixed reviews all on its own. Even when it wasn't being compared to the classic MATE desktop or the new GNOME Shell desktop, Unity still did things differently. Unity 7 started as a 2-D desktop which later transitioned to a 3-D desktop, causing all sorts of performance issues in virtual machines and on workstations with limited support for 3-D visual effects, often due to driver issues.
Ubuntu 14.10 -- Running the Unity desktop with its dash in 2014
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The Unity desktop was also embroiled in the on-line search scandal in which Canonical, for a time, defaulted to sending searches for local files to commercial partners like Amazon. This resulted in many people labelling the search options (called scopes) in Unity as spyware.
To make matters more interesting, Unity also used a global file menu for a time (which didn't always mesh well with non-Unity applications), introduced thin scroll bars, placed the desktop dock on the left side of the screen, and moved window control buttons from the upper-right corner of windows to the upper-left.
It was an experimental time at Canonical.
What essentially ended up happening was Canonical, for a few years, had an unusual desktop environment that was trying a few experimental things and didn't really look like anything else on the market at the time. This meant there was a learning curve involved in getting settled into the desktop and it was an alien experience for a lot of people. As a result, many people didn't like the Unity desktop.
I, on the other hand, made an effort to spend a full month with Unity to see if I could get used to its 3-D, left-oriented style. As I noted in that review from ten years ago, the first few days were difficult. By the middle of the first week I was starting to get comfortable with the way Unity behaved. By the end of the week I was sold on Unity as a concept. The unified messaging system, the intuitive way items could be moved around, and the HUD for searching menus were all welcome features. I also found, after a time, Unity had a, well, unified approach. The desktop had an overall design, a natural flow which comes from being designed from the top down. This was in contrast to many open source desktops which often evolve over time, often picking up quirks and ideas from a wide range of people.
Ubuntu 14.10 -- Running the Unity desktop and its settings panel in 2014
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Anyway, I became and remained a fan of the Unity 7 desktop on my workstation and, a few years later, became a fan of Unity 8 running on my phone.
However, Unity never really got adopted widely outside of Ubuntu and, when Canonical decided to cease development in favour of running GNOME as their default desktop, Unity was tossed onto the rubbish heap of history. Until, that is, this year a third-party developer picked up Unity and decided to fix some issues, releasing a new version of the desktop: Unity 7.6
Some of the changes in the fresh release of Unity 7.6 are cosmetic. The desktop has a flatter appearance and it looks like the default theme is closer to blue than the purple and orange Canonical used. The project's announcement also says Unity should use slightly less RAM now and the trash system uses the Nemo file manager in place of Nautilus.
Unity 7.6 -- The new flat style and settings panel
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Trying out the new Unity
I decided to try Unity on a modern version of Ubuntu, specifically Unity 22.04. I already had the distribution installed and so set about following the instructions on the Unity project website to add the proper package repository (PPA) and install the Unity package. The install went cleanly and I signed out of GNOME and was able to select Unity as my new session option.
Unfortunately I was unable to get signed into Unity. The first time I logged into the Unity environment the system showed me a blank, blue screen for a few seconds and then kicked me back to the login screen. I tried signing in again. This time I was greeted with a generic error window which said "Oh no! Something has gone wrong. A problem has occurred and the system can't recover. All extensions have been disabled as a precaution." I was then kicked back to the login screen.
I suspected the Unity desktop was not playing well with GNOME, Ubuntu's current default desktop. The two have some shared heritage and I thought they might have conflicting libraries. I decided to give Unity a fresh start.
A fresh start
I decided to install Lubuntu, mostly because it is relatively small and light while still having the same package base as Ubuntu. Plus Lubuntu ships with a Qt-based desktop while Unity and GNOME (and many other Ubuntu community editions) use GTK-based desktops. This seemed to me to be one of the easiest ways to test the new desktop without worrying about conflicting libraries and other resources.
After setting up Lubuntu, which looks fantastic by the way (I'm tempted to review it on its own), I then enabled the Unity PPA and installed Unity 7.6. The installation went smoothly and I was able to sign into the Unity desktop. Once I was logged into Unity some serious pros and cons started to show themselves.
Pros
On the positive side of things Unity feels faster compared with how I found it in the past. A large part of this is probably due to my computer being ten years younger than the last time I tried Unity. But I found Unity has gone from being about average in performance (akin to Cinnamon or GNOME 3) to snappy (closer in performance to Xfce). Memory consumption seems to be about the same as before, once I factored in the underlying operating system. Unity's memory usage running on Lubuntu was about 680MB, putting it on the heavier side of mid-range. When I last tried Unity the memory consumption was around 480MB, but the operating system underneath was a lighter then too, so Unity has remained pretty much the same in terms of memory consumption.
I like the layout. I know some people question why they'd want almost everything, such as the panel, left-aligned. It takes some time to get used to it. But what I've found is that Unity's layout greatly reduces mouse movement. Almost everything I ever want to access in a Unity session is in the upper-left quadrant of the screen. This is in contrast to most other desktops where there is a lot of movement across the entire screen.
The settings panel seems to work fairly well, or at least the modules I tried functioned as expected.
I like the way the dock behaves with its quick access to programs and the ability to quickly pin or dismiss applications.
Cons
I noticed three key problems while using the new version of Unity. The first was the dash (the area which replaces an application menu in Unity) failed to show me anything on any search scope. Whether I was trying to see application launchers, local documents, or software packages the dash was always empty. At first I thought this might be an issue of the desktop having trouble identifying applications which had originally been associated with the LXQt environment, but the dock has launchers on it for tools like LibreOffice. In other words, the dock can see and launch pre-installed programs but the dash cannot. This problem bled into other areas too. For example, right-clicking on the desktop and selecting the option to open a terminal does nothing because Unity can't find its terminal and there is no way to select a different terminal in the preferred applications section of the settings panel.
Unity 7.6 -- Trying to find launchers in the dash
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The second issue I ran into is probably related to video drivers. Often times when a window or menu is closed, it remains on the screen. This means when the dash is closed or a window is minimized it sometimes remains drawn on the screen, leaving a ghost of itself behind. Over time other elements are drawn over top of it and this can leave the desktop in a weird state where it's cluttered with elements of past work. I'm not sure, but I think this issue might be related to the fact I cannot disable desktop effects. In the Appearance settings module there is a toggle between "Low" and "High" visual effects and the only accepted setting is "High".
Unity 7.6 -- The desktop becoming cluttered with old elements
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The third and final issue was each time I tried to logout of Unity the desktop would hang. It wouldn't keep running and it wouldn't sign me out. The elements on the screen would disappear, leaving me with just the background and then nothing would happen. In contrast, if I powered off the computer from within Unity the desktop would shut down with seemingly no problems.
Something that was mentioned in the Unity release announcement was Unity now uses a flatter theme. This is accurate, Unity's icons and elements are flatter. I wasn't sure whether to put this in the pro or con list because I, personally, dislike the flat look. I find it's less descriptive, harder to tell when something is a button and when it is a label, and harder to determine the purpose of some icons. However, some people like the minimal look as they find it less cluttered and more consistent with the way mobile interfaces are designed these days. So I'll mention the flat look, which seems to be applied consistently, and let people decide whether this is a step forward or backward.
Conclusions
While I'm happy to see some development work going into Unity, it feels like a project barely holding on thanks to life support. Some basic stuff works (and looks good). I like the dock, the HUD, and the way the desktop is organized. However, with the dash not working and Unity having trouble clearing the screen there are pretty big gaps in functionality happening. Even on Ubuntu/Lubuntu itself, Unity's native home, the desktop feels like it's missing key pieces.
I'd like to see Unity grow and continue to evolve. I'd like to see it ported to other distributions. The style and layout feel very efficient to me. However, I suspect this will be difficult considering how much custom work Canonical did ten years ago that did not make it into upstream libraries. Porting Unity and patching it to be more tidy and work with others desktops is likely to be a big undertaking.
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| Released Last Week |
Kali Linux 2022.2
Kali Linux is a Debian-based distribution with a collection of security and forensics tools. The prject has published a new version, Kali Linux 2022.2, which features the GNOME 42 desktop, along with KDE Plasma 5.24 as an alternative user interface. "Like for every (almost) half-year, there is a new version bump for the GNOME desktop environment. Kali 2022.2 brings the new version, GNOME 42, which is a more polished experienced following the work previously introduced in versions 40 and 41. The shell theme now includes a more modern look, removing the arrows from the pop-up menus and using more rounded edges. In addition, we've upgraded and tweaked the dash-to-dock extension, making it integrate better with the new look and fixing some bugs." Additional information, a list of new features, and screenshots of the light and dark themes can be found in the project's release announcement.
Kali linux 2022.2 -- Exploring the application menu
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FreeBSD 13.1
Glen Barber has announced the release of FreeBSD 13.1, the second stable build in the project's 13 branch: "The FreeBSD Release Engineering team is pleased to announce the availability of FreeBSD 13.1-RELEASE. This is the second release of the stable/13 branch. Some of the highlights: OpenSSH has been updated to version v8.8p1; OpenSSL has been updated to version 1.1.1o; the use of FIDO/U2F hardware authenticators has been enabled in ssh, using the new public key types ecdsa-sk and ed25519-sk, along with corresponding certificate types; the ice(4) driver has been updated to 1.34.2-k, adding firmware logging and initial DCB support; the iwlwifi(4) driver along with a LinuxKPI 802.11 compatibility layer was added to supplement iwm(4) for newer Intel Wireless chipsets; ZFS has been upgraded to OpenZFS release 2.1.4; EC2 images are now built by default to boot using UEFI instead of legacy BIOS." See the release announcement and in the detailed release notes for further information.
Rocky Linux 8.6
Louis Abel has announced the release of Rocky Linux 8.6, the new stable version of the project's community clone of Red Hat Enterprise Linux: "We are pleased to announce the general availability of Rocky Linux 8.6. This release is available for the x86_64 and aarch64 architectures. Highlights: PHP 8.0 provides bug fixes and enhancements, namely to the use of structured metadata syntax, newly named arguments that are order-independent, and improved performance for Just-In-Time compilation; Perl 5.32 provides a number of bug fixes and enhancements, including support for Unicode version 13, a new experimental infix operator, and faster feature checks; high availability (HA) cluster system role - this role helps create and manage secure, stable HA clusters; enhanced network system role - this role helps users create secure connections (including over Wi-Fi) along with robust firewall rules...." Read the rest of the release announcement for more information and upgrade instructions.
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9.0
Red Hat has announced the release of Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9.0, the latest major version of the IBM-owned distribution. Among the big ticket items in this release is an effort to confirm the integrity of the operating system with digital signatures and hashes: "Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9 also introduces integrity measurement architecture (IMA) digital hashes and signatures. With integrity measurement architecture, users can verify the integrity of the operating system with digital signatures and hashes. This helps to detect rogue infrastructure modifications, making it easier to limit the potential for systems to be compromised. Further supporting enterprise choice in architectures and environments across the open hybrid cloud, Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9 will be available on IBM Cloud and also complements the key security features and capabilities of IBM Power Systems and IBM Z systems. Pairing the security-focused hardware capabilities of IBM's architectures with the security enhancements in Red Hat Enterprise Linux 9 delivers the innovation, strength and security capabilities that many organizations need in hybrid cloud computing."
Oracle Linux 8.6
Simon Coter has announced the release of version 8.6 of Oracle Linux, an enterprise-class Linux distribution supported by Oracle and built from source packages for Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL): "Oracle is pleased to announce the availability of the Oracle Linux 8 update 6 for the 64-bit Intel, 64-bit AMD (x86_64) and 64-bit Arm (aarch64) platforms. This release includes the Unbreakable Enterprise Kernel (UEK) Release 6 Update 3 on the installation image, along with the Red Hat Compatible Kernel (RHCK) for the x86_64 platform. Oracle Linux 8 Update 6 introduces support for drop-in configuration files to OpenSSH servers, Policy-Based Decryption (PBD) for automated unlocking of LUKS-encrypted drives and delivers many enhancements, including: modulesync - this command is used to ensure the presence of modular metadata and facilitate the module installation when modular metadata is not available; lsvpd updated to version 1.7.13; the net-snmp-cert gencert utility has been updated to generate certificates by using SHA512 encryption algorithm...." See the release announcement and the detailed release notes for further information.
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Development, unannounced and minor bug-fix releases
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| Torrent Corner |
Weekly Torrents
The table below provides a list of torrents DistroWatch is currently seeding. If you do not have a bittorrent client capable of handling the linked files, we suggest installing either the Transmission or KTorrent bittorrent clients.
Archives of our previously seeded torrents may be found in our Torrent Archive. We also maintain a Torrents RSS feed for people who wish to have open source torrents delivered to them. To share your own open source torrents of Linux and BSD projects, please visit our Upload Torrents page.
Torrent Corner statistics:
- Total torrents seeded: 2,725
- Total data uploaded: 42.0TB
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| Upcoming Releases and Announcements |
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Summary of expected upcoming releases
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| Opinion Poll (by Jesse Smith) |
What do you think of Unity being worked on again?
This week we looked at the resurrection of Unity, a desktop originally created by Canonical for the Ubuntu distribution. Community volunteers are now working on developing new versions of the desktop. What do you think of this renewed effort to keep Unity working? Are you looking forward to running Unity? Let us know about your experiences with Unity, past and present, in the comments.
You can see the results of our previous poll on buying a phone to run various Linux-based operating systems in last week's edition. All previous poll results can be found in our poll archives.
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What do you think of Unity returning?
| I previously liked it and will use it: | 197 (12%) |
| I did like it and will not use it: | 225 (14%) |
| I did not like it but will try it: | 93 (6%) |
| I did not like it and will not try it: | 577 (35%) |
| Have not used Unity before and will try it: | 93 (6%) |
| Have not used Unity before and will not try it: | 472 (28%) |
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| Website News |
DistroWatch database summary
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This concludes this week's issue of DistroWatch Weekly. The next instalment will be published on Monday, 30 May 2022. Past articles and reviews can be found through our Article Search page. To contact the authors please send e-mail to:
- Jesse Smith (feedback, questions and suggestions: distribution reviews/submissions, questions and answers, tips and tricks)
- Ladislav Bodnar (feedback, questions, donations, comments)
- Bruce Patterson (podcast)
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| Linux Foundation Training |
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| MALIBAL |
MALIBAL: Linux Laptops Custom Built for YouMALIBAL is an innovative computer manufacturer that produces high-performance, custom laptops for Linux. If your MALIBAL laptop is not the best Linux laptop you have ever used, you can return it for a full 100% refund. We will even pay the return shipping fees! For more info, visit: https://www.malibal.com
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| TUXEDO |
TUXEDO Computers - Linux Hardware in a tailor made suite
Choose from a wide range of laptops and PCs in various sizes and shapes at TUXEDOComputers.com. Every machine comes pre-installed and ready-to-run with Linux. Full 24 months of warranty and lifetime support included!
Learn more about our full service package and all benefits from buying at TUXEDO.
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| Archives |
| • Issue 1022 (2023-06-05): GetFreeOS 2023.05.01, Slint 15.0-3, Liya N4Si, cleaning up crowded directories, Ubuntu plans Snap-based variant, Red Hat dropping LireOffice RPM packages |
| • Issue 1021 (2023-05-29): rlxos GNU/Linux, colours in command line output, an overview of Void's unique features, how to use awk, Microsoft publishes a Linux distro |
| • Issue 1020 (2023-05-22): UBports 20.04, finding another machine's IP address, finding distros with a specific kernel, Debian prepares for Bookworm |
| • Issue 1019 (2023-05-15): Rhino Linux (Beta), checking which applications reply on a package, NethServer reborn, System76 improving application responsiveness |
| • Issue 1018 (2023-05-08): Fedora 38, finding relevant manual pages, merging audio files, Fedora plans new immutable edition, Mint works to fix Secure Boot issues |
| • Issue 1017 (2023-05-01): Xubuntu 23.04, Debian elects Project Leaders and updates media, systemd to speed up restarts, Guix System offering ground-up source builds, where package managers install files |
| • Issue 1016 (2023-04-24): Qubes OS 4.1.2, tracking bandwidth usage, Solus resuming development, FreeBSD publishes status report, KaOS offers preview of Plasma 6 |
| • Issue 1015 (2023-04-17): Manjaro Linux 22.0, Trisquel GNU/Linux 11.0, Arch Linux powering PINE64 tablets, Ubuntu offering live patching on HWE kernels, gaining compression on ex4 |
| • Issue 1014 (2023-04-10): Quick looks at carbonOS, LibreELEC, and Kodi, Mint polishes themes, Fedora rolls out more encryption plans, elementary OS improves sideloading experience |
| • Issue 1013 (2023-04-03): Alpine Linux 3.17.2, printing manual pages, Ubuntu Cinnamon becomes official flavour, Endeavour OS plans for new installer, HardenedBSD plans for outage |
| • Issue 1012 (2023-03-27): siduction 22.1.1, protecting privacy from proprietary applications, GNOME team shares new features, Canonical updates Ubuntu 20.04, politics and the Linux kernel |
| • Issue 1011 (2023-03-20): Serpent OS, Security Onion 2.3, Gentoo Live, replacing the scp utility, openSUSE sees surge in downloads, Debian runs elction with one candidate |
| • Issue 1010 (2023-03-13): blendOS 2023.01.26, keeping track of which files a package installs, improved network widget coming to elementary OS, Vanilla OS changes its base distro |
| • Issue 1009 (2023-03-06): Nemo Mobile and the PinePhone, matching the performance of one distro on another, Linux Mint adds performance boosts and security, custom Ubuntu and Debian builds through Cubic |
| • Issue 1008 (2023-02-27): elementary OS 7.0, the benefits of boot environments, Purism offers lapdock for Librem 5, Ubuntu community flavours directed to drop Flatpak support for Snap |
| • Issue 1007 (2023-02-20): helloSystem 0.8.0, underrated distributions, Solus team working to repair their website, SUSE testing Micro edition, Canonical publishes real-time edition of Ubuntu 22.04 |
| • Issue 1006 (2023-02-13): Playing music with UBports on a PinePhone, quick command line and shell scripting questions, Fedora expands third-party software support, Vanilla OS adds Nix package support |
| • Issue 1005 (2023-02-06): NuTyX 22.12.0 running CDE, user identification numbers, Pop!_OS shares COSMIC progress, Mint makes keyboard and mouse options more accessible |
| • Issue 1004 (2023-01-30): OpenMandriva ROME, checking the health of a disk, Debian adopting OpenSnitch, FreeBSD publishes status report |
| • Issue 1003 (2023-01-23): risiOS 37, mixing package types, Fedora seeks installer feedback, Sparky offers easier persistence with USB writer |
| • Issue 1002 (2023-01-16): Vanilla OS 22.10, Nobara Project 37, verifying torrent downloads, Haiku improvements, HAMMER2 being ports to NetBSD |
| • Issue 1001 (2023-01-09): Arch Linux, Ubuntu tests new system installer, porting KDE software to OpenBSD, verifying files copied properly |
| • Issue 1000 (2023-01-02): Our favourite projects of all time, Fedora trying out unified kernel images and trying to speed up shutdowns, Slackware tests new kernel, detecting what is taking up disk space |
| • Issue 999 (2022-12-19): Favourite distributions of 2022, Fedora plans Budgie spin, UBports releasing security patches for 16.04, Haiku working on new ports |
| • Issue 998 (2022-12-12): OpenBSD 7.2, Asahi Linux enages video hardware acceleration on Apple ARM computers, Manjaro drops proprietary codecs from Mesa package |
| • Issue 997 (2022-12-05): CachyOS 221023 and AgarimOS, working with filenames which contain special characters, elementary OS team fixes delta updates, new features coming to Xfce |
| • Issue 996 (2022-11-28): Void 20221001, remotely shutting down a machine, complex aliases, Fedora tests new web-based installer, Refox OS running on real hardware |
| • Issue 995 (2022-11-21): Fedora 37, swap files vs swap partitions, Unity running on Arch, UBports seeks testers, Murena adds support for more devices |
| • Issue 994 (2022-11-14): Redcore Linux 2201, changing the terminal font size, Fedora plans Phosh spin, openSUSE publishes on-line manual pages, disabling Snap auto-updates |
| • Issue 993 (2022-11-07): Static Linux, working with just a kernel, Mint streamlines Flatpak management, updates coming to elementary OS |
| • Issue 992 (2022-10-31): Lubuntu 22.10, setting permissions on home directories, Linux may drop i486, Fedora delays next version for OpenSSL bug |
| • Issue 991 (2022-10-24): XeroLinux 2022.09, learning who ran sudo, exploring firewall tools, Rolling Rhino Remix gets a fresh start, Fedora plans to revamp live media |
| • Issue 990 (2022-10-17): ravynOS 0.4.0, Lion Linux 3.0, accessing low numbered network ports, Pop!_OS makes progress on COSMIC, Murena launches new phone |
| • Issue 989 (2022-10-10): Ubuntu Unity, kernel bug causes issues with Intel cards, Canonical offers free Ubuntu Pro subscriptions, customizing the command line prompt |
| • Issue 988 (2022-10-03): SpiralLinux 11.220628, finding distros for older equipment and other purposes, SUSE begins releasing ALP prototypes, Debian votes on non-free firmware in installer |
| • Issue 987 (2022-09-26): openSUSE's MicroOS, converting people to using Linux, pfSense updates base system and PHP, Python 2 dropped from Arch |
| • Issue 986 (2022-09-19): Porteus 5.0, remotely wiping a hard drive, a new software centre for Ubuntu, Proxmox offers offline updates |
| • Issue 985 (2022-09-12): Garuda Linux, using root versus sudo, UBports on the Fairphone 4, Slackware reverses change to grep |
| • Issue 984 (2022-09-05): deepin 23 Preview, watching for changing to directories, Mint team tests Steam Deck, Devuan posts fix for repository key expiry |
| • Issue 983 (2022-08-29): Qubes OS 4.1.1, Alchg Linux, immutable operating systems, Debian considers stance on non-free firmware, Arch-based projects suffer boot issue |
| • Issue 982 (2022-08-22): Peropesis 1.6.2, KaOS strips out Python 2 and PulseAudio, deepin becomes independent, getting security update notifications |
| • Issue 981 (2022-08-15): Linux Lite 6.0, defining desktop environments and window managers, Mint releases upgrade tool, FreeBSD publishes status report |
| • Issue 980 (2022-08-08): Linux Mint 21, Pledge on Linux, SparkyLinux updates classic desktop packages, Peppermint OS experiments with Devuan base |
| • Issue 979 (2022-08-01): KaOS 2022.06 and KDE Plasma 5.25, terminating processes after a set time, GNOME plans Secure Boot check |
| • Issue 978 (2022-07-25): EndeavourOS 22.6, Slax explores a return to Slackware, Ubuntu certified with Dell's XPS 13, Linux running on Apple's M2 |
| • Issue 977 (2022-07-18): EasyOS 4.2, transferring desktop themes between distros, Tails publishes list of updates, Zevenet automates Let's Encrypt renewals |
| • Issue 976 (2022-07-11): NixOS 22.05, making a fake webcam, exploring the Linux scheduler, Debian publishes updated media |
| • Issue 975 (2022-07-04): Murena One running /e/OS, where are all the openSUSE distributions, Fedora to offer unfiltered Flathub access |
| • Issue 974 (2022-06-27): AlmaLinux 9.0, the changing data of DistroWatch's database, UBports on the Pixel 3a, Tails and GhostBSD publish hot fixes |
| • Issue 973 (2022-06-20): openSUSE 15.4, collecting distro media, FreeBSD status report, Ubuntu Core with optional real-time kernel |
| • Issue 972 (2022-06-13): Rolling Rhino Remix, SambaBox 4.1, SUSE team considers future of SUSE and openSUSE Leap, Tails improves Tor Connection Assistant |
| • Issue 971 (2022-06-06): ChimeraOS 2022.01.03, Lilidog 22.04, NixOS gains graphical installer, Mint replaces Bluetooth stack and adopts Timeshift, how to change a MAC address |
| • Issue 970 (2022-05-30): Tails 5.0, taking apart a Linux distro, Ubuntu users seeing processes terminated, Budgie team plans future of their desktop |
| • Full list of all issues |
| Free Tech Guides |
NEW! Learn Linux in 5 Days
In this FREE ebook, you will learn the most important concepts and commands and be guided step-by-step through several practical and real-world examples (a free 212-page ebook).
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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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| Shells.com |
Your own personal Linux computer in the cloud, available on any device. Supported operating systems include Android, Debian, Fedora, KDE neon, Kubuntu, Linux Mint, Manjaro and Ubuntu, ready in minutes.
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| Random Distribution | 
Shift Linux
Shift Linux was a project that was created by the Neowin community. Based on Ubuntu, it has access to all of the software and applications as other Ubuntu-based distributions. Neowin's Shift Linux was designed to give the user an experience of being part of the Neowin community and to have a simple, easy-to-use live CD that can be installed to a hard drive. Shift was a free distribution released under the General Public License. It can be freely distributed or modified.
Status: Discontinued
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| Tips, Tricks, Q&As | | Tips and tricks: Creating, removing, modifying, and ignoring aliases |
| Tips and tricks: Gathering system information |
| Tips and tricks: Tools for rescuing the operating system and data files |
| Tips and tricks: Navigating multiple shells |
| Tips and tricks: Find common words in text, find high memory processs, cd short-cuts, pushd & popd, record desktop |
| Questions and answers: Simple command-line tricks |
| Questions and answers: Security and the size of a distribution's team, update on streaming Netflix on Raspbian |
| Questions and answers: Alternatives to GNOME 3 |
| Questions and answers: Using older kernels on Ubuntu LTS releases |
| Questions and answers: Finding the performance bottleneck |
| More Tips & Tricks and Questions & Answers |
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NEW! Learn Linux in 5 Days
In this FREE ebook, you will learn the most important concepts and commands and be guided step-by-step through several practical and real-world examples (a free 212-page ebook).
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| MALIBAL |
MALIBAL: Linux Laptops Custom Built for YouMALIBAL is an innovative computer manufacturer that produces high-performance, custom laptops for Linux. If your MALIBAL laptop is not the best Linux laptop you have ever used, you can return it for a full 100% refund. We will even pay the return shipping fees! For more info, visit: https://www.malibal.com
|
| TUXEDO |
TUXEDO Computers - Linux Hardware in a tailor made suite
Choose from a wide range of laptops and PCs in various sizes and shapes at TUXEDOComputers.com. Every machine comes pre-installed and ready-to-run with Linux. Full 24 months of warranty and lifetime support included!
Learn more about our full service package and all benefits from buying at TUXEDO.
|
| 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.
|
| Free Tech Guides |
NEW! Learn Linux in 5 Days
In this FREE ebook, you will learn the most important concepts and commands and be guided step-by-step through several practical and real-world examples (a free 212-page ebook).
|
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