 DistroWatch Weekly |
| DistroWatch Weekly, Issue 989, 10 October 2022 |
Welcome to this year's 41st issue of DistroWatch Weekly!
We are nearing the next wave of releases from the Ubuntu family of distributions. Ubuntu and its many community editions will be publishing version 22.10 later this month. Among the community editions will be a new entry: Ubuntu Unity. This spin of Ubuntu includes the Unity desktop environment, which was originally developed by Canonical specifically for Ubuntu and then dropped in favour of GNOME. This week we begin with a look at the Ubuntu Unity project and report on how the desktop performs. Canonical has, over the years, switched desktop environments a few times and it generally results in fans of the discarded desktop creating their own spin. Which of Ubuntu's default desktops has been your favourite? Let us know in this week's Opinion Poll. In our News section we discuss a kernel bug which has hit people running cutting edge distributions such as Arch Linux. We also report on Canonical offering free Ubuntu Pro support subscriptions for individuals and share changes coming to the elementary OS distribution. Then we share a report of AlmaLinux OS introducing support for a new architecture not previously available upstream. Plus, in our Questions and Answers column, we talk about the command line prompt, its elements, and how to customize the look of the prompt. Then we are pleased to share the releases of the past week and list the torrents we are seeding. Finally, we're pleased to welcome the TUXEDO OS distribution to our database. TUXEDO is a custom Ubuntu distribution made by TUXEDO Computers for their range of Linux-friendly hardware. We wish you all a terrific week and happy reading!
Content:
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| Feature Story (by Jesse Smith) |
Ubuntu Unity
Earlier this year the Unity 7 desktop, which was originally started by Canonical, celebrated its first release in a long time. The desktop environment has found a new lease on life as a community project. Back in May I tried Unity for a few days on Lubuntu to see how it would perform. The experience was largely underwhelming, but it was nice to see someone was making an effort to modernize the Unity 7 desktop environment.
In early September, I read that Ubuntu Unity, a spin of Ubuntu featuring the updated Unity desktop, may become an official community edition of Ubuntu. I was curious to see how this potential community edition would perform and set about testing the latest release.
I tried downloading the latest stable release, Ubuntu Unity 22.04.1. Once the download had completed (apparently successfully) I ran its checksum and found the download was corrupted. I erased the original ISO file, which is a little over 3GB in size, and tried downloading it again along with its checksum. The transfer was once again corrupted. I'm not sure if the published MD5 was wrong, the file was corrupted on the server, or damaged in transit. However, I decided to look for an alternative.
I next looked at the next most recent version, 20.04.5, and discovered its directory on the official Ubuntu Unity download mirror was empty. Going down through the list: 20.10 is no longer supported, 21.04 is no longer supported, 21.10 is no longer supported, and 22.04 failed its checksum again. I went back a bit further and found version 20.04.4 was available on the download mirror and the downloaded file passed its MD5 checksum. By process of elimination, this was the version I decided to install and run.
Installing
I don't have a lot to say about the live media or the install process. Booting from the Ubuntu Unity media feels just like using Ubuntu. The system brings up a graphical environment and offers to launch a live desktop or start the install process. Taking the live environment initiates a Unity session, which I'll discuss later. The install option kicks off the Ubiquity installer which functions exactly like it does on other modern versions of Ubuntu and most of its community editions.
After walking me through disk partitioning, picking my language, my time zone, and making up a username for myself the Ubiquity installer went to work. All seemed fine for the first few minutes. However, towards the end, when the progress bar looked to be near the finish line, the installer just stopped showing new progress messages. After a few more minutes I opened a terminal and found Ubiquity and dpkg were still running, but consuming no CPU resources or involving any disk access. The system simply stayed like that, doing nothing, but not locked up either, for about 30 minutes before the installer suddenly sprang to life again, installed another package and reported it was finished. I then rebooted and started using Ubuntu Unity in earnest.
Early impressions
Ubuntu Unity boots to a graphical login screen where we can sign into the Unity 7 desktop. Almost immediately a pop-up appeared and offered to upgrade the operating system to version 22.04. I put this off at first, planning to explore other options before taking up a lot of time with a big upgrade. Shortly after, as the desktop seemed to be settled into place, two more pop-ups appeared, these both said something had gone wrong and offered to send crash reports to the developers.
A minute later another update notification screen was back, popping up a window saying important security updates were available. I clicked a button which offered to show these updates. The Software Centre opened and I was shown a few applications, the Snapd software, and system updates. I clicked a button to install all available updates and was shown two error messages. One was a vague "Something went wrong" notification, seemingly indicating a crash. The second reported there was no Snap package update available in the repositories, despite Snapd being listed as one of the new packages available. Or maybe the Software Centre meant there were no updates from the Snap repository available and the fact Snapd was waiting to be updated was a coincidence? If I'm not sure, how would most regular users know what the issue was? In either case, the Software Centre failed to apply any of the waiting updates.
Ubuntu Unity 20.04 -- Trying to install updates
(full image size: 83kB, resolution: 1680x1050 pixels)
I next tried the dedicated, lightweight update manager. Searching for this utility in the Unity dash caused the desktop to crash. When it automatically reloaded, I tried the update manager again. The update manager then crashed.
Other impressions
Putting aside software updates for a moment, I shifted focus to the desktop environment itself. The experience was different from my trial earlier in the year. When I tried Unity 7 in May the experience suffered visually. There were often artefacts on the screen, Unity couldn't find its virtual terminal application, and icons were missing. Performance was pretty decent though.
This time there were several differences. This time Unity crashed a lot more frequently and, sometimes applications I was running would crash. The update tool crashed, the settings panel crashed a few times, once the screen locked and Firefox was gone when I unlocked the screen. The desktop experienced a crash almost every time I performed a search in the dash for an application. These crashes, session resets, and steady crash report pop-ups often caused work in progress to be lost and interrupted the flow of desktop usage.
Ubuntu Unity 20.04 -- The Unity settings panel
(full image size: 132kB, resolution: 1680x1050 pixels)
The Unity desktop on this version of the distribution was unusually slow to respond, and tended to lag a bit, even compared with the performance I enjoyed four months ago. The system looks better, complete with its icons, consistent theme, and such. However, the visual environment crashes so often it's nearly impossible to get anything done.
Conclusions
It was hard for me to give a good evaluation of Ubuntu Unity, at least in its modern form, because I couldn't get a recent, still supported, version of the distribution. Multiple attempts to download the latest version resulted in corrupted ISO files and almost every other version released in the last two years is no longer supported. The one remaining option is over two years old and attempts to update it repeatedly failed. That was, at least, when the system remained stable long enough for me to check for updates.
Unity looks nice and I like its layout. I like how most elements are clustered in the upper-left corner (the dash, dock, most menus, and window control buttons are all left-oriented) which makes mouse movement minimal. I like the control panel, which is nicely arranged and easy to navigate. I like the nice, large icons, and flexible dock. Unity is, in a lot of ways, well designed. But this implementation is about as stable as a house of cards made out of wet bread.
Maybe the newest version of Unity is doing better, but it's hard to tell as I couldn't get a usable download of the latest version and the long-term support edition I grabbed wasn't able to update.
Maybe this is all bad luck, or maybe it's a sign of a project that is small and doesn't have a lot of testers. Maybe it's a hardware issue and I'm having a bad experience due to a quirky driver combination that fails on Unity while working well with most other desktops. Perhaps the state of Unity 7 is just a mess. It's hard to tell. Whatever the reason, trying this spin of Ubuntu was a poor experience for me and not up to the usual quality I enjoy from official community editions of the Ubuntu family.
An additional note
Most of my trial with Ubuntu Unity took place just before the announcement of the new 22.10 Beta release which also let people know this spin was becoming an official community edition of Ubuntu. As a result, the bulk of this review was based on past stable releases rather than the new beta.
However, in an effort to cover all the bases, I did download the new 22.10 Beta and gave it a whirl. The packages and wallpaper have been updated. However, the same problems remain. Performance is still on the lower end of the scale and almost every time I opened the dash, Unity crashed. Often times launching a program or performing a search resulted in a crash. Adjusting the panel in the Unity settings caused a crash. Browsing directories in the Files utility caused a crash. At one point within the span of five minutes, I managed to cause three desktop crashes, bringing my exploration to a short pause each time.
I still very much like the overall design of Unity and the way everything is oriented to the upper-left corner of the display, but the state of the implementation (even in the new beta snapshot) is in a poor condition.
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Hardware used in this review
My physical test equipment for this review was a Lenovo desktop with the following specifications:
- Processor: Hex-core Intel i5-10400 CPU @ 2.90GHz
- Storage: Western Digital 1TB hard drive
- Memory: 8GB of RAM
- Networking: Realtek RTL8111/8168/8411 wired network card, Realtek RTL8822CE 802.11ac PCIe wireless adapter
- Display: Intel CometLake-S GT2
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Visitor supplied rating
Ubuntu Unity has a visitor supplied average rating of: 9.2/10 from 12 review(s).
Have you used Ubuntu Unity? You can leave your own review of the project on our ratings page.
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| Miscellaneous News (by Jesse Smith) |
Kernel bug causes issues with Intel video cards, Canonical offers free Ubuntu Pro subscriptions, elementary OS adds features to software centre, AlmaLinux introduces new architecture
People running the latest kernels on cutting edge distributions such as Arch Linux ran into a bug with an Intel driver this past week. The issue caused corruption to the display on computers running Intel video cards. The issue appears to affect people who are running the 5.19.8 through 5.19.12 kernels only. "Intel laptop users running Linux are being advised to avoid running the latest Linux 5.19.12 stable kernel point release as it can potentially damage your display. Intel Linux laptop users on Linux 5.19.12 have begun reporting 'white flashing" display issues with one user describing it as '[the] laptop display starts to blink like lights in a 90's rave party.'" Phoronix reports a new kernel release, 5.19.13, has been published to address the issue.
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For a while now Canonical has offered extended, professional support for the Ubuntu distribution, which includes up to ten years of security fixes. This commercial support has been geared toward enterprise customers, but Canonical is now making their Ubuntu Pro support line available, free of charge, to individual users who wish to sign up. "`Since we first launched Ubuntu LTS, with five years free security coverage for the main OS, our enterprise customers have asked us to cover more and more of the wider open source landscape under private commercial agreements. Today, we are excited to offer the benefits of all of that work, free of charge, to anyone in the world, with a free personal Ubuntu Pro subscription', said Mark Shuttleworth, CEO of Canonical." Details on what features are included with an Ubuntu Pro subscription are covered on the Ubuntu website.
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The elementary OS developers have been working on a number of improvements and fixes. A few regressions have been addressed in the Gala window manager. The software centre has also received some new features: "You can now see the release notes of up to 5 past releases on app info pages to get a clearer idea of how often an app is updated. Plus, we now support the <issues> tag so that developers can provide links back to solved issues that you've reported. We're hoping this encourages folks to get involved as part of the open source community for their favorite apps. There's now an overlay status bar showing a description of currently in progress tasks. This replaces the mysterious spinner that previously appeared in the header bar. And, in the updates view, the Update All header is now sticky to the view, making its action always easily accessible." Additional details can be found in the distribution's September newsletter.
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The AlmaLinux project has published new install media for the s390x CPU architecture, joining the project's existing ARM, PPC, and x86_64 processor builds. What is interesting about the new s390x install media is that, while AlmaLinux OS is typically viewed as a sibling of CentOS, the CentOS project does not have a build for s390x. "Hello, IBM Z fans and Linux world at large. Today we have an interesting story to share about a new release - AlmaLinux 8.6 for s390x. The thing is, this release should not exist! Let's explain. In general, we build an AlmaLinux release by consuming upstream sources from the CentOS git and pulling those into our AlmaLinux Git Server which are then built using the AlmaLinux Build System. While the CentOS project built releases for a few architectures, CentOS 8 was never built for IBM Z!" Additional information on the new release along with download links can be found in the project's announcement.
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These and other news stories can be found on our Headlines page.
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| Questions and Answers (by Jesse Smith) |
Explaining the components of the command line prompt
Starting-to-type-everything asks: When I open a terminal it shows something like "[beeman@localbox ~]$". What does all of that mean and can I change it to something more useful for me?
DistroWatch answers: The text you are seeing in the terminal before each command is called a "command line prompt" or, often just "the prompt". It is intended to basically do two things: Let you know the system is ready for your next command and provide some basic context information.
The first part of the prompt, the part before the "@" symbol, is your username. In this case it is telling you that you are logged in as the user beeman. On my system it says jesse. The text field immediately following the "@" symbol is the name of your computer. In this case, the computer's name is set to localbox.
The next part, the "~" sign in this example, is the directory in which you are currently working. The "~" symbol is shorthand for your home directory. If you use the cd command to change to another directory, the "~" symbol will change to the name of the directory. For example, if you run the command "cd /usr", the prompt should change to "[beeman@localbox /usr]$".
The dollar sign at the end of the prompt usually helps indicate which shell you are using and whether you are logged in as a regular user or the root (system administrator) user. Most Linux distributions use the bash command-line shell which ends each prompt with the "$" symbol. If you spend time running FreeBSD systems you'll find user accounts typically run a command line shell called tcsh and it uses the "%" sign at the end of the prompt. Both shells display the "#" symbol if you login as the root user. The "#" symbol signals the user should be careful as they are performing tasks as the administrator, not their regular user.
You can change the information shown in the prompt. Let's assume you're using the bash shell, which you can confirm by running the following command:
echo $SHELL
The text which appears in the bash shell is set in the .bashrc file in your home directory. (If it's not there, sometimes a global default will be set in the /etc/bashrc file.)
The prompt is set using a variable called PS1. Right now, if you look in your .bashrc file you'll likely find a line which looks like this:
PS1="[\u@\h\w] \$ "
That probably looks messy. Most characters are displayed literally, but the backslashes before the letters indicate those letters represent variables which the shell will interpret. In this case "\u", "\h", and "\w" indicate the shell should display the username, hostname, and working directory.
To see what other variables are available you can look at the bash manual page which has a section called PROMPTING. This lists all the possible variables you can use, many of which involve displaying the date, time, number of jobs running in the shell, and different ways to display the name of the current directory.
You can set up a new prompt by typing "PS1=" followed by the symbols or variables you want to use. For instance, this will display the current time on one line, followed by your username and the current directory name:
PS1="\A\n[\u - \w] \$ "
The "\A" displays the current time and the "\n" bit starts a new line. You can set PS1 on the command line to test it. Once you have a prompt you like you can add a command to set PS1 in your .bashrc file so that it gets set every time you open a new terminal window.
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Additional answers can be found in our Questions and Answers archive.
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| Released Last Week |
Redcore Linux 2201
Redcore Linux is a Gentoo-based distribution featuring the KDE Plasma desktop environment, a graphical system installer, and a repository of binary packages for people who prefer not to compile their software. The project's latest release works to keep the binary repository up to date with its Gentoo parent. "October seems to be our month, as the previous stable release was launched just shy of 1 year ago. Today, I am pleased to announce the immediate availability of Redcore Linux Hardened 2201 (codename Rastaban) stable. This cycle had ups and downs, but at the end of it, we have the best release to date, and a very up to date one. Redcore Linux has been a rolling release distribution from the very beginning, but it used to lag behing Gentoo Linux by a few, usually 5 to 7, days. At times the lag was considerably longer, due to time constraints on my part. But, the old, fluctuating pattern is gone. Starting mid-July, I implemented some changes, and now Redcore Linux resyncs itself with Gentoo Linux every 6 hours." Additional information and a list of bug fixes can be found in the project's release announcement.
Redcore Linux 2201 -- Running the KDE Plasma desktop
(full image size: 1.9MB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
KaOS 2022.10
KaOS is an independent Linux distribution which focuses on providing one desktop (KDE Plasma) with one toolkit (Qt) on one CPU architecture (x86_64). The project's latest snapshot is version 2022.10 which introduces a number of changes to the system installer: "Many changes have been implemented to the installer Calamares in the last few months, so it is fitting to start with listing all that is new or has changed. It is now possible to do a typical install entirely from a touchpad or mouse, a keyboard is no longer needed. A virtual keyboard has been implemented for those modules that need text input. For those who prefer PulseAudio over Pipewire, a module has been added (KaOS only), that gives users the option to select which sound server they prefer (with Pipewire set as default). Dracut is the new default for the initramfs image creation (mkinitcpio is no longer in use for new installs). To accommodate that change, the Dracut module in Calamares had to be adjusted, so it now supports version-less kernels." Additional information is provided in the project's release announcement. Download (SHA256): KaOS-2022.10-x86_64.iso (2,954MB, signature, pkglist).
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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: 2,777
- Total data uploaded: 42.4TB
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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) |
Do you prefer the idea of running Ubuntu, Ubuntu MATE, or Ubuntu Unity?
Over the span of its life, the Ubuntu distribution has used three different desktop environments: GNOME 2 (which now lives on as MATE), Unity, and GNOME Shell. Whenever the main Ubuntu edition moves on to a new default desktop environment, a community spin has come along to continue offering the old approach.
When it comes to Ubuntu, which has been your favourite default desktop? Do you prefer the original MATE/GNOME 2 approach, Unity, or the modern GNOME Shell?
You can see the results of our previous poll on the idea of SpiralLinux adding a rolling-release branch in last week's edition. All previous poll results can be found in our poll archives.
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Do you prefer Ubuntu MATE, Ubuntu Unity, or Ubuntu (GNOME Shell)?
| Ubuntu MATE/GNOME 2: | 719 (32%) |
| Ubuntu Unity: | 188 (8%) |
| Ubuntu (GNOME Shell): | 330 (15%) |
| None of the above: | 1017 (45%) |
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| Website News |
New distributions added to database
TUXEDO OS
TUXEDO OS is an Ubuntu-based distribution developed in Germany by TUXEDO Computers GmbH, designed and optimised for the company's own range of Linux-friendly personal computers and notebooks. The distribution uses KDE Plasma as the preferred desktop. Some of the differences between Ubuntu and TUXEDO OS include custom boot menu, the TUXEDO Control Centre, Calamares installer, availability of the Lutris open gaming platform, preference for the PipeWire audio daemon (over PulseAudio), removal of Ubuntu's snap daemon and snap packages, and various other tweaks and enhancements.
TUXEDO OS 1-20220929 -- Running the KDE Plasma desktop
(full image size: 4.5MB, resolution: 2880x1800 pixels)
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New distributions added to waiting list
- Vanilla Dpup. Vanilla Dpup is a Puppy Linux flavor based on Debian packages. It's minimal and looks like Puppy Linux 4.1.x, but brings features not found in other Puppy Linux family distros, like special tuning for privacy, low resource consumption and fast boot. Plus features advanced users would appreciate such as support for man pages and keyboard shortcuts.
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DistroWatch database summary
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This concludes this week's issue of DistroWatch Weekly. The next instalment will be published on Monday, 17 October 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)
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| Linux Foundation Training |
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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 1046 (2023-11-20): Slackel 7.7 "Openbox", restricting CPU usage, Haiku improves font handling and software centre performance, Canonical launches MicroCloud |
| • Issue 1045 (2023-11-13): Fedora 39, how to trust software packages, ReactOS booting with UEFI, elementary OS plans to default to Wayland, Mir gaining ability to split work across video cards |
| • Issue 1044 (2023-11-06): Porteus 5.01, disabling IPv6, applications unique to a Linux distro, Linux merges bcachefs, OpenELA makes source packages available |
| • Issue 1043 (2023-10-30): Murena Two with privacy switches, where old files go when packages are updated, UBports on Volla phones, Mint testing Cinnamon on Wayland, Peppermint releases ARM build |
| • Issue 1042 (2023-10-23): Ubuntu Cinnamon compared with Linux Mint, extending battery life on Linux, Debian resumes /usr merge, Canonical publishes fixed install media |
| • Issue 1041 (2023-10-16): FydeOS 17.0, Dr.Parted 23.09, changing UIDs, Fedora partners with Slimbook, GNOME phasing out X11 sessions, Ubuntu revokes 23.10 install media |
| • Issue 1040 (2023-10-09): CROWZ 5.0, changing the location of default directories, Linux Mint updates its Edge edition, Murena crowdfunding new privacy phone, Debian publishes new install media |
| • Issue 1039 (2023-10-02): Zenwalk Current, finding the duration of media files, Peppermint OS tries out new edition, COSMIC gains new features, Canonical reports on security incident in Snap store |
| • Issue 1038 (2023-09-25): Mageia 9, trouble-shooting launchers, running desktop Linux in the cloud, New documentation for Nix, Linux phasing out ReiserFS, GNU celebrates 40 years |
| • Issue 1037 (2023-09-18): Bodhi Linux 7.0.0, finding specific distros and unified package managemnt, Zevenet replaced by two new forks, openSUSE introduces Slowroll branch, Fedora considering dropping Plasma X11 session |
| • Issue 1036 (2023-09-11): SDesk 2023.08.12, hiding command line passwords, openSUSE shares contributor survery results, Ubuntu plans seamless disk encryption, GNOME 45 to break extension compatibility |
| • Issue 1035 (2023-09-04): Debian GNU/Hurd 2023, PCLinuxOS 2023.07, do home users need a firewall, AlmaLinux introduces new repositories, Rocky Linux commits to RHEL compatibility, NetBSD machine runs unattended for nine years, Armbian runs wallpaper contest |
| • Issue 1034 (2023-08-28): Void 20230628, types of memory usage, FreeBSD receives port of Linux NVIDIA driver, Fedora plans improved theme handling for Qt applications, Canonical's plans for Ubuntu |
| • Issue 1033 (2023-08-21): MiniOS 20230606, system user accounts, how Red Hat clones are moving forward, Haiku improves WINE performance, Debian turns 30 |
| • Issue 1032 (2023-08-14): MX Linux 23, positioning new windows on the desktop, Linux Containers adopts LXD fork, Oracle, SUSE, and CIQ form OpenELA |
| • Issue 1031 (2023-08-07): Peppermint OS 2023-07-01, preventing a file from being changed, Asahi Linux partners with Fedora, Linux Mint plans new releases |
| • Issue 1030 (2023-07-31): Solus 4.4, Linux Mint 21.2, Debian introduces RISC-V support, Ubuntu patches custom kernel bugs, FreeBSD imports OpenSSL 3 |
| • Issue 1029 (2023-07-24): Running Murena on the Fairphone 4, Flatpak vs Snap sandboxing technologies, Redox OS plans to borrow Linux drivers to expand hardware support, Debian updates Bookworm media |
| • Issue 1028 (2023-07-17): KDE Connect; Oracle, SUSE, and AlmaLinux repsond to Red Hat's source code policy change, KaOS issues media fix, Slackware turns 30; security and immutable distributions |
| • Issue 1027 (2023-07-10): Crystal Linux 2023-03-16, StartOS (embassyOS 0.3.4.2), changing options on a mounted filesystem, Murena launches Fairphone 4 in North America, Fedora debates telemetry for desktop team |
| • Issue 1026 (2023-07-03): Kumander Linux 1.0, Red Hat changing its approach to sharing source code, TrueNAS offers SMB Multichannel, Zorin OS introduces upgrade utility |
| • Issue 1025 (2023-06-26): KaOS with Plasma 6, information which can leak from desktop environments, Red Hat closes door on sharing RHEL source code, SUSE introduces new security features |
| • Issue 1024 (2023-06-19): Debian 12, a safer way to use dd, Debian releases GNU/Hurd 2023, Ubuntu 22.10 nears its end of life, FreeBSD turns 30 |
| • Issue 1023 (2023-06-12): openSUSE 15.5 Leap, the differences between independent distributions, openSUSE lengthens Leap life, Murena offers new phone for North America |
| • 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 |
| • Full list of all issues |
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| Random Distribution | 
OpenIndiana
OpenIndiana is a continuation of the OpenSolaris operating system. It was conceived during the period of uncertainty following the Oracle takeover of Sun Microsystems, after several months passed with no binary updates made available to the public. The formation proved timely, as Oracle discontinued OpenSolaris soon after in favour of Solaris 11 Express, a binary distribution with a more closed development model to début later this year. OpenIndiana is part of the illumos Foundation, and provides a true open-source community alternative to Solaris 11 and Solaris 11 Express, with an open development model and full community participation.
Status: Active
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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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| 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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