 DistroWatch Weekly |
| DistroWatch Weekly, Issue 1057, 12 February 2024 |
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Welcome to this year's 7th issue of DistroWatch Weekly!
There is a lot of work which goes into making an operating system, especially one with a lot of modern features, conveniences, and options. This week we take a look at a distribution called Adelie Linux which strives for a simple, standards-compliant design in an effort to untangle operating system complexity and the potential bugs which can result from such complexity. Read on to find out how Adelie performs while using this clean design. Adelie is a fairly young project and not yet tested by a large group of users. Does the age of a distribution affect your willingness to run it? Let us know in this week's Opinion Poll. In our News section we report on the Debian project preparing packages for the year 2038 bug which will cause 32-bit software to struggle to process dates. We also talk about elementary OS splitting updates, handling the base system and applications separately. The Redox OS team is making it easier to port software from Linux to their modern operating system written in Rust and we share details below. Then we talk about Fedora organizing its atomic desktop spins into one family. Plus we talk about whether rolling or fixed releases offer a smoother upgrade experience in this week's Questions and Answers column. We are then pleased to share the releases of the past week and list the torrents we are seeding. We wish you all a fantastic week and happy reading.
This week's DistroWatch Weekly is presented by TUXEDO Computers.
Content:
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| Feature Story (By Jesse Smith) |
Adelie Linux 1.0 Beta
Adelie Linux is a fairly young project, but one I've been hearing people talk about recently. The distribution's website describes the project as follows:
Adélie is an independent, libre operating system based on the Linux kernel and musl runtime library. We focus on reliability, security, compatibility, portability, and usability.
The project appears to place a focus on technological simplicity, striving to use software packages which follow the Unix guideline of "do one thing well" with a minimum amount of fuss and flash.
In case we are interested in seeing which packages are available for Adelie, the project maintains a web portal for searching for packaged software.
While Adelie appears to be striving for a minimal approach, it is a distribution which offers a lot of builds and editions. The distribution runs on x86_64, x86, PPC, PPC64, ARMv7L, and AARCH64 processors. Beyond this, there are four editions we can download for the supported processors: Desktop, Server, Root filesystem (full), and Root filesystem (minimal). While there is just one Server flavour, there are four desktop flavours: KDE Plasma, LXQt, MATE, and Xfce.
I initially decided to download the LXQt desktop flavour for 64-bit computers (x86_64). The ISO was fairly small, only about 660MB, which is still small enough to fit on a CD.
Before trying out Adelie Linux, I recommend visiting the distribution's on-line documentation which gives a good deal of detail on how to perform common tasks, including installing the operating system.
Getting started
Booting from the Adelie media brings up a GRUB boot menu where we can choose to launch the distribution's live desktop interface or a text-only console session. We are then shown some text related to services starting. It looks as though a default username and password are shown, but the desktop loaded before I could get a look at the information. (Later, I found the default username and password are both "live".) Then the LXQt 1.4.0 desktop was displayed with icons on the desktop and a panel across the bottom of the display. The desktop icons launch the awkwardly named PCManFM-Qt file manager. The panel holds an application menu, virtual desktop switcher, and a system tray.
The LXQt desktop uses a light theme and, later, I discovered the KDE Plasma desktop also uses a light theme by default. People who like dark themes can change the look of either Adelie flavour using the corresponding desktop's settings panel.
Adelie Linux 1.0 Beta -- Exploring the LXQt desktop
(full image size: 187kB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
Adelie doesn't use any welcome window or customization wizard, keeping with the project's goal of a clean, simple design.
Installing
There is no icon for the system installer on the desktop. Adelie's installer can be found in the application menu under System Tools (on the LXQt edition) and under System (on the KDE Plasma edition). Adelie ships with its own, custom system installer which is called Horizon.
The Horizon graphical installer is designed to be easy to navigate with the mouse or with the keyboard. The first page of the installer tells us we can use function keys to navigate forwards and backwards if we don't want to click buttons with the mouse. We are told we can press F1 to access helpful hints. These shortcuts all work and I appreciate the focus on making it easy to navigate the interface. This first page of the installer also assures us nothing will be changed on our computer until we get to the final step of the install process, giving us a chance to move forward and back through the steps before applying changes.
The first screen of the installer also features a drop-down menu we can use to launch external utilities. A graphical partition manager, web browser (NetSurf), a terminal, and advanced install options can be accessed from this drop-down menu.
The second page asks us to pick a keyboard layout from a long, cryptic list of options. The default is to use the US keyboard. The third page asks if we'd like to fetch and install proprietary firmware to handle devices such as wireless cards. This step is optional and requires an active Internet connection.
Guided or manual partitioning is our next choice. The manual approach opens the KDE Disk Partitioning tool to help us divide up our disk. The automated approach takes over the local disk and sets up a root partition formatted with ext4. No swap partition or swap file is created for us using the automated approach.
Networking comes next and here things can get a bit complicated. We can take an automated approach which attempts to use a local, wired network connection. The automated approach uses DHCP to get DNS, gateway, and IP address information. The manual approach asks us to type in this information. We can supply IPv4 or IPv6 information, or both, when supplying network settings manually. The tricky part here is there aren't any options for wireless networking. Adelie's installer seems to assume we will use wired networking only. Further, there do not appear to be any networking tools or widgets in the LXQt live edition to help us get connected to the network.
This lack of networking utilities on the live media seems to affect just the LXQt edition. I downloaded the KDE Plasma flavour and it does include a graphical networking widget in the system tray and in the System Settings panel. This eventually led me to switch to the KDE edition after I finished setting up the LXQt flavour, but I digress.
The installer then walks us through selecting our timezone from a list and making up a hostname. We're next asked to choose which software bundles to install. We can choose to set up Adelie as a text-only system or pick a desktop (Plasma, LXQt, MATE, or Xfce). We can then select a "profile" for our desktop. Each desktop supports three profiles: Standard (for a full desktop and tools); Mobile (which offers all the Standard software, plus utilities for mobile computing); and Compact (a minimal desktop and a few applications). There doesn't appear to be any way to install multiple desktops. As I was using a laptop, I chose the LXQt Mobile profile as I hoped it would include a battery monitor and wireless networking tools.
The installer asks us if we want to install a boot loader and then we're asked to make up a password for the root account. This password must be at least eight characters long.
The following page offers to help us create up to four user accounts and we can supply usernames and passwords for each one. Optionally, accounts can be marked as being granted administrative access. After the account creation screen, we are asked to confirm we wish to proceed with the install and Horizon gets to work. I like that it's easy to move forwards and backwards through the installer's screens and the application is quite responsive.
My first time through the install process Horizon failed immediately after the confirmation screen. The error said a failure at this point almost certainly was caused by a corrupt ISO or by hardware failure. The installer then offered to show me its log file, which I think is a great feature. Bringing up the log file showed the cause was something entirely different. I'd attempted to create two user accounts, one called "jesse" and one called "guest". The installer reported a fatal error in its log while trying to create the "guest" account as the name was reserved.
Unfortunately, it's not possible to go back through the installer's screens to fix things after it has started working, so I had to start from scratch. I took all the same settings, but this time named my user accounts "jesse" and "anyone". The installer accepted these names and completed its work successfully. The install process took around 15 minutes during which no progress information was shown. When Horizon finished it suggested I restart the computer and remove the live media.
After installing the LXQt edition on my laptop I confirmed there were no wireless networking utilities included, even with the Mobile profile selected at install time. Since my laptop is modern enough (or thin enough) to not have a wired networking option, the lack of wireless connection tools posed a barrier. I decided to switch to the KDE Plasma edition. I downloaded the KDE edition which was a 1.8GB ISO. The KDE flavour of Adelie included a networking widget in the system tray. This allowed me to get on-line before running the installer. The KDE flavour installed exactly the same way as the LXQt edition. However, once the KDE edition with its Mobile profile was installed, my local copy of Adelie did not include the networking tools that had been available on the live media.
This seems strange. On the live KDE media not only is there a networking tool in the system tray, there is also one in the System Settings panel. However, neither of these tools were available on my installed copy of Adelie, effectively cutting off access to the Internet when running the distribution on physical hardware.
Early impressions
While I started with the LXQt flavour of Adelie, almost all of my time ended up being spent with the KDE Plasma edition. This offered me a wider range of applications and a chance to test features on the live media which required a network connection.
Booting my new copy of Adelie brought up a login screen (powered by SDDM) where accounts were listed side-by-side. I was able to select my username and sign into the Plasma environment.
Plasma, like LXQt, is presented with a light theme. A panel is placed across the bottom of the screen. And, as with the LXQt flavour, there is no welcome window or customization wizard. We're simply handed control and left to explore as we would like.
Adelie Linux 1.0 Beta -- Exploring KDE Plasma's application menu
(full image size: 127kB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
Hardware support
I had mixed, and sometimes negative, experiences when trying to get Adelie to work in my test environments. The distribution worked passably well in VirtualBox. The system booted quickly and was responsive. Neither Plasma or LXQt automatically resized the desktop to match my VirtualBox window, but I was able to adjust the resolution of both desktops in their settings panels.
When I tried running Adelie on my laptop the distribution started out well, booting successfully in both Legacy BIOS and UEFI modes. When I booted the LXQt edition I found my trackpad didn't work. My keyboard did work though and I was able to navigate LXQt well enough to launch its control centre and check the mouse settings. This confirmed for me that LXQt was unable to detect my trackpad. This might be the first time I've ever used a distribution which couldn't work with a laptop's trackpad.
When I switched over to the KDE Plasma edition it was also able to boot in both UEFI and Legacy BIOS modes. However, when I signed into Plasma, the desktop didn't load properly. There was no wallpaper and no panel. Like the LXQt edition, Plasma was unable to detect or use my laptop's trackpad. I was able to open Plasma's application menu and its Run dialog box using the keyboard, but KDE's keyboard support is not as good as LXQt's and it proved challenging to try to navigate the menu or settings panel without a mouse pointer.
Adelie Linux 1.0 Beta -- Changing the desktop theme using System Settings
(full image size: 208kB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
Both editions I tested were fairly light as both of them used less than 5GB of disk space. LXQt used about 190MB of RAM while KDE Plasma started out taking up just 340MB of RAM. However, Plasma slowly took up more and more space. After a minute, Plasma required 350MB of RAM, then 360MB a minute later. After ten minutes, while not running any new applications, Plasma used 450MB of RAM, and it continued to grow.
Included software
The software included in Adelie varies a lot depending on which desktop we install. The LXQt environment includes relatively little, mostly just desktop management tools and a few small utilities. The KDE Plasma edition includes dozens and dozens of applications. These include the Calligra productivity suite, VLC, KTorrent, multiple messaging clients, the Dolphin file manager, a microblogging tool, the KDE System Settings panel, and many small games. The KDE edition features four media players, several educational tools, a few development utilities, a system monitor, and multiple text editors.
The NetSurf web browser appears to be a common application across both editions. The GNU command line utilities and manual pages are also available across both editions. Adelie uses the zsh shell by default, though other shells, such as bash, are available.
The distribution ships with the s6 init software and uses OpenRC to manage services. I'll talk a little about OpenRC later. The distribution runs on version 5.15 of the Linux kernel, which struck me as unusually conservative as the 5.15 series is over two years old at the time of writing.
While browsing the software included by default, a few things caught my attention. Earlier, I mentioned the lack of networking tools on the installed versions of the distribution. Volume controls were another unusual point. The LXQt edition included one volume control widget in the system tray while the KDE edition has two audio controls in the system tray.
The sudo utility for running tasks as another user is included on the live media, but not included on the installed copy of the distribution. In its place we can use the su utility to switch between user accounts. This got me wondering about the "admin" checkbox option on the user creation screen of the installer. Since neither sudo or doas is installed, checking a box to indicate a user is an "admin" doesn't seem to have any practical effect. Technically, there are a few differences. People marked as administrators are added to a few additional user groups - specifically the wheel, kvm, and usb groups - though this doesn't have any noticeable effect with most tasks and non-admin users can still use su to become the root user if they have the proper password.
One other curious feature (or missing feature) which seems to make Adelie unique in my 25 years of Linux experience is it doesn't include the clear command to wipe the contents of a terminal. We can use the Ctrl-L keyboard shortcut to clear a screen, but the clear command doesn't exist in the user's path.
Software management
While exploring the two desktop flavours of Adelie I did not find any graphical software centre or package manager. A trip to the project's documentation shows Adelie uses APK for package management, the same command line utility used by Alpine Linux. The APK utility is not in the regular user's executable path (it's located under the /sbin directory). In other words, the package manager is semi-hidden to users who don't know to look for it. APK is in the root user's path.
Adelie Linux 1.0 Beta -- Running the APK package manager
(full image size: 131kB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
The APK package manager is unusually fast and, while it has a few syntax differences compared to other Linux package managers, it worked well for me. It's very sparing in its output, so it's not always clear what the package manager is doing, but it completes tasks in record time, pulling in new software and updates from Adelie's own repositories.
I checked and found no Flatpak support installed on Adelie or in the distribution's software repositories. Likewise, Snap is not available; it wouldn't work anyway since Snap relies on systemd and Adelie runs s6 for its init software.
Adelie Linux 1.0 Beta -- Managing system services
(full image size: 154kB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
While we can use APK to install software, packages which install services do not enable those services by default. To handle services we can turn to the OpenRC utility which is talked about in the distribution's documentation. In brief, we can run the rc-update command to enable or disable services at boot time. The rc-status command shows us which services are running or enabled. Finally, the service command can be used to start or stop a service. I quite like OpenRC and appreciate its quick, straight forward approach.
Conclusions
I tend to like distributions which strive to keep their technology base simple, I like the Unix philosophy of being open, simple, having most components focused on doing one thing well. Adelie seems to take this approach to heart and I appreciate this style of design.
The project seems ambitious, supplying builds for multiple architectures with multiple desktop environments and multiple profiles of each desktop. That is a lot of ground to cover. Adelie is still in beta, nearing its first stable release, so I don't want to assume too much or expect too much. However, it does feel like the distribution's team is stretched too thin at the moment. There are a lot of good goals and designs evident in the Adelie project, but the implementation has some concerning holes, at least in the two desktop editions I tried.
Adelie Linux is one of the only distributions I've encountered to not have working trackpad support. Not including tools for wireless networking in its Mobile flavour seems like a significant oversight. Likewise, not allowing the creation of a user called "guest" at install time and crashing the install process over it, and then blaming the hardware feels like a series of problems which should have been avoided (ideally by just allowing a user called "guest" like every other distribution).
Again, these issues might simply be a result of the distribution being young and not having enough exposure yet, but I do think it shows the project is trying to take on more than its team is ready to handle.
I will say that, at least in the VirtualBox environment, both flavours of Adelie performed quickly and required few resources. The desktop editions were stable, fast, and pleasantly lacking distractions. Once some bugs are addressed, this could be a good distribution, especially for people who want to run modern software on older equipment where efficiency is desired.
At times using Adelie felt like using Alpine Linux. Both projects have a fairly minimal base, use the musl system library, provide OpenRC for managing services, and the use APK package manager. In fact, I think if I installed Adelie's Server edition I'd probably find it difficult to tell it apart from Alpine unless I looked closely at the command line tools and APK configuration.
Adelie Linux probably needs some time to mature, some time to be tested. If it survives and grows over the next few years, I suspect it will come to be seen as a desktop companion to Alpine and similar in style to some other lightweight, cleanly designed projects such as Void.
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Hardware used in this review
My physical test equipment for this review was an HP DY2048CA laptop with the following
specifications:
- Processor: 11th Gen Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-1135G7 @ 2.40GHz
- Display: Intel integrated video
- Storage: Western Digital 512GB solid state drive
- Memory: 8GB of RAM
- Wireless network device: Intel Wi-Fi 6 AX201 + BT Wireless network card
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| Miscellaneous News (by Jesse Smith) |
Debian works to prepare packages against 2038 bug and updates install media, elementary OS splits application and system updates, Redox makes it easier to port Linux software, Fedora announces Atomic Desktops
Historically, Unix and Unix-like operating systems (including Linux) used a 32-bit integer to represent time, specifically the number of seconds since the start of the year 1970. While this approach has worked for years, it has an upper limit. Specifically, the number of seconds since the beginning of 1970 will be a number too high to count at some point in the year 2038. This is a well known problem and operating systems are being gradually patched to properly process dates beyond 2038 (ideally without disrupting existing 32-bit systems). The Debian project is currently working on patching 32-bit software to keep it year 2038 compatible, as Steve Langasek writes: "A number of you will have noticed already that the 64-bit time_t transition is now in progress in Debian experimental. The goal of this transition is to ensure that 32-bit architectures in Trixie (whether they are currently release architectures, or out of archive, etc) will be capable of handling current and future timestamps referring to times beyond 2038." Additional information on this transition is presented in the Debian wiki page on 64-bit time.
The Debian team have announced updated install media for Debian 12 which include security updates for the project's Stable branch. "The Debian project is pleased to announce the fifth update of its stable distribution Debian 12 (codename Bookworm). This point release mainly adds corrections for security issues, along with a few adjustments for serious problems. Security advisories have already been published separately and are referenced where available. Please note that the point release does not constitute a new version of Debian 12 but only updates some of the packages included."
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The elementary team are preparing for version 8 of their distribution. The project is testing some changes, including separating base system updates from application updates: "The headlining feature this month is the brand new mechanism for operating system updates. Instead of being a part of updates in AppCenter, system updates now live in the System page of System Settings. The new updates mechanism is super fast and includes an option to download updates automatically. It will also let you know explicitly if security updates are part of the updates package." Additional details on this change and other features of the upcoming elementary OS 8 can be found in the project's blog post.
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Redox is a Unix-like Operating System written in Rust, aiming to bring the innovations of Rust to a modern microkernel and a full set of applications. The project aims to extend its functionality by offering ported Linux applications, though the ways in which resources are accessed has sometimes made porting programs difficult. The Redox team is changing the way applications reference resources to make porting Linux applications to Redox easier. "Redox has a microkernel core, with drivers and other resource providers running as tasks and providing 'schemes'. A scheme is the name of a resource provider, and until now, resources have been accessed using URI/URL format. For example, files would be accessed as file:path/to/my_file, and a TCP connection would be accessed as tcp:127.0.0.1. This format, while forward-looking, has not been very backwards-compatible.
In order to simplify our efforts to port Linux software to Redox, we have decided to change our resource path format to the Linux-compatible /scheme/scheme_name/path/to/resource. Paths that do not begin with /scheme will be assumed to refer to the file scheme, so /path/to/my_file is treated by the system as /scheme/file/path/to/my_file, but the application will only see the /path/to/my_file portion. Using this format, normal paths now look just like Linux paths, while drivers and other resources can still be addressed without breaking software." The project's newsletter also mentions Redox can run on Raspberry Pi 3B+ computers.
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The Fedora project includes many spins of the distribution. These spins often provide alternative desktop environments or focus on specific tasks. Some spins use atomic package management and this last category is getting its own special designation: Fedora Atomic Desktops. "We are happy to announce the creation of a new family of Fedora Linux spins: Fedora Atomic Desktops! As Silverblue has grown in popularity, we've seen more of our mainline Fedora Linux spins make the jump to offer a version that implements rpm-ostree. It's reached the point where it can be hard to talk about all of them at the same time. Therefore we've introduced a new brand that will serve to simplify how we discuss rpm-ostree and how we name future atomic spins." There are currently four atomic spins: Silverblue (GNOME), Kinoite (Plasma), Sway Atomic, and Budgie Atomic.
The Fedora Magazine article also points out that "atomic" is more accurate, in Fedora's case, than the term immutable: "This nice branding term is also a more accurate way of talking about how rpm-ostree works. Fedora Atomic spins are not actually immutable. There are ways to get around the read-only aspects of the implementation even though it is much harder. The nature of the OS, where updates are only implemented when they successfully build and you can rollback or rebase between core host systems, is better described by atomicity than immutability."
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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) |
Rolling release vs fixed for a smoother experience
Getting-started asks: In terms of ease of use, does it make more sense to go with a rolling release vs a fixed release? I hear upgrading fixed releases can be a pain and want to avoid headaches.
DistroWatch answers: Most Linux distributions follow what is called a "fixed release" approach. What this means is: once a new version of a distribution is published, the software included in the operating system remains static. Typically no new major features are introduced, no big application changes occur, and no new versions of the desktop are introduced into this version of the operating system. If you want new versions of a package or new features, you need to wait for the next major version of the distribution to be published (often six months or a year after the previous release).
Most fixed release distributions will update a few key components, such as the web browser, in order to remain current. Also, all major distributions supply security updates for their packages. This means users may be running an older version of a package, but they are kept secure with security fixes that were included in newer versions of their software.
The fixed release approach is good for stability as it means the distribution will remain virtually unchanged (apart from security fixes) for the supported lifespan of the distribution. This is usually a year for short-term releases, but may be up to five or ten years for long-term support releases. This provides an unchanging environment which is convenient for the user and the operating system likely to remain quite stable for the entire supposed lifespan of the distribution.
There are two main problems with fixed releases. One is they do not receive new features in the main repositories. This means in order to enjoy newer versions of applications we need to enable a backports repository (which may be unsupported) or we need to use a portable package format, such as Flatpak, to install newer versions of preferred applications.
The second problem with fixed releases is, once the release is no longer supported, we'll need to upgrade to a new version of the distribution. This will typically result in nearly every component on the system jumping to a new version. Everything from the desktop, to the web browser, the office suite, the e-mail client, and the development tools will be bumped up to new versions. This tends to result in incompatibilities with old file formats and settings, along with changes to the user's workflow. Engaging in a distribution's major version jump tends to be a headache that can result in days of finding new little changes or incompatibilities which need to be addressed.
In contrast, a rolling release is continuously updated. A rolling release distribution typically updates packages shortly after new versions of applications become available. This means people running a rolling release system regularly get access to the latest new features and enhancements.
With a rolling release there is no big upgrade hiccup every three/five/ten years, because the system is constantly being upgraded piece-by-piece. There is no big transition point where the user needs to pause and work out how to handle new versions of all their applications and libraries. We don't need to re-install or upgrade a rolling release distribution because it's constantly evolving.
This constant evolution brings its own challenges. A rolling release distribution isn't static, it may introduce little changes to the user interface, applications, or libraries at any time. This means, in small ways, we may run into changes in our workflow or run into incompatible components which no longer work together. Instead of one giant upgrade every few years, we're instead faced with making small upgrades each week or month. Often times these mini-updates go smoothly, but occasionally one will break packages, cause unexpected behaviour, or force a change in the way we navigate an application.
A fixed release typically runs smoothly for years, but then necessitates one big upgrade with corresponding headaches every few years when we upgrade. A rolling release will introduce small changes and issues on a regular basis. The number of components which change are roughly the same, but one is a "steady drip" while the other offers a "rare leap".
Which of these approaches is nicer, which one offers the least amount of stress for the user, will probably depend on the user's perspective. Some people like trying out new things and having the latest features as soon as possible and don't mind the occasional change or disruption to their workflow. Other people want their computer to work the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow and prefer to plan a weekend when they can perform a major upgrade to the next fixed version. It's a personal decision.
For less experienced users I tend to recommend a fixed release and planned upgrades every five-ish years. But for people who like new features and don't mind the occasional surprise, a rolling release can offer a more "gentle slope" in terms of upgrades.
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Additional answers can be found in our Questions and Answers archive.
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| Released Last Week |
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: 2,958
- Total data uploaded: 44.0TB
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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) |
How established does a distribution need to be before you will try it?
Our Feature Story this week talked about Adelie Linux, a young project with a focus on being light, simple, and standards compliant. Adelie is still in early development, awaiting its first major stable release. This week we would like to hear how established a distribution becomes before you feel comfortable running it. Are you happy to try out new projects that are still in early development? Do you wait until a project has a stable release, or multiple stable releases? Let us know in the comments what your criteria are for trying out a new project.
You can see the results of our previous poll on running Damn Small Linux (DSL) in our previous edition. All previous poll results can be found in our poll archives.
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I will first try a distro when...
| It is pre-stable release (alpha/beta): | 100 (7%) |
| It reaches its first stable release: | 405 (28%) |
| It has produced multiple stable releases: | 312 (22%) |
| After a set period of time (months or years): | 92 (6%) |
| I do not have a release/time requirement for new distros: | 532 (37%) |
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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, 19 February 2024. Past articles and reviews can be found through our Weekly Archive and Article Search pages. 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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| Archives |
| • Issue 1156 (2026-01-19): Chimera Linux's new installer, using the DistroWatch Torrent Corner, new package tools for Arch, Haiku improves EFI support, Redcore streamlines branches, Synex introduces install-time ZFS options |
| • 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 |
| • Full list of all issues |
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Ultramarine Linux
Ultramarine Linux is a Fedora-based distribution featuring extra package repositories such as RPM Fusion and enabling multimedia codecs. Ultramarine can be considered a spiritual successor to Korora Project and aims to make Fedora a more desktop-friendly experience.
Status: Active
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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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