DistroWatch Weekly |
DistroWatch Weekly, Issue 531, 28 October 2013 |
Welcome to this year's 43rd issue of DistroWatch Weekly! Open source software comes in many different forms, representing various styles and ideals. This week we aim to celebrate the diversity of the open-source ecosystem by looking at projects and technologies that have a wide range of goals and varying target audiences. First up is a review of the PC-BSD operating system. The PC-BSD project is one of the few BSDs to specifically target desktop users and Jesse Smith took the latest release for a spin to find out how it performs. In this issue of DistroWatch Weekly we will also weigh the pros and cons of upgrading an existing installation to a new version of our operating system and talk about a new firewall technology coming to the Linux kernel. The openSUSE project has some exciting new features coming up in their 13.1 release and is looking for beta testers, read on to find out what the community project is preparing to launch and how you can help test it! In addition, we link to an article which discusses the availability of computers that ship with Linux pre-installed. If you want to avoid the hassle of working around Secure Boot or wish to skip the installation process, this article will help you find the best ready-made solution. As usual, we cover distribution releases from the past week and look forward to exciting new developments. We wish you all a wonderful week and happy reading!
Content:
Listen to the Podcast edition of this week's DistroWatch Weekly in OGG (21MB) and MP3 (37MB) formats
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Feature Story (by Jesse Smith) |
PC-BSD 9.2: The daemon is in the details
The PC-BSD project carries the interesting task of taking the FreeBSD operating system and fashioning it into a desktop-oriented experience. The latest release of PC-BSD, version 9.2, is based on FreeBSD 9.2 and comes with a number of promising new features, many of which will appeal to system administrators. The new release of PC-BSD comes with a backup utility which not only allows users to create archives of their files on a remote server or NAS, it also integrates with the ZFS advanced file system. This means users should be able to create snapshots of their home directories and restore files from within the Life Preserver backup tool.
The PC-BSD operating system now uses the GRUB 2 boot loader and this also integrates with ZFS, allowing the administrator to create boot environment snapshots. This essentially means that, prior to an upgrade or system change, a snapshot can be created of the existing operating system. Once the change has been made the administrator can revert back to the old snapshot (the version of the operating system known to be good) simply by rebooting the machine. This version of PC-BSD also comes with a working PKG-NG repository. This is a collection of binary packages which work similarly to RPM and Deb package repositories in the Linux community. In addition to the PKG-NG repository, PC-BSD comes with a PBI package manager. A PBI package is a stand-alone software bundle that can be easily transferred between computers, but we can come back to talk about software management later. One further behind-the-scenes feature of PC-BSD 9.2 is the project's new mirror system, hosted by ScaleEngine. This lets users download files quickly without manually hunting for a fast/close server.
The PC-BSD operating system comes in a few flavours, including a DVD build which is 3.6 GB in size, a compressed live USB image and a large installation-only USB image. There is no live-DVD nor CD-sized option. Each of the download options is for the 64-bit x86 architecture, there are no 32-bit options. I opted to download the DVD edition of the operating system. When I first starting working with PC-BSD I wanted to try it in a virtual machine prior to setting it loose on my hard drive. I found the operating system did not work well with VirtualBox's default settings and I had to try a few different combinations of settings before PC-BSD would boot in the virtual environment. In addition I tried running PC-BSD in a QEMU virtual machine and, here, the operating system ran, though it was extremely slow. In the end I focused my time on running PC-BSD in VirtualBox (where things eventually worked passably after some trial and error) and on my desktop computer (dual-core 2.8 GHz CPU, 6 GB of RAM, Radeon video card, Realtek network card). I found PC-BSD worked smoothly on the physical machine, properly detecting my display's resolution and running fairly quickly. As I'll discuss later, PC-BSD comes with many possible desktop environments which can be selected at install time, so measuring memory usage will vary a lot from one machine to the next. I installed two desktop environments, LXDE and KDE. When running KDE the operating system used approximately 420 MB of RAM and, when logged into LXDE, PC-BSD actively used about 150 MB of RAM.
Installation and first impressions
Booting from the PC-BSD installation disc brings up a graphical system installer. The first screen asks us to select our preferred language. Icons appear in the lower-left corner of the screen and give us access to tools which are available throughout the installation process. One icon brings up a window which shows us what hardware the operating system has detected and which devices can be utilized. Another allows us to configure a network connection. Other icons enable an on-screen keyboard, allow us to change our keyboard's layout and display tips on how to use the system installer. The second screen of the installer asks if we would like to install PC-BSD's desktop edition, the PC-BSD server edition (called TrueOS) or we can opt to restore our operating system from an existing backup. We are shown a Customize button which allows us to mark optional packages for installation on top of the base we select. Some of these software bundles are desktop environments (KDE, GNOME, Xfce, LXDE), some are development tools, there are some third-party drivers (such as the NVIDIA proprietary video driver) and there are unsupported user interfaces (such as Ratpoison and Openbox).
The following screen covers disk partitioning and there are three basic options to be had. We can hand our hard drive over to the installer and basically let it take over the disk; we can walk through a guided disk partitioning wizard where we can set up ZFS RAID and mirroring, name our ZFS data pool and adjust our swap partition's size; and the final option is to open a command line partition manager and set up everything manually on our own. New administrators should be aware it is recommended that we give the desktop edition of PC-BSD 50GB of hard drive space and the server edition 20GB of free space. I found installing the desktop edition with the default desktop (KDE) required approximately 7GB of drive space.
PC-BSD 9.2 - documentation and package management (full image size: 551kB, screen resolution 1280x1024 pixels)
The first time we boot PC-BSD the operating system presents a graphical interface with a window asking us to select an appropriate video driver for our computer. We can also set our display's resolution in this window. PC-BSD does try to guess which driver it should use and we can override its choice if we think it appropriate. Following this screen we are shown an animation and then a series of windows appear asking for further information. We are asked to confirm our preferred language, our time zone and we are asked to provide a hostname for our computer. We then enter a password for the root account and create a regular user account for ourselves. We have the option at this point of encrypting the user's home directory. With this done we are brought to a graphical login screen.
The first time we login a series of screens appear, offering us tips on how to make use of some of PC-BSD's key features. These help screens briefly talk about connecting to networks, installing new applications, where to find system settings, how to install security updates and how to create backups of our files. On the desktop we find icons for accessing the AppCafe (a package manager), the PC-BSD Control Panel and the project's Handbook. I tried running the KDE and LXDE desktops and found they both had a traditional layout with the application menu, task switcher and system tray sitting at the bottom of the screen. One of the first things I attempted was to open the project's Handbook which contains a great deal of documentation and this led me on a journey of sorts. When I attempted to open the Handbook the Okular document viewer opened and said it could not open the file. I checked and confirmed the file did, in fact, exist and so decided to install an alternative document viewer to see if that would make a difference.
Applications and software management
The first stop in finding new applications is the AppCafe, a modern, user-friendly package manager. AppCafe allows us to search for software by name or by category. Clicking on a specific application will bring up detailed information on the selected software, including the application's size and a description. The AppCafe will also show us related items, so for example looking at the Firefox web browser will show us other available web browsers. Applications can be installed with the click of a button. The AppCafe actually has two tabs, one for browsing available software and another which shows items that have been (or are being) installed. Clicking on an installed item will show us information on the installed software. Users can remove installed applications or mark them to be automatically updated as newer versions become available. Once an application has been installed its icon is added to our desktop.
During my time with PC-BSD I installed several applications such as Firefox, the VLC multimedia player and a couple of PDF viewers, including Xpdf. Most of the applications installed and ran without any complications, the exception being Xpdf. When Xpdf installed I clicked on its desktop item and a text editor opened, showing the contents of the application's launcher. I found Xpdf had been installed, even if its launcher didn't work, and I was able to manually launch the program from the command line. At this point I tried opening the project's Handbook in Xpdf and learned the document file was corrupted. My quest for a way to view the documentation continued...
I feel it is worth mentioning that software installed through the AppCafe is provided in PBI format. PBIs are self-contained software bundles, meaning they contain an application and all the application's dependencies. This is very convenient when transferring software between computers which may have different libraries (or different versions of libraries) installed. However, the trade-off is PBIs are large and can be around ten times bigger than dynamically linked packages available in most Linux distributions.
PC-BSD 9.2 - Control Panel and AppCafe (full image size: 618kB, screen resolution 1280x1024 pixels)
For people wanting packages handled in a more Linux-like fashion there is PKG-NG. This command line package manager has a syntax similar to YUM or APT in Linux distributions. The concept is also similar in that PKG-NG connects to remote repositories and downloads binary packages (and their dependencies) to install or upgrade. PKG-NG might be thought of as an extension of sorts to the FreeBSD Ports collection in that the same software is available, but packaged in a different format. PKG-NG is a handy way to search for and install software from the command line and the binary packages are much smaller than the equivalent PBI bundles. PC-BSD comes with one more package manager, a graphical utility which gives us the ability to add or remove big-picture items. For example, with a couple of clicks we can install third-party drivers, alternative window managers or entire desktop environments. This secondary graphical package manager also gives us the ability to download and install all available software updates. There does not appear to be a way to selectively upgrade only desired packages using this utility.
Speaking of upgrades, when software updates are available for the system, a notification appears in the system tray letting us know. Clicking on this notification launches an update manager application. On my system this update manager always locked up, apparently waiting for information to load concerning the new updates. Closing the update manager and manually upgrading PBIs (through the AppCafe) or system packages (using PKG-NG) worked for me and kept the operating system up to date. I noticed upon applying all available package upgrades I was able to open and view the project's very useful Handbook. The Handbook is extensive, detailed and the documentation it contained was very much worth the wait.
System configuration
One of the nicer elements of PC-BSD is the system's Control Panel. This panel, which closely resembles the KDE System Settings panel, gives us a one-stop location for dealing with system settings. From this panel we can launch the various package managers, activate Active Directory integration, tweak the login manager and check the operating system's compatibility with our hardware. We can manage background services, add and delete user accounts, change our display settings and set up printers and scanners. There is a firewall module that was easy to use, the Life Preserver backup utility and the Warden.
I feel the Warden deserves a special mention. On FreeBSD (and PC-BSD) there is the concept of a jail, a sort of very lightweight virtual machine. These jails are useful for testing software which may misbehave or for running network services that should be kept isolated for security reasons. The Warden is a utility which makes managing jails an easy point-n-click process. PC-BSD supports three kinds of jails, one for running FreeBSD style environments, one for working with software ports and one for running Linux containers. Using the Warden's interface we can quickly create new jails, take snapshots of existing jails and roll back to previous points in the jail's time-line. The Warden can also open a command line interface that exists inside the jail for system administration of the isolated container. I tried running a FreeBSD jail, which worked well, and a Linux jail, which could not be successfully created.
It's hard to talk about what software PC-BSD comes with by default as we have the option of customizing the installation right from the start. Some applications will be consistent across all installs such as the Control Panel and the Warden, backup utilities and ZFS support. Others will vary depending on which desktop environment we install. Taking the default environment (KDE) installs the Konqueror web browser, the Kopete instant messaging client, the KMail e-mail software and the Okular document reader. It also gives us the KTorrent bittorrent software, the GNU Image Manipulation Program, the k3b disc burning software, MPlayer and the Amarok music player. PC-BSD multimedia programs are supported by popular media codecs and we can enjoy most media formats right out of the box. I found that Adobe's Flash player was installed, but disabled by default. This could be confusing to new users, but to enable the Flash player the user must first run, from the command line, "flashpluginctl on". Underneath the hood PC-BSD runs atop FreeBSD 9.2 and makes use of FreeBSD's kernel and userland programs.
Special features
Another feature which I feel deserves special mention is the Life Preserver utility. This program can be accessed either from the Control Panel or from the desktop's system tray. Life Preserver makes it very easy for users to schedule ZFS snapshots of their home directories and to copy data to remote servers or NAS boxes via a secure shell connection. The latest version of Life Preserver allows users to browse existing snapshots and to restore either entire snapshots or individual files. At least that is the idea. I found Life Preserver created ZFS snapshots just fine and I could browse old snapshots, but when I tried to restore files I ran into an "undefined" error. This prevented file restores using the GUI tool, but I was able to drop to the command line and manually restore files from existing snapshots.
PC-BSD 9.2 - Warden and Life Preserver (full image size: 588kB, screen resolution 1280x1024 pixels)
The ZFS technology in PC-BSD isn't just useful for desktop users, it is also helpful when it comes to restoring the operating system. Administrators can create boot environment snapshots prior to performing an upgrade or altering the base operating system. Snapshots can be created using a simple graphical application available through the Control Panel. Once one of these snapshots has been created it is available from the system's boot menu. This means if the underlying operating system is corrupted in some way the administrator can put things right by simply rebooting the computer and selecting the older snapshot from the GRUB boot menu.
Before getting into my conclusions with regards to PC-BSD, I want to tackle the issue of this operating system being 64-bit only. This has been a thorny issue with some people who prefer to run 32-bit operating systems for one reason or another. Personally, I was sorry to see live CDs and 32-bit both being dropped as I like having smaller images to download and test, but being a reviewer is a very niche market and I do not expect projects to cater just to me. In the big picture I think moving to 64-bit only makes sense for PC-BSD. The operating system is designed for modern machines with 64-bit processors, the memory footprint isn't much larger than one would get from the 32-bit build, and this move will let the developers focus on features rather than bug fixes for 32-bit. This focus is apparently important where ZFS technology is concerned. Anyone who really needs to run a 32-bit operating system probably will not be interested in PC-BSD due to the operating system's size. Alternatively, people can install FreeBSD and then install the PC-BSD software on top of the FreeBSD base using the Ports Collection.
Conclusions
As to running PC-BSD, my experience had me constantly swinging back and forth between two thoughts: "Wow, this is a great feature, I wish more projects did this!" and "Drat, another bug, this is frustrating!" There was not a lot of middle ground between these two thoughts while running PC-BSD. It seems as though the developers tried to supply several new features for this release, all of them good ideas, but some of the implementations still have problems. Let's start with the system installer. This is a fine piece of software. I really like that the installer can detect our hardware and warn us if some hardware support is missing. I also like the various guided disk partitioning options and the optional package selection screen. Both of these features were well implemented and I had no issues at all with the installer.
Moving on to package management, this was a case of great features mixing with problems. The new PBI manager, AppCafe, is one of the better software managers I've used to date. It's fast, lets us browse packages while it is working and I really like the related software list which helps users find competing applications. The auto-update feature is welcome too as it will help keep items like the Firefox web browser updated without manual interaction. The flip side to AppCafe was the software update manager which always seemed to be busy and never worked for me. The graphical package manager worked passably, but it was frustrating not having a way to pick and choose which items I wanted to upgrade. The command line package manager, PKG-NG, worked very well for me. I really like this package manager, which works in a similar fashion to APT or YUM and features a simple syntax. I think PKG-NG will make software management on FreeBSD and PC-BSD much easier for people coming from a Linux background.
The Warden was another area where I was really impressed. The level of control over jails is excellent and I like that the Warden can integrate with ZFS, giving us instant snapshots of our virtual containers. The interface is easy to navigate and the ability to create and destroy jails in this way is great. On the flip side, Linux jails (which worked in PC-BSD 9.1) no longer worked for me with PC-BSD 9.2. The control centre which comes with PC-BSD was welcome. It is nice to have a central place to handle settings which is not tied to a particular desktop. I don't have any complaints here.
I really like the direction the Life Preserver backup utility is taking. The ability to manage home directory snapshots, send copies of files to a remote server and restore snapshots or entire files -- all from one location -- is excellent. Unfortunately I found I was unable to restore files from local snapshots using Life Preserver. The files were there and I could manually retrieve them using the command line, but there seems to be a problem with the graphical utility when it comes to restoring files. Luckily the backup and archive browsing functionality worked very well.
There were a few other minor bugs, things which will probably get fixed during the life of the release. For example, the Xpdf application launcher opening its short-cut information instead of the application itself or the PC-BSD Handbook not opening. Prior to downloading system updates my wallpaper would not display when I logged into KDE. These are minor, if annoying, problems that can be fixed in short order.
For the most part I think PC-BSD 9.2 is a step in the right direction. There are some great system administration tools included in this release and the design of some applications (such as the AppCafe and Life Preserver) are very promising. However, I found there were some bumps on the Road of Progress and there were problems which would likely cause newcomers to turn away. If you are feeling experimental or would like to play with exciting new ZFS features then I think PC-BSD is a great choice. This release did have its problems, but PC-BSD remains, in my opinion, the best desktop solution in the BSD community.
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Miscellaneous News (by Jesse Smith and Ladislav Bodnar) |
openSUSE looks for more testers, finding computers with Linux pre-installed, SolusOS closes shop, Linux gains new firewall technology
The openSUSE project is nearing the launch of the distribution's 13.1 release. The new release will feature improvements to the distribution's Btrfs implementation, an overhaul of YaST and various other new features. The project has put out a call for people to test the new openSUSE release candidate and they are particularly interested in how the distribution works on the hardware of real users. "The automated testing has limitations: it only works in a virtualized environment, precluding testing of hardware and technologies like UEFI/Secure boot. And our Factory users have a limited amount of hardware available and they're usually only updating, not doing new installations. So it is extremely valuable if you grab an old (or new!) laptop or desktop and do a full installation on it instead of using a virtual machine." The release of openSUSE 13.1 is scheduled to take place on November 19, 2013.
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Most people reading this will be aware that Linux distributions can make for good desktop/laptop operating systems. Many Linux distributions are user-friendly, come with a great deal of quality software and are consistently stable -- all ideal features for a desktop OS. The hurdle for many people is getting the free operating system installed. For new users it can be intimidating to download an ISO, burn it to a disc and try to figure out what partitioning a hard disk is, let alone doing it. For this reason, computers which come with Linux distributions pre-installed are valuable and Computer World has a useful guide to finding computers bundled with GNU/Linux. "People may joke about `the year of the Linux desktop' always being some five years into the future. But for a whole clutch of PC vendors who sell Linux as a standard pre-loaded OS on their systems, that year came a long time ago." The article lists some big name vendors with Linux offerings, such as Dell, and some lesser known entities such as ThinkPenguin.
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SolusOS, a beginner-friendly Linux distribution based on Debian's stable branch, closed shop last week. Citing "lack of manpower" to continue with development in an efficient manner, lead developer Ikey Doherty announced the sad news after nine alpha releases of what would have been the project's second stable release. The distribution's website was no longer accessible at the time of writing, but IT World's Jon Gold summarised the point from the announcement in Beginner-friendly Linux distro SolusOS to shut down: "Developer Ikey Doherty announced this week that work on SolusOS, a Debian-based distro aimed at beginning Linux users, would come to a halt. The solo nature of the project eventually became too much for Doherty, he wrote in an official blog post. He is employed full-time as a software engineer at Intel. 'Simply put, there is no longer enough manpower to fulfill the vision,' he said. 'What began as a Debian derivative evolved into an independent distribution, without the large development team required to back such an effort.'" SolusOS thus joins the list of discontinued distributions the number of which currently stands at 413.
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Technology is constantly changing and in fewer places is that more apparent than in the Linux community. The Linux kernel is soon due to receive a new way of filtering network packets with nftables. In the past Linux has used a number of approaches to filtering packets, including IPChains and IPTables. The new nftables approach to network filtering should simplify the in-kernel code and reduce complexity. The new code has been in development for over four years and is just now getting ready for inclusion in the 3.13 version of the Linux kernel. Jonathan Corbet has a nice write-up of what nftables is and how it will work, a good read for network administrators eager to test out the new technology.
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Questions and Answers (by Jesse Smith) |
Considering upgrade pros and cons
Not-eager-to-upgrade asks: I'd like to know is what are the benefits of upgrading my operating system, if any, if I run PPA's / Backports? I currently run Kubuntu 12.04 LTS and have various "Precise" PPAs enabled, including the Backports PPA. I'm running KDE SC 4.12 for the majority of my system with a little 4.11 scattered throughout and whatever else is updated from time to time through those Kubuntu PPAs.
Since Kubuntu 13.10 is now released, my question is: why would (or why should) I erase all that and install Kubuntu 13.10? Is there an advantage to doing so, or is it unnecessary? Should I just stick with my long term support operating system and PPAs?
On a side note, why should I only use a distro specific PPA? For example, "Precise" as opposed to "Raring" or "Saucy" for my LTS distro? Is the reason that a later release may have a different tool chain in use? Why is that better (or is it)?
DistroWatch answers: When other people ask me whether or not they should upgrade their operating system my response typically boils down to asking three questions of them:
- Does your current operating system do everything you need it to and is it still receiving security updates?
- Do you know of any new features the new version of your operating system offers that you need and do not already have?
- How much spare time do you have for when something breaks during the upgrade process?
Now, from the sounds of things, you already have a working operating system (Kubuntu 12.04) and it is running up-to-date desktop software and applications. The Kubuntu 12.04 release is supported through to about 2017. Assuming the existing operating system is running smoothly and you can perform all the tasks you need to do with your computer, there seems to be little incentive to move away from Kubuntu 12.04. Looking at Kubuntu 13.10 we see that it comes with similar versions of software you already run, it only receives security updates for approximately nine months and looks (to me) to be a fairly tame version with regards to features. In other words, Kubuntu 13.10 doesn't seem to have exciting new features which would draw people to it. Now, Kubuntu 13.10 may have some low-level improvements that would make your computer faster, hardware drivers are often improved from one release to the next, but otherwise it sounds to me like Kubuntu 12.04 is probably the better solution unless you are feeling experimental.
As to why there are separate PPA packages for each version of the Ubuntu family, the reason is that different versions of the distribution will supply different versions of libraries or perhaps put components in different places. There is no guarantee a program built to work with "Raring" will run on "Precise", for example. As a result, each package needs to be rebuilt for each supported version of the operating system. It is best not to try to mix packages built for different versions of your operating system.
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Released Last Week |
Ultimate Edition 3.6
"TheeMahn" has announced the release of Ultimate Edition 3.6, a desktop-oriented distribution and live CD with MATE as the default desktop, based on Ubuntu 12.10: "Ultimate Edition 3.6 was built from the ground up bootstrapped from the Ubuntu 12.10 tree. This was the first time I have done this. I have discovered in doing so that it makes for a tighter release as can be seen in the Lite edition. The release boots in under 6 seconds on my PC. Many repositories have been added to increase software availability. The kernel was pulled from the X.Org 'Crack Pushers PPA', version 3.7. Ultimate Edition 3.6 Lite has the very basics and a good ground to build your operating system forward, adding only what you need. Ultamatix has been resurrected from the dead to assist in this matter. Ultamatix's dependancies on older libraries have been stripped and replaced with WebKit (still not fully functional so use at your own risk)." Continue to the release announcement for more information and screenshots.
Kwheezy 1.3
Euan Thoms has announced the release of Kwheezy 1.3, the latest update of the Debian-based distribution centred around the KDE desktop: "Version 1.3 is now available from the download page. This release focuses on improving the installation and post-install process. Also there is quite a bit of tidying up and polishing. Changes in version 1.3: Updated to Debian 7.2; added GPT partitioning support to the installer (requires BIOS/Legacy boot); a new post-installation wizard adds polish, hopefully the need to add a regular user account will be clearer; a few redundant (duplicate functionality) applications have been removed; the administrator account has UID/GID changed to 999, so the first real user will be 1000; the menu has been tidied up, so it should be easier to browse; Kwheezy Keyboard Selector now has a text box for testing the new configuration; some other minor tweaks and polish. Version 1.2 installations can be upgraded to 1.3 via Apper or apt-get." Here is the brief release announcement.
MakuluLinux 4.0
Jacque Raymer has announced the release of MakuluLinux 4.0, a desktop-oriented distribution with Xfce, based on Debian's "testing" branch: "Unlike our previous releases, this is a solo Xfce build, focusing on bringing Xfce visually on par with modern desktop environments while at the same time keeping stability and speed a top priority. This is our 4th release and a major stepping stone as we have moved away from Ubuntu and moved completely to Debian as a base for this and future versions. This version is built from scratch and has undergone extensive testing while using it on a daily basis. Major changes since 3.0: rolling release; upgraded kernel to 3.10.3; extremely stable and fast; single desktop environment (Xfce upgraded to 4.10); easy to use traditional style environment; complete new look (themes, icons, decorations, wallpaper, lots of customisations); focus on transparency; featuring complete out-of-the-box pre-installed software, codecs, Flash player and games...." Read the rest of the release announcement for more information.
SuperX 2.1
Wrishiraj Kaushik has announced the release of SuperX 2.1, an Ubuntu-based distribution with a tweaked KDE desktop, aimed at beginners and casual Linux users: "This is SuperX 2.1, code name 'Ada'. SuperX 2.1 is a minor update to 'Darwin' and contains mostly performance tweaks and updated software stack. If you have installed Darwin and have constantly updated it, you are probably running 'Ada' at the moment as we updated the packages a few weeks ago but no ISO images were available then. As an effort to enhance user experiences in Ada we've decided to remove certain software from the default selection that doesn't play well with SuperX: Firefox - yes it is a great browser, but Chromium plays better with SuperX, especially when it comes to global menu integration; Blender - a very specialized application, showcases the power of open-source development, we removed it because the real use of this great software is limited to 3D designers and animators only. Apart from this, we've updated KDE to 4.10.5." Here is the full release announcement with a screenshot.
Voyager Live 13.10
Voyager Live 13.10 has been released. Voyager Live is a Xubuntu-based distribution with a highly customised Xfce desktop and a large number of usability improvements. These include retractable dynamic panels, the Skippy "exposé" plugin, and the Slingscold launcher for starting applications. Also presented on the desktop are Plank, a configurable and responsive dock for launching programs, a much-improved "Box Wall" for changing themes on the four virtual desktops, an excellent backup utility called "Box Backup", a new Conky control tool, and Startpages that allow to append applications and websites to any of the virtual desktops. There is much more - the comprehensive release announcement which includes plenty of screenshots to illustrate the ergonomic and usability enhancements to the Xfce desktop is in French only, but the distribution actually defaults to English and it also supports a number of other languages.
Voyager Live 13.10 - a Xubuntu-based distribution with a highly customised Xfce desktop (full image size: 239kB, screen resolution 1280x1024 pixels)
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Development, unannounced and minor bug-fix releases
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Upcoming Releases and Announcements |
Summary of expected upcoming releases
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DistroWatch.com News |
New distributions added to database
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New distributions added to waiting list
- Centrych. Centrych is based on Ubuntu and presents a unified look and feel, as well as support for both KDE/Qt and GNOME/GTK+ applications.
- Metamorphose Linux. Metamorphose Linux is a Brazilian distribution which tries to be complete and beginner-friendly while providing a great deal of power and hardware support.
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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, 4 November 2013. To contact the authors please send email to:
- Jesse Smith (feedback, questions and suggestions: distribution reviews, questions and answers, tips and tricks)
- Ladislav Bodnar (feedback, questions, suggestions and corrections: news, donations, distribution submissions, comments)
- Bruce Patterson (feedback and suggestions: podcast edition)
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1 • Observations on today's DWW (by Sondar on 2013-10-28 10:01:39 GMT from United Kingdom)
Another helpful review from PC-BSD, thank you, Jesse. Used to be a fan. Excessive bloat, complexity increases, lack of liveCD, 64bit only as well as increasing 'issues' killed my interest. K.I.S.S. Notwithstanding, such a minority sport as BSD still places more obstacles between operators and phishers/scammers! The big issue in upgrading (Jesse again) is swapping over to 64 from 32bit. Less than intuitive, less than quick and easy. Anyone written an automated script? Probably not. If accompanied by updating hardware, swapping from IDE to SATA adds to headaches. Tried Makulu - very nice if somewhat bloated. Show-stopper for Brits is Chromium-FlashPlayer combo; difficult to 'switch-on' FP or upgrade it in order to use BBC iPlayer. Will the Beeb finally dump Adobe and use HTML5 before Jacque either fixes Chromium or offers another FP-friendly browser? Or a DW contributor offers constructive suggestions...
2 • What does "PC" mean in PC-BSD? (by CAI ENG on 2013-10-28 10:10:11 GMT from United States)
By my count, this review of PC-BSD, uses the word "administrator" 6 times, and the word "server" 5 times.
Why?
"This release did have its problems, but PC-BSD remains, in my opinion, the best desktop solution in the BSD community."
Well, I write only my own opinion, not attempting to imagine how anyone else feels about this review, but, "jails" are not something I find attractive as a feature of a DESKTOP operating system.
When one considers how much of this review is devoted to describing "administrative" functions, for example, the "ability" to save the entire operating system, easily, I wonder whether my own use of a desktop computer is aberrant.
If (when) I wish to replace my existing desktop os, I download the newest version (I prefer Crunchbang, and Lubuntu), I don't require, or desire, wasting space on a hard drive, saving the most recent version of the OS, that worked. That's a tool required by an ADMINISTRATOR, not the user of a desktop computer, or tablet, or phablet.
Your review simply highlights how far removed from the reality of 2013, UNIX appears, to me. I used UNIX, in the 70's. I can't imagine wanting to use it today. The entire thrust of the OS is MULTIUSER, in a refrigerated room, with security access required, not single user on a desktop, in their own home, or riding on an airplane. I haven't downloaded the newest version, but previous versions of PC-BSD insisted, during installation, that the user name and password conform to some 1960's era notion of a proper login, for a multiuser system. I failed to observe, in your review, any mention of that aspect of the installation process. I don't use any OS that demands my conformance to someone else's notion of a "proper" login id or password.
On my computer, I decide, not Bell Labs from 1968, how many characters to employ in login and password.
CAI ENG
3 • SolusOS (by uz64 on 2013-10-28 11:39:16 GMT from United States)
Such a promising distro, sucks to see it go.
4 • SolusOS closes shop (by raksi on 2013-10-28 11:51:57 GMT from Hungary)
This story is a good example for why I do not use distros with small momentum anymore.
5 • SolusOS was great (by Carlos Felipe on 2013-10-28 12:31:03 GMT from Brazil)
but when they start a distro from scratch, I thought: will be a failure, is a lot of work for just one man. Crazy decision.
6 • About zenwalk and the closure of SolusOS (by Jeferson Vasquez on 2013-10-28 12:52:48 GMT from Brazil)
If the people of zenwalk choses the xfce desktop manager(light weight indeed) and review their marketing concepts it will indeed revive the distro and its a shame that the SolusOS is discontinued. It was on the road of becoming a great distro ´cause of their various alphas they were releasing. The leader project should do as the same as the people of OPENSuSE were doing. Put a hack-a-ton contest to test out the reliability of the distro.
7 • SolusOS (by Archdevil on 2013-10-28 12:53:20 GMT from Netherlands)
I read the news last weekend: SolusOS has stopped. I loved the 1.x version, but I found that it took too long to get the 2.x version up-and-running. Ofcourse one of the reasons was the switch to a built from scratch distro. This meant a reboot of the 2.x series, leading to 9 alpha's. Too bad Ikey did not find the time to get this distro back on the road. While running Sabayon atm, after using PCLinuxOS for a few years, I was looking forward to using SolusOS soon. But that will never happen.
Thanks for trying, Ikey!
8 • SolusOS (by kc1di on 2013-10-28 13:15:46 GMT from United States)
I too had use SolusOS for a while. and sorry to see it go. For those who liked it you may want to take a look at Point Linux. it's based on Debian stable also. you can find it here : http://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=point
9 • PC-BSD (by Dave Postles on 2013-10-28 13:21:12 GMT from United Kingdom)
I'd use it, but it's always such a pain mounting a usb memory stick. I've installed PC-BSD on numerous occasions to try it, but in the end just abandoned it for that reason.
10 • Re #2, "Desktop" usage (by Pearson on 2013-10-28 13:24:18 GMT from United States)
Well, for casual home use, your workflow is likely typical and appropriate for most people. For professional desktop usage, however, jails and backups can be very important. Recall that, in a non-small business environment, "administrators" are often called upon to resolve desktop issues. When an OS update is pushed out to 100 desktops, and then major problems are found[1], it's a great time saver to just roll them all back to the earlier OS.
1: let's not get into "it should've been tested better". Perhaps a the major problem was outside of the administrator's control (new direction from management, compatibility with newly required software, new security vulnerability, etc.). The point is that this *does* happen.
11 • Re #10, #1: a short rephrasing (by Pearson on 2013-10-28 14:29:36 GMT from United States)
I think I could summarize/rephrase my comment #10 with "Not all Desktop computers are home computers. Some are in a business or other mission-critical environment, where updates/changes must me made more carefully and security (from disaster/mistakes and from intrusion/malware) is very important."
12 • pcbsd (by greg on 2013-10-28 14:46:38 GMT from Slovenia)
Point is they have some great features, but critical bugs and also hardware support is the issue. it wouldn't be bad to see some of these neat features incorporated in linux. especially their PBI.
13 • #10-11 What does the "P" designate? hint, not Pearson (by CAIENG on 2013-10-28 15:03:58 GMT from United States)
the "P" denotes "PERSONAL", not enterprise. You are describing the parent of Pc-bsd, i.e. FreeBSD.
The rationale for creating a separate distro, was precisely to acknowledge that not everyone is still living in 1973, when 100 users shared a DEC-10, and thought they were livin high!
The "P" means, PERSONAL, not 100 users. Try again.
14 • upgrading Ubuntu 12.04 to 13.10 (by octathlon on 2013-10-28 15:04:22 GMT from United States)
I normally go from LTS to LTS, but even though 13.10 is only good for 9 months, I did this upgrade for a few reasons:
1) I'm using Cinnamon via the PPA and it went to 2.0, worked OK on 12.04 but some things weren't quite right.
2) Since the next release will be an LTS and I know I'll be upgrading again within the 9 months anyway, why wait.
3) I heard Unity had improved a lot since 12.04 and wanted to try it (I'll spare you my review of that).
4) After the upgrade (clean install) I now have kernel 3.11 instead of 3.2, boots and runs faster, Cinnamon 2.0.2 running nicely, etc. so it was a good decision.
15 • PC-BSD & SolusOS & Makulu Linux (by Sam on 2013-10-28 15:09:33 GMT from United States)
Is it me, or looking at the UI, which of these distros was competing to out-Windows-95 Micro$oft Windows 95?
Every time I've tried PC-BSD it reminds me of the functionality and buginess of Linux distros from roughly 5 years before whatever year it was I was trying PC-BSD. Sure it installed a lot friendlier than FreeBSD, but the lengths to which I had to go to get it usable on my old whitebox desktop PC workhorse just wasn't worth it when even Fedora would be far more usable as a desktop distro in far shorter time. While I'm sure BSD works great for a server, I'm at a loss to explain why anyone would waste their time and talent into trying to turn it into a desktop OS. Want a good BSD on the desktop, try OsX...
SolusOS folding? After turning their Debian derivative into a stand-alone-OS with only one guy routinely committed to development? A guy with a full-time job and probably a life outside a computer screen? I'd never seen that coming.
Makulu Linux. Seriously? If this was some poor kid in Africa's first effort at development to help his village become economically self-sufficient, congrats to him/her. If this is a serious contender for a global Linux distro, I'm afraid the old GeoWorks Suite (yeah, I'm going back THAT far) called and want their UI theme back.
16 • @14 (by jaws222 on 2013-10-28 15:10:04 GMT from United States)
That's always good to hear. I also go LTS to LTS. I'm checking out 13.10 now in Virtualbox (Xubuntu) and it seems okay, but I prefer 12.04.
17 • @12 (by mandog on 2013-10-28 15:16:25 GMT from Peru)
So you would like to see a applications like Kdenlive installing 637.3 MB or your system? firefox 201.13 MB?, Libreoffice 533.39 MB?. Because that is what you will get with bundled packages. That gives you windows type bloat does it not PCBSD recommends a 250gb hardrive should be enough for most people.
18 • @17, "Personal" Computer BSD (by Pearson on 2013-10-28 15:48:54 GMT from United States)
If the Unix paradigm doesn't fit how you use a computer, then it may not be the right tool for you. I'm not trying to convince you otherwise; I'm merely pointing out that the paradigm still applies to *some* today.
That being said..
I looked at the PC-BSD About page[1], and you're definition *is* more correct:
>> PC-BSD aims to make the FreeBSD experience easy and achievable for the average "casual" computer user <<
I'll soften my response by saying that the multi-user and stability features can still be useful for the causal users. Imagine that a student wants to update the OS, but has a paper due in a few days. The roll back feature lets him update with less fear of risking his paper. Or, imagine a family with several kids. Supporting multiple users (and jails, I think -- I'm not a BSD user, so I may be wrong) allows the kids to use the computer with lessened risk; supporting multiple users simultaneously also supports this.
I don't desire an argument, so this will be the last I say on this.
[1] http://www.pcbsd.org/en/about/
19 • @15 re: Makulu (by octathlon on 2013-10-28 16:06:55 GMT from United States)
From the screenshot, that looks like XFCE with the Whisker menu, both of which have been growing in popularity lately, and for good reasons.
20 • @CAIENG: 'The "P" means, PERSONAL, not 100 users.' (by joncr on 2013-10-28 17:07:07 GMT from United States)
It's of no consequence what the "P" means.
Organizations who maintain and support multiple users on multiple desktops on a single network have different needs than a singleton desktop user. While you may find it perfectly fine to burn an image and completely reinstall to move to a new OS version, a business paying to support hundreds of desktops doesn't want to pay people to run around the building doing manual installs on each machine. Nor do they want to incur the employee downtime if and when one of those installs go wrong. They want to push out the update overnight when no one is working.
So, the features in FreeBSD, which PC-BSD leverages or builds on, make sense in that environment. If someone wants to use PC-BSD on a singleton desktop, they are free to ignore those features.
21 • PC-BSD, SolusOS and openSUSE (by Pierre on 2013-10-28 17:12:14 GMT from Germany)
Nice to see good progress at the BSD front. Nevertheless BSD is still much behind Linux based OS's when it comes to hardware-compatibility and usability. But if multimedia is not such a big topic and if you have the right hardware for FreeBSD/PC-BSD both are quite good choices for a workstation. I like PKG-NG a lot. For a long-time Linux user who got used to comparable package management tools over the years it's nice to have such on BSD, too And with Btrfs still not in stable state ZFS gains a lot of momentum here, especially with user-friendly GUI-Tools for managing snapshots.
openSUSE already has such a GUI-Tool called snapper for managing snapshots of Btrfs volumes. Additionally updates trigger an automatic snapshot of the system, if the system's drive is formated with Btrfs. I am using Btrfs on my machines since 12.1 and have not experienced any problems except from some performance issues in 12.1 and 12.2 which were gone with 12.3 and therefore hopefully will not occur in 13.1 either. Additionally I am reading more and more very good early (p)reviews about the openSUSE 13.1 release candidates. So hopefully this is another rock solid release since the amazing 12.1 release.
SolusOS's shut down is very sad. I was looking forward to test-drive version 2 as soon as it gets released. Now that will never happen. Best wishes to Ikey. Hope his visions find their future in some other projects. Maybe they should not have split off Debian and stayed with a strong base instead of doing all the work on their own. But thanks for trying from me, too, Ikey!
Greetings from Germany!
22 • PC-BSD 9.2 (by Jon Kaplowitz on 2013-10-28 18:25:21 GMT from United States)
I have to agree with the other posters. PC-BSD is difficult to install. I got it to install without hanging on the 8th try. Then, the update "feature" was buggy. I could not mount an ext4 filesystem from a USB stick drive, although it did recognize a FAT32 partition on a flash stick.
It also requires to much drive space and bandwidth compared to standared Linux distros.
I gave up playing with it after 4 days of trying to make if "just work."
Conclusion: PC-BSD developers are living in 1995. This is NOT a good release even for experienced Unix users. PC-BSD 9.2: Just AWFUL.
23 • RE: What does "PC" mean in PC-BSD? (by CAI ENG on 2013-10-28 10:10:11 GMT from U (by M. Edward (Ed) Borasky on 2013-10-28 18:58:14 GMT from United States)
I'm the exact opposite of you - I want a scientific workstation. I was forced to use Windows PCs at work to do scientific computing, and it wasn't until Windows 2000 Professional that the core OS was solid enough to support that. Windows 3.1 with 32-bit hacks, Windows 95, 98, 98SE and ME were DOS with a shim tacked on - useless.
So I dual-boot Windows and Linux and might well add PC BSD to the mix.
24 • Call for a unified Linux Distro package manager. (by Jeffersonian on 2013-10-28 19:02:19 GMT from United States)
Hello: if the Kernel is pretty much the same (or can be!) for all Linux Distros, there is an insane numbers of packages proliferation!
It would be time, for a benevolent Linux developer to spend time on the application, user or kernel level, rather than developing an almost endless number of packages. (In doubt, have a peek a "texstudio.sourceforge.net"... so many, too many packages required !
The Perl script "Checkinstall" was a brave attempt, but does not really address the issue. Having a positive bias for RPM packages (the most elaborate and mature in my view), I would suggest for each distro to give the choice of the package manager(s) at install time.
I do not see the need for more than one, but it could be possible... Ideally the RPM (or Debian etc...) package manager used, would keep the database updated.... but please "keep it simple".
I would suggest too the top Linux distros to be leaders, and all adopt the same package manager. Why not after all !
"Call for a unified Linux Distro package manager." You hear Mageia, Mint, Redhat, Ubuntu people ?
And Linus, could you be there again a benevolent dictator, with any finger(s) you deem useful to use, we are with you !
Please post useful comments if you have one.
Jeffersonian.
25 • @23 DOS??? (by Ulf on 2013-10-28 19:32:13 GMT from Netherlands)
@23, Really you know what you are talking about then? All and i mean All even 7 and 8 windows versions are DOS, still resident in hi memory. (if you know something about oss`es. UNIX, BSD, and all of its derivatives (linux) , are more suitable fore scientific computing. In short all windows versions are; DOS with a shim tacked on - useless.
Greetings from a happy opensuse user, who is as i might add, running it as a server/desktop environment at the same time on a real old machine. (Dont need a heavy multicore full of ram machine for that if you know a little about oss`es and tweaking)
26 • Qu 22 (by dbrion on 2013-10-28 19:41:51 GMT from France)
" I could not mount an ext4 filesystem from a USB stick drive, although it did recognize a FAT32 partition on a flash stick."
Can Windows read an ext3/4 flash drive? (in 2013)
Can GNUlinux mount/read a ZFS flash drive ?
Which distributions can mount/read a Btrfs flash drive?
27 • @24 unified package manager won't work (by DavidEF on 2013-10-28 20:04:19 GMT from United States)
Different distros have different reasons for being, different goals, and different end users. Therefore, the package selections will be different. There will always be someone using the latest greatest version of every known package, and always someone using the older, more stable, with an endless rainbow of mixed modes in between. There will always be differences in opinion about how packages should be, um, packaged, as well. And of course, there are lots of attempts at creating the next new, awesome, best-in-the-world thing. People say we're fractured. Maybe it's true. But, then, maybe we LIKE it that way! After all, it really is all about choice! Let's not become Microsoft, okay?
28 • @26 ZFS flash drive? Btrfs flash drive? (by DavidEF on 2013-10-28 20:08:17 GMT from United States)
Do you also put Corvette engines on a moped?
29 • Makulu (by Hopper on 2013-10-28 20:42:04 GMT from United States)
I currently have it installed. It is really very, very, smooth, and fast. It could be a keeper. I'll know after a couple of weeks. It is XFCE with the Whisker menu (@19). Don't knock it without trying it. It's well worth the download.
30 • unified package management (by Lutz on 2013-10-28 20:45:08 GMT from Germany)
before packagemanagement comes compiling from the sources. often upstream gives different options to compile your flavour of the program. every user knows about that. everybody wants or needs different things. that is the way the sources function. therefore: no unification
31 • There can be only one? (by :wq on 2013-10-28 21:34:14 GMT from United States)
This is not in response to any preceding comment; it is just an observation. Many of the 'quit trying'/'why bother?' criticisms of *BSDs that are sometimes voiced by the Linux community are the same 'quit trying'/'why bother?' criticisms GNU/Linux itself had to face (and often still faces) from other communities (e.g. smaller PC market share, existence of alternatives, issues with hardware support and the user experience, etc). I guess that's human nature, but I think it's an undesirable sentiment. I'll grant that the BSD family is not at all new, and that as an operating system, GNU/Linux is more established, both in terms of mind share and development manpower, but I don't think that therefore 1) other operating systems, be it BSD or otherwise, have nothing of value to offer the world, or that 2) these operating systems should be pigeonholed (ex. '__ is only suitable for servers' or '__ is a hobbyist OS' – gee, where have I heard the likes of these before?) and frowned upon as they seek to evolve within the constraints of the vision and manpower of their respective communities.
32 • MakuluLinux (by Jacque Raymer on 2013-10-28 22:08:26 GMT from South Africa)
@1 • Observations on today's DWW (by Sondar on 2013-10-28 10:01:39 GMT from United Kingdom)
Flashplayer and Chrome is fixed in Makulu 4.1 which is live already, Also included in 4.1 is a fully working Minitube youtube browser as a bonus. 4.2 should be live tomorrow sometime which brings bunch of new fixes, it will all be in the release notes on sourceforge.
15 • PC-BSD & SolusOS & Makulu Linux (by Sam on 2013-10-28 15:09:33 GMT from United States)
Every person has his preference, If makulu isnt for you then use whatever suits your needs, I welcome feedback to improve wherever i can, I also want to point out this is version 4, not version 1.
@19 • @15 re: Makulu (by octathlon on 2013-10-28 16:06:55 GMT from United States)
Yes, it is XFCE with whisker menu, and yes, its definitely the future of XFCE and a long overdue to a menu overhaul.
33 • OpenSuse heading south? (by Bob on 2013-10-28 22:10:13 GMT from Austria)
OpenSuse's next release (13.1) is getting closer. For the first time in years it looks that they've done something right. The release candidate works surprisingly well and their KDE version is probably one of the best out there.
Nevertheless OpenSuse's Distrowatch ranking keeps slowly drifting downwards. Still trying to guess the reason for that ...
34 • @33 (by jaws222 on 2013-10-28 22:13:46 GMT from United States)
Actually, 12.1 - 12.3 were done right imo. the 11 series was a disaster.
35 • There are only 10 kinds of people (by Oko on 2013-10-28 22:52:48 GMT from United States)
the one who do understand binary numbers and the one who don't! That being said there also only 10 kinds of file systems users. The one who need ZFS and the one who don't. The one who do need ZFS do understand that ZFS requires 64-bit operating system, full stop. The one who don't need can stop reading right here and get back to your 32-bit OSs :)
I will concede that this has been one of better and more useful reviews I have read on DWW over the past couple of years. While I tent to use OpenBSD for almost anything these days ZFS seems to be one two most interesting file systems for large data storage (second being Hammer of DragonFly). The fact that PC-BSD makes ZFS and Jails accessible to a casual home user is commendable.
I would like to see the review of DragonFly after the next release. Hopefully it will be better than the last one which I stop reading after I learned that reviewer has opted for UFS file system.
36 • openSuse's ranking. (by LinuxMan on 2013-10-28 23:15:23 GMT from United States)
@33, What you have to remember is that the Distrowatch ranking does not indicate quality or user base. It does sometimes give us a slight indication of popularity. I've known people who have switched to a Linux system but have never gone to the Distrowatch site. Still the page hit rankings are fun to look at and it sometimes give us something to talk about. The best thing to do is to take all the rankings you see on the internet with a grain of salt. There are some great distros way down in the rankings so we shouldn't use that as an indicator not to try a distro. It's all fun by the way. All the different DM's, package managers, and some people even like Gnome3. (except Jim Lynch) :-)
37 • openSUSE (by Reuben on 2013-10-29 00:11:02 GMT from United States)
I have to concur that openSUSE is a great distro. And the rankings here are a lot like the billboard music charts in that they mean very little. There are dozens or hundreds of excellent distros and SuSE is only one of them.
38 • @24, and version upgrades (by Charles on 2013-10-29 00:52:52 GMT from Mexico)
¿ I'd like to know is what are the benefits of upgrading my operating system?
The only benefit that justifies, is SECURITY. Explanation: There are not virus, there is very little malware, but ... the weakness in any system (GNU / Linux included), are attacks (hackers, crackers, MIMs, backdoors, etc.). Windows is the weakest of all, partly because of their limited and delayed updates, and for his few major version upgrades. Instead, on GNU / Linux, the defense is higher, among others, thanks to the constant updates and a variety of distributions. For a hacker / cracker, is more attractive break a system with a single version in three years (Windows), to deal with a system with hundreds of versions (distributions), and six major upgrades in three years (example: Ubuntu).
@24 "if the Kernel is pretty much the same (or can be!) for all Linux Distros, there is an insane numbers of packages proliferation! "Call for a unified Linux Distro package manager." You hear Mageia, Mint, Redhat, Ubuntu people ?"
No, In these days of hacks, think of safety, the larger the target, the lower the effectiveness of the attack.
39 • Ultimate edition 3.6, Solus OS (by Chanath on 2013-10-29 04:41:03 GMT from Sri Lanka)
Once, I liked Theeman's Ultimate Edition, but later I found it so bloated up. Sure I found OZUnity Ubuntu respins, which were not that bloated, and quick in response. Now, we have 3.6, which comes from Ubuntu 12.10. I don't know, whether 12.10 is supported anymore. Anyway, if you know a bit about Ubuntu distros, it is always easy to have your own distro with what you want, and even throw away some of Ubuntu's bloat. So, I won't download it. If Theeman would make his respin from Ubuntu 14.04 LTS, maybe, just maybe I'd look into it.
Solus OS should've been with Debian, rather than trying to get an already dead system in to develop a full data repository. Well, he didn't listen to anyone, and there goes Solus OS. One thing is to have a dream, but you'd have to inject that dream into others, and that can't be done, if you are flogging a dead horse. Anyway a person has to have a job and a place to live. I wish Ikey all the best in his future endeavors. I still have his Debian based Solus OS 2 beta working versions, made to work with the old Slingshot launcher. I would upgrade it from the Debian repos, and keep it alive in one of the partitions. Thank you, Ikey and wish you all the best!
40 • Makulu (by Hopper on 2013-10-29 05:09:29 GMT from United States)
@32 - Actually, now that I think about it...XFCE with the Whisker menu is the XFCE I've been waiting for. I never liked the XFCE menu. I am an XFCE fan and this is exactly what it needs.
41 • Voyager 13.10 (by Chanath on 2013-10-29 05:16:38 GMT from Sri Lanka)
Voyager is one of the nicest XFCE distros I've seen up to date. The young French developer uses the old Slingshot as the menu, and in this new release there is no menu, only the Slingshot. Workwise, this is the best solution, easy and pretty.
By the time Ubuntu 14.04 comes, lot of people would forget Elementary OS, with its buggy, unproved apps. Voyager, for example takes two of the aps, Plank and Slingshot. Pear OS does the same thing, and both of these OSs are much more popular than the eOS. Some people might disagree, but do you see many comments on the eOS web site?
The only problem with Voyager is that its website is in French, but its easy to get translated, and it gives a complete how-to in it.
42 • SolusOS (by Jeremy Justus on 2013-10-29 06:12:01 GMT from United States)
SolusOS closing to me is a consequence of a larger problem in the Linux community. I understand that variety and choices are good, but the sheer fragmentation among Linux distributions is almost obscene. We don't need 40 Debian-stabled based distributions, 87 Ubuntu-derivatives, and 11 Sid variants, as is currently the case. In 90% of the distributions listed on this site there's a significant overlap in terms of design and goals with at least half a dozen other distributions.
We would see far, far more progress if instead of everybody trying to roll their own special snowflake, they instead combined their efforts with currently existing projects.
43 • @14 - 12.04 LTS Upgrading (by Woodstock69 on 2013-10-29 07:58:34 GMT from Papua New Guinea)
I too run (Kubuntu) 12.04 LTS, and a significant number of PPA's, though not too exotic, to keep the apps up to date. No Unity issues, no Dash issues. Just easy computing. KDE updates keep coming through, making KDE better and better.
Kernel 3.11.5 (Saucy) from mainline PPA runs fine. Sure I have some issues from time to time with the Catalyst drivers, but I can always fall back to the Radeon driver, which works well. I persist with the Catalyst drivers only for my own twisted entertainment and curiosity.
So, after Jesse's commentary, there really isn't any reason to move to 13.10. I'll happily wait until the next LTS (14.04?) and even then, I still have another 3 years of 12.04 LTS updates available.
All good..... For now......
44 • PC-BSD (by blahblablah@yopmail.com on 2013-10-29 09:05:24 GMT from United States)
I tried installing PC-BSD on my ageing amd64. Would always fail installing. Always a problem with grub. If you went to install with grub it would fail, and if you declined installing with grub it would fail. Needless to say it does not work for me. I was able to install Freebsd though. However, does not work with the ati card I have. Would only do vesa. KMS is the problem but have not been able to get that going as you can in linux. I installed freebsd on an ancient laptop (dell cpx latitude). It works on this, but you have to get through loops just to get flash to work. You have to install some linux port. Once this is done the fan control (which is the only reason I installed freebsd on the dell) stopped working. So I can either have no flash support in the browser or have no fan control. I also agree with what @15 said above about going back in time to a distro that was less functional and polished and has issues with various things.
45 • Fragmentation (by Fossilizing Dinosaur on 2013-10-29 09:47:26 GMT from United States)
Divided we assert our independence - and often fall, one by one. The global economy is tightening these days. A difference study might be illuminating, but merging communities is like herding cats, or rival ant colonies. Geeks are rarely long on community-building social skills, likewise proprietary-bent organizations. Many spins differ most by window-manager/desktop-environment, which should be a simple choice from several options, but where's the API to enable such choices? Few provide an installation/maintenance checklist; instead of keeping concessions and compromises to a tightly-controlled minimum, package deal. Many start with a similar mix/library of drivers & apps; the global library is huge. Without either packaging standards or better package managers, who can maintain it all? Who'd want to?
Other Musings How often is the latest kernel an improvement for hardware you already have? How does the artificial "intelligence" of automated translation stack up against genuine wisdom?
46 • Elementary OS (by Wolf on 2013-10-29 10:59:00 GMT from Germany)
@41
Dear Chanath, I not unlike you distrohop quite a bit. There is fun in trying modern Software solutions to problems no one is actually having. So I stumbled over Elementary OS with the usual :"Oh no not another Ubuntu respin, I am tired."
But Alas this one really got me hooked 12.04 LTS as Base, polished looks, just the right amount of Eye Candy. Desktop Management at its best and not one crash that Ubuntu 12.04 so relentlessly threw at me. So please tell me what you meant by:
"By the time Ubuntu 14.04 comes, lot of people would forget Elementary OS, with its buggy, unproved apps. .... Some people might disagree, but do you see many comments on the eOS web site?"
To the last part, I admit not to much traffic on EOS Web Site. So popularity might become an issue, but please tell us about those buggy unproved Apps you are writing about.
I tried Voyager and Pear but you know french is kind of a deal breaker, cause I don't understand any!
Bye Wolf
47 • Makulu and Debian-Ubuntu-based distros (by netscarf on 2013-10-29 11:42:21 GMT from United States)
I think Debian-based distros are the future, and you will see less new ubuntu-based distros. The trend seems to be Ubuntu-based distros moving to debian as well... {Crunchbang, LMDE, Solydxk, etc}.
I'm not knocking Ubuntu, it's just going in a direction I'm not going. There seems to be a growing divide in the linux community. Ubuntu Gnome3 people, and the traditionalists.
As for Makulu, I've been looking for a Debian-based Xubuntu replacement for awhile. Makulu is really really nice. Smooth running, nice-looking, Great menu.. Think I'm gonna stick with this one.
48 • @47 (by jaws222 on 2013-10-29 14:46:56 GMT from United States)
Give SalineOS a try. It's a very good distro. Also, if you don't mind Arch try Manjaro. Manjaro also has a pretty sweet Openbox version too.
49 • @ #47 • Makulu and Debian-Ubuntu-based distros (by Pierre on 2013-10-29 15:18:45 GMT from Germany)
Well, at least we see lesser Ubuntu based respins than we saw in the past. I am not picking at Ubuntu here either. But I dislike the way they're heading. Debian is a nice and stable distro with a huge community behind it with people who really know what they are doing.
Crunchbang is one of my favorites at the moment when it comes to Debian based distros. It's clean and stable and the Openbox configuration is simply beautiful in my eyes. But LMDE, SalineOS, SolydXK, Kwheezy, Snowlinux and Makulu are nice distros alltogether, too.
But nevertheless I still prefer openSUSE over all of them. As usual this is simply a question of taste, needs and preferences.
50 • PCBSD (by mandog on 2013-10-29 16:40:18 GMT from Peru)
I just upgraded to 9.2, I keep PCBSD on a 250gb partition to see how its evolving every release does close the gap a little, Criss moore does a good job, with what he has to work with. He is very aware that more software support like sound cards need to be addressed but that is not a priority, like flashdrive media player support, The building of kernels for instance is now down to 2 commands after you edit the confige file so rebuilding the kernel to use my sound card is now easier, its not the solution but works. Gnome 2 desktop to me is like a visit to the past but it is functional. LXDE is really good alternative, KDE is the weakest link and gives many problems for some reason that is echoed by beanpole, Xfce is stable but I have not used it on PCBSD so I cant comment, Windows drives can be automounted, Flash drives are very hit and miss at the moment but that will be sorted in the near future. Boot times are slow compared to Linux but you should have any need to boot if you use any BSD distro as it should be used.
51 • Musix (by thom on 2013-10-29 17:44:26 GMT from Sweden)
Help needed. I just downloaded Musix 3 (rc) and can't get past the log-in screen. The Musix site is half-empty (or half-full, depending on your perspective :-) and the wiki-page leads nowhere. Is anybody able to help? Oh yeah, and the video resolution at the log-in screen looks suspiciously like 600x800/256. I thought that died with the millenium bug. Anybody...? peace
52 • Debian based distros. (by LinuxMan on 2013-10-29 18:02:52 GMT from United States)
"There seems to be a growing divide in the linux community. Ubuntu Gnome3 people, and the traditionalists." @47, I do agree that there is a divide between certain groups of people. I don't believe it is as pronounced as you state tho. There will always be a divide. There was one between KDE 3 and KDE 4, Gnome 2 and Gnome 3, deb and rpm, Unity and Mate and the list goes on and on. Not all Debian respins do so well. For instance take LinuxMint Cinnamon main based on Ubuntu and LinuxMint Debian Edition. LMDE is in no way as polished or stable as the main edition of LinuxMInt. It could be the manpower or lack of resources. It's hard to say. Sometimes the transfer going from one base works and sometimes it just doesn't. One example is SolusOS. They went from Debian to independent and just couldn't keep up. The only thing wrong with Ubuntu respins is that they are easy to make. That's why you get such a bunch of them. Then again I believe that's what open source is all about. Doing whatever you want and getting things done, like work and fun.
53 • @42 Number of Debian/Ubuntu Based Distros (by Rev_Don on 2013-10-29 18:03:05 GMT from United States)
You are overlooking one significant aspect in this. Sure one could take any existing Debian/Ubuntu based distro and customize it to their liking fairly easily when it's installed to a hard drive. It's not quite so simple customize a LIVE CD/DVD. Yes there are tools to do so, but the amount of work required is significantly higher, plus you lose the ability to download one on the fly when needed. IMNSHO, that is where the strength of variety of distros comes into play. Some people might not see it that way, but it is a realistic factor that should be taken into consideration.
54 • RE 53 : It is possible to automagically create 14 respins a day (by dbrion on 2013-10-29 18:40:41 GMT from France)
Fedora builds automagically 14 kinds of respins every night http://alt.fedoraproject.org/pub/alt/nightly-composes/ (with the latest software): one is for LXDE, two other (KDE and Science+KDE), ... for KDE, one for XFCE, one for robotics lovers, one for gaamers, one for electronics lovers (FCEL : many free tools, from the trivialest to the most sophisticated). They work as **installable** LIVE DVDs/CDs and I often found FCEL very useful, once installed.
OTOH, as they might change every night (xUBUs change less frequently) they are humbleenought to call them respins or nightly builds and not tell the entire world there are 14 new releases every night.
55 • PC-BSD (by Koroshiya Itchy on 2013-10-29 18:44:30 GMT from Belgium)
PC-BSD is a great alternative to Linux. I tried it out of Linux kernel regressions frustration and liked it a lot.
Of course, hardware support within the BSD family tends to be more limited as compared to Linux. However, PC-BSD has always worked like a charm in all my hardware. In certain cases, even devices that were giving troubles with Linux, worked perfectly (and out of the box) with PC-BSD. This includes a particular sound card and a graphics card that started to give troubles with Linux kernel versions newer than 2.6.32.
Advanced features such a ZFS and Jails will be a big plus for many and PC-BSD is easier to install and use than most Linux distros.
The big issues for me were:
1.- No CUDA support. 2.- Noticeably reduced desktop responsiveness (even the Xfce version pulls KDE dependencies aplenty). 3.- Reduced general performance.
56 • re.32 & Makulu & Jacque (by Sondar on 2013-10-29 18:55:57 GMT from United Kingdom)
Thank youi! Just the sort of support to build confidence. A CD version would be welcome, too.
57 • BSD (by Togo on 2013-10-29 20:15:52 GMT from United States)
I'm tired of hearing about BSD. Leave it on the server. It is not as good as Linux on the desktop and it doesn't seem like it ever will be. I want to like it, but it is what it is. Just one person's opinion.
58 • Lots of Respins (by LinuxMan on 2013-10-30 00:06:34 GMT from United States)
@54, Ubuntu has a nightly build on their development version and I don't know about the builds of the derivatives. Nothing like what the Fedorproject has. That's really amazing. I do a lot of PLC and robotics programming on automation systems. Those builds sound really interesting. Thanks for the link.
59 • @58 (by :wq on 2013-10-30 00:49:04 GMT from United States)
I'm probably mentioning what is already known, but if by chance not, should you not want a nightly build, you can find the spin releases at http://spins.fedoraproject.org/.
60 • thanks (by trish on 2013-10-30 03:17:37 GMT from United States)
"roll their own special snowflake"
Thanks for the chuckle : )
61 • Re: #14 upgrading Ubuntu to 13.10 Cinnamon 2.0 warning (by octathlon on 2013-10-30 03:36:26 GMT from United States)
I just found out that installing Cinnamon 2.0 breaks Unity on 13.10 Saucy. Can fix by uninstalling Cinnamon. I will keep Cinnamon unless it causes some other problem, but if you were planning to use Unity after installing it you have been warned. :)
62 • PC-BSD's place in the world (by Jesse on 2013-10-30 13:12:03 GMT from Canada)
Some people have raised questions as to the role PC-BSD plays and whether its utilities suit typical desktop usage. I suppose it could be debated whether PC-BSD is really targeting consumer users at home, it does feel more like a friendly power-user desktop system than a device for the average user sitting at home.
Personally, I suspect PC-BSD's target audience is businesses, particularly business which use FreeBSD and FreeNAS in the server room. PC-BSD is sponsored by iXsystems, a company which sells hardware and BSD support. A product like PC-BSD lets iXsystems supply servers, storage and workstations while bundling each with an appropriate operating system. Basically, iXsystems can provide end-to-end hardware and software solutions for enterprises, covering most usage scenarios. In my opinion the fact PC-BSD can be used as a decent home desktop operating system is a bonus, probably not the primary intent.
63 • PC-BSD reviewed by Linux Format Magazine (by Koroshiya Itchy on 2013-10-30 14:01:04 GMT from Belgium)
It gets 9/10:
http://www.ixsystems.com/resources/ix/updates/pc-bsd-92-earns-rave-reviews-from-linux-format-magazine.html
64 • @ 46 eOS Wolf from Germany (by Chanath on 2013-10-30 14:29:50 GMT from Sri Lanka)
Hi Wolf,
Its not like the eOS guys tweaked Ubuntu 12.04, but changed all kinds of apps. For example, if the known devil Nautilus works well, there is no real need to change it by semi-working one. When David at Pear OS made some changes to Plank, eOS guys had to do something, even though they are somewhat arrogant, and think they had reinvented the wheel.
When, Clem at Mint was shown that his Cinnamon menu goes above the screen, when favorites are added, he took the call and corrected it, and that menu had become quite a nice one today.
If you take the old Slingshot and the new one of eOS Luna, which is much more comfortable to work with? If you are using a netbook, or 11", 13" screen laptop, would you want an unresponsive Wingpanel, which doesn't have any wings at all? I took the Luna beta and took away that useless Wingpanel, and made the "new" Slingshot work without it. Showed the eOS guys, why that Wingpanel is not needed, just to hold one menu box. Even without the Wingpanel, the "new" Slingshot opened pointing at the top left corner.
Then threw away that Plank, and either installed the patched one of Pear, or installed the dear old Docky. The respin of Luna worked perfectly without practically all of the eOS apps. Then, I took the vanilla 12.04 and made myself a Luna without most of the eOS apps. I am not a geek, but I know how to work with the Terminal, and its a question of uninstalling some apps, blocking some repos, adding some apps.
When did the eOs guys come out with Luna? After the release of Raring? In a few months, 14.04 LTS would be released, but it would be very much different from 12.04 LTS. So, eOS would go the same way as Solus OS. Even, if the eOS guys would come out with a next distro 18-24 months after the release of 14.04, who is going to wait?
Not being a geek, I had made "Slingshot" working distros from Ubuntu 12.10, 13.04 and 13.10, and with 13.10, I started that from the 1st 13.10 cdimage.
The whole Elementary OS is 4 things; the Wingpanel, Plank, the new Slingshot and the Elementary icons & theme. But actually, if one can still use the Old Slinghshot, none of the above are needed.
By the way, Voyager's French website is not a problem, as you can always translated by Google. One can understand it. The distro itself can be installed in English, and after that you don't need any French language knowledge.
I don't exactly hop distros. I know now which ones to download and enjoy. I enjoy using Linux distros. I have one 500 GB laptop with so many partitions, so I would install them, and keep those I like for a long time. I can open my apps in all of the Linux distros, so I don't lose time. Even, if I lose few minutes, not a big deal, as I like the Linux distros and enjoy them. I'd always download Puppy, Calculate and Sabayon. OpenSuse had stopped being interesting. Mageia has something that makes me look into it. I won't be interested in Mint, while Ubuntu is there. I've lost interest in the Cinnamon menu. Oh, I shouldn't bore you with what I like or not.
I am awaiting Ubuntu 14.04, because it would bring something new that the other distros won't have. I have a feeling that Kubuntu 14.04 might come with Wayland, and Lubuntu would go the Qt way. By April 2014, would the other distros come out with something new, or would it still the same with new cosmetics?
65 • 24 Unified package manager. (by Willi-amp. on 2013-10-30 14:32:26 GMT from United Kingdom)
It was shown a couple of years ago that several peripherals suppliers said they would be happy to put drivers for Linux on their driver discs if only one was needed. And that, of course, is not the only benefit. I think highly of Mageia, they have a great team doing things in the right way and I would be using their distro if it wasn't for their insane selection of URPMI. Their package manager does work reliably but it's not easy to use, because applications are scattered all over the place and when you list them under 'All', you get a 'Few', and the 'Few' never includes the one that you want. As it is I use PCLOS, similar in some ways, but light-years ahead when it comes to package management ease of use. Why can't Mageia see it?
66 • re. 1,32 & 56 (by Sondar on 2013-10-30 17:10:24 GMT from United Kingdom)
...but sadly v4.2 now gives Shockwave Flash unavailable. Already ticked .../plugins Adobe FlashPlayer 'always allowed'. Something else to do?
67 • Respin (by Wolf on 2013-10-30 20:14:38 GMT from Germany)
Dear Chanath as I cannot reach you via email I'll reply here very shortly!
Nautilus didn't need replacing but the eOS Filemanager is working fine!
Not sure about Slingshot never used it. Some few Software that I use often I start from plank. The rest I'll comfortably find in the starter on top (Wingpanel??). No problem there as far as I see.
You mentioned corners. I find those very well done and easy to configure!
"Then threw away that Plank, and either installed the patched one of Pear, or installed the dear old Docky. The respin of Luna worked perfectly without practically all of the eOS apps. Then, I took the vanilla 12.04 and made myself a Luna without most of the eOS apps. I am not a geek, but I know how to work with the Terminal, and its a question of uninstalling some apps, blocking some repos, adding some apps."
Ok but they do it for me and you so why should I bother? I like their philosophy on how a desktop should work and look (e.g. no cluttering Icons) Again the handling of different Desktops is superb (e.g. reducing the open Desktops when the last Software on it was closed) And the Systemmanagement though close to Ubuntu just a tiny bit better. Not one crash report to Ubuntu where 12.04.3 crashed on a daily basis.
"When did the eOs guys come out with Luna? After the release of Raring? In a few months, 14.04 LTS would be released, but it would be very much different from 12.04 LTS. So, eOS would go the same way as Solus OS. Even, if the eOS guys would come out with a next distro 18-24 months after the release of 14.04, who is going to wait?"
There you are right, they are very late but on my old machine maybe it stays on till 17.04 5 Years you know it's based on LTS
"By the way, Voyager's French website is not a problem, as you can always translated by Google. One can understand it. The distro itself can be installed in English, and after that you don't need any French language knowledge."
No Google translation from French to German (my native language) is horrible pardon my french. I tried that but even my nonexisting french knowledge (2 holidays) allowed better translations than that. At least my german does make a little bit of sense whereas google .......
So all in all I think I'll take another look into voyager and pear (tried them 6 months ago wasn't too impressed) and then I tell you what bugs me about those 2. Even if my Life depended on it I don't recall what turned me away
Greetings from germany Wolf
PS I bet you no Wayland or Mir in 14.04 (should be LTS)
68 • To many Linux OS's? (by Used Solus on 2013-10-30 20:46:24 GMT from United States)
[Q]I understand that variety and choices are good, but the sheer fragmentation among Linux distributions is almost obscene. [Q/]
I used SolusOS. It was great. When I did a search I only found two OS's that fit my needs. I want a Debian stable with a traditional desktop. I do not want the bloat of KDE. That left me Solus and Point. I am now using Point. I will probably end up with Debian. I am not using Debian yet, as I am newer to Linux and am not sure from what I know I could configure Debian and add the Mate desktop. So of the only real choice that works for me right now, you want to take that away?
69 • @68 (by jaws222 on 2013-10-30 21:02:36 GMT from United States)
Give Crunchbang a shot. It's default DE is Openbox. Very clean and fast.
70 • MakuluLinux (by Jacque Raymer on 2013-10-30 23:14:06 GMT from South Africa)
66 • re. 1,32 & 56 (by Sondar on 2013-10-30 17:10:24 GMT from United Kingdom)
Are you talking about makululinux ? Flashplayer in 4.2 works, ive tested it MANY times over, i even made a video in youtube using 4.2 which you can view here : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ogksyrlrf8w&feature=youtu.be
go to menu, system, synaptic package manager and Check if you have flasplugin-nonfree installed, that is the package i use for flash in chromium, maybe for some reason it got removed with another installation or update?
71 • Good distro for installing on Win 7 UEFI system? (by Anony Moss on 2013-10-31 05:45:45 GMT from India)
A quick question for you guys out there. I want to install a Linux distro on my Win 7 desktop machine without wiping my windows. I haven't installed Linux on a Win 7 machine before, so I'm seeking some advice here. This PC has an OEM Windows version and I don't have a Win 7 installation CD in case my Linux installation messes up the boot process.
The machine seems to have UEFI and I have enabled 'legacy boot devices' in the BIOS. Is there anything else I need to do?
**Which Linux distro has a reliable and 'safe' installer that has good chances of playing well with my existing OS installation?** I'll prefer a smaller installation medium, if possible a LiveCD available via bittorrent.
Additionally, do I need any special care while repartitioning HDD in UEFI based Win 7 systems? If the above Linux distro has good tools for this purpose, it'll make life easier for me.
Thanks in advance for the help.
72 • @71 Dual boot with UEFI Win 7 (by Oliver on 2013-10-31 08:44:22 GMT from Germany)
I dual or triple boot my desktop (BIOS) and notebook (UEFI) with Linux, Win 7, Win XP and Win 8 and found the following setup very convenient:
I don't install Linux's boot loader to the the boot partition. Instead I install it into the Linux partition itself and create a new entry for the Windows boot loader to chainload it. I use EasyBCD to create the OS entry. Then I suppress the selection screen / countdown for the Linux loader and select the OS at startup from the Windows loader.
GParted should be able to shrink the Windows partition even with GPT / UEFI. But my recommendation would be to get a an additional HDD / SSD as they are very cheap nowadays.
The only critical part would be not overwriting the Windows boot loader with the Linux install, but any mainstream Linux distribution should supply the necessary options. Ubuntu and Mint do.
Best regards, Oliver
73 • @71 Duel Boot Win 7 (by Rev_Don on 2013-10-31 13:31:35 GMT from United States)
If your desktop didn't come with a Windows 7 disk then it should have a Recovery Partition and software to create a set of Recovery Disks. You can also create a Win 7 System Repair Disk from your existing install. See http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows7/create-a-system-repair-disc for more information on doing that.
You can also legally download an actual Windows 7 install disk ISO image from http://forum.notebookreview.com/windows-os-software/604187-legal-download-digitalriver-windows-7-sp1-13-languages.html .
74 • RE 58 and 59 Fedora "respins" (by dbrion on 2013-10-31 15:17:14 GMT from France)
Well, I was glad , thanks :wq, to know that there were 'stable' versions, too, of their respins and the link they give is interesting with another respect : respins are sorted by popularity (there, translates as number of downloads) and electronic lab had a high score (immediatley behind DE -except Compiz/mate, which is unpopular ...; above sugar, a musician -oriented respin, a artist oriented one). I thought very little people were interested in electronics (and there is a huge increase of electronic software which become GNUlinux supported : 5 years ago, they were very few).
I use FC-Electronic to know what is inside the next Fedora, though their DE, now, is very uncomfortable (looks like a "smart" "phone"). Once Fedora officially releases a comfortable **and** official DE -such as LXDE-, I install it and put the softwares I am interested in/ find interesting -it is faster than looking how to install them from source or how to convert apt-get orders into rpm orders -main packages have often the same nomenclature, whatever the distribution : perhaps package management does not need to be unified- From their build log, one can see (by downloading and looking for software names) wget http://kojipkgs.fedoraproject.org//work/tasks/3310/6113310/livecd.log grep ffice livecd.log Retrieving http://infrastructure.fedoraproject.org/pub/fedora/linux/development/20/i386/os/Packages/l/libreoffice-calc-4.1.2.3-3.fc20.i686.rpm ...OK
they use to day libreoffice as a suite (in 2011, they used vym, View Your Mind , an idea manager -which has been kept: what about people having no ideas?). What I find missing (but is in FC repos or can be built from source) are cross compilers/debuggers for Texas msp430 -very cheap and low consuming 16 bits controllers- and for ARMs , getting popular, too. Some applications lose functionalities on a live CD (one cannot manage to have a USB-serial readable/writeable by user -settings would be lost- ; therefore, programming a device through USB is difficult) and need full installation ...
75 • @ 67 Wolf (by Chanath on 2013-10-31 18:28:23 GMT from Sri Lanka)
Dear Wolf, thanks for your reply. Try to translate the Voyager website into English. Voyager is a respin. He practically says so. You cannot upgrade from one to the newer. So, if you feel like using Voyager, you'd have to have a separate home partition.
I also think that neither Mir nor Wayland would be in 14.04. I only wish it would.
I love to respin. That's the freedom Linux gives. For example, I like Word 2000, so if I am using a distro for long, I uninstall the Office Suite and install Word 2000 through Wine. Making a Pear OS or ZorinOS out of Ubuntu is a pretty easy thing.
Have you noticed that in Plank, you can't place the clock, logout, power-off, notifications and other needed icons? That's why a Wingpanel is needed. This Plank works like the Gnone2 type bottom panel, as there is no way to hold "window list" in the Wingpanel. The system is like a 2-panel system of Gnome2/Gnome Classic. You see, even the simple Lxpanel holds the "window list." In eOS, there is no way out of the top panel and bottom panel way.
If you liquidate Plank and the Wingpanel, keeping all the eOS apps, and install Cairo dock, you have fully working one dock/panel system eOS Luna. The "new" Slingshot would still work and open in the top left corner. The present Wingpanel is an unresponsive, meaning useless, and in eOS, it holds a button to open the Slingshot menu, hold a clock in the middle and hold the rest of the icons in the right corner. What else can it do? It can't even autohide.
Okay, you like the eOS, and that's the freedom of Linux. And, I like to respin. I also like lovely distros/respins like Deepin, Oz Unity, Voyager, and with them I play too. In one partition, I am already using Ubuntu 14.04 from the daily cdimage. Linux is superb in that way!
76 • @72, 73 (by Anony Moss on 2013-10-31 18:56:43 GMT from India)
Oliver, Rev_Don, thank you. I read some articles on Win 7 and UEFI, and upon checking some settings it seems Win 7 is not installed on this machine in the UEFI mode, which sounds like good news.
The information both of you provided has been helpful. Oliver, I'll use your tips if the straightforward Linux installation runs into rough weather. Rev, that was really helpful information, it also reminded me that I did make some OEM recovery DVDs once. Still, it's reassuring that the OS images are available to download. Good to see Microsoft playing well for once.
I'm downloading Ubuntu 13.10 and will try installing with it. The choice has to do with it being a recent release, having a newer kernel, and the ubuntu site having a small and clean writeup about UEFI. I've yet to ascertain if I would need GParted, I guess I'll first take a look at what the disk partitioning tool in Ubuntu CD shows and advises me.
77 • Open Source is all about real democracy! (by Transform Humanity on 2013-11-01 17:53:24 GMT from India)
#42 "We would see far, far more progress if instead of everybody trying to roll their own special snowflake, they instead combined their efforts with currently existing projects."
Open source is more like a real democracy unlike the very fake democratic governments of the world - You really can do what you want to do! Nobody gets hurt because you are doing what you want to do.
78 • Follow up on Win 7 dual-boot setup (by Anony Moss on 2013-11-01 21:10:54 GMT from India)
Just here to report how it went. Partitioned Win 7 creating a new 40 GB partition, used thw inbuilt windows shrink utility that worked fine. So did not need GParted. Next I installed Ubuntu 13.10 after booting up the LiveCD desktop.
I was disappointed to see that Ubuntu did not even give an option to set the GRUB boot order. I had to do it by hand later. Nice UI colour scheme, feel and polish to Ubuntu, but I am underwhelmed so far with what's under the hood. The system utilities look quite sparse so far in the desktop edition. Most of Canonical's effort seem to go in Ubuntu One store and Cloud, both of which personally I have little interest in. I'd rather just email my documents to NSA.
I'll probably wait to see how the upcoming OpenSuse release shapes up, and then install it as a serious distro. Or maybe Slackware and Salix once the new versions are out.
Thanks for the helpful tips.
79 • MakuluLinux (by Jacque Raymer on 2013-11-02 07:55:15 GMT from South Africa)
@78 - Maybe you should try MakuluLinux ? it has just surpassed Ubuntu in the Distrowatch 7 day rankings and is holding at number 3 spot.
Features : Makululinux runs on debian testing Its easy to use. Very fast and very smooth. Preloaded with most common software people use. No paid software. Live support offered. Installing Debian based distro's can be tricky for first timer, but there is a youtube video that guides you.
you can view a clip of installation and use here : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VQaLp5Kv2MQ
80 • Whiskers menu in Xfce (by Barnabyh on 2013-11-02 10:58:47 GMT from Hong Kong)
@32 Why would that be the future of Xfce? The default menu is fine and in fact much more straightforward. But then I also never liked the Kick-off menu, Lancelot, 'The Slab' in GNOME2 or the new menu that Cinnamon came up with, so I'm probably hopeless ;-).
81 • @80 Whisker Menu in XFCE (by Rev_Don on 2013-11-02 15:45:13 GMT from United States)
I wouldn't say you were hopeless, Like a lot of people you have grown accustomed to menus (and probably computers in general) working a certain way and don't feel the need to change. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that. If numerous others hadn't felt that way we wouldn't have had MATE or Cinnamon replicating the good old "it just works and stays out of my way" Gnome 2 desktop experience after Unity, Gnome 3, and KDE 4 went over the top with their glitzy, in your face interfaces.
82 • @79 (by Anony Moss on 2013-11-02 17:53:03 GMT from India)
Thanks, looks interesting. I may try out Makulu after Suse in the coming month.
83 • @78 Unity and dumbed down desktop environments (by fernbap on 2013-11-02 18:34:04 GMT from Portugal)
It is clear from your post that the reason why you didn't like Ubuntu is the fact that Unity is a dumbed down DE, and you are the kind of user that prefer to have more control. If that is the case, avoid Unity and Gnome 3 at all costs. But don't worry, you have many DEs to chose from even from Ubuntu: Kubuntu, Xubuntu, Lubuntu. Personally i would recommend KDE or MATE, but you have many to chose from. I sugest that, prior to chosing your distro, try different DEs and pick your choice. BTW, that is why it is my opinion that Ubuntu is hurting Linux: a windows newcomer will try Ubuntu and think that that is what Linux is. Rest assured, it isn't.
84 • @83 (by mandog on 2013-11-03 16:23:14 GMT from Peru)
Correction a windows newcomer will try Ubuntu and think wow so this is LInux. most young people are street wise and Unity/Gnome shell meet there creds not some old fashioned out of date monstrosity imitating Ms. or worse from the last century.
85 • Linux DE (by tdockery97 on 2013-11-03 18:18:10 GMT from United States)
I have to agree with mandog on this one. I'm 64 and have been into personal computing since the DOS days, and use MATE or KDE myself. In my opinion the new generation of Linux users will most likely flock to the new interfaces like Unity and Gnome Shell.
86 • @84,86 (by fernbap on 2013-11-04 00:33:56 GMT from Portugal)
First of all, i was responding to " but I am underwhelmed so far with what's under the hood. The system utilities look quite sparse so far in the desktop edition." Obviously, the one that made that post don't like dumbed down desktops, and my post was regarding that issue to that particular poster. As to my own opinion on Ubuntu, i think that if windows users like dumbed down desktops, they will simply continue to use windows. As simple as that.
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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 1104 (2025-01-13): DAT Linux 2.0, Silly things to do with a minimal computer, Budgie prepares Wayland only releases, SteamOS coming to third-party devices, Murena upgrades its base |
• Issue 1103 (2025-01-06): elementary OS 8.0, filtering ads with Pi-hole, Debian testing its installer, Pop!_OS faces delays, Ubuntu Studio upgrades not working, Absolute discontinued |
• Issue 1102 (2024-12-23): Best distros of 2024, changing a process name, Fedora to expand Btrfs support and releases Asahi Remix 41, openSUSE patches out security sandbox and donations from Bottles while ending support for Leap 15.5 |
• Issue 1101 (2024-12-16): GhostBSD 24.10.1, sending attachments from the command line, openSUSE shows off GPU assignment tool, UBports publishes security update, Murena launches its first tablet, Xfce 4.20 released |
• Issue 1100 (2024-12-09): Oreon 9.3, differences in speed, IPFire's new appliance, Fedora Asahi Remix gets new video drivers, openSUSE Leap Micro updated, Redox OS running Redox OS |
• Issue 1099 (2024-12-02): AnduinOS 1.0.1, measuring RAM usage, SUSE continues rebranding efforts, UBports prepares for next major version, Murena offering non-NFC phone |
• Issue 1098 (2024-11-25): Linux Lite 7.2, backing up specific folders, Murena and Fairphone partner in fair trade deal, Arch installer gets new text interface, Ubuntu security tool patched |
• Issue 1097 (2024-11-18): Chimera Linux vs Chimera OS, choosing between AlmaLinux and Debian, Fedora elevates KDE spin to an edition, Fedora previews new installer, KDE testing its own distro, Qubes-style isolation coming to FreeBSD |
• Issue 1096 (2024-11-11): Bazzite 40, Playtron OS Alpha 1, Tucana Linux 3.1, detecting Screen sessions, Redox imports COSMIC software centre, FreeBSD booting on the PinePhone Pro, LXQt supports Wayland window managers |
• Issue 1095 (2024-11-04): Fedora 41 Kinoite, transferring applications between computers, openSUSE Tumbleweed receives multiple upgrades, Ubuntu testing compiler optimizations, Mint partners with Framework |
• Issue 1094 (2024-10-28): DebLight OS 1, backing up crontab, AlmaLinux introduces Litten branch, openSUSE unveils refreshed look, Ubuntu turns 20 |
• Issue 1093 (2024-10-21): Kubuntu 24.10, atomic vs immutable distributions, Debian upgrading Perl packages, UBports adding VoLTE support, Android to gain native GNU/Linux application support |
• Issue 1092 (2024-10-14): FunOS 24.04.1, a home directory inside a file, work starts of openSUSE Leap 16.0, improvements in Haiku, KDE neon upgrades its base |
• Issue 1091 (2024-10-07): Redox OS 0.9.0, Unified package management vs universal package formats, Redox begins RISC-V port, Mint polishes interface, Qubes certifies new laptop |
• Issue 1090 (2024-09-30): Rhino Linux 2024.2, commercial distros with alternative desktops, Valve seeks to improve Wayland performance, HardenedBSD parterns with Protectli, Tails merges with Tor Project, Quantum Leap partners with the FreeBSD Foundation |
• Issue 1089 (2024-09-23): Expirion 6.0, openKylin 2.0, managing configuration files, the future of Linux development, fixing bugs in Haiku, Slackware packages dracut |
• Issue 1088 (2024-09-16): PorteuX 1.6, migrating from Windows 10 to which Linux distro, making NetBSD immutable, AlmaLinux offers hardware certification, Mint updates old APT tools |
• Issue 1087 (2024-09-09): COSMIC desktop, running cron jobs at variable times, UBports highlights new apps, HardenedBSD offers work around for FreeBSD change, Debian considers how to cull old packages, systemd ported to musl |
• Issue 1086 (2024-09-02): Vanilla OS 2, command line tips for simple tasks, FreeBSD receives investment from STF, openSUSE Tumbleweed update can break network connections, Debian refreshes media |
• Issue 1085 (2024-08-26): Nobara 40, OpenMandriva 24.07 "ROME", distros which include source code, FreeBSD publishes quarterly report, Microsoft updates breaks Linux in dual-boot environments |
• Issue 1084 (2024-08-19): Liya 2.0, dual boot with encryption, Haiku introduces performance improvements, Gentoo dropping IA-64, Redcore merges major upgrade |
• Issue 1083 (2024-08-12): TrueNAS 24.04.2 "SCALE", Linux distros for smartphones, Redox OS introduces web server, PipeWire exposes battery drain on Linux, Canonical updates kernel version policy |
• Issue 1082 (2024-08-05): Linux Mint 22, taking snapshots of UFS on FreeBSD, openSUSE updates Tumbleweed and Aeon, Debian creates Tiny QA Tasks, Manjaro testing immutable images |
• Issue 1081 (2024-07-29): SysLinuxOS 12.4, OpenBSD gain hardware acceleration, Slackware changes kernel naming, Mint publishes upgrade instructions |
• Issue 1080 (2024-07-22): Running GNU/Linux on Android with Andronix, protecting network services, Solus dropping AppArmor and Snap, openSUSE Aeon Desktop gaining full disk encryption, SUSE asks openSUSE to change its branding |
• Issue 1079 (2024-07-15): Ubuntu Core 24, hiding files on Linux, Fedora dropping X11 packages on Workstation, Red Hat phasing out GRUB, new OpenSSH vulnerability, FreeBSD speeds up release cycle, UBports testing new first-run wizard |
• Issue 1078 (2024-07-08): Changing init software, server machines running desktop environments, OpenSSH vulnerability patched, Peppermint launches new edition, HardenedBSD updates ports |
• Issue 1077 (2024-07-01): The Unity and Lomiri interfaces, different distros for different tasks, Ubuntu plans to run Wayland on NVIDIA cards, openSUSE updates Leap Micro, Debian releases refreshed media, UBports gaining contact synchronisation, FreeDOS celebrates its 30th anniversary |
• Issue 1076 (2024-06-24): openSUSE 15.6, what makes Linux unique, SUSE Liberty Linux to support CentOS Linux 7, SLE receives 19 years of support, openSUSE testing Leap Micro edition |
• Issue 1075 (2024-06-17): Redox OS, X11 and Wayland on the BSDs, AlmaLinux releases Pi build, Canonical announces RISC-V laptop with Ubuntu, key changes in systemd |
• Issue 1074 (2024-06-10): Endless OS 6.0.0, distros with init diversity, Mint to filter unverified Flatpaks, Debian adds systemd-boot options, Redox adopts COSMIC desktop, OpenSSH gains new security features |
• Issue 1073 (2024-06-03): LXQt 2.0.0, an overview of Linux desktop environments, Canonical partners with Milk-V, openSUSE introduces new features in Aeon Desktop, Fedora mirrors see rise in traffic, Wayland adds OpenBSD support |
• Issue 1072 (2024-05-27): Manjaro 24.0, comparing init software, OpenBSD ports Plasma 6, Arch community debates mirror requirements, ThinOS to upgrade its FreeBSD core |
• Issue 1071 (2024-05-20): Archcraft 2024.04.06, common command line mistakes, ReactOS imports WINE improvements, Haiku makes adjusting themes easier, NetBSD takes a stand against code generated by chatbots |
• Issue 1070 (2024-05-13): Damn Small Linux 2024, hiding kernel messages during boot, Red Hat offers AI edition, new web browser for UBports, Fedora Asahi Remix 40 released, Qubes extends support for version 4.1 |
• Issue 1069 (2024-05-06): Ubuntu 24.04, installing packages in alternative locations, systemd creates sudo alternative, Mint encourages XApps collaboration, FreeBSD publishes quarterly update |
• Issue 1068 (2024-04-29): Fedora 40, transforming one distro into another, Debian elects new Project Leader, Red Hat extends support cycle, Emmabuntus adds accessibility features, Canonical's new security features |
• Issue 1067 (2024-04-22): LocalSend for transferring files, detecting supported CPU architecure levels, new visual design for APT, Fedora and openSUSE working on reproducible builds, LXQt released, AlmaLinux re-adds hardware support |
• Issue 1066 (2024-04-15): Fun projects to do with the Raspberry Pi and PinePhone, installing new software on fixed-release distributions, improving GNOME Terminal performance, Mint testing new repository mirrors, Gentoo becomes a Software In the Public Interest project |
• Issue 1065 (2024-04-08): Dr.Parted Live 24.03, answering questions about the xz exploit, Linux Mint to ship HWE kernel, AlmaLinux patches flaw ahead of upstream Red Hat, Calculate changes release model |
• Issue 1064 (2024-04-01): NixOS 23.11, the status of Hurd, liblzma compromised upstream, FreeBSD Foundation focuses on improving wireless networking, Ubuntu Pro offers 12 years of support |
• Issue 1063 (2024-03-25): Redcore Linux 2401, how slowly can a rolling release update, Debian starts new Project Leader election, Red Hat creating new NVIDIA driver, Snap store hit with more malware |
• Issue 1062 (2024-03-18): KDE neon 20240304, changing file permissions, Canonical turns 20, Pop!_OS creates new software centre, openSUSE packages Plasma 6 |
• Issue 1061 (2024-03-11): Using a PinePhone as a workstation, restarting background services on a schedule, NixBSD ports Nix to FreeBSD, Fedora packaging COSMIC, postmarketOS to adopt systemd, Linux Mint replacing HexChat |
• Issue 1060 (2024-03-04): AV Linux MX-23.1, bootstrapping a network connection, key OpenBSD features, Qubes certifies new hardware, LXQt and Plasma migrate to Qt 6 |
• Issue 1059 (2024-02-26): Warp Terminal, navigating manual pages, malware found in the Snap store, Red Hat considering CPU requirement update, UBports organizes ongoing work |
• Issue 1058 (2024-02-19): Drauger OS 7.6, how much disk space to allocate, System76 prepares to launch COSMIC desktop, UBports changes its version scheme, TrueNAS to offer faster deduplication |
• Issue 1057 (2024-02-12): Adelie Linux 1.0 Beta, rolling release vs fixed for a smoother experience, Debian working on 2038 bug, elementary OS to split applications from base system updates, Fedora announces Atomic Desktops |
• Issue 1056 (2024-02-05): wattOS R13, the various write speeds of ISO writing tools, DSL returns, Mint faces Wayland challenges, HardenedBSD blocks foreign USB devices, Gentoo publishes new repository, Linux distros patch glibc flaw |
• Issue 1055 (2024-01-29): CNIX OS 231204, distributions patching packages the most, Gentoo team presents ongoing work, UBports introduces connectivity and battery improvements, interview with Haiku developer |
• Issue 1054 (2024-01-22): Solus 4.5, comparing dd and cp when writing ISO files, openSUSE plans new major Leap version, XeroLinux shutting down, HardenedBSD changes its build schedule |
• Issue 1053 (2024-01-15): Linux AI voice assistants, some distributions running hotter than others, UBports talks about coming changes, Qubes certifies StarBook laptops, Asahi Linux improves energy savings |
• Issue 1052 (2024-01-08): OpenMandriva Lx 5.0, keeping shell commands running when theterminal closes, Mint upgrades Edge kernel, Vanilla OS plans big changes, Canonical working to make Snap more cross-platform |
• Full list of all issues |
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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Random Distribution |
Rockstor
Rockstor is a specialist openSUSE-based Linux distribution designed for Network Attached Storage (NAS) and private cloud storage solutions. It is based on popular open-source technologies, such as the Btrfs file system and Docker for automating the deployment of applications inside software containers. In addition to standard NAS features like file sharing via NFS, Samba, SFTP and AFP, advanced features such as online volume management, CoW Snapshots, asynchronous replication, compression, and bitrot protection are also supported. Rockstor provides additional applications, including ownCloud, Syncthing, OpenVPN and Plex. These applications (called "Rock-ons") are powered by a Docker-based application hosting framework. The Rockstor user interface, written in JavaScript, makes it simple to manage the server from within a web browser.
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.
|
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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