 DistroWatch Weekly |
| DistroWatch Weekly, Issue 641, 21 December 2015 |
Welcome to this year's 51st issue of DistroWatch Weekly!
Security was a popular topic last week in the open source community, largely due to some proactive moves by various projects. For instance, we learned recently that Qubes OS, a project which isolates applications, will be shipping on Librem's security-focused laptops. The Fedora project offered users Let's Encrypt packages and a tutorial to facilitate setting up secure websites while the GRUB boot loader got patched to plug a security hole. Not all the news was security related though and the ALT Linux project unveiled a new set of images, called starter kits, for people who wish to experiment with alternative software configurations. In our Feature Story this week we explore Arch Linux, a unique project that keeps its users on the cutting edge using a rolling release model. In this issue we share thoughts on systemd and launchd in our Myths and Misunderstandings column. We also share the torrents we are seeding and provide a list of distributions released last week. In our Opinion Poll we discuss the new Let's Encrypt software and ask who is taking advantage of the free Let's Encrypt security certificates. Plus we talk about a new feature on DistroWatch, the ability to track page hit ranking trends. This will be our final issue of DistroWatch Weekly in 2015 as we are off next Monday for the holiday. The Weekly will return on January 4th, 2016 with more news, reviews and answers to your questions. We wish you all a wonderful and safe fortnight and happy reading!
Content:
Listen to the Podcast edition of this week's DistroWatch Weekly in OGG (25MB) and MP3 (18MB) formats
• Music credit: Clouds Fly With Me by Matti Paalanen
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| Feature Story (by Jesse Smith) |
Arch Linux
Arch Linux is a project I do not talk about a lot. Part of the reason for that is due to the fact Arch is a pure rolling release distribution and, in essence, the project does not really have releases. The developers simply push out regular snapshots of the installation media. This tends to keep Arch Linux out of the news. Another reason I tend not to talk about, or review, Arch Linux often is because the distribution has a rather long and mostly manual installation process. But I will come back to that point in a bit.
Despite not talking about Arch much, I do acknowledge the project has a dedicated following and the Arch developers make some interesting choices when it comes to the design of the operating system. With that in mind, I would like to conclude this year's series of reviews with a look at the Arch Linux project.
The Arch Linux website does not have a lot to say about the distribution. The project's website describes Arch as follows:
You've reached the website for Arch Linux, a lightweight and flexible Linux distribution that tries to Keep It Simple. Currently we have official packages optimized for the i686 and x86-64 architectures. We complement our official package sets with a community-operated package repository that grows in size and quality each and every day.
The installation media for Arch Linux is a dual-architecture ISO that runs on 32-bit and 64-bit x86 computers. The ISO is 659MB in size and getting a copy of this ISO was my first challenge. At first I tried to download the ISO using the Transmission bittorrent software, but Transmission kept running into errors after downloading a few megabytes and crashing. This is the only torrent I have encountered which causes this behaviour. I switched to using a direct HTTP download and grabbed a copy of the installation media from a nearby mirror. The mirrors include checksum files so we can verify the contents of our download.
Booting from the Arch media brings up a menu asking if we would like to boot Arch Linux in 32-bit mode or 64-bit mode. There is also an option to launch a hardware detection utility. Taking one of the boot options brings up a text console where we are logged in as the root user. Arch will try to automatically detect and activate a network connection if one is available. This is just about the only thing Arch Linux does automatically.
The Arch installation media does not offer users a graphical desktop to explore and it does not include a system installer that will handle the gritty aspects of setting up a new copy of Arch Linux. Instead, the project provides us with a wiki that includes an installation guide and many pages of documentation that explore setting up the system with services and graphical desktop environments. For those who have not installed Arch Linux before, or who have not done so recently, I recommend reading the project's Beginners' Guide. It provides step-by-step command line instructions (with some examples) that explain how to perform a minimal installation of Arch Linux.
To install Arch Linux we need to manually walk through a number of steps on the command line. These steps include partitioning the hard drive (using parted, fdisk or cfdisk), formatting partitions and enabling swap space. Then we mount the partition that is to be used as our root file system and run a command that downloads and installs the base operating system. In total there are about 208MB of packages to download for the default operating system, plus about another 6MB of data if we want to install a boot loader. We then run through commands to set our time zone, enable locale information and set up a network connection. We should then create a password for the root account and un-mount the partition we have been working on. At this point we can reboot and see if the installation completed successfully.
While the above steps sound about the same as the steps performed when setting up other distributions such as Fedora or Ubuntu, those distributions provide easy to navigate point-n-click graphical installers. Arch gets us to type out commands and we need to know how to work with tools such as console partition managers and systemd and how to manually mount partitions. This makes installing Arch a rather lengthy process, even without double-checking the steps in the on-line manual.
Arch Linux 2015.11.01 -- The System Settings configuration panel
(full image size: 996kB, resolution: 1280x1024 pixels)
Booting our new copy of Arch brings us to a text console where we can sign in as the root user. At this point the user gets to decide what they want to do with the operating system. All we really have to work with, by default, are the GNU command line utilities, manual pages, the pacman package manager and systemd. Any network services, window managers, desktop environments or applications need to be located in the distribution's software repositories and installed. I decided to take the path of setting up the KDE Plasma desktop environment along with some common desktop programs such as Firefox, LibreOffice and the GNU Image Manipulation Program.
I decided to install the SDDM session manager and the Plasma desktop by following the Arch wiki. Unfortunately, the wiki's page on installing KDE software was out of date at the time of writing and the packages mentioned no longer exist. I was able to search for the modern equivalents of the packages mentioned in the wiki and install them. Adding SDDM and Plasma to my system required downloading an additional 300MB of software.
With Plasma in place we can start the session manager or reboot to get a graphical login screen. However, we cannot login until we have first created a non-root user. Blocking root from logging into the desktop is actually a nice security feature and probably a good default setting to have. Once I had created a new user account, created its home directory and set the proper permissions on the new user's home from the text console I was able to switch back to the graphical login screen and sign into either the Plasma desktop or the Plasma Media Centre. Actually, as it turned out, selecting either session (Plasma or Plasma Media Centre) from the login screen brought me to the Plasma desktop.
As a side note to getting a desktop session running, while enabling the desktop on a physical computer went smoothly, I found that extra steps were required to get to a graphical login screen (and desktop environment) when running Arch in VirtualBox. Though it took me a while to find the appropriate document, there is a page in the Arch wiki which deals with running Arch in a VirtualBox instance. Following the steps on that page allowed me to run graphical sessions from within the virtual machine.
Once I had installed Plasma and got it running, I found the desktop environment to be very minimal. Plasma, by default, places the application menu, task switcher and system tray at the bottom of the screen. There are no icons on the desktop and the default wallpaper looks like a rainbow fell on a pile of triangles. Looking through the application menu we find the KDE System Settings panel which provides a method for customizing the desktop environment. The Qt Designer application is installed along with a task monitor. There is no file manager, web browser or other common desktop utilities. These can be added using the command line package manager. Looking at the lower level software I found that, at the time of my trial, Arch was running systemd 227 and version 4.2.5 of the Linux kernel. Since Arch is a rolling release distribution package versions will change frequently.
When I first got Arch Linux installed, I checked the amount of disk space that was being used before I started adding applications. Arch was consuming approximately 3GB of disk space and, prior to running a graphical session, about 70MB of RAM. Once I had installed some common applications such as the Dolphin file manager, LibreOffice and Firefox, Arch was consuming around 4.5GB of disk space. Sitting idle at the Plasma 5.4 desktop required 250MB of RAM. Earlier I mentioned I tried running Arch on a physical desktop computer and in a VirtualBox virtual machine. Arch performed well in both environments, properly detecting my hardware, setting up a network connection and, once I had installed the proper video drivers, my screen was set to its maximum resolution.
Arch Linux 2015.11.01 -- The pacman package manager
(full image size: 833kB, resolution: 1280x1024 pixels)
I have mentioned working with the package manager a few times now and Arch's command line package manager, pacman, does see a lot of use. I find pacman uses an unusually terse command line syntax and its output is sparse. The package manager is very quick though and gave me no problems during my trial. This was good since I ended up installing a regular stream of software and package upgrades. Each day I found a few new package updates were waiting to be installed and this pattern will continue since Arch is a rolling release and quickly adopts new software as it becomes available from upstream projects.
Though pacman worked very well for me, it is a powerful tool and we need to be careful with it, especially given Arch's rolling release nature. I do not just mean that we need to watch for changes in dependencies or packages which need special attention when they are upgraded, but we also need to be aware of older software mixing with newer packages in the repositories. As an example, I mentioned earlier that I had set up my copy of Arch with KDE's Plasma 5 desktop. Arch's software repositories contain Plasma 5 applications, but there are also packages from KDE4 available too and some of them have similar names to the new Plasma 5 packages. A few times during the week I went to install a new Plasma application only to discover that there was a KDE4 application with a similar name and pacman was going to install the older version along with the entire set of KDE4 software libraries to support the older version. In short, it is important to pay attention to what pacman tells us and to think about what is happening before confirming an action.
Given Arch Linux's minimal nature, it should be no surprise the distribution does not ship with multimedia support, Java or Flash. The project takes the philosophy of having us build our own operating system from the ground up. Installing media players does pull in multimedia codecs as dependencies, enabling us to play media files and Adobe's Flash plug-in is available in the Arch repositories.
Arch Linux 2015.11.01 -- Running the Firefox web browser
(full image size: 758kB, resolution: 1280x1024 pixels)
Earlier I mentioned one of the session options from the login screen was for the Plasma Media Centre. While this session option just logs us into the regular Plasma desktop, there is also a Media Centre launcher in the Plasma application menu. Launching the Media Centre from the application menu brought up a screen where I could browse through images and media files, but I could not find any way to quit the Media Centre interface. In the end, I had to force the termination of my login session to leave the Media Centre screen.
While Arch offers users a Spartan experience, most of the software I installed worked and ran smoothly. Despite software packages being on the cutting edge, there were very few bugs in evidence. One of the few which appeared during my trial was that, when changing the Plasma wallpaper, previews of available wallpapers were blank.
Conclusions
I have a lot of thoughts on Arch Linux, partially because the project is so unusual in the Linux ecosystem. One point that stands out is Arch has some of the best documentation in the Linux community. The wiki is a very valuable resource, not just for people who run Arch Linux, but for the community as a whole and the wiki is an essential read for people who wish to try Arch.
Another point is that getting up and running with Arch Linux is a bigger investment in time and effort than most other Linux distributions. With most mainstream distributions we can put in the installation media, click "Next" through some installation screens, set up a user account and we will soon have a feature-rich operating system. Arch feels less like a finished product, like openSUSE or Linux Mint, and more like a collection of components we can put together however we like. I would compare it to the difference between buying a toy car and buying a model kit where we paint the individual pieces and glue them together. Putting together the model takes a lot longer and requires some skill, but what we end up with includes just the pieces we used and in the colour we wanted.
The flip side to Arch taking a long time to set up is that, in theory, it will be possible to constantly update the distribution without re-installing. This may be of benefit to some people, especially those who like to stay on the bleeding-edge of software development. Rolling Arch forward gradually may be less work (over time) than updating to a new release of Fedora or Ubuntu every six months. However, Arch is not likely to remain as stable as Debian or CentOS over five years as some packages will almost certainly break during that time period. People looking to install-and-forget a distribution will probably be better off with a long-term-support release that will remain stable for years while people who want to keep up with the latest software changes may find Arch less work in the long run.
Another point I would like to raise is with Arch Linux's self-described "lightweight" nature. By default, when we install Arch Linux it is, indeed, lightweight. We start off with a few gigabytes of packages and the operating system consumes less than 100MB of RAM. However, on the flip side, the default OS does not do much. We have the bash shell, systemd, manual pages and a package manager, but little else. By the time we add a desktop environment, a few application and some services such as OpenSSH and CUPS, we are using around 5GB of disk space and over 300MB of RAM. In short, Arch Linux is technically lightweight at the start, but if we ask Arch to perform the same tasks as other distributions, Arch Linux will use approximately the same hardware resources other distributions require. Arch also uses more bandwidth since, after downloading the ISO, we tend end up downloading around another gigabyte or two of packages to get started. Plus we receive a regular stream of updates. I would recommend having a high-speed Internet connection for people who plan to run Arch.
Arch Linux 2015.11.01 -- Running various desktop applications
(full image size: 269kB, resolution: 1280x1024 pixels)
Finally, I would like to make a more personal and subjective set of observations. Personally, I have never regarded Arch Linux as a particularly practical approach to getting things done. The distribution has a long set up time, newcomers will require access to an on-line wiki while setting up the operating system and the rolling nature of Arch is incompatible with most of my use cases. So, for me, Arch does not hold a lot of appeal today.
That being said, toward the end of the week I started to notice a fondness growing in me for Arch. One that did not line up with the amount of tinkering involved and time spent downloading yet more packages to accomplish simple tasks. And I recognized the feeling as being nostalgia. Working with Arch Linux reminded me a lot of working with my first Linux distribution, Pygmy Linux, back in the 1990s. Pygmy Linux was a trimmed down spin of Slackware which provided users with a simple command line interface only, by default. There was no compiler, no package manager, no desktop environment. Everything was done manually or with hand-written scripts. Pygmy presented a steep learning curve when I was first introduced to Linux and Unix, and it was what I needed to become familiar with the technology and pass my course in operating systems.
While I eventually moved on to other distributions for my daily computing needs, I hold a certain fondness for Pygmy Linux and its sparse, do-it-yourself approach. It taught me a lot. In a similar vein, I think of Arch much the same way. Arch Linux presents an investment in time, reading and maintenance that I do not find practical for my day-to-day needs. But I do think we could all agree running Arch Linux is an educational experience. Running Arch is something I think will appeal to people who like to build their operating systems rather than simply run them.
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Hardware used in this review
My physical test equipment for this review was a desktop HP Pavilon p6 Series with the following specifications:
- Processor: Dual-core 2.8GHz AMD A4-3420 APU
- Storage: 500GB Hitachi hard drive
- Memory: 6GB of RAM
- Networking: Realtek RTL8111 wired network card
- Display: AMD Radeon HD 6410D video card
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| Miscellaneous News (by Jesse Smith) |
Qubes OS to ship pre-installed on Librem laptops, ALT offers starter kit images, Fedora provides Let's Encrypt tutorial and GRUB password protection patched
Arstechnica reported last week that Qubes OS will be offered pre-installed on Librem 13 laptops in the near future. Qubes OS separates processes from each other, allowing a user to maintain separate profiles, or containers, for their digital lives. This means if a profile used for casual web browsing is compromised it will not affect data or applications stored in the profile used for work. Finding computers that will run Qubes OS properly has been difficult, but Librem hopes to change that. "Qubes wants to lower the barrier of entry for new users, including security-conscious enterprise users who might want to buy a number of laptops for their staff. In addition to the Librem 13, Qubes plans to certify the larger Librem 15, plus other laptops that are `as diverse as possible in terms of geography, cost, and availability.' Qubes tests the laptops they certify to ensure compatibility with all the OS's features. Purism has worked closely with Qubes developers since before the laptop manufacturer's successful crowdfunding campaigns, which raised a combined total of more than $800,000 (₤530,000), to meet the demands of security-conscious Qubes users. Purism manufactures their own motherboard, and all chips are designed to run free software. The Librem also ships with hardware kill switches for the camera, microphone, and wi-fi."
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The ALT Linux developers have announced a new set of downloadable images for people who would like to experiment with alternative software without installing software packages on their main operating system. The new images, called "starter kits", are described on the project's website: "Starter kits are built with ALT Linux stable repository as a base; these are intended for experienced users lending them a convenient way to have a look at a DE/WM they didn't get around yet to mess with, or to deploy another system spending reasonable amount of time to set it up accordingly. These are not complete distributions: no special docs are written for each release, the design is simple and shared by all the builds - is there any sense to paint the walls just to have them repainted by the settlers? There are not too many packages included: we've decided that it's better to install LibreOffice or PostgreSQL another time than to have to download it each time." Further information on the starter kits can be found in ALT's wiki.
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The Let's Encrypt service, which provides free security certificates for websites and other on-line services, entered public beta earlier this month. In an effort to make setting up secure services easier, projects like Fedora and FreeBSD have created packages of the Let's Encrypt software and published them in official software repositories. Fedora Magazine has an article on how to use the Let's Encrypt software to set up website certificates. "The official Let's Encrypt client can be installed in Fedora 23 or later with this command: `dnf install letsencrypt'. In the official client, there are three methods to prove ownership of your domain(s). Manual verification: The secret needs to be put in place by hand. Standalone verification: The Let's Encrypt client listens on port 80 or 443 and responds to the server itself. Web root verification: The client is pointed to the web root (e.g. /var/www/html) and writes files directly. At the time of writing, full automatic configuration of Apache and nginx are in progress." The article goes on to explore various ways users can install the free Let's Encrypt certificates.
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Also on the topic of security, we received some bad news last week when it was revealed the GRUB boot loader contained a security flaw which would allow users to bypass the boot loader's password prompt. The bug affects GRUB 1.98 through to 2.02beta and allows a malicious user to bypass the GRUB password prompt by simply pressing the backspace key several times. Fixes are already starting to appear in distributions' software repositories with patched versions of GRUB already available for Ubuntu and Debian users.
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| Myths and Misunderstandings (by Jesse Smith) |
Myths and misunderstandings: the spread of systemd and launchd
Two of the complaints I hear about most with regards to systemd is that it changes a lot of the GNU/Linux software stack and that it has spread across the Linux ecosystem rapidly. This combination of large and rapid change appears to have caused a bit of culture shock among users and system administrators. A side effect of this is I get weekly e-mails asking how to find open source operating systems which do not rely on systemd.
For those interested, we have a list of distributions which do not include systemd packages on our Search page. It is also worth noting that Gentoo and Linux Mint, while they make systemd packages available, do not necessarily use systemd.
With all the concern over systemd, a number of rumours and pieces of misinformation have spread about the systemd suite of software and I would like to address some of those today.
The first is that systemd has spread to virtually every Linux distribution and cannot be avoided. This is not entirely true. While systemd has been widely adopted, there are several Linux distributions which still do not package the systemd software. Options for people who do not wish to run systemd may be limited, but one of the nice things about Linux distributions is the diversity available. People can always migrate to a distribution which suits their requirements.
Which brings me to a second point, many people suspect that, eventually, enough software will depend on systemd that all Linux distributions will be unable to survive without it. Too many packages will link to systemd and it will be necessary to run systemd if we want to run a desktop environment, network services or common applications. This scenario is unlikely for two reasons. The first is that most components have little need to rely directly on systemd. A few low-level services and some of the big desktops may benefit from depending on systemd, but most software does not. The second is that various developers around the world are building compatibility layers for applications which rely on systemd. These compatibility layers, called shims, "emulate the systemd functions that are required to run the systemd helpers without using the init service." This means that developers who like systemd can use its features and people who do not like systemd can use the shims, which include just the features required without replacing the operating system's init software.
The "you cannot evade systemd" rumour sometimes expands to not only include Linux distributions, but also the BSDs. There seems to be this idea that systemd will either be adopted by the various BSD projects (which is highly unlikely) or the BSDs will adopt a similar technology such as launchd. I think this idea that launchd is the BSD equivalent of Linux's systemd is misplaced. While launchd is an alternative init software and service manager, the scope of launchd is much smaller than systemd's. The launchd project aims to speed up boot times and simplify service management, but little else. In comparison, systemd tackles not only init tasks and service management, but also other tasks such as date & time settings, login/authentication, hardware device management, logging and virtual terminals. It is also worth noting that while systemd was adopted relatively quickly in the Linux community, launchd has been a work in progress in the FreeBSD community for about ten years. The BSD communities rarely adopt anything quickly and they like to make sure all the bugs are shaken out before technology ships in a stable release.
In short, while a lot of people were unhappy with how quickly systemd was adopted and the changes systemd bought with it, there are still plenty of open source operating systems which do not rely on systemd. Nor are the projects which do not currently use systemd likely to adopt the technology (or something similar) in the future.
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| Torrent Corner |
Weekly Torrents
Bittorrent is a great way to transfer large files, particularly open source operating system images, from one place to another. Most bittorrent clients recover from dropped connections automatically, check the integrity of files and can re-download corrupted bits of data without starting a download over from scratch. These characteristics make bittorrent well suited for distributing open source operating systems, particularly to regions where Internet connections are slow or unstable.
Many Linux and BSD projects offer bittorrent as a download option, partly for the reasons listed above and partly because bittorrent's peer-to-peer nature takes some of the strain off the project's servers. However, some projects do not offer bittorrent as a download option. There can be several reasons for excluding bittorrent as an option. Some projects do not have enough time or volunteers, some may be restricted by their web host provider's terms of service. Whatever the reason, the lack of a bittorrent option puts more strain on a distribution's bandwidth and may prevent some people from downloading their preferred open source operating system.
With this in mind, DistroWatch plans to give back to the open source community by hosting and seeding bittorrent files. For now, we are hosting a small number of distribution torrents, listed below. The list of torrents offered will be updated each week and we invite readers to e-mail us with suggestions as to which distributions we should be hosting. When you message us, please place the word "Torrent" in the subject line, make sure to include a link to the ISO file you want us to seed. To help us maintain and grow this free service, please consider making a donation.
The table below provides a list of torrents we currently host. If you do not currently have a bittorrent client capable of handling the linked files, we suggest installing either the Transmission or KTorrent bittorrent clients.
Archives of our previously seeded torrents may be found here. All torrents we make available here are also listed on the very useful Linux Tracker website. Thanks to Linux Tracker we are able to share the following torrent statistics.
Torrent Corner statistics:
- Total torrents seeded: 145
- Total data uploaded: 23.0TB
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| Released Last Week |
CentOS 7-1511
Karanbir Singh has announced the launch of a new version of CentOS. The CentOS project builds an enterprise class distribution based on source code from Red Hat Enterprise Linux. The latest release, CentOS 7-1511, contains mostly minor new features and security fixes. "Since release 1503 (abrt>=2.1.11-19.el7.centos.0.1) CentOS-7 can report bugs directly to bugs.centos.org. You can find information about that feature at this page. sudo is now capable of verifying command checksums. A Kerberos HTTPS proxy is now available for identity management. NSS no longer accepts DH key parameters < 768 nor RSA/DSA certificates with key sizes < 1024 bits. NSS also now enables TLS1.1/1.2 by default. Various packages now support TLS1.1/1.2 and EC ciphers..." Singh reported CentOS developers are working to produce builds for ARM, Aarch64 and 32-bit x86 architectures. Further information can be found in the project's release announcement and in the release notes for CentOS 7-1511.
ClearOS 6.7.0
Peter Baldwin has announced the release of ClearOS 6.7.0, the latest stable version of CentOS-based distribution's legacy branch - a product designed primarily for servers and gateways: "ClearOS 6.7.0 has been released for both Community and Professional editions. Now that ClearOS 7 is available, the ClearOS 6 release series has entered maintenance mode. Security and bug fixes will continue to be released. This version features improvements and bug fixes. ClearOS 6.7 enters extended support and no further features for this version are anticipated. To upgrade an existing system to ClearOS 6.7.0, you can run the following command: 'yum upgrade'. For a full list of improvements that have been added, please review the changelogs." See the release announcement and release notes for more information.
Tails 1.8
Tails 1.8 has been released. Tails (The Amnesic Incognito Live System) is a live Linux distribution, based on Debian's latest stable release, designed for secure and anonymous web browsing. The main change in this release is the switch to Icedove (Thunderbird) as the default email client: Tails 1.8 is out. This release fixes numerous security issues. All users must upgrade as soon as possible. New features: Icedove, a re-branded variant of Mozilla Thunderbird is now the official email client in Tails, replacing Claws Mail. Claws Mail will be removed from Tails in version 2.0 (2016-01-26). If you have been using Claws Mail and activated its persistence feature, follow our instructions to migrate your data to Icedove. Upgrades and changes: Electrum Bitcoin wallet from 1.9.8 to 2.5.4, now Electrum should work again in Tails; Tor Browser to 5.0.5; Tor to 0.2.7.6; I2P to 0.9.23; Icedove from 31.8 to 38.4; Enigmail from 1.7.2 to 1.8.2." Read the rest of the release announcement for more information and known issues.
Tails 1.8 -- Connected to the Tor network
(full image size: 80kB, resolution: 1600x1200 pixels)
Alpine Linux 3.3.0
Natanael Copa has announced a new release of the Alpine Linux distribution. Alpine Linux is a minimal, independently developed Linux distribution, designed to run on firewalls, VPN services and low-resource devices like the Raspberry Pi. The latest release, Alpine Linux 3.3.0, ships with version 4.1 of the Linux kernel, GCC 5.3, LibreOffice 5.0 and version 1.12 of the MATE desktop environment. This release is available in several flavours: "We are pleased to announce Alpine Linux 3.3.0, the first release in v3.3 stable series. The ISO images have been renamed. Current images are now: alpine (previously ‘alpine-mini’). Minimalist boot media for network access. alpine-vanilla (same as before). Same as ‘alpine’ but with vanilla kernel. alpine-extended (previously ‘alpine’). Same as ‘alpine’ but with slightly more packages available in the repository. Handy where network access is limited. alpine-xen (same as before). Boot media for Xen Dom 0. alpine-rpi (same as before). alpine-uboot (same as before). General ARM image." Further information on Alpine Linux 3.3.0 can be found in the project's release announcement.
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Development, unannounced and minor bug-fix releases
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| Upcoming Releases and Announcements |
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Summary of expected upcoming releases
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| Opinion Poll |
Let's Encrypt
The Let's Encrypt organization strives to make Internet security easier and less expensive to set up. The organization does this by providing free security certificates for websites and other on-line services. These certificates can be downloaded and installed quickly using simple client software.
Let's Encrypt recently shifted from a closed beta trial to being publicly available to anyone who wants to try their free certificate service. In just a few weeks, the organization has provided over 100,000 certificates for websites around the world.
This week we would like to know who among our readers have experimented with Let's Encrypt's certificates and software. How was your experience? Please leave us a comment with your impressions of this free certificate service.
You can see the results of last week's poll on source-based distributions here. All previous poll results can be found in our poll archives.
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Let's Encrypt
| I have used Let's Encrypt: | 95 (9%) |
| I plan to use Let's Encrypt later: | 364 (33%) |
| I have no plans to use Let's Encrypt: | 366 (33%) |
| I plan to wait before deciding: | 270 (25%) |
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| DistroWatch.com News |
Tracking page hit trends
Our page hit ranking tracks the number of times a distribution's information page is visited in the course of a day. This gives a rough indication of how many people who visit DistroWatch are interested in a particular project. We provide tables which rank distributions based on the number of visit to their page and show the average number of visits each page gets over the span of one, three, six and twelve month spans.
Some of our readers asked us to provide a way to see which distributions are receiving more or less attention over a span of time. Which distributions are more popular this month than last month, for example, and by how much?
We now provide a new set of tables which show trends over periods of time. This allows DistroWatch visitors to see how many page hits a project is receiving now, compared to one, six or twelve months ago. These numbers tend to spike a lot following a project's release announcement, but otherwise can indicate growing or reduced interest in a distribution among DistroWatch readers.
On our front page we provide a Page Hit Ranking chart down the right side of the page. By default, this chart shows the average number of visits a distribution's information page receives over a six month span. Using the Page Hit Ranking drop-down menu, it is possible to see page hit rankings for longer or shorter periods of time. It is also possible to see trends for intervals of one week, one month, three months, six months and twelve months.
While the page hit ranking and trend information may indicate a level of interest in a particular project, these charts do not reflect installation base or the quality of a distribution. They are fun to explore, but we should not read too much into these trends.
On another note, we would like to thank Marshal Webb for volunteering his time and kind assistance in helping us track down a scripting bug.
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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 January 2016. 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)
- Michael DeGuzis of Libre Geek (podcast)
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1 • arch (by mandog on 2015-12-21 01:00:42 GMT from South America)
Jesse nice review not entirely accurate but not bad
Arch has dropped all kde4 packages last week so that small problem is no more.
I have used arch for over 10 years and overall it has needed less maintenance than all so called stable distros I have used.
size on disk can also be trimmed down with pacman -Sc that will leave only the current software in /var/cache/pacman/packages pacman -Scc will remove all. More important you can always downgrade packages with pacman -U if they are in the package cache that is what it is for.
as for older software mixing KDE4/5 was a exception as kde5 till the last week was not viable without some KDE4 software again KDE fell in the trap of releasing 5 before it was complete. With Arch normally all old packages are dropped from the repros as new are released, and stored on the arch rollback machine just in case.
2 • Disengenious (by Troy Cecil on 2015-12-21 01:14:12 GMT from North America)
It is disingenuous to show pages of discontinued distros as viable option to systemd. In the list of active distros, many are special purpose or live, which is hardly a viable option either. Systemd is the best thing that could have happened to the BSDs.
3 • No chkdisk in linux, but... (by Ben Myers on 2015-12-21 01:37:14 GMT from North America)
Because Linux has no chkdsk, one needs to look elsewhere for solutions. It's not open-source and it's no longer updated by its creator, but HiRens Boot CD 15.2 allows one to boot a somewhat skeletal Windows XP and run chkdsk, as well as other hard drive repair utilities. I've also put HiRens onto a bootable flash stick, then updated a few drivers and programs with more recent stuff.
Whether Linux or Windows or otherwise, it is always best to make sure that the hard drive itself is in a respectable state before messing with it. After all, changing data on a drive corrupted by bad sectors may corrupt it even more. Best practice is to look at the SMART data for the drive, to see if it has any repaired sectors, sectors pending repair (SMART turned off in the BIOS) and unrecoverable bad sectors. If the hard drive is error-free, CHKDSK can do a reasonable job of fixing up a broken file system.
4 • Arch (by c00ter on 2015-12-21 02:08:24 GMT from North America)
Thanks for the review of Arch, Jesse, and your willingness to tackle it. For me, the sense of accomplishment in running Arch is important. Arch gives me the ability to install what I want Instead of running someone else's idea of Linux. Doing so from the base packages up, keeps it lean, clean, and easy to maintain. Regards.
5 • Arch Linux (by Linux411 on 2015-12-21 02:18:24 GMT from North America)
Very nice article, Jessie. The very essence of Arch Linux dictates that it does not follow the standard path of *most* other Linux distributions. It is an awesome learning tool and a very viable desktop system. Arch Linux has always been about knowing Linux, not just using what you get and Arch Linux hits a bulls-eye with their philosophy.
I have actually setup in a fully operating Arch Linux system in under 5 minutes, whereas other more "notable" distributions can take 30 minutes. Granted, I do have a synced repository on my hard drive, however, most installations of other distributions contain a full system with their installation disks. Maybe I have too much "Old School" in me, but I prefer to make what I want instead of getting what I get.
I have learned so much from Arch Linux that I would otherwise have not even thought about having someone else do it for me for convenience sake.
Don't get me wrong, other distributions do incredibly well with their choices of what they include in a release. But for those who want to get exactly what they want and not somethings they will never use taking up resources, Arch Linux is the way to go.
I would like to point out as well, you can install the additional packages from within the installer boot disk at the pacstrap command by adding packages, as exampled, 'pacstrap /mnt base grub abcde audacity automoc4 base-devel breeze-gtk cabextract cdcover cdrkit cmake converseen cpio cups darkhttpd dialog dosfstools dvdrip easytag frozen-bubble gimp git gksu gnome-doc-utils gpart gparted gstreamer0.10-base-plugins gstreamer0.10-good-plugins gstreamer0.10-bad-plugins gstreamer0.10-ffmpeg gstreamer0.10-ugly-plugins gstreamer0.10-python gutenprint gvfs gvfs-smb gvfs-gphoto2 gvfs-mtp help2man hplip icedtea-web intltool java-environment kde-applications kde-gtk-config knotifications libart-lgpl libdvdcss libgme libgnomecanvas libgoom2 libreoffice-still libva-intel-driver mc mpg123 minetest mplayer mtools mutagen networkmanager network-manager-applet numlockx nvidia-340xx p7zip pingus plasma pycddb pysolfc python-dbus python-distutils-extra python-gobject python-pyqt4 python2-beautifulsoup3 python2-bsddb python2-notify pywebkitgtk qbittorrent rpcbind ruby rss-glx rsync sane sauerbraten sddm sddm-kcm streamripper subversion supertux systemd-kcm ttf-freefont ttf-dejavu ttf-liberation twolame udisks2 urbanterror unrar unzip vlc warsow warzone2100 wpa_supplicant xdotool xine-lib xmoto xorg xsane xsane-gimp xscreensaver xterm zip'
That will actually give you a fully working KDE desktop. Of course, you have to do a little 'useradd -m -g users -G sys "username" &
passwd "username" as well before rebooting.
I do appologize for the rant. Thank you for all you and the rest of the folks at Distrowatch do to keep us all up-to-date and educated with Linux. You are all a valued and respected resource.
6 • Arch Linux (Appended) (by Linux411 on 2015-12-21 02:31:13 GMT from North America)
I would like to point out that if anyone wishes to take note of installing via pacstrap mentioned above, you may want to leave out urbanterror and warsow, as they are rather large downloads. Also, switch nvidia-340xx to whatever video card you use. There are are few systemd calls which need to be made as well. But most importantly, don't use it, because where's the fun in that? Just wanted to show it is easier than most people think, if you want to learn it.
7 • Poll (by a on 2015-12-21 02:33:07 GMT from Europe)
I feel that the poll lacks another answer: "I have no need for an SSL certificate at the moment but will use let's encrypt should I need one in the future."
"I have no plan to use let's encrypt" doesn’t distinguish between not wanting to use the service and not needing to use it...
8 • Purism (by GWright on 2015-12-21 03:06:31 GMT from Asia)
Purism won't let me access their webpage because I'm going thru Tor - oh the irony. There are dozens of ostensibly 'open' tech sites that do this. They have to stop employing Cloudflare - it's more than 12 months now since I've even attempted to solve a Cloudflare captcha.
9 • Agree! (by spambait on 2015-12-21 04:08:32 GMT from Europe)
I use Tor as a matter of policy, and when I come across a page that asks me to solve that obnoxious captcha, I just go somewhere else.
There must be better ways to deter bots.
10 • X Never Marks The Spot (by X on 2015-12-21 04:13:17 GMT from Europe)
"They have to stop employing Cloudflare"
It seems like a week or so ago a switch was turned on somewhere and boom - Cloudflare screens everywhere for Tor users.
It often helps to mash the "New Tor Circuit For This Site" option on the green onion icon in the browser. Mash it and mash it until you eventually reach the page being Cloudflared. Or, just find one of many free web proxies and access the blocked site through the proxy while using Tor.
11 • Re: X Never Marks The Spot (by GWright on 2015-12-21 04:57:51 GMT from Asia)
The Register turned it on 11 days ago - can't even get their Atom feed - how can a feed reader solve a captcha? Then there are Phoronix and Ghacks that will often just blackhole your request, keeping your browser hanging for a couple of minutes.
But folks running websites like puri.sm need to check out their sites using Tor once in a while - they'll see how utterly impossible those captchas are to solve. They must surely have received feedback on this, but they're so organizationally dysfunctional that they have no mechanism to deal with such, thus I will surely never want to deal with their products.
12 • Purism (by GWright on 2015-12-21 05:32:53 GMT from Asia)
"There must be better ways to deter bots."
When I was running a Wordpress blog a while ago I found it could be all done by inspecting request headers. HTTP1.0 is a dead giveaway, of course. Other indiscretions like not sending accept-lang raise the red flag. I'm sure it's still quite easy - doesn't sound so rock-your-bollocks off when you're talking to an IT manager though, does it?
13 • A few comments about Arch. (by Hannah Montana on 2015-12-21 05:47:31 GMT from North America)
My first install of Arch a couple years ago took me about 25 minutes, including installing the video driver and a basic KDE (but then, I been around some...).
A few points as I remember them:
*It helps to have a second device to view the installation guide as you are installing. I did not, so I used the links text-only browser from the Arch installation itself. Painful, but it got me installed.
*After first boot, Arch asks you to view and edit several config files. I found there was nothing to change except selecting the nearest download mirror, so don't be intimidated.
*There was a gotcha, where I could not install some initial software. It turned out to be because pacman would not overwrite some existing config files. That's a good thing. These files turned out to be unneeded, so a forced install did the trick.
*One major difference I found with other distros was that, since Arch lets you set up your system with only the software you want, in some cases you may not get all dependencies you need when installing a package, so you have to know what you need, then configure it.
*I use the Arch Wiki extensively in setting up/fixing non-Arch systems. I think its some of the best linux documentation you can find.
Personally, Arch does not fit what I do. You can learn a lot about linux from it (although if you really want to learn how a linux works, I would suggest LFS). I would rather spend my time using my system rather than setting it up.
14 • Arch (by Rajesh Ganesan on 2015-12-21 06:20:47 GMT from Asia)
Hi,
Though I do not use Arch directly but only through Manjaro, as earlier commenters have said I love pacman for its speed and preciseness. I use latest and my disk space is kept at minimum. Yes, I too love Arch but only due to Manjaro. Thanks Arch/Manjaro.
15 • Truly disingenuous (by M.Z. on 2015-12-21 06:22:52 GMT from North America)
@2/Troy
It is truly disingenuous to ignore the fact that there are about 90 versions of Linux on the list that are actively developed & don't contain systemd in the latest release. Sure there are specialist distros & not all will fit any one particular user, but it's a fairly good sized list. I really don't get all the doom & gloom nonsense, there are a fair amount of options & if things go as bad as the haters claim then you are bound to receive far more.
16 • There must be better ways to deter bots. (by the dude on 2015-12-21 06:43:14 GMT from Europe)
Hello Tom's Hardware. I just bought a fairly expensive system last week. None of your sponsors got the order.
Tigerdirect, you didn't get the order either.
17 • Arch (by ftux on 2015-12-21 07:17:40 GMT from Europe)
4 reviews in 5 years... this was like a Christmas present.
Let's recall this 3 August 2003 DW interview with Judd:
"Arch Linux is one of those quiet and little-known distributions, rarely figuring in the headlines of major Linux news publications."
http://distrowatch.com/dwres.php?resource=interview-arch
Another "quiet and little-known distribution" worth a look, also developed by computer science students (Jürg Billeter, Raffaele Sandrini), with very much in common with Arch, is Paldo Linux.
18 • arch (by peer on 2015-12-21 08:02:22 GMT from Europe)
I have tried two times to install Arch a while ago. Both times I was not able to install Arch. There was a hurdle in the wiki that was to difficult for me. I gave up.
So no easy install for me. I think I have still a lot to learn about linux.
19 • @13 - A few comments about Arch (by Black_Codec on 2015-12-21 08:12:58 GMT from Europe)
[cit]Personally, Arch does not fit what I do. You can learn a lot about linux from it (although if you really want to learn how a linux works, I would suggest LFS). I would rather spend my time using my system rather than setting it up.[/cit]
Yes LFS can be better, also slackware and other distribution that are full source based can be better but i think arch is a real start point for who dont know very well linux and want to know something of this os and how it works.
The time you spend in configuration is only the first step, i f i think to ubuntu or fedora i spent the same time to remove unused packages, so the difference where is? In the arch approach I have a system clean and made as I want not as the others want like gentoo for example, that i think is a great distribution for who have time to spent on configuration.
20 • Antergos for Arch goodies (by far2fish on 2015-12-21 08:16:55 GMT from Europe)
If you want to get to know know Arch without the steep learning curve of installing it, one good alternative is to install Antergos instead. Once you feel comfortable enough with Antergos, you can take the leap over to Arch.
21 • Arch Linux (by Stan on 2015-12-21 08:53:18 GMT from Europe)
I've started my Linux experience with Fedora Core 4 and went trough almost all major distros.
Just about 6 month ago I've discovered Arch, I agree that the initial setup time is the major barrier, but it is the best choice for a user who know what he wants from a Linux Distro.
When a stable and conservative Desktop Environment is chosen along with a LTS Kernel, Arch Linux out-shines any other Distro out there.
What I do not like from the standard release Distros is that you sometimes get stuck with the bugs until next release. That was basically my main struggle in any Distro that I've tried before, all the default selections were bad or had a problem.
22 • Rescue Me from Arch Learning Experiences (by Arch Watcher 402563 on 2015-12-21 09:07:13 GMT from North America)
I've gone over it before: to install Arch, use Bridge Linux.
The idea of learning from Linux madness, with its kernel design upheavals every two years, makes little sense to me. It can be valuable to learn a particular server OS that some corporation will pay you to admin.
Learn from Arch? Learn what? Use it if you want the latest packages. That's the only reason I do. I wish more distros were as quick about packaging upstream. Pacman is indeed nice, and so is pacaur, which has the same syntax, saving you more "learning."
My recommendation for Grandma and Bubba is Manjaro OpenRC so far as Arch distros are concerned. Yet if you want a hardcore Arch hacker's life, but not systemd, there is obarun.org booting runit. It will take work but is a worthy project.
There may be even better init systems on the horizon. That's something worth learning!
https://www.mail-archive.com/supervision@list.skarnet.org/
http://www.troubleshooters.com/linux/init/manjaro_experiments.htm
The BSD launchd thing won't ever happen.
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/jonathan.deboynepollard/FGA/launchd-on-bsd.html
23 • Alpine 3.3 D/L URL Correction (by Arch Watcher 402563 on 2015-12-21 09:15:23 GMT from North America)
http://dl-4.alpinelinux.org/alpine/v3.3/releases/x86_64/
Most action at Alpine Linux is IRC. They are really, really, WAY too slow about their website updates and nobody answers the forums. But it's a FANTASTIC distro and a great team of devs. Gang, get your website act together!
24 • KDE wiki documentation (by Charles on 2015-12-21 10:59:07 GMT from Europe)
"Unfortunately, the wiki's page on installing KDE software was out of date at the time of writing and the packages mentioned no longer exist."
Just in case anybody is thinking about installing Arch with KDE Plasma, the KDE Packages wiki page that is mentioned is indeed outdated and is probably going to be dissolved. People should instead refer to the main KDE page: https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/KDE
25 • Arch (by Stubbz on 2015-12-21 10:59:30 GMT from North America)
I think Arch (and Manjaro) are as easy to use and as stable as any distro I have used...and thats most of them..
I gues for a lot of newer Linux users instalation is different though if you can follow a few instructions it is not so. when I started with Linux all instalations were CLI i think so Arch is easy.
I actually choose CLI over many installers still as it always seemed the GUI ones seemed to have some issue or another,
My Manjaro box is still running from the original install about 4 yrs ago and i have never had a show stopper problem. . and I think the only things i had with Arch were down to the odd package not being in sync with the rest..but i now always wait a day to 2 before i update anything. and glance through the forums to see if any issues are about.
26 • Bleeding Edge is Overvalued (by joncr on 2015-12-21 12:35:04 GMT from North America)
I spent a long time using Slackware back in the Old Days when it was even more of a DIY kit than Arch is now. E.g., no package manager and no dependency resolution.
Back then compiling your own kernel and drivers and building from source were more or less necessary if you wanted a functional machine. You had to stay bleeding edge because the "bleeding edge" was very often the "working edge".
That's not necessary any more. Linux is mature enough that we don't need to stay on the bleeding edge to maintain a useful system.
So, seen from here, the appeal of Arch rests in the "noodling around" that's needed to keep it running, plus the attraction of new stuff. That latter may be important to some developers and designers, but it's great;y overvalued for mainstream users.
27 • Arch (by arch boys on 2015-12-21 12:52:07 GMT from Europe)
Arch = the only distro that makes sense for me. :)
I have no need for fancy do-it-all desktop compilations, but I do have a need for the latest software versions. Rolling release is the only thing that makes sense for me, too, as the maintenance is minimal compared to the need to install your system anew every half a year or so. Having pretty standard system configuration (through text files) is a very big plus, compared to the ever changing distro-specific set of menus that rely on distro-specific files hidden in distro-specific places.
Gentoo does the same thing but I very rarely need the compilation flags, so the already-built packages of Arch are good enough for me.
The wiki is high quality info and the forum answers are often on point too (again, compared to some other projects).
28 • letsencrypt (by anonymous on 2015-12-21 13:30:17 GMT from North America)
I really wanted to use letsencrypt to replace the self-signed certificate i use for a client's email server. I got through the process of manually creating the letsencrypt certificate, only to learn that the maximum certificate lifetime they support is 90 days. That was a dealbreaker.
29 • @26 (by Stan on 2015-12-21 13:34:40 GMT from Europe)
Bleeding edge is not the only benefit, there is simplicity and a rolling system like Windows 10 (which is joining very late to this party), is not overvalued either.
If you want a new version of software X in a proprietary Operating System, you just go to the developer page download and install. Why it has to be over-complicated in Linux and you have to wait from months to years to get a new version, unless you become a compilation monkey, of course.
Also stable packages is not equal as bug-free packages.
E.g. Ubuntu LTS 14.x comes with a bug in Tesseract package, good look on relying in the default repositories to fix that bug, wait until next LTS release and have a nice day.
Debian 8, wine package comes with an annoying bug in some 32bit vs 64bit variables, wait until next Debian release and have a nice day.
30 • Arch (by rich52 on 2015-12-21 13:54:37 GMT from North America)
Manjaro works best for me. I've tried Arch a while back only because I used a CLI type installer I found on Sourceforge.net that would simplify it's installation. It is best left for the developers and computer programmers who tinker with code. I just want to use my computer for what it's intended purpose was designed to be ' a tool' to do other work with. I'm not knocking Arch but feel its aimed at a 'niche' group of people who tinker
with code and programming a category we all don't fit into. Despite these technicalities Manjaro has completely won me over these past 3 which has benefited from the workings
of those involved with Arch and other distro's.
Rich
31 • @3, chkdsk (by Pearson on 2015-12-21 15:20:01 GMT from North America)
Not sure what this has to do with today's Distrowatch Weekly, but ...
In Linux (and most any *nix I've seen -- I'm no expert on non-Linux), fsck serves a similar purpose to chkdsk. And fsck supports multiple (numerous!) filesystems.
32 • @ post #10 I would make some noise to EFF about this (by RJA on 2015-12-21 15:35:03 GMT from North America)
I would make some noise about treating everybody like a bot.
33 • I was looking for the Audio Podcast. (by BrentEmeryPieczynski on 2015-12-21 17:15:44 GMT from North America)
This multimedia such as audio is desired, because my eyes can burn. And I desire it to also being an alternative to video, with eyes hurting from text being entered onto the screen often, just like with this commentary. So please cause that part of Distrowatch to become, more easily accessible again.
34 • Re: disingenuous (by dogma on 2015-12-21 17:23:38 GMT from North America)
I planned to say that Jesse's claims about the systemd situation were disingenuous, but I see that Troy Cecil already got there right away.
The linux distributions that don't use systemd are all more or less small and special-purpose. None of them are very suitable right now if you want the old debian experience of having stable software available and fairly well vetted, and not having an infinite cascade of trying to get code to compile yourself or having to put your trust in random user-contributed binaries. And I was a stubborn slackware user for a long time. Of course maybe Devuan will happen someday, and maybe it'll be wonderful.
35 • paldo (by Hoos on 2015-12-21 17:51:59 GMT from Asia)
The live image and the fresh install work fine and are impressively fast.
However upkg-upgrade (in root) does not work, so I cannot update the installation. The script churns out a whole lot of error messages. I've tried installation on actual HDD and in Virtualbox.
It's been like this for the Oct and Nov iso files, and I tried reinstalling a few times.
Pity.
36 • Archlinux (by FOX on 2015-12-21 18:13:04 GMT from Europe)
I think if you want an "Archlinux out of the boxe" : try Manjaro Linux, you will not be disapointed
37 • Arch "lightweight" claims (by Pearson on 2015-12-21 18:20:17 GMT from North America)
I think one thing about Arch's supposed "lightweight" nature isn't only that the initial (minimal) install is so small, but that the user can choose to install smaller, lightweight packages. Basically, a user could make an alternative to one of the lightweight distributions (almost) as easily as a full-blown install. So, Arch *can* be lightweight, possibly easier than Ubuntu can.
38 • Arch (by Jordan on 2015-12-21 19:28:07 GMT from North America)
Nice to see Jesse's reasoning in getting through the Arch installation, learning and building a foundation of Linux knowledge etc a while back.
I remember diving into Slackware many years ago for the same reasons. Gentoo then got my attention and I was off into portage-land for a while.
But I'm one of the many who just wants to get the OS going and get on with work and play.
I get the feeling that many Arch enthusiasts have Linux as their work things and play things. If it weren't for them we'd have much less of a Linux universe.
39 • Arch (by Linuxista on 2015-12-21 19:33:28 GMT from North America)
@1 "I have used arch for over 10 years and overall it has needed less maintenance than all so called stable distros I have used."
I second that, though in my case Arch has been my primary for about 6 years. My distro hopping ended with Arch (and Manjaro). I'm afraid Jesse still adheres (despite trying to break out of it) to the stubborn orthodoxy that the Release Upgrade model is more stable. But when you can have a stable, cutting-edge system that stays clean and fast for years upon years without ever having to reinstall and reconfigure your settings, scripts and tweaks, you start to realize which model is higher maintenance.
40 • Arch (by V3lh0 on 2015-12-21 21:10:27 GMT from Europe)
You grow personal attachment to arch because of the diy fashion. You make it your own distro, nothing that any other distro can offer.
41 • lets encypt 90 day issue (by dmacleo on 2015-12-21 21:45:03 GMT from North America)
have no plans on using it, while it costs more its much easier to buy cert(s) (2 for me) and replace every 2 years on personal exchange server and essentials 2012r2 server than replace every 90 days.
42 • Archlinux (by archap on 2015-12-21 22:29:10 GMT from Europe)
The graphical installers have restricted functionality . No distribution allows install on btrfs partition with the compression which is easily enabled by the simple command in CLI , f.i. .
This allows to suggest Arch installer as modern rather than opposite.
The only regret is the loss of control over the system through the only BSD style RC text file . Current Ubuntu-kind approach is more prone to the mess .
43 • From Arch to Mint (by Götz on 2015-12-21 22:42:41 GMT from Europe)
After installing Arch, I stopped distro hopping. I learned a lot, and step by step I ended up with the behavior of comfortable OS, almost like the Mint I am using now. However, the more comfortable it got, the more I "unlearned" how to use the command line :-)
Then I spent 6 weeks in a hospital and could not update my installation. During i was away, major changes where introduced. When I was healthy again, i returned home and pacman messed up everything. Now my computer was sick. So I switched to Mint.
It is exactly as you wrote: "But I do think we could all agree running Arch Linux is an educational experience. Running Arch is something I think will appeal to people who like to build their operating systems rather than simply run them." I Iiked Arch a lot, but now I need an OS to get work done which is not related to exploring Linux. For that I do not need something as cool as Arch.
44 • Arch (by rop75 on 2015-12-21 22:59:49 GMT from Europe)
From my point of view, Arch is a nice distro to play with your laptop, but it requires a lot of time to install it, and to fix the broken packages you might have due to the rolling release system. Spending ages to set up the system and fixing the breakges after an update is what some people would call fun, and what I would call a headache
In my opinion Debian stable (and other distros like opensuse or linux mint) is a better distro to work with your laptop. I don't care whether my VLC version is the latest or not, I just want VLC (and the other apps in my system) to work. And Debian stable just works, in a boring way for some people, but it simply works
45 • Arch (by Charles Burge on 2015-12-21 23:02:35 GMT from North America)
Thanks for the review for Arch Linux. At the risk of repeating some points already made, let me tell you why I like Arch.
You get only what you want/need. I find that very appealing. Not every Linux installation needs a desktop. Sometimes you want just an FTP server, or just a MySQL server, or just a CIFS or NFS server, or whatever. With Arch you can do that, and be confident that nothing else is hiding there. I've installed "minimal" installations from other distros (such as Debian), and then found that Postfix was usually installed and running by default. Getting something you didn't ask for isn't necessarily a good thing.
I like netctl (the network configuration tool). It's easy to understand, easy to configure, and easy to have multiple network configurations that you can switch back and forth.
Comprehensive documentation. The wiki pages are very thorough, and usually tell you every step that you need to take in order to accomplish something. Even when I google something for Linux in general, there's usually a wiki from archlinux.org near the top of the search page.
I'll also echo Jesse's final comments. Since I first started using Arch about 3 years ago, I've learned far more about Linux than I did in the previous 10 years of using Mandrake.
46 • Confused (by Linux411 on 2015-12-22 02:02:33 GMT from North America)
I must be getting to be a Linux Old-Timer. I see a lot of people saying that it takes forever to install Arch Linux. It installs quicker than any distribution I've ever installed in the past 10 years with the exception of PCLinuxOS Mini-Me, SLAX, Puppy, DSL, Tiny Core and Porteus. 5 out of 6 of those are micro-editions. If anyone can get a full desktop distribution to install in under 5 minutes, please let me know. I am very interested in what I missed.
47 • Re chkdsk (by EarlyBird on 2015-12-22 02:28:49 GMT from North America)
31) by Pearson in his reply to 3) Ben Myers
This had nothing to do with Distrowatch 641. It appears Ben Myers, in post 3, was replying to Tim Dowd's post 45 in Distrowatch 640. I would hazard a guess that AS Ben was typing his reply to post 45, Distrowatch 640 was "closed", and Distrowatch 641 "opened", so unbeknownst to Ben, his post automagically appeared in episode 641. The invisible transition zone between episodes seems to be approx. 8 PM Eastern time zone, Sunday evenings.
Re using fsck, while that IS useful, Tim Dowd post 45 was specifically asking about NTFS filing system, where ntsf-3g is the proper tool, or perhaps as Ben suggested, using HiRens CD. And his suggestion about Smartdrive where spot-on.
Anyway, hope that answers YOUR question.....
48 • Arch user since '07 (by Brad on 2015-12-22 04:40:18 GMT from North America)
I find Arch fast & quite daunting at times.. before I learned how to use it, install it, etc.. I was banned from their forums, called a "help vampire" and "n00b" and worse.. told to go back to windows/ubuntu.. that all being said, it's been a long wild ride, but after using arch, I find it hard to use any other distro.. even the "easier" ones. I've left Arch off and on, but always learned more and came back.. and btw, Manjaro Rocks!
49 • @31 Microsoft chkdsk vs Linux fsck (by Ben Myers on 2015-12-22 06:04:59 GMT from North America)
I responded with comments about Windows chkdsk, about which I know a little, because comment #67 in Issue 640 lamented that Linux had no chkdsk. I figured I was providing some useful information to at least one person. Does that make sense?
fsck does something similar to Windows chkdsk, BUT (a big BUT) it does not verify the complete integrity of the NTFS file system in addition to handling corrupted or bad sectors.
This response may be redundant. See comment #47.
50 • arch (by peer on 2015-12-22 09:13:26 GMT from Europe)
It is great to see that so many people love Arch!
51 • under 5 minute #46 (by ftux on 2015-12-22 11:22:27 GMT from Europe)
"If anyone can get a full desktop distribution to install in under 5 minutes, please let me know."...
Yes. Paldo (full Gnome3) installs in 1min.10secs !!!
The Live Media (USB) loads in 47 seconds.
What iso:
Latest x86_64 stable Live CD
Build Date: 2015-12-20 14:25 UTC (817MB)
Hardware:
Drive: sata CPU: 1.86 Mem: 4GB
# 35 • paldo (by Hoos)
No problems with upkg-upgrade, with me!
52 • systemd (by solt87 on 2015-12-22 12:33:07 GMT from Europe)
"The BSD communities rarely adopt anything quickly and they like to make sure all the bugs are shaken out before technology ships in a stable release."
The very same thing used to be true about Debian, yet they embraced systemd in the blink of an eye. (So much for their debates about it.)
53 • @46 Distro installed under 5 minutes (by Tran Older on 2015-12-22 13:03:39 GMT from Asia)
You missed Igelle. Regretably, Igelle was discontinued.
54 • Arch (by barcelona on 2015-12-22 15:27:35 GMT from Europe)
Since I discover Arch (june 2015) I stopped distrohopping. Two hours ago I installed, for fun, a full arch linux system with cinnamon on 8 gb usb in 5 minutes 35 sec.
There are archers with a 10 years installation and I know a guy that install a new ArchLinux EVERY DAY on his servers.
Arch is not easy to install for newbies (arch wiki + youtube), but when you learn and understand the process you really learn Linux and Arch becomes a distro SIMPLE with the philosophy KISS.
55 • Arch Linux assets (by zsurnz on 2015-12-23 00:15:02 GMT from Europe)
I've been using Unix systems for over 20 years and ArchLinux for 11 years. Meanwhile I also use RedHat and Windows on a regular basis, and more sporadically Fedora, Ubuntu and Mint. As Jesse's review paids so much attention to its installation process, bleeding edge and rolling release aspects, I'm afraid it misses much more significant assets of AL: simplicity, ease of maintenance, and availability of so many packages through AUR.
As mentioned in other comments, AL is very quick to install, despite the lack of integrated installer. Of course it takes more time to configure. This is indeed its major weak point as configuration is tedious, especially regarding the selection of fonts, color schemes, optimal applications... However, it is done essentially once in many years. Furthermore, Arch derivatives allow us to skip this step by providing pre-configured systems.
Some reviewers assume that the rolling release model brings a degraded stability and extensive upgrades. However, this is true only if one insists on keeping the system up-to-date. This is of course unnecessary as long and no binary package upgrade is performed. I use two computers deprived of network connection, on which Arch Linux was installed over 2 years ago. I just made a first upgrade very recently as I needed additional packages with many dependencies installed. Despite the lack of internet connection, it took me only a couple of hours, using simple scripts to download the Arch packages needed from a RedHat box.
At home, having a permanent internet connection, I can of course afford much more frequent upgrades. However, in practice I met less problems in 10 years than during a couple of months with Mint LMDE. The only serious difficulty I can remember was with the introduction of KMS many years ago.
More importantly, I'd like to emphasize the simplicity of Arch Linux. Some time ago, I considered switching to a mainstream distro, such as Debian or Fedora, but was taken aback by the complexity of making RPM or DEB packages. As a scientist, I come to try out and use a very large set of programs not available as binary packages, and often not packaged according to standard rules. I find some of them in AUR, and for the others I can easily write so-called PKGBUILD files describing compilation recipes. Then I can easily compile these programs on various machines. This really saves me much time. In conclusion, Arch Linux is by no means reserved to computer geeks or users that what to learn about Linux. I believe that on the contrary, this distribution can save much time to end users with specific needs regarding the software they use. Finally, in contrast to some mainstream distros, Arch Linux does not promote the use of bloated and non-ergonomic desktop environments.
56 • Fedora upgrade from 22 to 23 (by Andre Gompel on 2015-12-23 01:57:42 GMT from North America)
I have used Red Hat & Fedora now for over a decade... (and a few other distros too.)
So far every attempt to upgrade to the latest version, was followed by a compelling need sooner or later to do a complete reinstall. This was true for other distros as well !
This time (late 2015) it seems that the new scheme (using a dnf plugin) (see https://fedoramagazine.org/upgrading-from-fedora-22-to-fedora-23/) works and the upgrade from Fedora 22 X86_63 to Fedora 23 was almost flawless.
I used "almost" because my machine (HP notebook) uses a Broadcom chip, and the upgrade made the WIFI not working, so I had to do some reinstall (At this time rpmfusion akmod-wl was not yet available for F23, now it is !).
Other than that F23 is very good, and after over one month is fully operational, no need to reinstall.
After the usual updates, finally also a very good version of Firefox (43.0), which now never crashes, even with lots of open tabs.
Most applications do work, but "tribler" does not work on Fedora 23.
For package manager GUI yumex-dnf is your best bet, not perfect yet : the fedora team does not seem to believe in a good GUI based package manager, but they could on occasion be useful.'
Desktop: MATE is my favorite by far, the most usable in my view, but now LxQt albeit yet not ready for prime time, start to somewhat work. It may become the best desktop sometime in 2016 (thanks to the excellent Qt library framework).
That's all folks...
A.G
57 • Arch Linux (by Michael Bryant on 2015-12-23 07:31:58 GMT from North America)
I haven't been using Arch as long as some of these people - only 4-ish years for me - and I have to agree that it's a big learning experience. I did a large amount of distrohopping, starting with Ubuntu, then Linux Mint, Mageia, openSUSE, Fedora, Debian (Stable, Testing, and Unstable), SolydXK, and the list goes on. I used each one for a month or so, unless there was some deal-breaker that made me want to switch.
Skipping that rant though, Arch was my first distro that required much knowledge from me. It took me a while to figure out the install process, though I had the Beginner's Guide open to help me. Now, I run through the install process without needing any documentation.
What I like most about Arch, other than the rolling-release setup, are the up-to-date packages and the minimal dependency load. For instance, I was setting up an ownCloud server at home and I had read that nginx was a better server software to use that apache, so I was going to do that. Yet on openSUSE the owncloud package pulls apache in as a dependency, while on Arch it does not, leaving the user able to choose apache or nginx as they see fit.
In the same way, the AUR is something that I find to be a much better way of providing unofficial packages than through a bunch of different repositories (though for large groups of packages or packages that take forever to compile I do understand the use of repositories).
I have run into one issue though: after suspending and resuming, my laptop is no longer able to start X applications. Something about not being able to find the display. I suspect that changing how the system suspends will fix the issue, but I haven't tried that yet. That and transitioning from Gnome/Cinnamon to KDE or the other way around (which sucks on any distro).
I would not recommend Arch to new, non-techy users, but for me it strikes the best balance between customizability and usability (compiling Gentoo takes too much time and effort, IMO).
Well, that was longer than I intended. Perhaps I'll write my own review of Arch at some point instead.
58 • @ 57 (by jaws222 on 2015-12-23 16:46:33 GMT from North America)
"Skipping that rant though, Arch was my first distro that required much knowledge from me. It took me a while to figure out the install process, though I had the Beginner's Guide open to help me. Now, I run through the install process without needing any documentation."
I also used all of the distros you speak of and many others and when I went to Arch had the same learning curve. But after learning arch, mainly Manjaro and Antergos, I'd argue that installing and maintaining them is just as easy, if not easier than Debian, Ubuntu, Fedora, OpenSuse, etc. I still use all of the above but my love of Arch is the speed. I thought Crunchbang was fast until I started using Manjaro and Antergos, and let me tell you those distros run fast, well and have minimal issues.
59 • Fedora upgrade (by M.Z. on 2015-12-23 19:51:56 GMT from North America)
@56/Andre
I tried the same Fedora 22 to 23 upgrade on a VM shortly after they described the upgrade path. When I tried to boot the new version a couple of times in regular mode and safe mode I kept having an issue where the screen would start to flicker & everything would lock up. I couldn't get it to boot again so I'd call my Fedora 22 to 23 upgrade a total failure. Not sure what the rate of problems is, but these in place upgrades seem fairly hit & miss to me. When it counts for something I tend to go for the wipe & install method which is quite reliable.
60 • Arch (by spacex on 2015-12-23 23:52:07 GMT from Europe)
The only real difference between Arch and distros like Ubuntu and Debian, is that Arch forces you to dig into it and learn, while Ubuntu and Debian let you decide whether you want it the easy way, or do it more complicated. You can start with a 5 MB minimal Ubuntu iso, choose every single package manually, and learn just as much as with Arch. The same from the Debian netinstall. So the difference is as I said, Ubuntu and Debian let you decide whether you want it easy or not, while Arch only offers the more advanced route.
61 • Manjaro/Arch (by Jordan on 2015-12-24 14:30:01 GMT from North America)
No learning curve with Manjaro (or, I'd imagine, Antergos). ;)
62 • About systemd and the *NIX philosophy (by G.Wolfe Woodbury on 2015-12-24 20:05:55 GMT from North America)
As an early instigator of (pre)SysVInit, I am quite familiar with the startup process. Systemd does it job and handles lots of "under the hood" tasks fairly quickly and (not so) easily. I actually do use systemd on a machine or two that run distros that use it.
My main disagreements with systemd and its developers amount two two philosophical choices. 1) A program should do one task and do it well -- this is getting a bit harder, and systemd goes way beyond one task (system startup) and doesn't do it that well. 2) The developers are egotists and tend to dump scorn on the complainers, without regard to thinking about the non-expert users; "If you don't like it, why don't you write your own" was an (almost) direct quote from one early in the quarrels over systemd.
I did write my own, way back in 1981, and at the time the processor speeds and programming techniques available made it an easy decision to "punt" certain tasks (such as sequencing the order of task startups) to the admin and the human mind. These days the processors are faster and programming techniques are available to solve the odering problems with dependency declarations in the startup scripts. Systemd is not the only solution that does this but systemd goes way beyond just being a system boot solution and inserts itself into the daily administration of the system. This "creeping featurism" was long ago pointed out as a problem, and *NIX programs were deliberately encouraged to avoid this sprawl.
The "desktop environment" phenomenon does demand a greater amount of integration, but DEs don't have to make a few programs do all the work, they can, if properly designed, still adhere to the trait of multiple programs working together, with each program doing a well defined set of tasks and doing them well.
63 • @60 "the real difference" (by linuxista on 2015-12-24 20:06:58 GMT from North America)
If you start with Archbang, Antergos, Bridge, Netrunner Rolling, or Manjaro ... Arch (or Manjaro) does not "force you to dig into it or learn" any more than Ubuntu, Mint, Debian, etc. Arch, including its derivatives, lets you decide whether you want it easy or not to the same degree.
64 • Mint17.3 (by yogidaddy on 2015-12-24 20:09:20 GMT from North America)
I have used mint for several years, until the new release 17.3. The new Linux Mint 17.3 does not have drivers for Broadcom chips used in WiFi. Your WiFi will not work. Do not pay for a CD it won't have the drivers either. The strange thing is that the live CD has the drivers and the WiFi runs all the way until final install! I have used Ubuntu 14.10, which is the basis for Mint and the drivers are installed and working. Mint P-L-E-A-S-E don't waste my time, A one hour install turned into two hours! Even after hooking my desktop directly to the modem using a cat 4 cable the WiFi still won't work. It should be a requirement that distributions include a disclaimer when major problems occur obtaining drivers. Clem I'm calling you out on this one, do better.
65 • Mint 17.3 @64 (by Jordan on 2015-12-24 21:47:34 GMT from North America)
You're mistaken. My Mint 17.3 (installed on a thumb drive) fires up my home wifi network out of the box.
Don't know what you're talking about.
66 • Cat4 (by pivoron@yahoo.com on 2015-12-24 22:12:18 GMT from North America)
WiFi on a Cat4 cable seems weird. Shucks still weird on a Cat5 cable.
67 • Linux on Nextbook Flexx? (by Roland Hughes on 2015-12-25 15:53:49 GMT from North America)
A good many of us have been searching for a Linux distro which will install in dual boot, or single boot mode on the Nextbook Flexx. I wrote a blog post about my latest effort.
http://www.logikalsolutions.com/wordpress/?p=1588
This family of computers is currently the best selling in the country, mainly because the sub $160 price tag and the physical durability of the device make it an easy choice for parents to stuff in the kid's backpack for school.
http://www.walmart.com/ip/Nextbook-Flexx-10.1-2in1-Tablet-2-32GB-Quad-Core-Windows-8.1-Includes-Bonus-Case/45596374
The main difficulty in getting a Linux distro to work is the fact the machine is 64-bit but has 32-bit UEFI. The bootia32.efi which has worked on other machines for me does not work from installation on this device. Works for the bootable thumb drive to run live and do the install, but not to make device dual boot.
Has anyone had success in locating a Linux distro which will install in either dual or single boot mode on this device?
68 • Mint 17.3 @64 (by Bill S. on 2015-12-25 15:59:28 GMT from North America)
17.3 found all my wireless cards and a wifi dongle just fine, both desktop and laptop.
Mint finding my wifi is something I pretty much always count on. Debian, not so much.
For those that celebrate, Merry Christmas.
69 • @64 Mint and wifi (by imnotrich on 2015-12-27 07:13:36 GMT from North America)
Actually, the bug you experienced is not unique to Mint it comes direct from Mint's Debian and Ubuntu Heritage.
Since Debian 6, wifi works during the install but is immediately and inexplicably disabled upon first boot and cannot be awakened. The open source drivers or proprietary drivers, does not matter. They both fail. Won't even scan in most cases. I've had this experience with several different PC's and laptops so it's not my hardware.
Funny how Puppy 4 was the first distro I tried back what 10 years ago with functional wifi, and the last Ubuntu Version with wifi that worked was 9.04.
So it IS possible. You'd think that eventually developers would focus on basic functionality instead of goofy guis (although Mint's guis are not goofy, they ROCK!)
70 • 67 • Nextbook Flexx (by Kragle von Schnitzelbank on 2015-12-28 06:53:08 GMT from North America)
According to many reviews, while the price is cheap, the product is even moreso. A buyer should first do proper research.
71 • 70 • Product cycle (by Somewhat Reticent on 2015-12-28 16:16:20 GMT from North America)
Usually when a cheap electronic factory product is new, odds of getting a good one are good, and customer service is good. When most have been sold, odds of getting one that should've been refurbished (and may have failed that) are much higher, and customer service is poor.
72 • Now Weekly News Letter? (by Niyas C on 2015-12-28 17:18:18 GMT from Asia)
So there is no weekly news letter this time? Is team out for holidays?
73 • wireless issues & DW weekly (by M.Z. on 2015-12-28 20:52:46 GMT from North America)
@64 - wireless issues
The one thing that often does separate Mint from Ubuntu is what the Mint devs call level 4 & 5 updates. I think your best shot at a fix for Mint might be to try either running the level 4 & 5 updates for wifi drivers, or alternatively making sure to leave them all off after a fresh install. I only run the default level 1 to 3 updates & security updates after I ran into issues with graphics drivers on my laptop.
I have had very few issues with wifi on Mint, though I seem to get lots of bluetooth issues on my laptop regardless of distro. I get a problem where my OS can't detect that I have bluetooth capability until after I suspend & resume my desktop session. It happens on both Mageia 5, Mint 17.x & LMDE 2. I know the issue is likely to be totally distro agnostic as Mageia has a totally different base system, & although it annoyed me I found the suspend thing is an effective workaround that allows me to send pics & such between my droid & laptop.
At any rate seriously doubt that there are any major differences between the drivers in Mint & Ubuntu beyond the previously mentioned updates, & would be interested to know if you have any similar issues on other distros. As with by bluetooth example I find trying other distros to be an extremely useful troubleshooting tool, & occasionally a good excuse to distro hop to something that works better with my hardware.
@72 - Weekly News Letter
Did you see the end of the intro section at top of DW weekly?
DistroWatch Weekly, Issue 641, 21 December 2015
"...This will be our final issue of DistroWatch Weekly in 2015 as we are off next Monday for the holiday. The Weekly will return on January 4th, 2016 with more news, reviews and answers to your questions. We wish you all a wonderful and safe fortnight and happy reading! "
http://distrowatch.com/weekly.php?issue=20151221
74 • Podcast Audio (by MikeyD on 2015-12-28 22:42:27 GMT from North America)
@BrentEmeryPieczynski, all
I record the audio for DistroWatch weekly's podcast. You can always find the audio links at the top of the page. Every week it should show up there later in the evening, or next morning. I record the day the podcast in written form comes out, so allow me some time until it shows up.
So, those looking for audio, just check back later for it, or the next day. If you leave a comment below about it, I will see it.
75 • podcast/newletter (by MikeyD on 2015-12-28 22:44:02 GMT from North America)
@Niyas C, correct, as said in podcast and at the end of this issue, this was the last for 2015. Check back next week :)
76 • Arch Linux Review (by Andy Bear on 2015-12-29 10:10:03 GMT from Europe)
Thank you Jesse for taking the time to install and thoroughly test Arch Linux. It is truly a shame that Arch Linux doesn't get as much spotlight as it most certainly deserves. Regarding the review, there are a few misconceptions I would like to point out (as has been probably mentioned in the vastness of previous comments anyway):
1. System installation and initial configuration doesn't take much longer than installation of a more mainstream distro like Ubuntu. pacstrap can be used to pull in more packages than just the base system, as recommended in the official Arch Linux Installation Guide. However, it is true that the initial time investment might be greater, because not everyone is comfortable with CLI :).
2. The 'lightweightness' of Arch Linux isn't only expressed in the amount of RAM or disk space it uses. Save for few cases, those variables are hardly limiting nowadays. The true 'lightweightness' stems from the fact that Arch doesn't come with a gazillion of helper scripts and processes running in the background to theoretically make the user's life easier.
3. As a system Arch Linux doesn't break more often than other Linux distributions. Quite the contrary! Because packages are updated individually or in dependency groups, breakage can be swiftly pinpointed and eliminated with a package rollback from the local cache. Release-based distributions do huge batch updates, which will break something more often than not. That or one has to reinstall every 0.5 - 1 year.
I hope no one found my comment offending, though seeing how those misconceptions are constantly being repeated, I felt the need to voice my opinion :).
77 • EFF_Panopticlick_verifies_validates_TAILS_superior_privacy (by k on 2015-12-29 16:46:23 GMT from North America)
Much thanks to EFF developers for providing very necessary and efficient tool at https://panopticlick.eff.org/ , and a peaceful and happy new year to all.
78 • Ian Murdock (by jadecat09 on 2015-12-30 21:43:59 GMT from Europe)
R.I.P. Ian Murdock.
Thank you for your legacy.
79 • Ian Murdock (by M.Z. on 2015-12-31 20:40:53 GMT from North America)
Sad to hear of the death of Ian Murdock, as #78 mentioned he left a massive legacy in the Linux world. Creating Debian and helping to steer the largest branch of the Linux family tree toward being principled and community oriented operating systems is no small accomplishment.
http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2015/12/ian-murdock-father-of-debian-dead-at-42/
80 • @76 Arch Linux truths. (by Gregzeng on 2016-01-01 00:18:30 GMT from North America)
Many 3rd party surveys seem to show that serious desktop Linux users like CLI basef Arch Linux. These serious users are not the bulk of Linux users.
On your 3rd point, that every 6 - 12 months, a re-installation of the disto will break it? We them assume that serious CLI work will eventually repair the breaks?
GUI users of computers use the GUI to avoid the textbooks. Well designed GUI will remove need for CLI & textbooks. This might upset yhe seriois investments of the CLI-lovers, with the immense loss of their time, skills,books, clippings,scripts, emotions, ...
IMHO the CLI-lovers are emotional, rather than intellectually trusting the man-years invested in GUI evolution. My preference is to use a GUI-based distribution closest to my final preferences. Then quickly add or remove the specific packages, if needed.
81 • Sad news re: Ian Murdock (by imnotrich on 2016-01-01 06:25:58 GMT from North America)
Radio Station KCBS in San Francisco is reporting Ian Murdock was found dead not long after Mr. Murdock accused San Francisco Police of sexually assaulting him. I do not have any details besides what is being reported, but I am skeptical of the finding "suicide."
http://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2015/12/31/prominent-programmer-dies-in-apparent-suicide-after-violent-encounter-with-san-francisco-police/
82 • Ian (by Somewhat Reticent on 2016-01-01 07:06:19 GMT from North America)
Final "tweets" seem incoherent ramblings, inconsistent thinking - concussion? Hack? WT_ happened in SF!?
83 • @80 - CLI versus GUI (by Ben Myers on 2016-01-01 16:52:05 GMT from North America)
It is not intellectual laziness that provokes people to use GUI instead of CLI. It is plain and simple savings of time for most of the steps in setting up and administering a Linux system. After all, until someone gets the earth to turn more slowly and someone else finds the true fountain of youth, there are still only 24 hours in a day and a limited number of days in ones life.
Having lived in the CLI world way before Apple's Lisa, I know and I can master any CLI, but why?
84 • linux (by amanda on 2016-01-01 20:45:04 GMT from Europe)
the operating system is amazing but the software & games etc is ancient & needs to catch up with the operating system
85 • games on Linux (by M.Z. on 2016-01-01 21:24:10 GMT from North America)
@84/amanda
You mean the no cost games in most Linux repos right? Isn't that like looking a gift horse in the mouth, especially considering that you had a paid alternative in the form of Steam that will get you lots of quality commercial games? I think there are plenty of games that are common in most Linux repos that are very good considering the free price. There are also at least 1,500 games available on Steam & I understand there are a fair number of high quality offerings, even if Windows does have some advantages in that department.
As for the state of the software in general, well I'd argue that there was more than enough good software in most distros. I'd call LibreOffice an excellent office suite by almost any measure, except of course for those that only want MS office. Given that most people use their PC for the office suite, the web browser, and occasional games, I think Linux would be a better choice for most users who don't have 'must have & only on Windows' software that they require. I'll admit that the quality of what's available on Linux can range from best available to just good enough, but that could be said of any OS.
If you want more on Steam:
http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2015/09/valve-hits-a-linux-landmark-1500-games-available-on-steam/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steam_(software)
86 • Wishes for 2016 (by linuxuser on 2016-01-01 21:46:39 GMT from Europe)
I wish a nice and creative 2016 for Distrowatch and the members of the Distrowatch Team. Thank you all for the good work. I wish you all the best.
87 • @63 (by spacex on 2016-01-02 20:02:42 GMT from Europe)
Yes, but with Debian you don't need to go to a derivative to get it the easy way. You get it all, withing Debian itself. As easy or as complicated as you please.
88 • @87 (by linuxista on 2016-01-03 22:21:16 GMT from North America)
That's fairly meaningless. The Arch derivatives are pure Arch, except for Manjaro, just as many many Debian derivatives are pure Debian, like Crunchbang, for example.
Do you get it all within Debian itself, like non-free codecs, for example? I can assure you there are easier options than plain Debian, especially if you need some of your apps to be current. Pinning has always been an exercise in frustration with Debian -- inevitably resulting, at least in my experience, in unresolvable dependency problems and package conflicts. No thanks.
Number of Comments: 88
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| • 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 |
| • Issue 1051 (2024-01-01): Favourite distros of 2023, reloading shell settings, Asahi Linux releases Fedora remix, Gentoo offers binary packages, openSUSE provides full disk encryption |
| • Issue 1050 (2023-12-18): rlxos 2023.11, renaming files and opening terminal windows in specific directories, TrueNAS publishes ZFS fixes, Debian publishes delayed install media, Haiku polishes desktop experience |
| • Issue 1049 (2023-12-11): Lernstick 12, alternatives to WINE, openSUSE updates its branding, Mint unveils new features, Lubuntu team plans for 24.04 |
| • Issue 1048 (2023-12-04): openSUSE MicroOS, the transition from X11 to Wayland, Red Hat phasing out X11 packages, UBports making mobile development easier |
| • Issue 1047 (2023-11-27): GhostBSD 23.10.1, Why Linux uses swap when memory is free, Ubuntu Budgie may benefit from Wayland work in Xfce, early issues with FreeBSD 14.0 |
| • Issue 1046 (2023-11-20): Slackel 7.7 "Openbox", restricting CPU usage, Haiku improves font handling and software centre performance, Canonical launches MicroCloud |
| • Issue 1045 (2023-11-13): Fedora 39, how to trust software packages, ReactOS booting with UEFI, elementary OS plans to default to Wayland, Mir gaining ability to split work across video cards |
| • Issue 1044 (2023-11-06): Porteus 5.01, disabling IPv6, applications unique to a Linux distro, Linux merges bcachefs, OpenELA makes source packages available |
| • Issue 1043 (2023-10-30): Murena Two with privacy switches, where old files go when packages are updated, UBports on Volla phones, Mint testing Cinnamon on Wayland, Peppermint releases ARM build |
| • Issue 1042 (2023-10-23): Ubuntu Cinnamon compared with Linux Mint, extending battery life on Linux, Debian resumes /usr merge, Canonical publishes fixed install media |
| • Issue 1041 (2023-10-16): FydeOS 17.0, Dr.Parted 23.09, changing UIDs, Fedora partners with Slimbook, GNOME phasing out X11 sessions, Ubuntu revokes 23.10 install media |
| • Issue 1040 (2023-10-09): CROWZ 5.0, changing the location of default directories, Linux Mint updates its Edge edition, Murena crowdfunding new privacy phone, Debian publishes new install media |
| • Issue 1039 (2023-10-02): Zenwalk Current, finding the duration of media files, Peppermint OS tries out new edition, COSMIC gains new features, Canonical reports on security incident in Snap store |
| • Issue 1038 (2023-09-25): Mageia 9, trouble-shooting launchers, running desktop Linux in the cloud, New documentation for Nix, Linux phasing out ReiserFS, GNU celebrates 40 years |
| • Issue 1037 (2023-09-18): Bodhi Linux 7.0.0, finding specific distros and unified package managemnt, Zevenet replaced by two new forks, openSUSE introduces Slowroll branch, Fedora considering dropping Plasma X11 session |
| • Issue 1036 (2023-09-11): SDesk 2023.08.12, hiding command line passwords, openSUSE shares contributor survery results, Ubuntu plans seamless disk encryption, GNOME 45 to break extension compatibility |
| • Full list of all issues |
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Linux Schools (formerly Karoshi) is a free and open-source school server operating system based on Ubuntu. It provides a simple graphical interface that allows for quick installation, setup and maintenance of a network.
Status: Active
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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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