 DistroWatch Weekly |
| DistroWatch Weekly, Issue 787, 29 October 2018 |
Welcome to this year's 44th issue of DistroWatch Weekly!
Earlier this month we saw the usual scheduled October release of Ubuntu and its many community editions. One of the notable changes in the new 18.10 versions came from Lubuntu as the project changed its desktop environment from the GTK+-based LXDE to Qt-based LXQt. This adjustment brings with it a number of related changes in default applications and resource usage and we explore these differences in our Feature Story. Lubuntu's change in desktops is also the topic of our Opinion Poll and we would like to know whether you are in favour of the shift from LXDE to LXQt. In our News section we discuss efforts to compile a list of compatible hardware which works with the Haiku operating system, and cover a story on the Solus distribution's missing founder. Plus we discuss IBM purchasing Red Hat, Pine64 planning a phone running Plasma, and the Mir display software and what its status is now that it has reached its 1.0 milestone. In our Questions and Answers section we talk about how to limit application usage to specific users. We are also pleased to share the releases of the past week and list the torrents we are seeding. We wish you all a wonderful week and happy reading!
Content:
- Review: Lubuntu 18.10 - now with LXQt
- News: Haiku hardware compatibility list, Solus founder out of contact, a potential new GNU/Linux phone, explaining Mir 1.0, IBM buying Red Hat
- Questions and answers: Limit application access to specific users
- Released last week: Tails 3.10.1, OpenIndiana 2018.10, Primtux 4
- Torrent corner: Archman, Bluestar, Clonezilla, Greenie, MorpheusArch, KDE neon, Nitrux, OpenIndiana, Primtux, Robolinux, Tails
- Upcoming releases: Fedora 29, FreeBSD 12.0-BETA3
- Opinion poll: Lubuntu's switch to LXQt
- New distributions: Open Secure-K OS
- Reader comments
Listen to the Podcast edition of this week's DistroWatch Weekly in OGG (21MB) and MP3 (15MB) formats.
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| Feature Story (by Jesse Smith) |
Lubuntu 18.10 - now with LXQt
On October 18th the Ubuntu distribution and related community projects released new versions. These new releases are short term releases, receiving just nine months of support. For the most part, I did not find many big, new features listed in the announcements, but one exception was the changing of Lubuntu's desktop environment:
Thanks to all the hard work from our contributors, Lubuntu 18.10 has been released. This is the first Lubuntu release with LXQt as the main desktop environment. The Lubuntu project, in 18.10 and successive releases, will no longer support the LXDE desktop environment or tools in the Ubuntu archive and will instead focus on the LXQt desktop environment.
The project has also reported that it plans to focus on being relatively light and modern, but will no longer focus on supporting older hardware.
A shift in desktop environments, even related ones like LXDE and LXQt, struck me as interesting and I was curious to see what practical effect, if any, this would have on Lubuntu's users. With that in mind, I would like to share some information on Lubuntu's final release featuring LXDE (version 18.04) and then talk about Lubuntu 18.10 with the LXQt desktop.
* * * * *
Lubuntu 18.04 with LXDE
Let's quickly talk about some of the characteristics of Lubuntu 18.04 with the LXDE desktop. Lubuntu 18.04 was provided as a 1GB ISO file. The distribution was installed with the Ubiquity installer and a fresh copy of the operating system used up 3.6GB of disk space. The LXDE desktop on Lubuntu used about 180MB of RAM and was wonderfully light and responsive in my test environments.
Lubuntu 18.04 featured a theme that used a lot of light grey backgrounds and black text. Most applications were members of the GTK+ family of programs. Software in the default install included Firefox, Pidgin, Transmission, AbiWord, Gnumeric, MPV and Audacious. Settings were managed through modules found in the application menu, and I do not recall there being a central settings panel.
Lubuntu 18.04 -- Running LXDE
(full image size: 387kB, resolution: 1280x1024 pixels)
For software management, Lubuntu 18.04 used GNOME Software to handle desktop applications. People who wanted to deal with lower level packages could run the Synaptic package manager. there was a third tool to manage package updates.
On the whole, I would say that Lubuntu 18.04 was a solid, long-term support release. There were not a lot of standout features, and I questioned the practicality of using AbiWord and Gnumeric over the more popular LibreOffice suite, but on the whole I thought the distribution's final version with LXDE was a good, lightweight distribution.
* * * * *
Lubuntu 18.10 with LXQt
The latest release if Lubuntu is provided as a 1.6GB download in both 32-bit and 64-bit builds. Booting from the live media loads the LXQt 0.13.0 desktop. The desktop's panel is still placed at the bottom of the display. The application menu is located in the bottom-left corner of the screen and the system tray is positioned in the bottom-right corner. The theme has been adjusted slightly, generally using white text on a black background for greater contrast. This darker look works pretty well except for a few corner cases such as the volume control in the system tray. It is presented as a dark grey icon on a grey background and is difficult to see.
The new version of Lubuntu uses the Calamares system installer, which replaces Ubiquity. This strikes me as an odd choice as most of the Calamares screens look the same as Ubiquity's and the steps are very similar. I think Calamares might offer a little more flexibility with disk partitioning, but otherwise the two installers are very similar, so I am curious about the change. The installer walks us through setting our time zone, selecting our keyboard's layout, setting up disk partitions and creating a user account. It then places its files on our hard drive and we can restart the computer to try out our new copy of Lubuntu.
Lubuntu 18.10 -- Running Firefox and monitoring processes
(full image size: 488kB, resolution: 1280x1024 pixels)
Lubuntu boots to a colourful, graphical login screen where we can sign into either the LXQt desktop or the Openbox window manager. The LXQt desktop is pleasantly responsive and I like the new theme and colourful icons. The desktop seems set up to avoid distracting us; there are very few notifications and there were no indication of new software updates during my trial.
Hardware
I experimented with Lubuntu 18.10 in a virtual machine and on a desktop computer. When running on the desktop computer, Lubuntu performed well. All my hardware was detected, the desktop was always responsive and Lubuntu was stable throughout my trial.
When running in VirtualBox, Lubuntu started off limiting my desktop resolution to 800x640 pixels. This could be adjusted in the display configuration module without requiring that I install any extra modules. After I sorted out my display's resolution, Lubuntu performed well in the virtual machine.
Lubuntu 18.10 required 280MB of memory when signed into LXQt, 55% more than the distribution needed to run LXDE. The new version of Lubuntu consumed 4.6GB of disk space with a fresh install, a full gigabyte more than the previous version.
Applications
Lubuntu 18.10 ships with software that is mostly part of the Qt family of applications. The application menu features the Firefox web browser, Qtransmission for downloading torrents, the Quassel IRC client and LibreOffice. The qpdfview PDF viewer is present along with the LXImage image viewer, and the FeatherPad text editor. We also find the K3b disc burning software, a calculator, archive manager and the oddly complicated QtPass password manager. Lubuntu ships with the qps process monitor and the PCmanFM-Qt file manager. Digging further we find the VLC multimedia player (I found no specific, dedicated music player). Like the previous version of Lubuntu, the distribution uses NetworkManager to set up network connections and features the systemd init software. Lubuntu 18.10 ships with version 4.18.0 of the Linux kernel.
Lubuntu 18.10 -- Browsing applications in the file manager
(full image size: 249kB, resolution: 1280x1024 pixels)
I found the included programs generally worked well, were stable and did not offer any surprises. The exception was trying to play videos in VLC. Sometimes the player would crash trying to start a video, though other videos and music files played successfully.
Settings
We can access Lubuntu's settings through the application menu or through a settings panel. The panel is somewhat buried (it's three levels deep in the application menu), but it presents us with a fairly easy and familiar way to adjust the desktop. Most of the configuration modules work as we might expect, making it pretty straight forward to change the wallpaper, keyboard short-cuts and and notifications. There is also a handy tool for setting up printers.
Lubuntu 18.10 -- The settings panel
(full image size: 414kB, resolution: 1280x1024 pixels)
There were two tools which stood out as being less user friendly. The Alternative Applications module shows application types and lists which application is being used. It seems like an overly complex way to explore this information and redundant since the settings panel also has a complex File Associations module. I call it complex as the File Associations module doesn't assign a group of file types (such as text or videos) to an application, instead it assigns individual file extensions to programs. This is very flexible, but may require changing dozens of entries to get all text or media files to open in the same program.
The user account manager was mostly a positive experience for me and I like how simple it is to use. However, the user manager shows two system accounts (systemd-coredump and nobody) mixed in with regular user accounts. I suspect this may confuse people and possibly result in these system accounts getting removed.
Software management
Lubuntu 18.10 ships with two software managers. The first is Discover, an application manager which shows links for available applications, installed items and settings down the left side of the window. On the right we see programs (or settings) in the selected section. When exploring available programs we can see a program's name and icon listed on the right side of the window and we can click an entry to see more information and a screenshot.
I ran into a few problems with Discover. While the software manager worked fairly smoothly on my desktop computer, it was terribly slow when running in a virtual machine. Scrolling through a list of applications could take over ten seconds to refresh the display and Discover would appear to lock-up when switching to a new screen or loading application information. At one point I installed the GNU Image Manipulation Program (GIMP) and later found there were two entries for GIMP in the Installed section. The two GIMP packages had different description pages. At first I thought one might be a portable package, but Flatpak was not enabled on my system and a check showed no Snap packages had been installed. The low level dpkg package manager showed only one copy of GIMP was installed, so I have no explanation for where the second copy of GIMP came from in Discover's listing.
Lubuntu 18.10 -- Multiple GIMP entries in Discover
(full image size: 133kB, resolution: 1280x1024 pixels)
The second software manager is the Muon package manager. Muon has a similar layout with two panes (categories on the left, programs on the right), but uses fewer visual elements and less space for entries. Muon focuses on low level packages and does not display as much information; its listings are more compact. Muon feels similar to Synaptic in its abilities and style, but with an interface that feels a bit more colourful and modern.
Both software managers offer to update packages, if new versions are available.
Lubuntu 18.10 -- The Muon package manager
(full image size: 465kB, resolution: 1280x1024 pixels)
Conclusions
I have mixed feelings about this release of Lubuntu. On the one hand most of the features worked well. The distribution was easy to install, I liked the theme, and the operating system is pretty easy to use. There were a few aspects I didn't like, usually programs or settings modules I felt were overly complex or confusing compared to their counterparts on other distributions. For the most part though, Lubuntu does a nice job of being a capable, relatively lightweight distribution.
Lubuntu 18.10 does not exist in a vacuum and I am mostly interested in how the new version compares to Lubuntu 18.04 - what is better and what is worse? In my opinion, the new, higher contrast theme is nicer to look at. I enjoyed the look of LXQt more than the older LXDE. Performance was in the same range on my machines, though I think 18.04 booted a little faster.
Some of the different programs I liked and some I did not. I think replacing AbiWord and Gnumeric with LibreOffice is a practical move. The latter might be heavier, but I think more people will be familiar with it and enjoy the greater range of features. On the other hand, swapping out GNOME Software for Discover feels like a step backwards. The former is faster, has a nicer interface (in my opinion) and I did not run into duplicate entries in the GNOME Software tool. Discover feels like a poorer tool, introduced for toolkit purity rather than capability.
For the most part I felt the switch from GTK+ to Qt applications went smoothly. We end up with most of the same capabilities and sometimes, as with Transmission, the same underlying software exists in the background.
One concern I had was with the increase in resource requirements in Lubuntu 18.10. Whether this is a big deal or not will depend a lot on how you look at the numbers. Lubuntu 18.10 has an ISO that is 60% larger than the one for 18.04. This seems like a big increase, but unless the user is on a dial-up Internet connection the download is not going to make a big difference and it is something we only need to do once.
Once installed, Lubuntu 18.10 uses up a full gigabyte more disk space. That is a big jump, proportionately, but it is unlikely to negatively affect anyone with a computer made in the past 15 years. So it looks like a step in the wrong direction, but probably not a practical issue.
I feel the same way about memory consumption. The new version is 55% heavier than the previous release in RAM. This is not ideal, but memory usage was still only 280MB. So, relatively speaking, Lubuntu's memory usage ballooned remarkably from one release to the next.However, Lubuntu's expanded resource consumption still makes it lighter than most other desktop Linux distributions, and the difference is roughly the equivalent of opening a few extra browser tabs. In short, when it comes to resources, Lubuntu is using more than before, but still so little that no computer made in the past decade or more will be impacted by the difference.
On the whole, I think the transition from LXDE to LXQt has gone smoothly. There are a few choices I didn't like, and a few I did, but mostly the changes were minor. I think most people will be able to make the leap between the two desktops fairly easily. I think a few settings modules still need polish and I'd like to see Discover replaced with just about any other modern software manager, but otherwise this felt like a graceful (and mostly positive) move from 18.04 to 18.10 and from LXDE to LXQt.
* * * * *
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
* * * * *
Visitor supplied rating
Lubuntu has a visitor supplied average rating of: 7.8/10 from 51 review(s).
Have you used Lubuntu? You can leave your own review of the project on our ratings page.
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| Miscellaneous News (by Jesse Smith) |
Haiku hardware compatibility list, Solus founder out of contact, a potential new GNU/Linux phone, explaining Mir 1.0, IBM buying Red Hat
The Haiku operating system is a lightweight, highly responsive desktop operating system and the spiritual successor to BeOS from the 1990s. The Haiku project recently released its first beta and, while the Haiku developers have made great progress, some users still struggle with hardware compatibility. Some users are assembling a list of compatible computers and hardware that will run Haiku and posting their findings on the project's forum. "Up to now, I've been storing the new responses to a simple Google page called 'Hardware List for Haiku 10' which I don't think anyone can effectively see or use that well, and if people are taking the time to test and contribute, it'd be nice if they can see their efforts. So, as of today, I'd actually like to also put that info here and make this a Wiki page so that anyone curious what computer models are compatible with Haiku can freely take a look..." The current list can be found in this forum thread. The thread has been added to our hardware compatibility page to make it easier for our readers to find in the future.
* * * * *
A little over a year after the founder of Solus, Ikey Doherty, announced that he was leaving his job to work on Solus full-time using funds donated to the project, the Solus core team have reported they are no longer in contact with him. "Ikey reached out to us on September 7th and informing us that he was still not feeling well, but that he had paid the server up for another 30 days so that we wouldn't need to rush to finish the migration... To date, that was the last communication we or anyone in contact with us have received from Ikey."
The remaining Solus developers are working to regain control of the Solus infrastructure and accounts. They report they have been unable to get access to the Solus Patreon account and advise people funding the project to cease their Patreon donations for the time being. "Unfortunately, with Patreon's refusal to assist us, our only option is to kindly request that you immediately cease your donations to it. My personal advice would be to additionally contact Patreon for refunds and express your frustration to them for their unwillingness to assist us. We can only hope that they decide to grant us access to the funds or account. I deeply apologize that we did not take the necessary measures earlier to ensure this account was accessible to the entire team. Moving forward, we will not be accepting any monetary donations until we have measures in place to ensure it can be accessed by the entire team at any point in time." Further details can be found in the Solus blog post. The Void team faced a similar issue earlier this year.
* * * * *
Pine64 is a company which makes and sells an ARM-based laptop called the Pinebook. It's FOSS has published an article reporting that the company is looking at developing a smart phone running GNU/Linux software and the Plasma user interface. "I contacted Pine64 team and TL Lim, founder of Pine64, confirmed the plans for a Linux-based smartphone and tablet. These devices are called PinePhone and PineTab. Lim revealed some information about PinePhone development. The first PinePhone developer kit will be given to selected developers for free on November 1. This is a combo kit of PINE A64 baseboard + SOPine module + 7″ Touch Screen Display + Camera + Wifi/BT + Playbox enclosure + Lithium-Ion battery case + LTE cat 4 USB dongle. This combo kit will allow developers to jump start PinePhone development. The Pine A64 platform already has a mainline Linux OS build thanks to the Pine64 community and support [from] KDE neon."
* * * * *
Earlier this year the Mir team published version 1.0 of their display software. Following the announcement the developers realized Mir is still an often-misunderstood piece of technology. A post on the Ubuntu Community boards provides an overview of X11, Wayland, and Mir and how they relate to each other. "We've recently (OK, recently-ish) released Mir 1.0 with usable Wayland support. Yay! That brought a bunch of publicity, including on LWN. Some of the comments there and elsewhere betray a misunderstanding about what Wayland is (and is not), and this still occasionally comes up in #wayland, so I'll dust off an old blog post, polish up the rusty bits, and see if I can make this clearer for people again!"
* * * * *
The weekend brought some significant news from Red Hat, the world's largest commercial Linux company. Red Hat is being purchased by IBM: "Today, one of the largest enterprise players on the planet has agreed to take open source and Red Hat even further. By joining IBM, Red Hat can deliver even more open source innovation to customers at a larger scale. Importantly, IBM has been a long time and great partner of ours, dating back to when they made a significant early investment in Linux and then became one of the first hardware platform partners to package and bring Red Hat Enterprise Linux to their customers."
* * * * *
These and other news stories can be found on our Headlines page.
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| Questions and Answers (by Jesse Smith) |
Limit application access to specific users
Blocking-access-for-some asks: Is there a way to password protect applications so that each user needs to put in a password to run, for example, Chrome?
DistroWatch answers: Yes, technically it is possible to put blocks in place which would require the user to put in a password in order to run an application. There are tools such as sudo and doas which are designed to grant temporary permission to run a program if the user can input the right password. However, for this to work you would need to first block users from running the program, then configure special entries in the sudo or doas configuration file for them. You may need to set up new accounts to handle application-specific information. It turns into a bit of a configuration mess.
I suspect what you are trying to do is set up a shared computer so that only certain users can run certain programs. For example, on a shared family computer you might want just the parents/guardians to be able to run a web browser while the children are limited to using other programs.
If this is the case there is a relatively easy way to limit access to certain programs to a group of people. Then only users in that group will be able to run the program and everyone else will be blocked. The user needs their password to sign in, but once they are logged in, they will automatically have access to run certain applications, or be denied from running other applications.
To accomplish this we need to do three things:
- Create a new user group.
- Add privileged users to the new group.
- Change the permissions of the program to be exclusive to the new group.
On most distribution we can create a new group, which I will call parents, by using the addgroup command:
sudo addgroup parents
Next we add each person we want to be able to run the program into the parents group. In this case, I'm going to assume their names are Bob and Alice. This takes multiple commands, one for each user.
sudo adduser alice parents
sudo adduser bob parents
Now we have Alice and Bob in the parents group. Anyone else on the system is not considered a parent. Our next step is to change the permissions of the program so that only the administrator and members of the parents group can run it. In the following example, I'm going to use the Chrome browser as the target program.
sudo chown root:parents /usr/bin/google-chrome-stable
sudo chmod 750 /usr/bin/google-chrome-stable
The first line changes ownership of the program so that it is owned by the administrator (root), and it is associated with the parents group. The second line allows root to do anything with the program (such as run, upgrade or remove it). The parents are allowed to read the program into memory and run it. Anyone else gets no access and cannot run or change the application.
The next time Alice and Bob sign into their accounts they will be able to run Chrome, but no one else will. You can do this with as many programs as you like, once the special group (parents in this case) has been created.
A word of warning with this method: your package manager may change the ownership of files the next time an upgrade for the application becomes available. If this happens you will need to re-run the last two commands in the above tutorial to get the proper permissions back.
* * * * *
Additional answers can be found in our Questions and Answers archive.
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| Released Last Week |
OpenIndiana 2018.10
Alexander Pyhalov has announced the release of OpenIndiana 2018.10, a new snapshot of the project's open-source operating system built from the ashes of Oracle's defunct OpenSolaris. This version updates the MATE desktop and most other applications to newer versions and provides various improvements to the Illumos kernel: "We have released a new OpenIndiana 'Hipster' snapshot 2018.10. The noticeable changes: MATE desktop was updated to 1.20; Python 3.5 was added, a lot of Python modules are now delivered for 3.5 Python version in addition to 2.7 and 3.4; Image Packaging System (IPS) has received a lot of updates from OmniOS CE IPS and Solaris IPS; KVM zone brand now allows you to manage your KVM VMs as Illumos zones; several new compilers were added, including GCC 8 (with patches necessary to build Illumos) and Rust 1.29; many components were migrated to 64-bit only, most newly-added software defaults to 64-bit; due to recent security fixes compatibilty with some Solaris applications is broken, the most important one is VirtualBox." See the release announcement and the detailed release notes for further information.
OpenIndiana 2018.10 -- Running the MATE desktop
(full image size: 1.6MB, resolution:1920x1080 pixels)
Tails 3.10.1
A new version of Tails has been released. Tails is a Debian-based live distribution whose goal is to help its users to browse the Internet anonymously and to circumvent censorship. This version is a standard security and bug-fix update: "Tails 3.10.1 is out. This release fixes many security vulnerabilities. You should upgrade as soon as possible. Upgrades and changes: hide the PIM option when unlocking VeraCrypt volumes because PIM won't be supported until Tails 4.0; rename the buttons in the confirmation dialog of Tails Installer to Install (or Upgrade) and Cancel to be less confusing; update Linux to 4.8, Tor Browser to 8.0.3, Thunderbird to 60.2.1. Fixed problems: prevent Tor Browser from leaking the language of the session; prevent Additional Software from asking to persist packages which are already configured as additional software; prevent Tails Installer from crashing when issuing an error message with international characters (non-ASCII); fix the VeraCrypt support for multiple encryption (cascades of ciphers); harden the configuration of sudo to prevent privilege escalation." Further information and screen shots can be found in the project's release announcement.
Primtux 4
PrimTux is a Debian-based distribution developed by a small team of school teachers and computer enthusiasts in the educational environment. The distribution's latest release is PrimTux 4 which unifies the look of the distribution's desktop environments across editions and makes it easier to customize the HandyMenu. The project's release announcement (in French) also reports updates to the parental controls. A translation of the announcement reads: "e2guardian replaces DansGuardian, privoxy replaces tinyproxy. The same browser is used for all because the filtering is done at the user level in transparent mode, the HTTPS traffic is filtered, time slots of use can be applied. In this case, a multicore processor is recommended. DansGuardian and tinyproxy are used, the HTTPS is filtered by the proxy. Desktop uniformity: all versions of PrimTux have the same desktops."
* * * * *
Development, unannounced and minor bug-fix releases
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| Torrent Corner |
Weekly Torrents
The table below provides a list of torrents DistroWatch is currently seeding. If you do not have a bittorrent client capable of handling the linked files, we suggest installing either the Transmission or KTorrent bittorrent clients.
Archives of our previously seeded torrents may be found in our Torrent Archive. We also maintain a Torrents RSS feed for people who wish to have open source torrents delivered to them. To share your own open source torrents of Linux and BSD projects, please visit our Upload Torrents page.
Torrent Corner statistics:
- Total torrents seeded: 1,089
- Total data uploaded: 21.7TB
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| Upcoming Releases and Announcements |
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Summary of expected upcoming releases
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| Opinion Poll |
Lubuntu's switch to LXQt
In this week's review of Lubuntu we talked about the distribution switching out their LXDE desktop for LXQt. The change not only affects some of the tools being shipped with the distribution, but also the amount of resources Lubuntu requires.
We would like to hear what our readers think about this change. Is it a good move for Lubuntu, or do you prefer the old LXDE desktop and associated applications?
You can see the results of our previous poll on running ARM-powered computers in last week's edition. All previous poll results can be found in our poll archives.
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Lubuntu switching to LXQt
| I prefer the switch to LXQt: | 470 (34%) |
| I preferred the LXDE desktop: | 396 (29%) |
| I have no preference: | 507 (37%) |
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| DistroWatch.com News |
Distributions added to waiting list
- Open Secure-K OS. Open Secure-K OS is a live, Debian-based operating system. It is designed to be run from a USB thumb drive and runs the GNOME desktop.
* * * * *
DistroWatch database summary
* * * * *
This concludes this week's issue of DistroWatch Weekly. The next instalment will be published on Monday, 5 November 2018. Past articles and reviews can be found through our Article Search page. To contact the authors please send e-mail to:
- Jesse Smith (feedback, questions and suggestions: distribution reviews/submissions, questions and answers, tips and tricks)
- Ladislav Bodnar (feedback, questions, donations, comments)
- Bruce Patterson (podcast)
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| Archives |
| • Issue 1092 (2024-10-14): FunOS 24.04.1, a home directory inside a file, work starts of openSUSE Leap 16.0, improvements in Haiku, KDE neon upgrades its base |
| • Issue 1091 (2024-10-07): Redox OS 0.9.0, Unified package management vs universal package formats, Redox begins RISC-V port, Mint polishes interface, Qubes certifies new laptop |
| • Issue 1090 (2024-09-30): Rhino Linux 2024.2, commercial distros with alternative desktops, Valve seeks to improve Wayland performance, HardenedBSD parterns with Protectli, Tails merges with Tor Project, Quantum Leap partners with the FreeBSD Foundation |
| • Issue 1089 (2024-09-23): Expirion 6.0, openKylin 2.0, managing configuration files, the future of Linux development, fixing bugs in Haiku, Slackware packages dracut |
| • Issue 1088 (2024-09-16): PorteuX 1.6, migrating from Windows 10 to which Linux distro, making NetBSD immutable, AlmaLinux offers hardware certification, Mint updates old APT tools |
| • Issue 1087 (2024-09-09): COSMIC desktop, running cron jobs at variable times, UBports highlights new apps, HardenedBSD offers work around for FreeBSD change, Debian considers how to cull old packages, systemd ported to musl |
| • Issue 1086 (2024-09-02): Vanilla OS 2, command line tips for simple tasks, FreeBSD receives investment from STF, openSUSE Tumbleweed update can break network connections, Debian refreshes media |
| • Issue 1085 (2024-08-26): Nobara 40, OpenMandriva 24.07 "ROME", distros which include source code, FreeBSD publishes quarterly report, Microsoft updates breaks Linux in dual-boot environments |
| • Issue 1084 (2024-08-19): Liya 2.0, dual boot with encryption, Haiku introduces performance improvements, Gentoo dropping IA-64, Redcore merges major upgrade |
| • Issue 1083 (2024-08-12): TrueNAS 24.04.2 "SCALE", Linux distros for smartphones, Redox OS introduces web server, PipeWire exposes battery drain on Linux, Canonical updates kernel version policy |
| • Issue 1082 (2024-08-05): Linux Mint 22, taking snapshots of UFS on FreeBSD, openSUSE updates Tumbleweed and Aeon, Debian creates Tiny QA Tasks, Manjaro testing immutable images |
| • Issue 1081 (2024-07-29): SysLinuxOS 12.4, OpenBSD gain hardware acceleration, Slackware changes kernel naming, Mint publishes upgrade instructions |
| • Issue 1080 (2024-07-22): Running GNU/Linux on Android with Andronix, protecting network services, Solus dropping AppArmor and Snap, openSUSE Aeon Desktop gaining full disk encryption, SUSE asks openSUSE to change its branding |
| • Issue 1079 (2024-07-15): Ubuntu Core 24, hiding files on Linux, Fedora dropping X11 packages on Workstation, Red Hat phasing out GRUB, new OpenSSH vulnerability, FreeBSD speeds up release cycle, UBports testing new first-run wizard |
| • Issue 1078 (2024-07-08): Changing init software, server machines running desktop environments, OpenSSH vulnerability patched, Peppermint launches new edition, HardenedBSD updates ports |
| • Issue 1077 (2024-07-01): The Unity and Lomiri interfaces, different distros for different tasks, Ubuntu plans to run Wayland on NVIDIA cards, openSUSE updates Leap Micro, Debian releases refreshed media, UBports gaining contact synchronisation, FreeDOS celebrates its 30th anniversary |
| • Issue 1076 (2024-06-24): openSUSE 15.6, what makes Linux unique, SUSE Liberty Linux to support CentOS Linux 7, SLE receives 19 years of support, openSUSE testing Leap Micro edition |
| • Issue 1075 (2024-06-17): Redox OS, X11 and Wayland on the BSDs, AlmaLinux releases Pi build, Canonical announces RISC-V laptop with Ubuntu, key changes in systemd |
| • Issue 1074 (2024-06-10): Endless OS 6.0.0, distros with init diversity, Mint to filter unverified Flatpaks, Debian adds systemd-boot options, Redox adopts COSMIC desktop, OpenSSH gains new security features |
| • Issue 1073 (2024-06-03): LXQt 2.0.0, an overview of Linux desktop environments, Canonical partners with Milk-V, openSUSE introduces new features in Aeon Desktop, Fedora mirrors see rise in traffic, Wayland adds OpenBSD support |
| • Issue 1072 (2024-05-27): Manjaro 24.0, comparing init software, OpenBSD ports Plasma 6, Arch community debates mirror requirements, ThinOS to upgrade its FreeBSD core |
| • Issue 1071 (2024-05-20): Archcraft 2024.04.06, common command line mistakes, ReactOS imports WINE improvements, Haiku makes adjusting themes easier, NetBSD takes a stand against code generated by chatbots |
| • Issue 1070 (2024-05-13): Damn Small Linux 2024, hiding kernel messages during boot, Red Hat offers AI edition, new web browser for UBports, Fedora Asahi Remix 40 released, Qubes extends support for version 4.1 |
| • Issue 1069 (2024-05-06): Ubuntu 24.04, installing packages in alternative locations, systemd creates sudo alternative, Mint encourages XApps collaboration, FreeBSD publishes quarterly update |
| • Issue 1068 (2024-04-29): Fedora 40, transforming one distro into another, Debian elects new Project Leader, Red Hat extends support cycle, Emmabuntus adds accessibility features, Canonical's new security features |
| • Issue 1067 (2024-04-22): LocalSend for transferring files, detecting supported CPU architecure levels, new visual design for APT, Fedora and openSUSE working on reproducible builds, LXQt released, AlmaLinux re-adds hardware support |
| • Issue 1066 (2024-04-15): Fun projects to do with the Raspberry Pi and PinePhone, installing new software on fixed-release distributions, improving GNOME Terminal performance, Mint testing new repository mirrors, Gentoo becomes a Software In the Public Interest project |
| • Issue 1065 (2024-04-08): Dr.Parted Live 24.03, answering questions about the xz exploit, Linux Mint to ship HWE kernel, AlmaLinux patches flaw ahead of upstream Red Hat, Calculate changes release model |
| • Issue 1064 (2024-04-01): NixOS 23.11, the status of Hurd, liblzma compromised upstream, FreeBSD Foundation focuses on improving wireless networking, Ubuntu Pro offers 12 years of support |
| • Issue 1063 (2024-03-25): Redcore Linux 2401, how slowly can a rolling release update, Debian starts new Project Leader election, Red Hat creating new NVIDIA driver, Snap store hit with more malware |
| • Issue 1062 (2024-03-18): KDE neon 20240304, changing file permissions, Canonical turns 20, Pop!_OS creates new software centre, openSUSE packages Plasma 6 |
| • Issue 1061 (2024-03-11): Using a PinePhone as a workstation, restarting background services on a schedule, NixBSD ports Nix to FreeBSD, Fedora packaging COSMIC, postmarketOS to adopt systemd, Linux Mint replacing HexChat |
| • Issue 1060 (2024-03-04): AV Linux MX-23.1, bootstrapping a network connection, key OpenBSD features, Qubes certifies new hardware, LXQt and Plasma migrate to Qt 6 |
| • Issue 1059 (2024-02-26): Warp Terminal, navigating manual pages, malware found in the Snap store, Red Hat considering CPU requirement update, UBports organizes ongoing work |
| • Issue 1058 (2024-02-19): Drauger OS 7.6, how much disk space to allocate, System76 prepares to launch COSMIC desktop, UBports changes its version scheme, TrueNAS to offer faster deduplication |
| • Issue 1057 (2024-02-12): Adelie Linux 1.0 Beta, rolling release vs fixed for a smoother experience, Debian working on 2038 bug, elementary OS to split applications from base system updates, Fedora announces Atomic Desktops |
| • Issue 1056 (2024-02-05): wattOS R13, the various write speeds of ISO writing tools, DSL returns, Mint faces Wayland challenges, HardenedBSD blocks foreign USB devices, Gentoo publishes new repository, Linux distros patch glibc flaw |
| • Issue 1055 (2024-01-29): CNIX OS 231204, distributions patching packages the most, Gentoo team presents ongoing work, UBports introduces connectivity and battery improvements, interview with Haiku developer |
| • Issue 1054 (2024-01-22): Solus 4.5, comparing dd and cp when writing ISO files, openSUSE plans new major Leap version, XeroLinux shutting down, HardenedBSD changes its build schedule |
| • Issue 1053 (2024-01-15): Linux AI voice assistants, some distributions running hotter than others, UBports talks about coming changes, Qubes certifies StarBook laptops, Asahi Linux improves energy savings |
| • Issue 1052 (2024-01-08): OpenMandriva Lx 5.0, keeping shell commands running when theterminal closes, Mint upgrades Edge kernel, Vanilla OS plans big changes, Canonical working to make Snap more cross-platform |
| • 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 |
| • Full list of all issues |
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MIRACLE LINUX
MIRACLE LINUX is a Japanese Linux distribution based on Red Hat Enterprise Linux. The distribution is free to use, with a 10-year support, but users can opt for a paid support provided by a company called Cybertrust, Inc. MIRACLE LINUX started as a high performance back-end server for business workgroups in the enterprise, with several specialist editions, such as MIRACLE LINUX for PostgreSQL, MIRACLE LINUX with Oracle and MIRACLE LINUX Server OS. It was also part of the Asianux consortium, now discontinued, together with some high-profile Linux distribution projects developed in China and Korea.
Status: Active
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TUXEDO Computers - Linux Hardware in a tailor made suite
Choose from a wide range of laptops and PCs in various sizes and shapes at TUXEDOComputers.com. Every machine comes pre-installed and ready-to-run with Linux. Full 24 months of warranty and lifetime support included!
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| Star Labs |
Star Labs - Laptops built for Linux.
View our range including the highly anticipated StarFighter. Available with coreboot open-source firmware and a choice of Ubuntu, elementary, Manjaro and more. Visit Star Labs for information, to buy and get support.
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