 DistroWatch Weekly |
| DistroWatch Weekly, Issue 858, 23 March 2020 |
Welcome to this year's 12th issue of DistroWatch Weekly!
The Arch Linux distribution is quite popular, especially among people who want to tinker with their systems, gain a high degree of control over which components are installed, or who just want to learn more about how the pieces of a distribution fit together. Installing Arch Linux tends to be a manual process which has given rise to many projects which offer quick and easy ways to automate the Arch install process. This week we begin with a look at Anarchy Linux, a project which adds a text installer and a lot of customization options to the process of setting up the Arch distribution. In our News section we discuss another Arch-based distribution, Manjaro Linux, becoming the default operating system for Pinebook Pro ARM-powered computers. Debian's Project Leader election is now underway and we link to the campaign platforms of the three candidates. Plus we talk about IPFire introducing a new level of security through kernel module signing and Qubes OS planning a new graphical domain to better isolate system components. Then our Opinion Poll asks how people feel about EarlyOOM, a service shipping in Fedora 32 Beta which removes processes which are consuming too much memory. We are also pleased to share the releases of the past week and link to the torrents we are seeding. We wish you all a wonderful week and happy reading!
Content:
- Review: Anarchy Linux 1.0.10
- News: Manjaro becomes Pinebook Pro's default OS, Debian Project Leader election begins, IPFire introduces kernel module signing, Qubes plans a separate GUI domain
- Questions and answers: Performance impact from installing dependencies and installing alternative package versions
- Released last week: Linux Mint 4 "LMDE", Emmabuntus DE3-1.01, FuryBSD 12.1
- Torrent corner: Android-x86, Archman, AUSTRUMI, Berry, Bluestar, Emmabuntus, FuryBSD, IPFire, KDE neon, Linux Mint, PCLinuxOS, Volumio
- Opinion poll: The EarlyOOM service in Fedora 32
- New distributions: RockSolid Signage
- Reader comments
Listen to the Podcast edition of this week's DistroWatch Weekly in OGG (15MB) and MP3 (10MB) formats.
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| Feature Story (by Joshua Allen Holm) |
Anarchy Linux 1.0.10
Anarchy Linux is an Arch-based distribution that provides a custom installation script designed to quickly configure and install Arch. The Anarchy Linux ISO is 665MB and the installation process requires an Internet connection to download packages. Basically, Anarchy fully automates many steps of the Arch install process. Selecting options in Anarchy's installer is all that is required to get a system up and running. Most of the steps in the text-mode installer are the same as the ones presented when installing almost any Linux distribution, but Anarchy does provide more customization options when it comes to software selection and configuration.
Anarchy Linux 1.0.10 -- Menu with installer and other options
(full image size: 7kB, resolution: 800x600 pixels)
The Anarchy installer provides a wealth of options, but the five main choices are: Anarchy-Desktop, Anarchy-Desktop LTS, Anarchy-Server, Anarchy-Server LTS, and Anarchy-Advanced. The difference between the LTS and non-LTS options are mainly which version of the Linux kernel gets installed. The LTS options use version 5.4.x of the kernel. The non-LTS versions use the latest version of the kernel (when I was working on this review, that was version 5.5.x, but 5.6.x will probably be what is current by the time you are reading this). The Desktop options provide a choice of five customized desktop environments: Budgie, Cinnamon, GNOME, Openbox, and Xfce. The Server options do not install a desktop environment and provide a very bare-bones default selection of software. The Advanced mode lets the user pick options far beyond what is offered by either of the other installation styles.
Anarchy Linux 1.0.10 -- Installation options
(full image size: 9kB, resolution: 800x600 pixels)
For this review, I will look at desktop installations with GNOME and Xfce, a server installation, and a GNOME desktop installed using the extra options available in the advanced installer. This barely scratches the surface of the many, many different ways an Anarchy Linux system can be configured using the installer, but I hope that it will provide a decent overview of the options. I should also note that Anarchy, like Arch itself, is a rolling release, so things are constantly changing. It is possible that issues I had during my experience are already fixed by the time you read this, and it is also possible that new issues have developed.
Anarchy Desktop
I started by trying out Anarchy in VirtualBox, and the first time I tried to install it I ran into problems. The version of the package Anarchy was trying to install to enable VirtualBox support was not available on the mirror the installer was selecting (the package had just been updated in Arch, so the mirror had a newer package than what the installer was looking for based on what a different package required) which caused the entire installation to fail. This issue fixed itself in a few hours when the mirrors were completely updated, but an installation process failing completely because one package was not available after three attempts to download it was not a good first impression. I would have a repeat of this issue a few days later when I tried to install the GNOME desktop and the Epiphany package on the mirror selected was, again, the "wrong" version.
Anarchy Linux 1.0.10 -- Desktop options
(full image size: 8kB, resolution: 800x600 pixels)
Aside from those two flukes, the Anarchy installation process worked well. The Desktop and Desktop LTS options provide an installation process not much different from the installation of other distributions. The installer prompts the user to configure language, keyboard layout, location, partition the hard drive, set up a user, and other basic configure options. The only major choice presented is which of the five desktop options to install. The options, as noted above, are Budgie, Cinnamon, GNOME, Openbox, and Xfce, and all the options provide a decent selection of software. However, not all software package selections are equal; the GNOME desktop option provides a ton of software, including almost all GNOME games and utilities, but Xfce did not pre-install nearly as much software. Xfce had a browser, LibreOffice, and software for performing many tasks, but seemed to be missing some basic utilities. The default PDF viewer on the Xfce desktop was LibreOffice Draw. Evince (or any other option) was not installed.
Anarchy Linux 1.0.10 -- Customized Xfce desktop
(full image size: 1.5MB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
The Desktop installer lets the user install additional software as a step after installing the desktop, but it does not identify which packages are already installed by the desktop environment. For example, both GNOME and Xfce come with LibreOffice, but LibreOffice, like all the other software listed, is unchecked in the list of options, so the first time I tried the GNOME desktop, I opted to "install" additional software that was already included as part of the base package selection. On all of my subsequent installations, I skipped the additional software step and installed software post-reboot, which I could do with the GUI package manager provided by the desktop environment I had selected. In the case of GNOME, the GUI package management tools were GNOME Software and GNOME Packages.
Anarchy Linux 1.0.10 -- GNOME desktop with Terminal showing zsh plugin error
(full image size: 2.0MB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
All of the customized desktop options provide Anarchy-specific tweaks. These tend to be the same across all the desktops, so all five of the options provide experiences that are identifiable as Anarchy Linux, which is great for branding. However, I did not like some of the choices made by the developers. The icon set, coloring, and default background were fine, but the font used for the interface text, Zekton, is way too hard to read. It looks cool, but it is not a font that I want to spend all day looking at. Thankfully, the document and monospace font used in the terminal are more traditional and easier to read.
Anarchy Server
Unlike the Desktop option, the Server option is very, very frustrating. I selected the defaults for most steps, configured a user, and let the installer install the packages it wanted, but I did not add any additional packages. When I rebooted the virtual machine and logged in, the system complained because the .zshrc file could not find the hostname program. When I tried to use the pacman package manager to install the package with hostname in it, I found that the network connection was not enabled. Rather than try to fix this by enabling the network connection, I opted to reinstall the system from scratch to see if I happened to miss something during the installation process. Unfortunately, I did not miss anything, so before I rebooted the system, I used the "Anarchy-Chroot Into Installed System" option to install the packages that provided hostname and nmtui, so I could solve the hostname issue and easily enable the network interface.
Once I had a system that worked without showing any errors, I had a server installation that worked, but the experience was nothing special. It was a typical GUI-less Linux installation that used zsh as its default shell. I could install packages using pacman or yay, a wrapper with AUR support. The system worked, and I could install and configure various services, but the experience was just ordinary. I like the Anarchy Desktop experience, but was not impressed by the Server experience. Broken installation issues aside, the Server option just does not offer enough to recommend it over something like CentOS or Debian.
Anarchy Advanced
Now that I had a feel for how Anarchy worked, I opted for a bare-metal installation for my test of the Advanced installation option. This is where Anarchy gets interesting. The Desktop/Desktop LTS options pick sane defaults for many options, but the Advanced installer lets the user pick from several advanced options to build the system the user wants. The kernel can be the vanilla (newest) version, long-term support, hardened, or zen. The default shell can be bash, dash, fish, mksh, tcsh, or zsh. The bootloader can be GRUB (which is used by the Desktop/Server installations), syslinux, systemd-boot, or efistub. Networking can be handled by Network Manager or netctl. There are way more desktop options in the Advanced mode. In addition to the five customized desktops available in the Desktop install option, there are non-customized versions of those five desktops and several more options. If there is a major desktop environment packaged for Arch, there is a good chance it is included in Anarchy's extensive list of desktop options.
Anarchy Linux 1.0.10 -- Customized GNOME desktop showing GNOME Tweaks font options
(full image size: 934kB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
For my bare-metal install I opted for the vanilla kernel, zsh with Oh-My-Zsh as the zsh configuration option, systemd-boot, Network Manager, and a non-customized GNOME with GDM as the login display manager. The installation process worked perfectly on the first try, so, thankfully, I was not stuck with a non-working laptop while I waiting for the mirrors to sort themselves out. When I rebooted, the system booted quickly and almost everything was configured correctly. My hardware all worked, but on the software side, there was a minor issue with zsh complaining about not being able to find the zsh-syntax-highlighting plugin. This should have been correctly configured when I picked the zsh and Oh-My-Zsh option during install, but it was not. However, that is the only issue I ran across when using the system. Aside from that one minor issue, I had a well configured Arch Linux-based system that I was able to set up in under 30 minutes by just selecting options and entering options in the Anarchy installer. Anarchy Linux is not perfect, but it does do a good job of making Arch super easy to install.
Final thoughts
Anarchy Linux is a good way to quickly get Arch installed and configured. I have some issues with some of the customization choices made in the customized desktops, and not all the desktop options are equal, but the Desktop and Desktop LTS options do provide a good experience. The installer could fail a little more cleanly when it cannot download a package, but when the installer works, it works well. However, the Server and Server LTS options need work. Finally, the Advanced option works great (though the same "fails completely when it cannot download a package" issue also applies here) and is perfect for users who want to customize an Arch install without having to do all the work by hand. Overall, Anarchy Linux a good distribution that needs just a little more polish, which, hopefully, will come as more people use Anarchy and file bug reports.
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Hardware used in this review
My physical test equipment for this review was an ASUS VivoBook E406MA laptop with the following specifications:
- Processor: Intel Pentium Silver N5000 CPU
- Storage: 64GB eMMC
- Memory: 4GB of RAM
- Networking: Qualcomm Atheros QCA9377 802.11ac Wireless Network Adapter
- Display: Intel UHD Graphics 605
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Visitor supplied rating
Anarchy Linux has a visitor supplied average rating of: 10/10 from 2 review(s).
Have you used Anarchy Linux? You can leave your own review of the project on our ratings page.
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| Miscellaneous News (by Jesse Smith) |
Manjaro becomes Pinebook Pro's default OS, Debian Project Leader election begins, IPFire introduces kernel module signing, Qubes plans a separate GUI domain
The PINE64 team have published a blog post in which they talk about updates to their Pinebook Pro laptops and offer news about the PinePhone mobile device. One of the new developments is the Pinebook Pro ARM-powered laptop will ship with Manjaro Linux as the default operating system. "We're excited and proud to announce that future Pinebook Pros will ship with Manjaro KDE as the default operating system. Pre-orders for the next production run of Pinebook Pros starts on March 18, 2020 with an estimated shipping date of early May, 2020 (once Hong Kong border opens to our shipping staff). The image that ships with the upcoming Pinebook Pro batch features an additional layer of polish, which extends to a custom set of wallpapers and tweaks to the default application list to include popular software. If you are a Manjaro enthusiast, then I probably don't need to convince you any further, and if you haven't gotten a chance to try Manjaro yet then I suspect you'll really enjoy the out-of-the-box experience. Speaking of the out of the box experience, Manjaro ships with an OEM setup / installer that allows you to set your username and password as well as choose your keyboard layout and system locale on initial boot."
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Once per year the Debian team votes to decide who will be the project's next leader. Debian is one of the world's largest distributions in terms of developers and maintains a massive collection of software which is used by dozens of distributions, meaning the decisions Debian developers make can cause ripples throughout the Linux community. There are three candidates in the 2020 election: Jonathan Carter, Sruthi Chandran, and Brian Gupta. Their platforms are presented on the Debian website. Voting for these three candidates will happen in April.
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The IPFire team is taking pro-active security measures when it comes to protecting the kernel. One of the approaches IPFire is introducing is kernel code signing to verify that the kernel has not been maliciously altered. "In IPFire 2.25 - Core Update 142, we are now cryptographically signing all kernel modules. That means every time a driver for a network adapter, a filesystem driver or other kernel module is loaded into the kernel, it is checked that this signature matches. The signature is added during compile time of the kernel and after we are done with that, we throw the key away. Nobody needs it any more. Nobody - not even we - have now the ability to change the kernel any more. The only way to change a line of code somewhere is to rebuild and re-ship the whole kernel." Further details are available in the distribution's blog post.
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Qubes OS is a security-oriented operating system which mitigates security issues through strong isolation of components into separate domains. The project is introducing a new domain for graphical components. "One of the Big Things coming soon, in Qubes 4.1, is the first public version of the GUI domain: the next step in decoupling the graphical hardware, the display and management, and the host system. Very briefly, the GUI domain is a qube separate from dom0 that handles all the display-related tasks and some system management. Why make a GUI domain at all? One of the biggest security concerns at the moment for Qubes is how much power is in dom0. Once a person has access to it, they can do anything: and while we separate it quite effectively from what is running inside application qubes, dom0 is still a big, bloated and complex domain that performs many disparate functions. It handles managing other domains, display and graphical interfaces, multiple devices (including audio devices), memory and disk management, and so on. We mitigate many of the GUI-related risks (like the powers wielded by the window manager, or the fact that huge, complex libraries such as Qt/GTK are always an increased attack surface) through compartmentalization." The project's blog post offers further details on the new GUI domain.
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These and other news stories can be found on our Headlines page.
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| Questions and Answers (by Jesse Smith) |
Performance impact from installing dependencies and installing alternative package versions
Adding-more-stuff asks: When I go to install WINE I am prompted to add a bunch of 32-bit dependencies. Will adding all these extra libraries slow down my machine? If not, why?
DistroWatch answers: Under most circumstances installing additional packages on your operating system will not slow down your distribution. The extra packages will take up disk space, but do not consume processor cycles just sitting on the disk. Installing these 32-bit libraries will use up a little storage space, but they will not be running or consuming memory (at least not most of the time) and your operating system will continue to run at the same speed.
There are just a few situations in which installing more software packages will slow down a distribution. For instance, if your hard drive is nearing its storage capacity and you add more software, the operating system may struggle to find room to write new files or the drive may become fragmented. This can slow down the system, but it should only happen if your drive is already very close to being full.
Should you wish to check how much storage space you have remaining on your system to make sure you are not near the limit, run the following command in a terminal:
df -h /
Assuming the amount of space being used on the partition is less than 80% it is unlikely you will run into any performance problems.
The other scenario in which installing new packages can slow down a system is when the package includes a service that runs in the background. For example, if you installed a file indexing service or a web server on your computer and it gets enabled automatically. In those situations the service runs quietly in the background, sometimes consuming your CPU's resources. In that case the system can slow down. However, installing most dependencies, like those used by WINE, should not include any new services you need to worry about.
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Wanting-a-different-version asks: I'm thinking that with a lot of distros, that either they're way behind in their application version, like Linux Mint still providing only qBittorrent 4.03 when it's now at 4.2.1, or providing a version that you kind of wish that you didn't have to upgrade to that version. At least with Windows, you can choose which version to install or go back to. With Linux, unless you're compiling it yourself, there seems to be less options. In Gentoo, I think I'd just have to install the very latest version, which I don't necessarily want to do because I like something to be out in the wild for a while to see if other people are having bad reactions to it. Are there some distros you know of where a person has more freedom to choose which application version?
DistroWatch answers: First, I'd like to point out that the issue you are describing, being stuck on a distribution's specific version of a package, is not a reflection on a limitation of a Linux distribution to only run one version. What we have here is a matter of most distributions choosing to ship with one version of a package to make it easier to trouble-shoot and get working with other software. There isn't anything about Linux which limits you to running a specific version of an application. The "one version" limitation you are seeing is a matter of what people get if they stick with only using curated packages from their distribution. However, there is nothing preventing people from installing alternative versions from other sources, which is essentially what people who run Windows are typically doing - running third-party packages they download from a website rather than the version from an official application store.
With that out of the way, let's look at a handful of approaches you can take with Linux to install alternative versions of applications, without compiling the program from its source code.
One thing you can do is look into Fedora's modularity feature. It is specifically designed to allow users to run alternative versions of applications while still using the distribution's official software repositories.
If Fedora is not to your liking, then most of the major distributions offer backport repositories. Fixed release distributions tend to ship with older versions of software, as you noted with Linux Mint and its qBittorrent package. However, many distributions also offer newer versions of packages through optional repositories. These add-on repositories can typically be enabled through the package manager and offer optional newer versions of software.
Another option is to use portable package formats. Flatpak, Snap, and AppImage bundles are often provided by upstream application developers and provide the Windows-style approach of installing whatever version of software you want, typically from a third-party. Application developers usually release these software bundles either on their websites or through portals such as Flathub.
Should you find yourself using a member of the Ubuntu family, like Linux Mint, you can often find alternative versions of software for your distribution through a personal package archive (PPA). These are mini repositories of software that are built to provide alternative or experimental versions of applications for your distribution. You can often find PPAs on Launchpad. For example, if you visit the qBittorrent website, their download page provides instructions for enabling their official PPA on Ubuntu and Linux Mint, which offers newer stable versions of the application.
In cases where you are using a more cutting edge distribution, such as Gentoo or a member of the Arch Linux family, you can install a new version of an application and then "pin" or "lock" it using your package manager. This causes the package to no longer get updated, letting you stick with the version you like for as long as you want.
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Additional answers can be found in our Questions and Answers archive.
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| Released Last Week |
Emmabuntüs DE3-1.01
Emmabuntüs is a lightweight, Debian-based distribution featuring the Xfce desktop. the project's latest release is Emmabuntüs Debian Edition (DE) 3-1.01. The latest version is based on Debian 10.3 and includes a number of fixes. "This Debian Edition 1.01 version includes the following features, fixes and enhancements: Based on Debian 10.3 Buster. Added additional soundtracks in French for Mr-Patate43. Added OpenBoard. Added open-vm-tools-desktop. Added Minetest. Added monitor monitoreDP-1 configuration. Added a screen tearing fixed script for Intel/AMD cards. Improved explanations of post-installation windows following the review of DistroWatch. Improved management of Cairo-dock icons. Improved accessibility of windows. Improvement of start-up time in live mode. Fixed icons for information on updating packages for Revival-blue and Moka themes. Fixed network share via Samba. Fixed XScreenSaver slideshow launch. Updated of HPLip 3.19.12, TurboPrint 2.49-1, Multisystem 1.0442, Firefox ESR 68.5.0, Thunderbird 68.5.0." Additional information can be found in the project's release announcement.
FuryBSD 12.1
FuryBSD, a desktop-oriented operating system featuring the Xfce and KDE Plasma desktops, has been updated to version 12.1. The ISO images were actually released to SourceForge on March 8, but the release announcement was only published on the project's website today: "New FuryBSD 12.1 images are available for Xfce and KDE. This new release is now based on FreeBSD 12.1 with the latest FreeBSD quarterly packages. This brings Xfce up to 4.14, and KDE up to 5.17. In addition to updates, these new ISO images mostly address community bugs, community enhancement requests and community pull requests. Changelog: clean-up leftover union dir after install to disk; make sure furybsd-xorg-tool installs the right version for nvidia-driver-390; add nvidia-driver (latest) category to fury-xorg-tool; restore beastie menu and default timeout on live media; add updating documentation; update packages on ISO images to FreeBSD quarterly branch branches/2020Q1; make root mount read write on live image; update ISO image to 12.1 (latest FreeBSD 12.1-p2)...."
Linux Mint 4 "LMDE"
The Linux Mint team have published a new version of the distribution's Debian-based branch. The new release, Linux Mint Debian Edition (LMDE) 4, is based on Debian 10 and ships with the Cinnamon desktop. "This new version of LMDE contains many improvements. Here are some of the main ones: Automated partitioning with support for LVM and full-disk encryption. Home directory encryption. Support for automated installation of NVIDIA drivers. NVMe support. Secure Boot support. Btrfs sub-modules support. Revamped installer. Automatic installation of microcode packages. Automatic resolution bump for the live session to a minimum of 1024x768 in VirtualBox. Linux Mint 19.3 improvements (HDT, Boot-repair, System reports, language settings, HiDPI and artwork improvements, new boot menus, Celluloid, Gnote, Drawing, Cinnamon 4.4, XApp status icons, etc). APT recommends enabled by default. Removed deb-multimedia repository and packages. Debian 10 Buster package base with backports repository." Further details can be found in the project's release announcement and in the release notes.
Linux Mint 4 "LMDE" -- Running the Cinnamon desktop
(full image size: 194kB, resolution: 1280x1024 pixels)
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Development, unannounced and minor bug-fix releases
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| Torrent Corner |
Weekly Torrents
The table below provides a list of torrents DistroWatch is currently seeding. If you do not have a bittorrent client capable of handling the linked files, we suggest installing either the Transmission or KTorrent bittorrent clients.
Archives of our previously seeded torrents may be found in our Torrent Archive. We also maintain a Torrents RSS feed for people who wish to have open source torrents delivered to them. To share your own open source torrents of Linux and BSD projects, please visit our Upload Torrents page.
Torrent Corner statistics:
- Total torrents seeded: 1,889
- Total data uploaded: 31.0TB
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| Upcoming Releases and Announcements |
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Summary of expected upcoming releases
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| Opinion Poll (by Jesse Smith) |
The EarlyOOM service in Fedora 32
One of the new features being tested in Fedora 32 Beta is EarlyOOM. The EarlyOOM service monitors the system's RAM and swap space consumption. When the operating system begins to run low on memory, EarlyOOM can step in and terminate memory-heavy processes, freeing up memory for the rest of the system. This should prevent situations where programs are constantly being swapped in and out of memory, slowing down the system and causing the user interface to become unresponsive.
What do you think of EarlyOOM? Is it a welcome new feature, something you already use, or something you are likely to disable?
You can see the results of our previous poll on the position of your distro on our PHR chart in last week's edition. All previous poll results can be found in our poll archives.
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The EarlyOOM service in Fedora 32
| I already use EarlyOOM and like it: | 26 (3%) |
| I look forward to trying EarlyOOM: | 313 (38%) |
| I have tried EarlyOOM and do not like it: | 11 (1%) |
| I have not tried EarlyOOM and do not want it: | 347 (42%) |
| Other: | 130 (16%) |
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| Website News (by Jesse Smith) |
Distributions added to waiting list
- RockSolid Signage. RockSolid Signage is an operating system designed for "indestructible" digital signage installations on a PC: it displays a full-screen browser view restricted to a specified resource. It is based on Resilient Linux, a distribution with the data partition mounted on top of the system partition, which is read-only by design at filesystem-level so resistant to filesystem corruption. The digital signage stack is directly derived from Raspberry Digital Signage.
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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, 30 March 2020. Past articles and reviews can be found through our Article Search page. To contact the authors please send e-mail to:
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| Reader Comments • Jump to last comment |
1 • Wanting-a-different-version (by Andy Prough on 2020-03-23 01:38:29 GMT from United States)
Jesse said: "In cases where you are using a more cutting edge distribution, such as Gentoo or a member of the Arch Linux family, you can install a new version of an application and then "pin" or "lock" it using your package manager. This causes the package to no longer get updated, letting you stick with the version you like for as long as you want."
Tumbleweed allows you to lock packages as well.
This is something I need to try on Artix, as there are a few packages for which a more conservative approach would be nice.
The ability to easily install different versions of packages is something I like about MX. In the MX Package Installer, you've got the conservative stuff from Debian Buster for the most part, but MX also makes the Debian Backports plus MX's own testing repo available with more recent packages.
2 • Anarchy Linus Review (by Vern on 2020-03-23 01:45:02 GMT from United States)
It's been a while since I use Anarchy Linux. I recently forgot all about it. Been using another distro. Thank you for a great review. I think I moved away from Arch type installs because of all the constant updates. Athough I sure one can limit that to a minimum.
3 • Software versions (by DaveW on 2020-03-23 01:54:34 GMT from United States)
I am running Linux Mint 18.3. I have 6 versions of LibreOffice installed in parallel, from 3.3 to 7.0-alpha. They are all usable, and I have applications for each. Just one example of what can be done with Linux.
4 • Anarchy review and related thoughts (by randomly generated entity on 2020-03-23 02:05:15 GMT from United States)
I'm sure Anarchy is a fine way to more easily install Arch, with the assorted gotchas encountered by the reviewer to be expected. Arch is about as bleeding edge as it gets after all, and installing it via any non-"Arch Way" is bound to require a little extra effort/research. Might as well just do it their way in the first place if you ask me...
What I find odd is that Plasma/KDE is not one of the default desktop options. Instead we find three different flavors of Gnome-ishness (Budgie and Cinnamon are both, to my mind, just Gnome made less inherently insane), Openbox(!), and Xfce. Why the heavy lean towards GTK and away from QT, which Arch does just fine with?
I wouldn't mind seeing a more KDE-centric simplified Arch (anyone else remember Bridge?). One that's genuinely up to date (unlike Manjaro) and perhaps offers the user an easier way to strip out some of the less useful bits (all the PIM stuff, Kmail, baloo, etc.). There's so much to the whole KDE experience that it just begs for a way to more specifically fine-tune the install.
5 • A Fair & Balanced Anarchy Linux Review (by David on 2020-03-23 02:26:49 GMT from United States)
Joshua -
Thanks for your insightful review of my favorite Arch installer, which I have used with regularity over the past few years, after having failed to succeed repeatedly by doing it "The Arch Way."
I would hesitate to call it a distro though, since it installs virtually plain vanilla Arch without the bloated proprietary repositories that all of the Arch offspring distros such as Manjaro and Arco include in their ISO files, also including the Zen Installer in that category, which falls just short of Anarchy in that regard.
I'd recommend that anyone interested in using Anarchy do just the base installation first, then add desired packages post-installation. I always use the Packages tool to uninstall any packages that I do not need or want during post-installation as well, with a word of caution to keep an eye on any possible broken dependencies that might crash the system. I've learned which packages I can dump, and those that I must retain via trial and error during my first several installation attempts.
I've never had the requirement to do a server installation, so the issues that you encountered have never had any bearing on my single-user status, but it is a responsible consideration for any potential server user to have a clear perspective on the installation problems that you encountered.
Using Anarchy Linux eliminated the intimidation factor that Arch can impose on some potential users, as it did for me, and I know there are those that will never use it because of SystemD, but for anyone that is interested in learning about and evaluating pure Arch for themselves, Anarchy Linux will provide the fastest and easiest startng point.
JMHO
6 • Anarchy (by Rick on 2020-03-23 12:07:34 GMT from United States)
Thanks for reviewing Anarchy! I eased into using Arch with other Arch based distro (Antergos) to see if it was for me before installing the "Arch way". Anarchy fills the niche left by Antergos by providing a near stock Arch install to get a user started.
I recently tried Anarchy and found it a rather good way to get going with an Arch-based install that has a nearly stock configuration.I found that removing theming gave me a very close to vanilla Arch install.
I did not try the advanced install and revisited it after reading the review. It is a very nice option and also provides a way for KDE lovers to install a plasma desktop,
This is a great way to test the Arch Linux world and see if it is for you! Thanks!
7 • Arch Linux installers (by OstroL on 2020-03-23 13:01:49 GMT from Poland)
It is good that there are developers/users, who care enough to create an installer for Arch Linux, because that way an ordinary user an install Arch Linux. Once, Arch Linux is installed, there's no need to install again, or wait for a periodic release. Simply update your installation once in a while. That's the beauty of Arch Linux.
8 • Anarchy (by Bob on 2020-03-23 13:06:13 GMT from United States)
...meh...I'll stick with current Archman and Manjaro install styles. It isn't that difficult to remove unwanted features and add my preferred applications. Nuff said.
9 • Arch installer - Archlab (by Simon on 2020-03-23 13:35:43 GMT from Switzerland)
I've never used Anarchy Linux and I cannot say how good it is.
But, recently, I've tried Archlab, which uses its own installer to install Arch. It is very good. You end up whit a slick Arch install with very little customization. Archlab works very well on my Asus laptop: the only point which bothers me are the endless Arch updates. But lets see hot it goes.
10 • Doesn't matter which Arch installer (by Lin on 2020-03-23 14:49:38 GMT from United Kingdom)
Doesn't matter which Arch installer, as far as it installs pure Arch Linux. After that, it is just a question of periodical updating of the installed system.
11 • Anarchy lost in the crowd (by Vern on 2020-03-23 15:22:18 GMT from United States)
I'm a bit confused. I used Anarchy in the distant past, and have forgotten about it because its not on the top 100. Once I found it, it appears to show that it first release is Jan 2020. that's not so:
https://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=anarchy
12 • RockSolid Signage (by Alexandru on 2020-03-23 15:26:08 GMT from Austria)
We were already witnesses of Oracle Unbreakable Linux, which silently changed its name into Oracle Linux. Such strong names are an invitation for crachers to test just how unbreakable / rock solid is the distribution.
13 • Anarchy releases (by Jesse on 2020-03-23 15:45:17 GMT from Canada)
@11: The page you linked to isn't indicating Anarchy's first release was in January 2020, only that the first one since DistroWatch started tracking it occurred in January. Release information is not retroactively added once a project gets put in the database.
14 • Anarchy (by Jeffrydada on 2020-03-23 18:45:10 GMT from United States)
@6 If you liked Antergos try RebornOS it is the spiritual successor to Antergos. Find in on the waiting list
15 • EarlyOOM service in Fedora 32 (by vasea on 2020-03-23 22:22:28 GMT from Republic of Moldova)
besides other there should be "I use BSD" option in the poll,
cause BSD has such functionality implemented ages ago.
I always was frustrated by linux running OOM, this was the only one feature in windows i missed.
Until I found BSD systems.
16 • #13 Tracking Anarchy (by Vern on 2020-03-23 23:31:40 GMT from United States)
Jesse, I didn't realize Distrowatch only started tracking Anarchy in 2020. I used it over a year ago. Seems to me there was a name change along the way, as Arch Linux didn't like its first naming.
17 • EarlyOOM (by Hoo Da Hell on 2020-03-24 03:13:42 GMT from Brazil)
In a desktop PC with 16GB RAM, like mine, EarlyOOM serves to nothing.
18 • @16 (by Hoos on 2020-03-24 05:44:20 GMT from Singapore)
'Twas called Arch Anywhere.
I do like its installer, but I can see why Arch objected to its original name, since they disagree that a system installed via any installer tool remains pure Arch. It's their right, as the IP owner of the name.
19 • Early OOM (by hank on 2020-03-24 07:12:06 GMT from Germany)
Early OOM, is this the answer to the Gigabyte Log files System D was writing to my SDD, slowing down my system and finally leaving me with no more space for files.
Thank you Mr Pottering, this issue encouraged me to try a system death free Distro.
I will NEVER install a Distro with that crap again.
20 • If EarlyOOM would stop me from opening one more tab, maybe (by Ole 1-2 GB Laptops on 2020-03-24 09:48:34 GMT from Austria)
I already know opening too many browser tabs is what causes my OOM swapping. So EarlyOOM will kill my browser so I don't have to cycle power...Maybe that's a small improvement, but not much. If it would pop up a "No More Tabs" warning when approaching the limit, that would be helpful.
21 • @4 (by James on 2020-03-24 11:14:16 GMT from United States)
The Anarchy installer offers KDE as an option in the non-customized desktop section. Meaning it installs the vanilla KDE Plasma desktop without any Anarchy customization. You can install every other supported DE in the same way if you don't want the Anarchy customization.
22 • Anarchy (by pavlos on 2020-03-24 17:12:46 GMT from Poland)
@ Joshua Allen Holm
Please be so kind and correct the very first sentence of the article - Anarchy is definitely NOT an Arch-based distribution. This is pure Arch distribution with the Anarchy installer add-on. Which is also bolded out on the Anarchy website.
Anarchy does NOT offer its own repository or any other distribution than Arch's own. During installation pacstrap pulls everything from original Arch repos.
By the way, such installers are against Arch purists. I would rather agree with them - proper manual installation may be tricky, but offers the fastest possible learning curve for newcommers. First, you can practice it as many times as necessary on a VM, then how frequently you need trepeating the process? Maybe if you work at a datacenter... This was also my case - I have tried all Manjaros, Antergoss's, all Architects, Archmans etc in VM... Finally I have finished with pure Arch installation. Knowing and understanding much more...
Do you have a brain? You'd better use it - doesn't pain, and brings a lot of fun,,, :)
23 • @21, @22 (by randomly generated entity on 2020-03-24 17:57:31 GMT from United States)
Yes, I gathered that KDE was an option if one were to go the "Anarchy-Advanced" route. I mean... that's fine, but if you're gonna do that, is an "Arch Way" install really that much more difficult? Furthermore, I wonder what the "customized" actually entails with the less advanced desktop options. If, as @22 claims, Anarchy is "a pure Arch distribution", why/how would anything be changed from what Arch provides?
Look, I'm well aware of the "btw, I use Arch" thing and how elitist it appears, but it seriously ain't all that hard to do a real Arch install, especially now that wifi-menu has been added. I can remember beating my head against the old fashioned way of getting wifi working from the install iso (before I became a chroot aficionado) and that was really the only sticking point. It's worth the minimal extra effort to gain a bit more understanding of what makes Arch's implementation of Linux tick.
24 • Anarchy status (by Jesse on 2020-03-24 20:19:58 GMT from Canada)
@22: "Please be so kind and correct the very first sentence of the article - Anarchy is definitely NOT an Arch-based distribution. This is pure Arch distribution with the Anarchy installer add-on. Which is also bolded out on the Anarchy website."
Anarchy Linux meets all the qualifications of a distribution. The developers may not see it that way, but they meet all our criteria of a distro, based on Arch. Holm's observation is accurate.
25 • EarlyOOM and Anarchy (by Bill on 2020-03-24 20:26:59 GMT from Australia)
Doesn't the kernal already do what EarlyOOM does?
I would be interested to try it on one of my lower power laptops anyway.
Arch is pretty easy to run and rarely breaks these days, while I wouldn't recommend it to a newcomer, anyone who has been using Linux for a few months should be able to manage it and there is no reason not to have a simple installer in 2020. Thanks Anarchy for saving me precious time.
26 • Arch Installer (by Justin on 2020-03-24 21:08:45 GMT from United States)
Having an Arch installer is the same reason to have automated build scripts for LFS... to save time for those who have done it several times before (but don't have it memorized) and want to stand up another machine efficiently (i.e., do other work while waiting for the install).
I agree with the reasoning that the manual install scares away newbies that will be over their head, and going through the process manually does teach you a lot. At the same time, I understand the process, I understand what the choices mean, I just want to set and forget an install, not babysit it for 15-20 minutes (and forget to install the bootloader and so have to do it all again). Having DE options is a nice perk so that, again, I avoid stupid mistakes like forgetting to install xorg-xinit because I'm in a hurry.
27 • Arch way no way. (by Vern on 2020-03-24 23:14:57 GMT from United States)
I've installed Arch, the Arch Way several. Never again. I would now prefer a distro like Anarchy to do the mundane tasks so I don't skip a step.
On the same note, I have in the past compiled my kernels. It takes a lot of time, and in the end, for me, not worth it. It was a learning experience while I was doing it.
28 • Anarchy status (by pavlos on 2020-03-25 00:36:55 GMT from Poland)
@24: I wouldn't agree that Anarchy meets all qualifications to be a separate distribution.
After the DW glossary: "A project which ships an operating system that includes the Linux kernel is said to be a Linux distribution.". This project does NOT ship any other operating system and any other Linux kernel than Arch's own.
Archman ISO is just the installer, doesn't ship anything important to your finally installed system. As I said, during the install all OS core contents is pulled directly from Arch repo, especially the kernel. You simply can't install it without the Internet - can you?
@26: I can fully understand that such an installer may facilitate a lot and our life becomes much easier... This is nothing wrong about the installer in itself... Yes, I have made my own notes to not to forget about xorg-xinit during installing a desktop environment...
And some of us have also tried gentoo, a hardcore DIY distro... Linux From Scratch?... No, I didn't, didn't have to. Life is too short to spend hours/days/weeks on recompiling every piece of code with each update... On the other hand, it really may be so interesting to know "how the hell it works" :-)
29 • Anarchy (by Jesse on 2020-03-25 00:53:04 GMT from Canada)
@28: "This project does NOT ship any other operating system and any other Linux kernel than Arch's own."
This isn't entirely true. As pointed out in the review, Anarchy customizes their supported desktop environments. You don't end up with pure Arch if you use the anarchy installer. Also, if you claim Anarchy isn't a distribution then Antergos, EndeavourOS, and Reborn aren't distributions either. Basically almost no Arch-based projects could be considered distributions.
Anarchy provides an operating system, Linux kernel, customized packages, an installer and independent ISO. It has its own website, dev team and support resources. That makes it a separate distro by my standards.
30 • The 'Feynman Disease'. (by R. Cain on 2020-03-25 02:49:54 GMT from United States)
@27--
"...On the same note, I have in the past compiled my kernels. It takes a lot of time, and in the end, for me, not worth it. It was a learning experience while I was doing it. "
***************************************************************************************
"You know how, after doing something, the Universe says to you, 'Don't do that again'? That's called a 'learning experience'."--Douglas Adams
31 • Anarchy installation: true distro? (by Hoos on 2020-03-25 04:51:54 GMT from Singapore)
It's been a while since I tested an anarchy install (VM), but I seem to recall that the installer gave the user the option to only have the Arch repos, or to also include their customised DE. The latter would include their choice of gtk theme and icons, and also their wallpapers. Certainly the wallpapers don't come from pure Arch repos.
Looks like you have a choice; in fact, there were lots of options in the installer for your setup, as I recall. That's distro-ish enough to me. Nothing wrong with that, IMO.
32 • What is best? (by One year-old newbie on 2020-03-25 09:45:24 GMT from United States)
@3 "Just one example of what can be done with Linux"
Compaq Armada 110 that come with Millennium, today runs XP 32bit OS with Office XP, Office 2007 & Office 2010 (no internet of course, because of the browsers not the OS)
As W7 refugee newbie I tried Antix, MX, Netrunner & after PCLinuxOS bricked a 32GB USB stick, I moved to Arch-based, since SistemD-free distros don't like to run on my old machines.
Arch-way was to much, so I installed Anarchy, thanks to its installer. After a short while with Manjaro, I moved to Arco, installed on a 64GB USB stick. (even if installed on its own HDD, runs way slower than W7, freezes and "gives" me a myriad of updates, so I don't like it too much, either.)
33 • EarlyOOM (by Ankleface Wroughlandmire on 2020-03-25 13:14:23 GMT from Ecuador)
I use EarlyOOM on my openSUSE laptop with 8GB of RAM to keep me out of trouble when I have to run Windows 10 in a VM. Frankly, I hate the idea of a user-space process being in charge of such a fundamental function as memory management, but it is unfortunately necessary. In my experience, the Linux kernel has laughably poor memory management for desktop usage patterns. It doesn't manage swap space well, leaving junk in the swap space even after manually closing processes to free up plenty of RAM. And even if there is no swap space configured, it still thrashes the disk, I don't remember the exact technical explanation of what it's exactly doing, but it brings the system to its knees. And that's the problem, in my opinion, the kernel should never *ever* allow a user-space process to bring down the system. Sure, the kernel and the daemons are technically still running, but anything that requires user interactivity with the mouse is rendered useless, and everything goes into a death spiral unless you SysRq out of it to manually invoke the OOM killer. Hence the necessity of EarlyOOM.
34 • @33 (by Justin on 2020-03-25 15:50:33 GMT from United States)
I ran into the disk thrashing with kwapd0 eating up 100% CPU on an old netbook with no swap configured. The problem is that the file cache is being purged to free up memory for programs. The kernel uses your excess RAM to cache files from disk to speed up performance. This is why when you open Firefox the first time it is one speed and closing and reopening is much faster. All the files to load from disk are already in memory.
What bugs me is that this thrashing can happen even with a fair amount of free memory. I was experimenting with KDE Neon so that I had a modern KDE experience (supposedly the latest KDE has lower memory requirements, and Trinity is just so old, a bit slow, and I question the security). With 1.1GB/1.7GB used, the browser thrashes like crazy if I open more than 2 or 3 tabs. Apparently so much memory is needed for KDE and the browser that the kernel loads one file, does its thing, then unloads it to load another file, run a little more code, then go back to the first... you can see where this is going.
Incidentally, I like how KDE Neon looks, but KDE on this netbook runs like Windows 7 (looks as good if not better, but all the lag is there unfortunately). I wish there were more nice looking desktops like KDE that were lighter (not just memory but CPU; I could buy more memory if I really cared). I'd love to show off this KDE setup, but it lags too much. Showing off JWM+ROX just doesn't do it for anyone any more. I wish there were a foundation, distro, or someone that we could donate to so that they could hire some artists to update icons, do more HiDPI, etc., that would benefit the entire Linux ecosystem / desktop selection.
35 • Arch/Anarchy (by Otis on 2020-03-25 18:16:41 GMT from United States)
Is Anarchy a distro? Not according to the Anarchy home website:
Anarchy Linux
A simple and intuitive Arch Linux installer
In nice bold font.
But, as pointed out by the DW site operator/maintainer, Anarchy fits his standards/definition of a distro in and of itself.
So, we have to agree to disagree.
36 • To Be a Distro or Not Be a Distro (by David on 2020-03-25 20:22:34 GMT from United States)
I think the point is a valid one that the only true "pure" Arch distro is that which is constructed manually - "The Arch Way."
While I am guilty of having characterized Anarchy as installing pure Arch, I usually describe it as being 99.99% pure Arch, which I feel is generally accurate. I must confess that I now regard Anarchy Linux as fitting the description of a distro.
I do, however, differentiate Anarchy, and find it unique and separate from the rest of the Arch-based distros, in the fact that the installation process draws directly from the default Arch repositories. It installs ZERO proprietary repositories, as virtually all of the Arch re-spins do. If you want all the packages in those proprietary repos, then that is your option. If you want reduce system bloat, and get access to ONLY the Arch default repos, then Anarchy is the installation option that you should consider. In my work, I require a relatively small number of packages, and I've never installed any packages from the AUR, which are not always properly vetted. The only serious breakage I've ever had running Arch was caused by a defective LightDM update that crashed one of my systems sometime last year. Otherwise, Arch has run virtually error-free for me for several years.
@23
From one "elitist" to another, I'm just a guy that prefers Arch to whatever distro(s) you like, which I've probably already tested and moved on from. After a couple of years with Mint/Cinnamon, I started distro-hopping like a psychotic bunny rabbit on steroids. I tried Slackware, Gentoo and many of their offspring, like Calculate. Debian, Ubuntu, OpenSuse, PCLOS, you name it, I tried it, motivated by pure curiosity. I wasn't until I finally and painfully was able to successfully install Antergos, that I gained my positive perspective on Arch. After having run virtually every Arch offspring distro on the DW/HPD list with varying success, I ran across Anarchy, and it's "as close to pure Arch as you can get" installer. It lead me to the distro that fulfills and optimizes my work flow. While I'm still reviewing the only viable non-SystemD Arch alternative, Artix Linux, in both Runit & OpenRC flavors, I've still found "plain vanilla" Arch to be the most stable & powerful distro I've every rolled with.
So, yes, I am an Arch user. If that makes me an elitist, then so be it.
I've also have been to "reverse-engineer" my Arch knowledge by reviewing some of the many Arco Linux YouTube tutorial videos produced by the Arco lead developer Erik DuBois, so any potential Anarchy users should check those out to get up to speed with Arch in a hurry.
JMHO
37 • @36 and Arch "elitism" (by randomly generated entity on 2020-03-25 21:50:54 GMT from United States)
@36 - My experience is similar to yours in many ways. Like you, I've tried just about any distro you could name - I have most of the major ones installed as a matter of fact, and wander from one to another as I get bored or my mood changes. I'm a curious guy, and I like keeping up to date on the current state of the distro world.
My first Arch-ish distro was probably Chakra, though Archbang is another possibility. But once I figured out how to do the "Arch Way" install, I found no reason to bother anymore with the various "make Arch easier" distros. I guess if I had to constantly deploy Arch on multiple machines, maybe I'd go another way, but I only have two machines, so that number of installs was trivial. Rolling release means no reinstalls and all that...
The "elitist" thing is really only important when it comes to support (if needed), because as we all know Arch's forum folks can be rather unforgiving in general, downright ornery if one hasn't installed Arch as opposed to one of their offspring distros. And they have every right to be! Unless you go through the install guide step by step and do your research and all that, why should they be expected to handhold anyone through the same issues over and over again? Is this elitism? Maybe. I call it protecting the brand and ethos of what has grown to be one of the most important distros in existence.
Arch and Arch-based distros are leaps and bounds more popular now than they were even a few years ago, which is a good thing if you ask me. I just hope that all the "I made an installer!" distros - and there are more of these every day it seems - are prepared to do user support, because it isn't Arch's problem if you don't follow their rules.
38 • Doing It The Arch Way (by David on 2020-03-25 22:40:33 GMT from United States)
@37
In between my last Arch offspring distro test - EndeavourOS - which I like very much because of it's XFCE4 ISO exclusivity (my favorite DE), and reduced system bloat, I was determined to install Arch manually, which I was able to accomplish exactly once, after about my fourth try. It was painful & time-consuming. The primary conclusion that I carried forward from that learning experience was that I'll never do another manual install.
I run as many as six PC's on my home network, and after I discovered the Anarchy installer, Arch became the standardized computing platform on all of my production PC's.
I'd still like to effectively ditch SystemD at some point, which is why I'm running two Artix init versions on my test boxes right now.
I've never encountered an Arch breakage that I couldn't fix myself by finding a solution in either reading the Arch Wiki, or by watching an Arco/Arch system recovery tutorial video on YouTube. I'm aware of the attitude of some of the Arch forum members, which as you say is probably justified. I have never asked a question of any of them, nor do I intend to start now.
Maybe I am an elitist, because I have no requirement for the forum member's back and forth advice or disdain.
JMHO
39 • @38 Further curiosity (by randomly generated entity on 2020-03-26 01:57:55 GMT from United States)
Wow, it sounds like you'd be someone ideally suited to being able to do an Arch Way install easily! I've probably done it 7-8 times over the years and, while I've certainly had to follow the instructions closely each time, it's never gotten me too frustrated - aside from back before wfi-menu removed that particular obstacle. Granted, things do get a little fuzzy between getting the base system installed and getting a DE/X up and running. They sure could make that more clear by putting it all in fewer jumps to other parts of the wiki, but I've never ended up with anything less than success. I don't think I ever even had to use my now-favorite trick of chroot-ing into installs to do fixes/updates/maintenance.
Can you recall at which point it caused issues for you? I'm not pointing fingers or anything, just genuinely curious. I mean, if you were able to get Gentoo (my current distro of choice with a lean and mean plasma) up and running, Arch should be much much easier. I've had some definite moments of confusion with Gentoo! Mainly due to having an older nvidia graphics card requiring the 340 series driver, but not always. For a while I was having trouble even getting a bootable kernel from genkernel!
Anyway, thanks for the back and forth, and happy distro-ing. I hope you find your perfect fit soon.
40 • @34 lxqt DE, or Knoppix KDE Plasma (by Elcaset on 2020-03-26 02:27:58 GMT from United States)
I prefer KDE Plasma, but you might enjoy the lxqt DE. It's fast on netbooks. Knoppix is also fast on netbooks, even when running KDE Plasma. I don't know how Klaus makes that happen!
41 • Transparency & Full Disclosure (by David on 2020-03-26 02:38:12 GMT from United States)
@39
In the interest of transparency and full disclosure, I mentioned Calculate because I used it as an introductory on-ramp to the Gentoo branch, which proved to be too much of a culture shock, and too much work to get up & running fast and efficiently. My interest in the Gentoo branch evaporated rapidly. The Calculate ISO also irretrievably corrupted the thumb drive upon which the image was burned, so buh-bye to Gentoo and its offspring.
I think @26 and @27 and @28 said it best -
"And some of us have also tried gentoo, a hardcore DIY distro... Linux From Scratch?... No, I didn't, didn't have to. Life is too short to spend hours/days/weeks on recompiling every piece of code with each update... On the other hand, it really may be so interesting to know "how the hell it works" :-) "
I don't recall where I went wrong with my manual Arch install attempts, I'm sure the bootloader omission crashed me at least once.
The point is Anarchy just works - for me, the installer is bulletproof, and has never failed me as a user. Non-SystemD Artix is promising, but I'm not ready to fully commit to it yet.
Over and out...
JMHO
42 • OOM/BSD (by Otis on 2020-03-26 16:05:21 GMT from United States)
@15 I don't know about the OOM thing.. yet, but I can tell you that GhostsBSD is one cracking operating system. 20.02 has no hitches or glitches that I can detect at this point (second day of use).
BSD in general could be the way to go for much of the expressed anxieties about the direction Linux distros have been heading.
43 • oom-killer and EarlyOOM (by CS on 2020-03-27 14:15:22 GMT from United States)
Sorry BSD fans, oom-killer is not new to Linux. oom-killer has been around since, I don't know a long time ago and in my experience works well on server workloads where usually just 1 process goes out of control.
I agree with what Ankleface says that if you ever hit oom-killer in a desktop environment your system will never behave quite right again till you reboot it.
https://github.com/rfjakob/earlyoom is a userspace implementation, the author went this route because you can make it behave however you want, e.g. to kill things earlier before all swap is gone. Maybe that will be better.
Number of Comments: 43
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| • 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 |
| • Issue 1035 (2023-09-04): Debian GNU/Hurd 2023, PCLinuxOS 2023.07, do home users need a firewall, AlmaLinux introduces new repositories, Rocky Linux commits to RHEL compatibility, NetBSD machine runs unattended for nine years, Armbian runs wallpaper contest |
| • Issue 1034 (2023-08-28): Void 20230628, types of memory usage, FreeBSD receives port of Linux NVIDIA driver, Fedora plans improved theme handling for Qt applications, Canonical's plans for Ubuntu |
| • Issue 1033 (2023-08-21): MiniOS 20230606, system user accounts, how Red Hat clones are moving forward, Haiku improves WINE performance, Debian turns 30 |
| • Full list of all issues |
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Ubuntu MATE
Ubuntu MATE is a desktop Linux distribution which aims to bring the simplicity and elegance of the Ubuntu operating system through a classic, traditional desktop environment - the MATE desktop. MATE is the continuation of the GNOME 2 desktop environment which was used as Ubuntu's default desktop until 10.10 (when it was replaced by Unity). The project began its life as an Ubuntu "remix", but starting with version 15.04, it was formally accepted as an official member of the Ubuntu family of Linux distributions.
Status: Active
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View our range including the highly anticipated StarFighter. Available with coreboot open-source firmware and a choice of Ubuntu, elementary, Manjaro and more. Visit Star Labs for information, to buy and get support.
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