 DistroWatch Weekly |
| DistroWatch Weekly, Issue 876, 27 July 2020 |
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Welcome to this year's 30th issue of DistroWatch Weekly!
Keeping computers and networks secure is a process involving many approaches. The software we use is certainly a component, but there are other, non-technical, factors to consider. There is a human element to security, a balancing of approaches and procedures to consider. This week in our News section we discuss a few security tips. First we hear from the IPFire team on locking down and maintaining a network. Then we share tips from Fedora Magazine on how to migrate from the secure copy (scp) tool to the more flexible rsync command. We are also pleased to share some positive information about newer versions of the Linux kernel using less energy. Then, in our Questions and Answers column, we discuss different types of release models and how they stay up to date in different ways. This week we also share a review of the Artix Linux distribution. Bernhard Hoffmann took this project for a spin and he reports on his experiences with the various editions in our Feature Story. Though we mostly talk about Linux, in particular GNU/Linux distributions, on this website there are plenty of other open source operating systems in the world. We would like to know if you use any of them in our Opinion Poll. Please let us know which open source, non-Linux platforms you are using in the comments. Plus we are 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: Artix Linux 20200125
- News: IPFire shares security tips, Fedora offers guide for switching from scp to rsync, Manjaro user tests kernel power consumption
- Questions and answers: Updating a rolling release versus a fixed release distribution
- Released last week: SUSE Linux Enterprise 15 SP2, GeckoLinux 152, REMnux 7
- Torrent corner: CloudyReady, GeckoLinux, IPFire, KDE neon, Omarine
- Upcoming releases: Tails 4.9
- Opinion poll: Open source alternatives to Linux
- New distributions: Laxer OS, AlterLinux, Serene Linux, RoshanTech POS OS, dahliaOS
- Reader comments
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| Feature Story (by Bernhard Hoffmann) |
Artix Linux 20200125
This is one of the lesser known distributions but it has garnered quite a few fans in its relatively short existence. Artix Linux, from hereon Artix in short, has a reader supplied rating of 8.4 as an average of 94 opinions on DistroWatch at the time of writing, which isn't bad for a distribution that is slightly more involved in terms of technical knowledge and experience a user should possess. Not to discourage the curious and the newcomers, but it is not an install and forget type of Linux though not really that hard to use either.
Artix is a systemd-free fork of Arch Linux that grew out of the Arch-OpenRC and Manjaro-OpenRC projects joining forces to provide installable images with alternative init solutions to Arch users who were unhappy with the parent moving to systemd. In fact, Arch was one of the early adopters. While in the beginning only OpenRC might have been offered, Artix now also provides install images using the runit and s6 init software, "because PID1 must be simple, secure and stable." [1] There's great variety and choice on the download page, but only the x86_64 architecture is supported. The project provides Artix base images of 520MB each, similar to a net-install or the Arch install image, and with Cinnamon, MATE, Plasma, Xfce, LXDE and LXQt ISO files for almost every major desktop environment. They weigh in between 939MB and 1.1GB depending on your chosen flavour. The page makes it clear what to expect with these, i.e. only a basic set of applications is included to get the user started: a file manager, a media player (MPV), a network manager, a document viewer, a web browser and the graphical installer. It is then up to us to add applications and shape the system to our needs and liking.
There are also community supported images labelled community-gtk and community-qt which are much larger at 2.3GB and 2.8GB respectively.
You can get every flavour with any of the three supported init systems. Official images seem to be respun now and then. At the time of writing most stable images are dated from February 2020, with the Xfce ISO labelled 20200506 apparently released in May. Further down the page there are also weekly snapshots that I guess incorporate the latest package updates, and testing images for GNOME and i3, again for all three init systems. That's a huge library to maintain and gives us a hint of how dedicated folks behind this project are. Should you have trouble with the latest version a few older ISOs have been archived and are accessible at the bottom.
Artix has been mentioned a few times in the comments section and having used ArchBang for a few years without the need to reinstall I'm quite comfortable with the Arch way. I quit this branch of Linux distributions when they moved to systemd so I kind of fall into their target audience and thought I would give it a try.
It needs to be said from the outset that this installation is only for testing purposes as I usually prefer an unchanging underlying base these days so as to avoid surprises with incompatible libraries and whatnot when gaming or just wanting to watch a movie with Kodi. While this has never really been an issue with Arch when I was running it you do not want to find out that something isn't working when you just sat back ready to watch the football or a TV show. Try explaining to your wife that the last update might have hosed something. She'll want her PayTV and Netflix back the next day. So stable it is for me, you get the picture. However, if this goes well Artix may stay on this machine as a secondary option, replacing an unused Manjaro.
For my trials I went for the latest KDE Plasma and Cinnamon editions with runit. The nice thing is these are all live images so we can check them out first and then decide which one we like most. I had also tried the 20200125 OpenRC Cinnamon image previously and compared to the one using runit with the same date but did not notice any difference in boot times or otherwise. For various reasons runit it is for me.
Live mode
Booting from the media brings up a menu of several boot options. We can set timezone, keyboard layout and language independently from each other as these are not linked, handy for example if you want your interface language to be British English but have a different keyboard. We can then tell the boot loader which media to boot from - optical media or USB. In practice this does not make any difference. If you choose CD but a USB stick is inserted it will boot this one anyway with a short delay.
Artix Linux 20200214 -- The Artix boot screen
(full image size: 708kB, resolution: 1021x768 pixels)
At the bottom there's an empty line where we can edit boot options. We get a very short boot sequence showing the Artix logo and kernel in use and it's off to the desktop.
I tested both the Plasma and Cinnamon editions in live mode. Multimedia keys on my Dell laptop are supported. Sleep and waking up worked fine. The lock screen has a short timeout and if you are left wondering how to log in again the password is 'artix'.
Artix Linux 20200214 -- The live Cinnamon desktop
(full image size: 735kB, resolution: 1280x800 pixels)
Both desktops are almost identically set up, only differentiated slightly by their particular theming and menus. In Cinnamon we get the usual links to access computer, home directory and Trash (or Wastebasket in British English), plus some additional links named Configuration and one for the particular init system chosen. They are essentially pointing to different sections of the same file to help us get started, with tips on how to set hostname and keymap in the virtual console, and configure ALSA and user permissions (OpenRC only). Troubleshooting includes some useful hints, for example if one should encounter problems with D-Bus in the KDE Plasma edition. The Readme file shows where a log of the live session can be found. KDE is a bit cleaner and does not include desktop specific shortcuts.
Artix Linux 20200214 -- The KDE Plasma desktop
(full image size: 742kB, resolution: 1280x800 pixels)
One thing to note is that if choosing a different language than English translations in Cinnamon are inconsistent. As an example, even though I chose German keyboard and language at the GRUB boot screen, links on the desktop remained in (American) English, as did parts of the menu relating to all applications, places and recent documents. Only the sub-menus of the software section were translated. The K menu was fully translated and not pre-populated with any favourites on the left.
The Plasma edition is also a bit more sparse with the wallpapers, with only the default Artix and Plasma 5.18 backgrounds included. The Cinnamon edition offers a large choice of Artix artwork plus several others. Interestingly, these were translated so it's a bit hit and miss on this front.
Artix Linux 20200214 -- Wallpaper selection in the Cinnamon edition
(full image size: 805kB, resolution: 1280x800 pixels)
Internal hard drives can easily be mounted by clicking on devices in the file manager.
This all looked good if you're not too fussy about the localization. The important thing is that the keyboard was set correctly to my chosen locale, in this case de_DE. I decided to proceed with the Cinnamon edition for further testing from hereon.
VirtualBox
First up was a test of the live session in VirtualBox. Mouse integration works. Ability to change the display resolution - check, but not in the resolution required for fullscreen. This persisted in the installed system. I need 1920x1080 and for full display and for some reason this wasn't possible so in order not to have to scroll in the VirtualBox window the highest practical resolution I could get was 1680x1050, or 1440x900 in windowed mode. I'm sure this can be fixed but it's not working right from the start.
Artix Linux 20200214 -- Installed in VirtualBox with a mix of German and English in the display settings
(full image size: 603kB, resolution: 1440x900 pixels)
I then proceeded to install Artix on a virtual disk which when finished gives us pretty much the same experience as in the live session, sans the helpful desktop shortcuts, so live mode is an accurate representation of the system, as it is supposed to be.
Installing Artix
In the KDE edition there's a shortcut to the installer on the desktop which can also be found under system settings. There seems to be a bug in that the installer shows up on the desktop only if the session has been started with the default US locale, at least it did not show up when selecting several other language settings I tried - German, Dutch, Polish and Czech.
Clicking on it opened a box that turns out to be the Calamares installer. In the Cinnamon edition however there was no obvious way to install the system and only after going through all applications in the menu was I able to locate the installer.
The installer starts in a window and walks us through the usual steps of choosing location and language, keyboard layout, partitioning scheme and setting up users. It also gives us a summary of our selections which really should be read before committing everything to disk. The customization module for various sets of software mentioned for an earlier iteration of the Artix installer seems to have been stripped out again.
For some reason Calamares insisted on installing Artix to the SD card left in the slot so be careful here in the partitioning phase. Worse, even after designating several partitions on my sda drive with mount points to Artix it still chose my SD card to install the boot loader on. As this entry is right at the bottom it is easy to overlook and I had almost missed it had I not read the summary provided before the install commenced for real.
The first boot up after finishing ended at a blinking cursor, with the hard drive light showing intermittent disk activity but apparently to no avail. I decided to pull the plug so to speak and booted again. The second time all went well and I was presented with the Cinnamon desktop.
Running Artix
Starting up, the distribution on another partition had been recognized and added to the GRUB menu.
The system booted from an SSD in a matter of seconds, shutdown time was incredibly fast and not even worth mentioning. Every interaction just felt incredibly fast and light. The main thing I noticed was that the Cinnamon environment was not localised or translated at all, just like in live mode, except parts of the menu.
A desktop notification let me know that wireless networks were available. Network manager is in use and after entering my credentials I was off to a good start. Despite the wallpapers, theming is not Artix's strong side. The default Artix-dark theme is a bit plasticky. A few nice Matefaenza icons are included but not used by default, which immediately give it a bit of a Mint flair. Luckily Cinnamon's themes panel makes downloading additional themes easy as pie after a quick refresh.
The entire fresh install used about 4.2GB drive space and htop showed 550MB of memory in use. As noted in the introduction, the project aims at not including too much software to start with. You get the control panel and tools of the desktop environment, the Nemo file manager, the Atril document viewer, a screenshot tool, a picture viewer, MPV for playing videos and Midori as browser (Falkon with the Plasma desktop). We can add from here but there is no graphical package manager. Using "sudo pacman -Syu" we can update the system. Having used the last stable image from February 2020 there were 146 packages to the tune of 245MB to download, not really too much given that nearly five months have passed.
The entire update process took less than two minutes on a 10MB/s connection, including the automated running of build hooks. Unfortunately, upon reboot a problem already encountered at the first boot persisted, namely going into a blank screen, no cursor this time. Shutting down and rebooting the desktop came up as normal and the issue did not crop up again during subsequent smaller updates.
Artix Linux 20200214 -- Checking out software repositories with Pamac
(full image size: 269kB, resolution: 1280x800 pixels)
Time to add more applications. Several repositories have already been added for us. The more interesting ones for a broader choice are probably Extra and Community, and we could also add the AUR from Arch Linux. For the graphical package manager I tried Octopi and Pamac. Octopi requires gksu which was unavailable. Pamac works well but requires a lot of scrolling as it always shows installed packages first. For this reason I would recommend staying with pacman at the command line. If you want to use Pamac however, it provides easy access to the Arch User Repository with its contributed build scripts which needs to be enabled in settings and it also adds an update notification to the system tray. This makes keeping track just as convenient as some of the major distributions.
Artix Linux 20200214 -- The settings panel and red update notification
(full image size: 406kB, resolution: 1280x800 pixels)
I was able to install the latest Kodi from the official repositories (be sure to choose the kodi-x11 package), the client for my chosen VPN and the Brave browser from AUR so my requirements were met. There's also a link to the Brave package from the contributor of the build script for those who don't want or cannot spend a lot of time compiling. Overall this and the efficiency and pure speed of package management made me quite happy to be using Artix.
Artix Linux 20200214 -- Watching an old video file in MPV
(full image size: 758kB, resolution: 1280x800 pixels)
Multimedia codecs seem to be onboard from the start as I was able to watch several video formats.
Resources
After a few days running the system on and off I noticed that the battery drained rather qickly when compared to my other install on this machine and set about to investigate. Running the 5.7.8 kernel CPU usage was intense, consistently using around 50% across both cores with no other applications open. This meant with 1 hour 40 minutes the battery lasted less than half as long as with my other system.
Conclusion
I really like Artix because it is providing us with a fine line-up of ready-made images of various desktops combined with a choice of several alternative and probably underused init systems. It even introduced me to one I had not heard about, s6, and made me look more into the pros and cons, strengths and weaknesses of the different ones available. If these environments are not to your liking, there's always the minimal base install to build from the ground up.
Former Arch users who did not like the move to systemd will enjoy Artix, as will new users with a basic level of understanding and knowledge of what applications are available they would like to install. Anybody already experienced with the pacman syntax of updating and installing applications should be comfortable with it and not have much of a learning curve.
If you are looking for a fully localized system, at least with Cinnamon, there is additional work to do. Turns out the cinnamon-translations package is needed. Even after this though the menu entry for Advanced Network Configuration pointing to Network Manager stubbornly remains. Perhaps this package could in future be included just to bring the desktop experience up to par with KDE Plasma where out of the box localization does not seem to be a problem. I also made the observation that the Cinnamon desktop is slightly less responsive on the same machine than my Debian 10 Plasma instance on another partition. Opening the Nemo file manager takes a good 3-4 seconds on an SSD and battery drain is a concern.
Artix also has a wiki, a mailing list and a forum and the team can be contacted via IRC channel. This being essentially Arch Linux the parent distro's wiki can also be consulted. This means there is a great deal of documentation and support available for those willing to look and read, which is a pre-requisite with this type of distribution. If you are looking for a fully localized system, at least with Cinnamon, there is additional work to do. It also pays to keep an eye on the Artix home page. Just like with Arch, news, arising issues and changes that require manual intervention are posted here so one is not caught out by a potentially troublesome update. Happy camping!
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Hardware used in this review:
- Dell Latitude E4300, 13.3" notebook display 1280x800 (WXGA) used with external monitor
- 6GiB DDR3 RAM
- 250GB Samsung SSD 860 EVO,
- Intel Centrino Core2Duo 9300 @ 1.6GHz (up to 2.26 with Boost)
- 1066MHz FSB, USB 2.0
- Intel Mobile 4 Series Chipset integrated graphics
- Intel Corporation Ultimate N WiFi Link 5300 wireless
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To get an idea of the features, pros and cons of each of these you might consult this overview, for example, and check out the Gentoo and Arch wikis. You can hop directly to this comparison.
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Visitor supplied rating
Artix Linux has a visitor supplied average rating of: 9.3/10 from 186 review(s).
Have you used Artix Linux? You can leave your own review of the project on our ratings page.
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| Miscellaneous News (by Jesse Smith) |
IPFire shares security tips, Fedora offers guide for switching from scp to rsync, Manjaro user tests kernel power consumption
The IPFire team develops a distribution focused on security, and network security in particular. Since the software we run is only ever a small part of the security puzzle, the IPFire team has begun publishing a series of guides to keeping computers and networks secure. "When it comes to IT security, you will need to rely on the users sooner or later - think about being lured to enable macros in malicious MS-Office documents. This is why raising security awareness of both administrators and users is the first step to a less insecure network. Hence this post focuses on non-technical aspects and preemptive information security (sometimes abbreviated as "infosec") considerations." The first article gives a good overview of important tips to consider when trying to secure a computer network, whether it is at home or in an office.
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The scp secure copy program is a widely used method to transfer files between computers. However, due to some limitations and weaknesses in the scp protocol, the developers have suggested people should migrate to other methods of transferring files, such as the sftp (secure file transfer protocol) and rsync synchronization software. Fedora Magazine has published a guide on how to use rsync along with a comparison of how to perform similar tasks using both scp and rsync. "As part of the 8.0 pre-release announcement, the OpenSSH project stated that they consider the scp protocol outdated, inflexible, and not readily fixed. They then go on to recommend the use of sftp or rsync for file transfer instead. Many users grew up on the scp command, however, are not familiar with rsync." Though the guide is published on Fedora Magazine, it should be applicable across all Linux and BSD platforms.
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A member of the Manjaro Linux community was curious about benefits (or drawbacks) to using different versions of the Linux kernel with regards to power consumption. After doing some experiments with a Dell XPS 13 laptop, the results were posted. Power consumption was shown to be greatly reduced (from about 6.09 watts down to 3.47 watts) on a recent development snapshot of the kernel and the results were posted on Reddit. "I tried as soon as I had some spare time available to do a simple comparison between the idle power consumption with the actual 5.4 stable kernel (5.4.52-1-MANJARO) and the 5.8rc5 experimental kernel, as described in the aforementioned post. Both the tests were taken 5 minutes after a cold boot, at around 95% of battery charge. In both tests the laptop (Dell XPS 13 9343) was connected to a WiFi network, no external monitors attached, 50% brightness, TLP in battery mode."
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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) |
Updating a rolling release versus a fixed release distribution
Catching-up asks: Sometimes I see people saying that they're still on older versions of a particular distro, like say CentOS 7 or Debian 8. How do they do this? How are they updating the programs installed but not the operating system itself? Because if I were to install, say, Debian 9 and then updated it, wouldn't it just jump to 10?
DistroWatch answers: When it comes to updating the software included in Linux distributions there are two main approaches developers can take. The first is called a "rolling release" model. When new versions of applications become available in a rolling release distribution the new versions replace the old versions of software. This causes the whole operating system to be gradually updated over time as old components are replaced with new ones. Users who regularly install updates are continually upgrading their operating system to its latest version.
In other words, if you installed a rolling distribution such as Manjaro Linux 19.0 and downloaded all the available updates for it, you would effectively be running Manjaro Linux 20.0.
The second approach to upgrading software in a Linux distribution is called a "fixed release". In a fixed release, the included software is "frozen" at the time the distribution is published. New versions of applications are not introduced (with some very rare exceptions). When problems are found in applications and a new version released the distribution's developers do not package up the new version of the application. Instead they take just the fixed piece of code and apply it to their existing, older version of the software. They "patch" their old version of an application to fix problems, but they do not package up an entire new version. This means, when the user installs new updates, they are getting security fixes for old problems, but not getting new versions of software or new features.
If you were to install Debian 9 and install all of its software updates, what you would end up with is still Debian 9, with some critical problems fixed. Your software packages would not be upgraded to match the ones available in Debian 10.
People often run rolling release distributions when they want to stay up to date with the latest software releases and enjoy a steady stream of new features. Fixed release distributions, which usually only update their software with security fixes, do not change much over time and are better suited for environments where the operating system needs to be static and predictable.
To make matters slightly more confusing, many fixed release distributions can perform a special kind of upgrade which jumps the operating system from one major version to the next. Debian, Fedora, and Ubuntu users, to name a few, have the option of jumping from one major version to the next. This is not the default behaviour when installing updates on any of these distributions, but it is an option people can use if they wish to run newer versions of their fixed release operating system without performing a fresh install from scratch.
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Additional answers can be found in our Questions and Answers archive.
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| Released Last Week |
GeckoLinux 152
GeckoLinux is a desktop-oriented distribution based on openSUSE. The project's latest version includes updated desktop environments and enables several third-party software repositories. "GeckoLinux continues to be focused on eliminating pain points and polishing its unique out-of-the-box configuration on top of the stable and flexible openSUSE base. Proprietary media formats play out of the box, and additional user-installed multimedia applications work automatically with restricted media codecs thanks to the prioritized inclusion of the Packman repository. Google and Skype repositories are also configured out-of-the-box for optional installation by the user of proprietary applications from those vendors. Third-party RPM packages can be easily installed using the graphical YaST package manager. GeckoLinux uses the Calamares system installer at version 3.2.15, providing easy but powerful options for reliable installation of the live system. A variety of GeckoLinux ISO spins are available with polished desktop environments to suit every need and preference. Each spin contains a well curated selection of preinstalled applications appropriate for the particular desktop environment. Current highlights include: Cinnamon 4.4.8; MATE 1.24.0; Plasma 5.18.5 / KDE applications 20.04; Xfce 4.14; GNOME 3.34.4; LXQt 0.14.1." Further information can be found in the project's release announcement.
SUSE Linux Enterprise 15 SP2
The SUSE team has announced the release of a new service pack (SP) for SUSE Linux Enterprise (SLE). The new update, SUSE Linux Enterprise 15 SP2, offers security improvements, techniques to reduce downtime, and improvements to ARM platforms. "Greater security for federal government and public sector organizations as well as others running high-security environments with FIPS 140-2 certification-ready packages. Ensure protection against outsider threats for IBM Z installations with support for IBM Secure Execution and Secure Boot. Support for a complete and secure offline installation for air-gapped deployments, which are typical for military and healthcare environments. Protect data at rest without additional software cost using cryptctl. Local and Remote disk encryption can be setup for all on-premises, cloud and hybrid installations along with enterprise key management KMIP standard. Increase Linux system uptime by up to 12 months while maintaining highest security standards with SUSE Linux Enterprise Live Patching, now also available for IBM Z and LinuxONE." Further details can be found in the company's release announcement.
REMnux 7
Lenny Zeltser has announced the release of REMnux 7, a major update of the project's Ubuntu-based distribution with a toolkit for reverse-engineering and analysing malicious software. The new version continues to be delivered as an OVA virtual appliance, but is now based on Ubuntu 18.04: "Ten years after the initial release of REMnux, I'm thrilled to announce that REMnux version 7 is now available. This Linux distribution for malware analysis includes hundreds of new and classic tools for examining executables, documents, scripts, and other forms of malicious code. What's new in REMnux 7? Almost everything! All the tools have been refreshed, some have been retired, and many new ones have been added to the distro. Browse the expanded, categorized listing of the tools to get a sense for what you can do with REMnux and learn about the tools' authors. For a quick glance, check out the one-page summary. Revamped REMnux documentation provides an extensive, categorized listing of the installed malware analysis tools, and lists their authors, websites, and license details. REMnux has been fully rebuilt to help stay up-to-date with the rapid pace of today's tool releases. To achieve this, the distro now uses SaltStack behind the scenes for automating the installation and configuration of software."
REMnux 7 -- Running the GNOME desktop
(full image size: 33kB, resolution: 1920x1080 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: 2,078
- Total data uploaded: 32.8TB
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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) |
Open source alternatives to Linux
When it comes to open source operating systems, GNU/Linux distributions tend to attract the most attention. The Linux kernel is used in billions of mobile devices, millions of desktop and server systems, and powers most of the world's top super computers. However, there are many other (often less talked about) open source operating systems in the world. Some are widely used behind the scenes in businesses, such as FreeBSD, others are providing lightweight desktop experiences the way Haiku does, while still others are embedded in places we might not expect, the way MINIX is. We would like to know if you run any non-Linux open source systems. Let us know which ones in the comments.
You can see the results of our previous poll on purchasing support for LibreOffice in last week's edition. All previous poll results can be found in our poll archives.
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Open source alternatives to Linux
| I run one or more BSDs: | 319 (17%) |
| I run Haiku: | 46 (2%) |
| I run MINIX: | 8 (0%) |
| I run ReactOS: | 34 (2%) |
| I run all of the above: | 19 (1%) |
| I run some of the above: | 92 (5%) |
| I run another alternative: | 54 (3%) |
| I do not run any non-Linux open source OS: | 1272 (66%) |
| I do not run any open source OS: | 69 (4%) |
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| Website News (by Jesse Smith) |
Distributions added to waiting list
- Laxer OS. Laxer OS is a rolling-release platform based on Arch Linux. The distribution ships with the GNOME desktop environment.
- AlterLinux is a Japanese distribution based on Arch Linux. The project uses the ZEN Linux kernel and is available in three desktop editions: KDE Plasma, LXDE, and Xfce.
- Serene Linux. Serene Linux is an Ubuntu-based distribution from Japan that strives to run on low-resource computers.
- RoshanTech POS OS. RoshanTech POS OS is a point-of-sale platform based on Linux Mint which uses web-based technology for its user interface.
- dahliaOS. dahliaOS is a minimal Linux distribution featuring a custom desktop environment called Pangolin. The graphical user interface is constructed using Google's Flutter toolkit.
- LudoOS. LudoOS is an Ubuntu-based distribution that runs the Pantheon desktop.
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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, 3 August 2020. 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 1122 (2025-05-19): GoboLinux 017.01, RHEL 10.0 and Debian 12 updates, openSUSE retires YaST, running X11 apps on Wayland |
| • Issue 1121 (2025-05-12): Bluefin 41, custom file manager actions, openSUSE joins End of 10 while dropping Deepin desktop, Fedora offers tips for building atomic distros, Ubuntu considers replacing sudo with sudo-rs |
| • Issue 1120 (2025-05-05): CachyOS 250330, what it means when a distro breaks, Kali updates repository key, Trinity receives an update, UBports tests directory encryption, Gentoo faces losing key infrastructure |
| • Issue 1119 (2025-04-28): Ubuntu MATE 25.04, what is missing from Linux, CachyOS ships OCCT, Debian enters soft freeze, Fedora discusses removing X11 session from GNOME, Murena plans business services, NetBSD on a Wii |
| • Issue 1118 (2025-04-21): Fedora 42, strange characters in Vim, Nitrux introduces new package tools, Fedora extends reproducibility efforts, PINE64 updates multiple devices running Debian |
| • Issue 1117 (2025-04-14): Shebang 25.0, EndeavourOS 2025.03.19, running applications from other distros on the desktop, Debian gets APT upgrade, Mint introduces OEM options for LMDE, postmarketOS packages GNOME 48 and COSMIC, Redox testing USB support |
| • Issue 1116 (2025-04-07): The Sense HAT, Android and mobile operating systems, FreeBSD improves on laptops, openSUSE publishes many new updates, Fedora appoints new Project Leader, UBports testing VoLTE |
| • Issue 1115 (2025-03-31): GrapheneOS 2025, the rise of portable package formats, MidnightBSD and openSUSE experiment with new package management features, Plank dock reborn, key infrastructure projects lose funding, postmarketOS to focus on reliability |
| • Issue 1114 (2025-03-24): Bazzite 41, checking which processes are writing to disk, Rocky unveils new Hardened branch, GNOME 48 released, generating images for the Raspberry Pi |
| • Issue 1113 (2025-03-17): MocaccinoOS 1.8.1, how to contribute to open source, Murena extends on-line installer, Garuda tests COSMIC edition, Ubuntu to replace coreutils with Rust alternatives, Chimera Linux drops RISC-V builds |
| • Issue 1112 (2025-03-10): Solus 4.7, distros which work with Secure Boot, UBports publishes bug fix, postmarketOS considers a new name, Debian running on Android |
| • Issue 1111 (2025-03-03): Orbitiny 0.01, the effect of Ubuntu Core Desktop, Gentoo offers disk images, elementary OS invites feature ideas, FreeBSD starts PinePhone Pro port, Mint warns of upcoming Firefox issue |
| • Issue 1110 (2025-02-24): iodeOS 6.0, learning to program, Arch retiring old repositories, openSUSE makes progress on reproducible builds, Fedora is getting more serious about open hardware, Tails changes its install instructions to offer better privacy, Murena's de-Googled tablet goes on sale |
| • Issue 1109 (2025-02-17): Rhino Linux 2025.1, MX Linux 23.5 with Xfce 4.20, replacing X.Org tools with Wayland tools, GhostBSD moving its base to FreeBSD -RELEASE, Redox stabilizes its ABI, UBports testing 24.04, Asahi changing its leadership, OBS in dispute with Fedora |
| • Issue 1108 (2025-02-10): Serpent OS 0.24.6, Aurora, sharing swap between distros, Peppermint tries Void base, GTK removinglegacy technologies, Red Hat plans more AI tools for Fedora, TrueNAS merges its editions |
| • Issue 1107 (2025-02-03): siduction 2024.1.0, timing tasks, Lomiri ported to postmarketOS, Alpine joins Open Collective, a new desktop for Linux called Orbitiny |
| • Issue 1106 (2025-01-27): Adelie Linux 1.0 Beta 6, Pop!_OS 24.04 Alpha 5, detecting whether a process is inside a virtual machine, drawing graphics to NetBSD terminal, Nix ported to FreeBSD, GhostBSD hosting desktop conference |
| • Issue 1105 (2025-01-20): CentOS 10 Stream, old Flatpak bundles in software centres, Haiku ports Iceweasel, Oracle shows off debugging tools, rsync vulnerability patched |
| • Issue 1104 (2025-01-13): DAT Linux 2.0, Silly things to do with a minimal computer, Budgie prepares Wayland only releases, SteamOS coming to third-party devices, Murena upgrades its base |
| • Issue 1103 (2025-01-06): elementary OS 8.0, filtering ads with Pi-hole, Debian testing its installer, Pop!_OS faces delays, Ubuntu Studio upgrades not working, Absolute discontinued |
| • Issue 1102 (2024-12-23): Best distros of 2024, changing a process name, Fedora to expand Btrfs support and releases Asahi Remix 41, openSUSE patches out security sandbox and donations from Bottles while ending support for Leap 15.5 |
| • Issue 1101 (2024-12-16): GhostBSD 24.10.1, sending attachments from the command line, openSUSE shows off GPU assignment tool, UBports publishes security update, Murena launches its first tablet, Xfce 4.20 released |
| • Issue 1100 (2024-12-09): Oreon 9.3, differences in speed, IPFire's new appliance, Fedora Asahi Remix gets new video drivers, openSUSE Leap Micro updated, Redox OS running Redox OS |
| • Issue 1099 (2024-12-02): AnduinOS 1.0.1, measuring RAM usage, SUSE continues rebranding efforts, UBports prepares for next major version, Murena offering non-NFC phone |
| • Issue 1098 (2024-11-25): Linux Lite 7.2, backing up specific folders, Murena and Fairphone partner in fair trade deal, Arch installer gets new text interface, Ubuntu security tool patched |
| • Issue 1097 (2024-11-18): Chimera Linux vs Chimera OS, choosing between AlmaLinux and Debian, Fedora elevates KDE spin to an edition, Fedora previews new installer, KDE testing its own distro, Qubes-style isolation coming to FreeBSD |
| • Issue 1096 (2024-11-11): Bazzite 40, Playtron OS Alpha 1, Tucana Linux 3.1, detecting Screen sessions, Redox imports COSMIC software centre, FreeBSD booting on the PinePhone Pro, LXQt supports Wayland window managers |
| • Issue 1095 (2024-11-04): Fedora 41 Kinoite, transferring applications between computers, openSUSE Tumbleweed receives multiple upgrades, Ubuntu testing compiler optimizations, Mint partners with Framework |
| • Issue 1094 (2024-10-28): DebLight OS 1, backing up crontab, AlmaLinux introduces Litten branch, openSUSE unveils refreshed look, Ubuntu turns 20
| | • Issue 1093 (2024-10-21): Kubuntu 24.10, atomic vs immutable distributions, Debian upgrading Perl packages, UBports adding VoLTE support, Android to gain native GNU/Linux application support |
| • Issue 1092 (2024-10-14): FunOS 24.04.1, a home directory inside a file, work starts of openSUSE Leap 16.0, improvements in Haiku, KDE neon upgrades its base |
| • Issue 1091 (2024-10-07): Redox OS 0.9.0, Unified package management vs universal package formats, Redox begins RISC-V port, Mint polishes interface, Qubes certifies new laptop |
| • Issue 1090 (2024-09-30): Rhino Linux 2024.2, commercial distros with alternative desktops, Valve seeks to improve Wayland performance, HardenedBSD parterns with Protectli, Tails merges with Tor Project, Quantum Leap partners with the FreeBSD Foundation |
| • Issue 1089 (2024-09-23): Expirion 6.0, openKylin 2.0, managing configuration files, the future of Linux development, fixing bugs in Haiku, Slackware packages dracut |
| • Issue 1088 (2024-09-16): PorteuX 1.6, migrating from Windows 10 to which Linux distro, making NetBSD immutable, AlmaLinux offers hardware certification, Mint updates old APT tools |
| • Issue 1087 (2024-09-09): COSMIC desktop, running cron jobs at variable times, UBports highlights new apps, HardenedBSD offers work around for FreeBSD change, Debian considers how to cull old packages, systemd ported to musl |
| • Issue 1086 (2024-09-02): Vanilla OS 2, command line tips for simple tasks, FreeBSD receives investment from STF, openSUSE Tumbleweed update can break network connections, Debian refreshes media |
| • Issue 1085 (2024-08-26): Nobara 40, OpenMandriva 24.07 "ROME", distros which include source code, FreeBSD publishes quarterly report, Microsoft updates breaks Linux in dual-boot environments |
| • Issue 1084 (2024-08-19): Liya 2.0, dual boot with encryption, Haiku introduces performance improvements, Gentoo dropping IA-64, Redcore merges major upgrade |
| • Issue 1083 (2024-08-12): TrueNAS 24.04.2 "SCALE", Linux distros for smartphones, Redox OS introduces web server, PipeWire exposes battery drain on Linux, Canonical updates kernel version policy |
| • Issue 1082 (2024-08-05): Linux Mint 22, taking snapshots of UFS on FreeBSD, openSUSE updates Tumbleweed and Aeon, Debian creates Tiny QA Tasks, Manjaro testing immutable images |
| • Issue 1081 (2024-07-29): SysLinuxOS 12.4, OpenBSD gain hardware acceleration, Slackware changes kernel naming, Mint publishes upgrade instructions |
| • Issue 1080 (2024-07-22): Running GNU/Linux on Android with Andronix, protecting network services, Solus dropping AppArmor and Snap, openSUSE Aeon Desktop gaining full disk encryption, SUSE asks openSUSE to change its branding |
| • Issue 1079 (2024-07-15): Ubuntu Core 24, hiding files on Linux, Fedora dropping X11 packages on Workstation, Red Hat phasing out GRUB, new OpenSSH vulnerability, FreeBSD speeds up release cycle, UBports testing new first-run wizard |
| • Issue 1078 (2024-07-08): Changing init software, server machines running desktop environments, OpenSSH vulnerability patched, Peppermint launches new edition, HardenedBSD updates ports |
| • Issue 1077 (2024-07-01): The Unity and Lomiri interfaces, different distros for different tasks, Ubuntu plans to run Wayland on NVIDIA cards, openSUSE updates Leap Micro, Debian releases refreshed media, UBports gaining contact synchronisation, FreeDOS celebrates its 30th anniversary |
| • Issue 1076 (2024-06-24): openSUSE 15.6, what makes Linux unique, SUSE Liberty Linux to support CentOS Linux 7, SLE receives 19 years of support, openSUSE testing Leap Micro edition |
| • Issue 1075 (2024-06-17): Redox OS, X11 and Wayland on the BSDs, AlmaLinux releases Pi build, Canonical announces RISC-V laptop with Ubuntu, key changes in systemd |
| • Issue 1074 (2024-06-10): Endless OS 6.0.0, distros with init diversity, Mint to filter unverified Flatpaks, Debian adds systemd-boot options, Redox adopts COSMIC desktop, OpenSSH gains new security features |
| • Issue 1073 (2024-06-03): LXQt 2.0.0, an overview of Linux desktop environments, Canonical partners with Milk-V, openSUSE introduces new features in Aeon Desktop, Fedora mirrors see rise in traffic, Wayland adds OpenBSD support |
| • Issue 1072 (2024-05-27): Manjaro 24.0, comparing init software, OpenBSD ports Plasma 6, Arch community debates mirror requirements, ThinOS to upgrade its FreeBSD core |
| • Issue 1071 (2024-05-20): Archcraft 2024.04.06, common command line mistakes, ReactOS imports WINE improvements, Haiku makes adjusting themes easier, NetBSD takes a stand against code generated by chatbots |
| • Issue 1070 (2024-05-13): Damn Small Linux 2024, hiding kernel messages during boot, Red Hat offers AI edition, new web browser for UBports, Fedora Asahi Remix 40 released, Qubes extends support for version 4.1 |
| • Full list of all issues |
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Vital Data Forensic or Rescue Kit (FoRK)
The team at Vital Data have been in development to adapt the Knoppix live CD for use as a forensic imaging and previewing tool. They have previously been using the Penguin Sleuth Kit to obtain images in the field, but wanted something more user-friendly for their staff and colleagues to be able to use efficiently without requiring a high level of Linux knowledge.
Status: Discontinued
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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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