 DistroWatch Weekly |
| DistroWatch Weekly, Issue 944, 22 November 2021 |
|
Welcome to this year's 46th issue of DistroWatch Weekly!
The Fedora project is a cutting edge distribution which is always packaging and testing out new features. The Fedora team recently published version 35 of their Red Hat-sponsored distribution and Ivan Sanders took the latest release for a spin. Check out our Feature Story to learn about Ivan's first impressions of Fedora's Workstation edition. In our News section we talk about GhostBSD hosting an on-line meet-up for people interested in FreeBSD, ZFS, and related technologies. We also link to a report on the current status of work going into FreeBSD while the AlmaLinux OS team answers questions from the public about their Enterprise Linux clone. Our Questions and Answers column this week talks about various ways to run scripts and services at login time, either as the user signing in or as the administrator. Do you run any custom login scripts on your computer? Let us know about them in this week's Opinion Poll. 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:
Listen to the Podcast edition of this week's DistroWatch Weekly in OGG (15MB) and MP3 (11MB) formats.
|
| Feature Story (by Ivan Sanders) |
Fedora 35
Fedora 35 was released on 2 November 2021, slightly after the anticipated launch in late October. I respect their delay, the Fedora team did not want to release a buggy product, or they still had some key issues to workout; nevertheless Fedora 35 is here. For some background, Fedora is a Linux distribution which aims to create, "an innovative, free, and open source platform for hardware, clouds, and containers that enables software developers and community members to build tailored solutions for their users." (Quoted from getfedora.org.) Many Linux users will know Fedora as the community and upstream version of Red Hat Enterprise Linux, the enterprise version of Fedora known primarily for running on servers and a company to provide support.
Installing
The installation process for Fedora 35 was straightforward. I always encrypt my drives with LUKS encryption, and the installation process offered me a simple way to do this. Additionally, as a user who hops distros about 2-3 times per year, I have all my Steam games on one hard drive, and I install distros on the other (home and root on the same drive, usually same partition). GNOME Disks (after installation) allows me to setup auto-mount for the hard drive that stores all my games; this drive is also encrypted and when I setup auto-mount through GNOME Disks the application stores the encryption key on the LUKS encrypted drive where I installed Fedora. Very convenient.
Fedora 35 -- Setting up mount options
(full image size: 1.5MB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
Initial impressions
From a layman's perspective, and as someone who has installed dozens of distros over the last five years, the installation was simple and great, but it seemed to be missing something. Upon first boot I realize what was missing - I did not setup a user profile during installation, which is odd. But it works. Its almost as if you're installing the operating system for the machine, and whoever gets the machine can do the rest; the feel is similar to an OEM install.
Fedora 35 -- Accessing local printers
(full image size: 1.5MB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
Upon first boot, the user is presented with a Welcome Screen. First it displays privacy options, which allows the user to disable location services and automatic problem reporting. As a privacy advocate, I appreciate and respect these options. Next, the Welcome Screen allows the user to enable third-party repositories. This is a trick.
This is a trick because, if you read the intro, Fedora is an open source platform. What they have done with this simple toggle is profound: they are empowering the user with the ability to enable third-party repositories. The user can decide if they want to use proprietary software in support of their hardware needs, and most of us need proprietary software whether it be from NVIDIA, Intel, Microsoft, etc. Fedora: thank you for empowering the user through this easy option. The next section, called About You, allows the user to setup a profile and password, rating the strength of the password on a range from weak to strong. Usually this process is done in the installation, but I kind of like how the team behind Fedora went their own way.
Usage as a daily driver
The default desktop of GNOME 41 is beautiful. Although there surely are a few Fedora zealots, you will not find many fanatics in the Fedora community (the community seems very kind and professional). This correlation also applies to GNOME desktop environment users. GNOME 41 is beautiful, only needs minimal tweaking (such as enabling a dark theme), and I prefer all of the other defaults straight out of the box. One thing I miss in Fedora (which was available in the Arch Linux AUR) was NetworkManager's GNOME WireGuard plugin which allowed me to setup WireGuard connections through the GUI. I don't mind using the command line, but as a reviewer I like to see more user friendly interpretations of command line applications.
Fedora 35 -- Checking the NVIDIA driver
(full image size: 1.9MB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
Installing the NVIDIA drivers on Optimus (dual video card) laptops has become much easier in the past two-to-three years. With NVIDIA Prime Offloading most distros only require relatively new NVIDIA drivers and newish X.Org drivers. I had only minor issues utilizing my NVIDIA card in my laptop with Fedora - I needed to install the kernel-devel package through the dnf package manager to get NVIDIA to work. In hindsight, I would have liked to install the NVIDIA drivers through GNOME's Software GUI, but I used the command line before I thought to use the GUI.
Fedora 35 -- Multitasking in GNOME Shell
(full image size: 960kB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
Time from the LUKS decryption screen to GNOME Display Manager was approximately 20 seconds, quite good for boot-up times. Consider also that I use a solid-state hard drive for my main installation media, which improves boot times significantly. It's not mere milliseconds, but it is very good for a full distro.
GNOME 41 is super polished. It seems like everything works out of the box (come on NVIDIA, let's get you on board). Whereas on other distros I would need to configure many options and drivers to get everything working properly, Fedora just works. The polish extends to all of the facets of this operating system. The boot-up splash screen is simple and beautiful. The installation of updates is clean, and the rebooting during installation is well polished. Fedora knows how to take control of an operating system and do it properly. I love how dnf (the package manager) handles updates and installing software. My Steam games worked as expected. I could edit photos easily using the photo editing software of my choice. Firefox worked great for streaming media. The HDMI output was perfect. What can I say, Fedora leaves little left to want. Yes there may be more highly configurable distributions, but Fedora seems to be one of, if not the most professional distribution I have used. (I have not been a Fedora user in the past.)
Fedora 35 -- Changing the desktop theme
(full image size: 1.4MB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
Conclusion
Fedora has pushed out a polished, beautiful, and clean new version with the release of Fedora 35. It may not be a major, life changing, reinterpretation of Linux gospel, but it is a solid update bringing new features and was well thought through. Not all Linux distros are refined out of the box, but thankfully we have Fedora 35. I may be a chronic distro hopper, but I will stay with Fedora for the foreseeable future. I highly recommend Fedora 35 to new Linux users, professionals, and advanced users.
Additional details
Fedora 35 used 1,126MB of RAM upon first boot, with NVIDIA drivers.
* * * * *
Hardware used in this review
Laptop - Lenovo Legion Y530
- Processor: Intel Core i7-8750H CPU @ 2.20GHz x 6
- Storage: 256GB NVMe SSD Samsung and 1TB HDD
- Memory: 16GB
- Networking: Realtek RTL8111/8168/8411
- Display: 1920x1080 @ 60Hz
- Graphics: Intel Corporation UHD Graphics 630, NVIDIA Corporation GP106M [GeForce GTX 1060 Mobile]
* * * * *
Visitor supplied rating
Fedora has a visitor supplied average rating of: 8.3/10 from 451 review(s).
Have you used Fedora? You can leave your own review of the project on our ratings page.
|
| Miscellaneous News (by Jesse Smith) |
GhostBSD to host community meeting, FreeBSD publishes status update, AlmaLinux OS team answers questions from the public
GhostBSD is a desktop-oriented flavour of FreeBSD which supplies pre-configured desktop environments, ZFS support, and convenient utilities for common tasks such as getting on-line and installing packages. For people who would like to learn more about GhostBSD, its FreeBSD base, and ZFS technologies, the GhostBSD project is hosting an on-line meeting on December 11, 2021. "GhostBSD online meetups consist of open discussions on GhostBSD, OpenZFS, FreeBSD, and questions and answers. Everyone can suggest a subject of discussion. There will be no official presentations until the group is more established." Details are offered on the GhostBSD website.
* * * * *
The FreeBSD project has published a new Quarterly Update which lists ongoing work and improvements to the FreeBSD operating system. One of the impressive feats mentioned in the report is the halving of FreeBSD's boot times in some environments. "Colin Percival is coordinating an effort to speed up the FreeBSD boot process. For benchmarking purposes, he is using an EC2 c5.xlarge instance as a reference platform and is measuring the time between when the virtual machine enters the EC2 "running" state and when it is possible to SSH into the instance.
This work started in 2017, leading to a conference presentation, 'Profiling the FreeBSD kernel boot', and quickly yielded roughly 4850 ms of improvements (starting from a baseline of about 30 seconds).
Since June, another roughly 9790 ms of time has been shaved off the boot process, taking it down to approximately 15 seconds. There is still more work to be done; in particular, while the loader and kernel have been profiled, the TSLOG system Colin is using does not currently support userland profiling." Additional information can be found in the project's report.
* * * * *
The AlmaLinux OS team creates a clone of Red Hat Enterprise Linux, based on the upstream provider's source code. The AlmaLinux developers have taken to Reddit in order to answer questions and field comments from the Linux community. "Hello everyone. We are the AlmaLinux team. AlmaLinux OS is an enterprise Linux distribution continuing the legacy of CentOS Linux and are a classical downstream 1:1 of Red Hat Enterprise Linux. We did something unique and setup a 501(c)(6) non-profit along with an open and free membership so that the community can actually own the OS and all the related intellectual property, vote in elections and steward the project." The open forum and the developers' responses can be found in this Reddit thread.
* * * * *
These and other news stories can be found on our Headlines page.
|
| Questions and Answers (by Jesse Smith) |
Running scripts at login as another user
Getting-things-started asks: With Windows there are many means for automatically running scripts: I can make startup/shutdown scripts (in group policy) to be executed by the builtin user "SYSTEM"; I can make logon/logoff scripts (in group policy) to be executed by the builtin user "Administrator"; I can make auto-start scripts, placed in the Start menu "Startup" folder which are executed by a user as they login.
Please explain how I can create logon scripts on Linux (with systemd) and execute them on behalf of the user "root". I already know how to create startup/shutdown scripts.
DistroWatch answers: I had to consider this question for a while because there are multiple ways to run commands as another user at login, but it's important to do it safely.
With Linux (and similar Unix-like operating systems) typically startup and shutdown scripts are run as the root user or another special user account that has been granted the privileges necessary to run the script. Scripts that are run at login time are usually run as the user who is logging in. Usually functions that need to be set up by the user (or for them) are handled by a user's own login script. These login scripts can be stored in a variety of locations, and the location may vary depending on which shell (or desktop) they are running.
Typically scripts which are run at login time are executed as the regular user and stored in the /etc/profile.d/ directory. Scripts to be run at logoff are specific to the shell or desktop used. For the popular bash shell, commands to be run when the user logs out can be run from the ~/.bash_logout script.
Each desktop environment has its own options for running scripts at login and logout, and these are typically found in the settings panel under either the Startup or Session modules.
The above options for running programs at login/logout all run the specified script as the user who is signed into the session, not as another user like root. Typically Linux administration assumes any service or program launched by the user signing in will be run as that user.
There are exceptions though where an administrator will really want to run a script as another user (such as root) when someone logs in. This can be accomplished on most Linux distributions through a Pluggable Authentication Module (PAM). Specifically through a module called pam_exec. (There is a similar module called pam_script.) The pam_exec module seems to be pretty standard and runs a command as either the root user or the user logging in, depending on how it is called. The pam_script module seems to be less commonly included on distributions by default, but offers some nice options for running scripts as any user we want.
The idea behind these PAM modules is you can edit your PAM login (or equivalent) module in the /etc/pam.d/ directory using any text editor. Then add an entry which says something like:
auth optional pam_exec.so seteuid /etc/my-special-script
The above will run the command /etc/my-special-script when the user logs in and the script will be run as the root user instead of the person who is signing in.
For instance, we can create a very simple command which creates a file in the /tmp directory whenever someone authenticates using the sudo command. This is accomplished by adding the following line near the top of the file /etc/pam.d/sudo:
auth optional pam_exec.so seteuid /usr/bin/touch /tmp/someone-sudoed
With the above line in place, someone trying to run sudo silently triggers the touch command and it makes an empty file in the /tmp directory.
A word of warning: changing PAM modules and login routines can break your system and prevent you from being able to login. Please test any changes to PAM (or other login functions) in a virtual machine or on a test box before applying them to an operating system you use regularly.
* * * * *
Additional answers can be found in our Questions and Answers archive.
|
| Released Last Week |
Rocky Linux 8.5
Rocky Linux is a clone of Red Hat Enterprise Linux, built from the upstream project's source code. The Rocky Linux team have launched version 8.5 of their operating system. One of the major changes in this release is the debut support for Secure Boot. "In less then 48 hours from RHEL-8.5 being released, we had successful tests on our ISOs and just before we were about to pull the string to go GA with 8.5, Microsoft countersigned our Secure Boot shim. We quickly deliberated and decided to backtrack and incorporate that into the 8.5 release. There were some things that we had to get in order and resolved, but it is with great pleasure that this release includes the official Rocky Linux signed shim. Here is the full thread to the shim review. As with any security related diligence, it is important to be able to validate the Secure Boot shim is exactly what you expect and that it is properly activated." Additional information is available in the distribution's release notes.
CentOS 8.5.2111
Johnny Hughes has announced the release of CentOS 8.5.2111, the latest version of the project's Linux distribution compiled from the source code of Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL). All CentOS users are welcome to update to this version, but are also reminded that CentOS 8 will reach the end-of-life status at the end of this year. "We are pleased to announce the general availability of the latest version of CentOS Linux 8. Effective immediately, this is the current release for CentOS Linux 8 and is tagged as 2111, derived from Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8.5 source code. Please note: CentOS Linux 8 will EOL on 31 December 2021. We will handle the EOL as directed by the CentOS Project Board of Directors. Major changes: later versions of the following components are now available as new module streams - Ruby 3.0, nginx 1.20, Node.js 16; the following components have been upgraded - PHP to version 7.4.19, Squid to version 4.15, Mutt to version 2.0.7; the following compiler toolsets have been updated - GCC 11, LLVM 12.0.1, Rust 1.54.0, Go 1.16.7." See the release announcement and release notes for further details.
Proxmox 7.1 "Virtual Environment"
Proxmox is a commercial company offering specialised products based on Debian GNU/Linux. The distribution's latest release is Proxmox 7.1 Virtual Environment (VE) which is based on Debian 11. "We're excited to announce the release of Proxmox Virtual Environment 7.1. It's based on Debian 11.1 "Bullseye" but using a newer Linux kernel 5.13, QEMU 6.1, LXC 4.0, Ceph 16.2.6, and OpenZFS 2.1. and countless enhancements and bug fixes. Proxmox Virtual Environment brings several new functionalities and many improvements for management tasks in the web interface: support for Windows 11 including TPM, enhanced creation wizard for VM/container, ability to set backup retention policies per backup job in the GUI, and a new scheduler daemon supporting more flexible schedules. Here is a selection of the highlights: Debian 11.1 'Bullseye', but using a newer Linux kernel 5.13. LXC 4.0, Ceph 16.2.6, QEMU 6.1, and OpenZFS 2.1. VM wizard with defaults for Windows 11 (q35, OVMF, TPM). New backup scheduler daemon for flexible scheduling options. Backup retention. Protection flag for backups. Two-factor Authentication: WebAuthn, recovery keys, multiple factors for a single account. New container templates: Fedora, Ubuntu, Alma Linux, Rocky Linux and many more enhancements, bugfixes, etc." Additional details can be found in the company's release announcement and in the release notes.
UBports 16.04 OTA-20
UBports is a community-developed fork of Canonical's Ubuntu Touch operating system for mobile devices. The project's latest release is UBports 16.04 OTA-20. The new release includes several changes to notifications. "We implemented notification LED support for devices with Halium 9 base. If your device is still not blinking, keep in mind that many recent devices do not have a notification LED anymore: Vollaphone and Pixel 3a cannot blink physically for example. Also vibration works now for incoming notifications on those devices. We added support for Khmer and Bengali fonts to support users from these locales a bit better. It is now possible to define a custom notification sound. Like with ringtones one can now select any accessible audio file to be played when a new notification arrives. Let's annoy our co-workers with style! A few new devices were added to the range of installable devices again: Xiaomi Redmi 9 and 9 Prime (lancelot), Xiaomi Redmi Note 9 (merlin), Note 9 Pro (joyuese), Note 9 Pro Max (excalibur), Note 9S (curtana), Xiaomi Poco M2 Pro (gram) and Pixel 2 (walleye). The Pixel 2 has some battery lifetime issues though, so it might not be fully ready for your daily drive." Additional information is available in the project's release announcement.
Q4OS 4.7
The Q4OS project produces a Debian-based distribution which is available in KDE Plasma and Trinity desktop flavours. The project's latest release is Q4OS 4.7 which is based on Debian 11 "Bullseye" and which features an update to the Trinity Desktop Environment. The release announcement reads: "A significant update to the fourth Q4OS stable series codenamed 'Gemini' has been released. This upgrade includes set of security and bug fixes, receives the most recent Debian Bullseye 11.1. as well as Trinity desktop environment R14.0.11 stable versions. Trinity desktop maintenance release of the R14 series is intended to bring bug fixes, while preserving overall stability. You can find the complete Trinity desktop release notes and new features list at the Trinity desktop environment website. We are currently pushing all the changes mentioned above into the Q4OS repositories, automatic update process will take care about to update computers for current users."
Q4OS 4.7 -- Running the Trinity desktop
(full image size: 214kB, resolution: 1600x900 pixels)
* * * * *
Development, unannounced and minor bug-fix releases
|
| 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:
- Peers connected: 2,157
- Total torrents seeded: 2,651
- Total data uploaded: 41.0TB
|
| Upcoming Releases and Announcements |
|
Summary of expected upcoming releases
|
| Opinion Poll (by Jesse Smith) |
Custom login scripts
In this week's Questions and Answers column we talked about various ways to run login scripts, either as the user signing in or as another user such as root. We'd like to hear if you use any custom login scripts. Let us know how you trigger these scripts in the comments.
You can see the results of our previous poll on preferred lightweight desktops in last week's edition. All previous poll results can be found in our poll archives.
|
Regarding scripts triggered at login
| I run custom scripts as the user signing in: | 197 (18%) |
| I run custom scripts as another user: | 13 (1%) |
| I have custom scripts for both situations: | 76 (7%) |
| I do not run any custom login scripts: | 822 (74%) |
|
|
| Website News |
Creating and tracking new torrents
For the past few years DistroWatch has been seeding torrents for new releases of distributions. Many of the torrents we have been sharing through our weekly Torrent Corner and through our Torrent Archive have been provided by the distribution developers themselves. A few torrents have been provided by community members who are helping out.
Some projects and their communities do not provide torrents of their distributions' ISO files. In these situations, when a new stable release comes out, we have been creating torrents for them and hosting them on our infrastructure. These torrents have made for Linux distributions are tracked through our very own torrent tracker.
A torrent tracker is a service which helps people who are downloading or seeding a torrent find each other. It's like a hub where torrent clients can find each other.
For the first few years this worked really well. Unfortunately, in recent months our torrent tracker has been absolutely flooded with requests and it seems like some people are trying to perform a denial-of-service attack against our torrent tracker. We've been able to keep it on-line, but the bandwidth requirements are becoming increasingly large. Our torrent tracker currently handles over ten times more bandwidth than both the DistroWatch website and our torrent seed server combined.
Given the expense associated with keeping the tracker on-line, after this month we'll be shutting down our torrent tracker at the end of November and will no longer be creating our own, custom torrents for projects which do not have their own. We will continue to seed torrents from Linux and BSD projects which provide a torrent file for new releases. We are happy to continue seeding torrents and contributing to the community. However, we will be relying on upstream projects to publish their own, official torrent files.
* * * * *
New distributions added to waiting list
- Lilidog. Lilidog is a Debian-based Linux distribution featuring the Openbox window manager. It is available in three editions: Full, Minimal, and Sid (a rolling release).
- Lirix. Lirix is distribution based on Arch Linux which features the MaXX Interactive Desktop environment. It is intended to be lightweight and use less than 200MB of memory at sign-in.
* * * * *
DistroWatch database summary
* * * * *
This concludes this week's issue of DistroWatch Weekly. The next instalment will be published on Monday, 29 November 2021. Past articles and reviews can be found through our Article Search page. To contact the authors please send e-mail to:
|
|
| Tip Jar |
If you've enjoyed this week's issue of DistroWatch Weekly, please consider sending us a tip.
(Tips this week: 1, value: US$9.46) |
|
|
|
 bc1qxes3k2wq3uqzr074tkwwjmwfe63z70gwzfu4lx  lnurl1dp68gurn8ghj7ampd3kx2ar0veekzar0wd5xjtnrdakj7tnhv4kxctttdehhwm30d3h82unvwqhhxarpw3jkc7tzw4ex6cfexyfua2nr  86fA3qPTeQtNb2k1vLwEQaAp3XxkvvvXt69gSG5LGunXXikK9koPWZaRQgfFPBPWhMgXjPjccy9LA9xRFchPWQAnPvxh5Le paypal.me/distrowatchweekly • patreon.com/distrowatch |
|
| Extended Lifecycle Support by TuxCare |
|
|
|
| TUXEDO |
TUXEDO Computers - Linux Hardware in a tailor made suite
Choose from a wide range of laptops and PCs in various sizes and shapes at TUXEDOComputers.com. Every machine comes pre-installed and ready-to-run with Linux. Full 24 months of warranty and lifetime support included!
Learn more about our full service package and all benefits from buying at TUXEDO.
|
| Archives |
| • Issue 1150 (2025-12-01): Gnoppix 25_10, exploring if distributions matter, openSUSE updates tumbleweed's boot loader, Fedora plans better handling of broken packages, Plasma to become Wayland-only, FreeBSD publishes status report |
| • Issue 1149 (2025-11-24): MX Linux 25, why are video drivers special, systemd experiments with musl, Debian Libre Live publishes new media, Xubuntu reviews website hack |
| • Issue 1148 (2025-11-17): Zorin OS 18, deleting a file with an unusual name, NetBSD experiments with sandboxing, postmarketOS unifies its documentation, OpenBSD refines upgrades, Canonical offers 15 years of support for Ubuntu |
| • Issue 1147 (2025-11-10): Fedora 43, the size and stability of the Linux kernel, Debian introducing Rust to APT, Redox ports web engine, Kubuntu website off-line, Mint creates new troubleshooting tools, FreeBSD improves reproducible builds, Flatpak development resumes |
| • Issue 1146 (2025-11-03): StartOS 0.4.0, testing piped commands, Ubuntu Unity seeks help, Canonical offers Ubuntu credentials, Red Hat partners with NVIDIA, SUSE to bundle AI agent with SLE 16 |
| • Issue 1145 (2025-10-27): Linux Mint 7 "LMDE", advice for new Linux users, AlmaLinux to offer Btrfs, KDE launches Plasma 6.5, Fedora accepts contributions written by AI, Ubuntu 25.10 fails to install automatic updates |
| • Issue 1144 (2025-10-20): Kubuntu 25.10, creating and restoring encrypted backups, Fedora team debates AI, FSF plans free software for phones, ReactOS addresses newer drivers, Xubuntu reacts to website attack |
| • Issue 1143 (2025-10-13): openSUSE 16.0 Leap, safest source for new applications, Redox introduces performance improvements, TrueNAS Connect available for testing, Flatpaks do not work on Ubuntu 25.10, Kamarada plans to switch its base, Solus enters new epoch, Frugalware discontinued |
| • Issue 1142 (2025-10-06): Linux Kamarada 15.6, managing ZIP files with SQLite, F-Droid warns of impact of Android lockdown, Alpine moves ahead with merged /usr, Cinnamon gets a redesigned application menu |
| • Issue 1141 (2025-09-29): KDE Linux and GNOME OS, finding mobile flavours of Linux, Murena to offer phones with kill switches, Redox OS running on a smartphone, Artix drops GNOME |
| • Issue 1140 (2025-09-22): NetBSD 10.1, avoiding AI services, AlmaLinux enables CRB repository, Haiku improves disk access performance, Mageia addresses service outage, GNOME 49 released, Linux introduces multikernel support |
| • Issue 1139 (2025-09-15): EasyOS 7.0, Linux and central authority, FreeBSD running Plasma 6 on Wayland, GNOME restores X11 support temporarily, openSUSE dropping BCacheFS in new kernels |
| • Issue 1138 (2025-09-08): Shebang 25.8, LibreELEC 12.2.0, Debian GNU/Hurd 2025, the importance of software updates, AerynOS introduces package sets, postmarketOS encourages patching upstream, openSUSE extends Leap support, Debian refreshes Trixie media |
| • Issue 1137 (2025-09-01): Tribblix 0m37, malware scanners flagging Linux ISO files, KDE introduces first-run setup wizard, CalyxOS plans update prior to infrastructure overhaul, FreeBSD publishes status report |
| • Issue 1136 (2025-08-25): CalyxOS 6.8.20, distros for running containers, Arch Linux website under attack,illumos Cafe launched, CachyOS creates web dashboard for repositories |
| • Issue 1135 (2025-08-18): Debian 13, Proton, WINE, Wayland, and Wayback, Debian GNU/Hurd 2025, KDE gets advanced Liquid Glass, Haiku improves authentication tools |
| • Issue 1134 (2025-08-11): Rhino Linux 2025.3, thoughts on malware in the AUR, Fedora brings hammered websites back on-line, NetBSD reveals features for version 11, Ubuntu swaps some command line tools for 25.10, AlmaLinux improves NVIDIA support |
| • Issue 1133 (2025-08-04): Expirion Linux 6.0, running Plasma on Linux Mint, finding distros which support X11, Debian addresses 22 year old bug, FreeBSD discusses potential issues with pkgbase, CDE ported to OpenBSD, Btrfs corruption bug hitting Fedora users, more malware found in Arch User Repository |
| • Issue 1132 (2025-07-28): deepin 25, wars in the open source community, proposal to have Fedora enable Flathub repository, FreeBSD plans desktop install option, Wayback gets its first release |
| • Issue 1131 (2025-07-21): HeliumOS 10.0, settling on one distro, Mint plans new releases, Arch discovers malware in AUR, Plasma Bigscreen returns, Clear Linux discontinued |
| • Issue 1130 (2025-07-14): openSUSE MicroOS and RefreshOS, sharing aliases between computers, Bazzite makes Bazaar its default Flatpak store, Alpine plans Wayback release, Wayland and X11 benchmarked, Red Hat offers additional developer licenses, openSUSE seeks feedback from ARM users, Ubuntu 24.10 reaches the end of its life |
| • Issue 1129 (2025-07-07): GLF OS Omnislash, the worst Linux distro, Alpine introduces Wayback, Fedora drops plans to stop i686 support, AlmaLinux builds EPEL repository for older CPUs, Ubuntu dropping existing RISC-V device support, Rhino partners with UBports, PCLinuxOS recovering from website outage |
| • Issue 1128 (2025-06-30): AxOS 25.06, AlmaLinux OS 10.0, transferring Flaptak bundles to off-line computers, Ubuntu to boost Intel graphics performance, Fedora considers dropping i686 packages, SDesk switches from SELinux to AppArmor |
| • Issue 1127 (2025-06-23): LastOSLinux 2025-05-25, most unique Linux distro, Haiku stabilises, KDE publishes Plasma 6.4, Arch splits Plasma packages, Slackware infrastructure migrating |
| • Issue 1126 (2025-06-16): SDesk 2025.05.06, renewed interest in Ubuntu Touch, a BASIC device running NetBSD, Ubuntu dropping X11 GNOME session, GNOME increases dependency on systemd, Google holding back Pixel source code, Nitrux changing its desktop, EFF turns 35 |
| • Issue 1125 (2025-06-09): RHEL 10, distributions likely to survive a decade, Murena partners with more hardware makers, GNOME tests its own distro on real hardware, Redox ports GTK and X11, Mint provides fingerprint authentication |
| • Issue 1124 (2025-06-02): Picking up a Pico, tips for protecting privacy, Rhino tests Plasma desktop, Arch installer supports snapshots, new features from UBports, Ubuntu tests monthly snapshots |
| • Issue 1123 (2025-05-26): CRUX 3.8, preventing a laptop from sleeping, FreeBSD improves laptop support, Fedora confirms GNOME X11 session being dropped, HardenedBSD introduces Rust in userland build, KDE developing a virtual machine manager |
| • 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 |
| • Full list of all issues |
| Star Labs |
Star Labs - Laptops built for Linux.
View our range including the highly anticipated StarFighter. Available with coreboot open-source firmware and a choice of Ubuntu, elementary, Manjaro and more. Visit Star Labs for information, to buy and get support.
|
| Random Distribution | 
Zenned
Zenned is an Arch-based desktop Linux distribution which runs the KDE Plasma desktop. The project provides a friendly, live environment and the Calamares system installer to help users get started.
Status: Active
|
| TUXEDO |
TUXEDO Computers - Linux Hardware in a tailor made suite
Choose from a wide range of laptops and PCs in various sizes and shapes at TUXEDOComputers.com. Every machine comes pre-installed and ready-to-run with Linux. Full 24 months of warranty and lifetime support included!
Learn more about our full service package and all benefits from buying at TUXEDO.
|
| Star Labs |
Star Labs - Laptops built for Linux.
View our range including the highly anticipated StarFighter. Available with coreboot open-source firmware and a choice of Ubuntu, elementary, Manjaro and more. Visit Star Labs for information, to buy and get support.
|
|
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
