 DistroWatch Weekly |
| DistroWatch Weekly, Issue 1032, 14 August 2023 |
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Welcome to this year's 33rd issue of DistroWatch Weekly!
There are many available desktop environments in the Linux community. Unlike on Windows and macOS, where users are given one predetermined desktop, the Linux community embraces a variety of different interfaces. These various desktop environments can focus on configurability, features, performance, or a particular workflow. Each desktop can be customized, making it better suited to the individual user. In this week's Questions and Answers column we talk about organizing windows on the desktop, in particular how to centre new application windows. How do you like to arrange windows on your desktop? Let us know in this week's Opinion Poll. First though, we explore the MX Linux distribution. MX is a Debian-based project with a large set of custom system administration tools and it features the Xfce desktop with an unusual layout. Jesse Smith takes MX Linux 23 for a spin and reports on his experiences with this distribution. Then, in our News section, we discuss Linux Containers adopting a fork of the LXD container management software after Canonical pulled LXD into its own infrastructure. We also report on two versions of FreeBSD reaching the end of their supported lifespans while SUSE, CIQ, and Oracle team up to form the Open Enterprise Linux Association. 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:
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| Feature Story (By Jesse Smith) |
MX Linux 23
MX Linux is a Debian-based desktop distribution which offers fixed releases. New versions typically get published every two years and receive support for about five years, keeping the project in step with Debian's Stable branch. MX Linux is available in three main editions: Xfce (the flagship edition), KDE Plasma, and Fluxbox. In addition to these main editions there are extra builds of some editions. For instance, while all three editions are built for x86_64 machines, the Fluxbox and Xfce editions have 32-bit (x86) builds too. There is also an Advanced Hardware Support (AHS) build of the Xfce edition which ships with a newer version of the Linux kernel to offer a wider range of support for newer computers. There are some unofficial spins of MX too, for example there is a build for Raspberry Pi computers.
I decided to try the flagship edition featuring the Xfce desktop. I selected the 64-bit build without the advanced hardware support kernel. The download for the Xfce desktop is 2.0GB in size. Booting from the live media gives us the chance to optionally test the media's integrity or jump straight into booting the distribution. When MX boots it launches the Xfce 4.18 desktop.
The Xfce desktop has an unusual layout with its panel placed vertically down the left side of the screen. There is a Conky status panel over on the right. On the desktop we find icons for launching the system installer and opening local copies of the project's documentation. Shortly after the desktop loads a welcome window appears.
The welcome window is divided into two tabs. In the first tab we find buttons which open documentation, link us with the MX Linux wiki, open a web browser to see the distribution's forums, launch the system installer, and open a software installer. The second tab offers a technical summary of the operating system, including such information as the Xfce version, and the version of Debian this build of MX Linux uses as a base.
I'd like to call attention to a few resources which I feel will be helpful for beginners. One is the MX Tour tool, which can be launched from the welcome window. This utility provides a quick overview of key features and how to navigate them. It explains how to explore the desktop, take system snapshots, and install additional software. The FAQ document does a good job of explaining what the distribution is and how it works. There is also a users' manual which is 197 pages of useful information that will help people perform most common tasks. It's not often Linux distributions put such a high priority on quality documentation and this feature gives a great first impression.
MX Linux 23 -- Reading the user manual and browsing MX Tour
(full image size: 489kB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
Installing
MX Linux uses a custom, graphical system installer. It begins by giving us a chance to adjust our keyboard layout. The next screen asks if we'd like guided or manual disk partitioning. The automated approach sets up a root and a /home partition and provides a sliding bar we can move to adjust the amount of disk space set aside for each partition. The manual approach is a little cluttered, but offers a point-and-click way to create partitions and assign them mount points. There is a helpful cheat sheet shown to the left of the window that helpfully explains commonly used partitions and layouts.
The following screen asks if we'd like to install a boot loader and if we'd like to create a swap file. I'd already created a swap partition so I skipped making a swap file. We're then asked to make up a name for our computer and optionally enable Samba file shares. The following screen asks us to confirm our locale and set our timezone. We have the option of enabling/disabling background services such as CUPS printing, the cron daemon, Bluetooth, and zRAM. These items can be enabled or disabled with a click. The final step in the installer asks us to make up a username and password for ourselves and, optionally, to set a password on the root account. If we don't password protect the root account then the root account will be locked.
The installer quickly copied its files to my drive and then offered to reboot the computer.
Early impressions
My new copy of MX Linux booted to a graphical login screen. From there I was able to sign into my account which brought up the Xfce desktop. Once again icons on the desktop offered easy access to documentation, though the installer icon from the live media is naturally absent. I like that the distribution includes local documentation so that, even without an Internet connection, we can still get help - including help on connecting to local networks.
MX with the Xfce desktop was highly responsive and I enjoyed the high contrast style of the desktop and its menus. Text tends to be white on black or black on white. Icons are usually colourful and quickly recognizable. The application menu has a two-pane layout with categories to the right and specific launchers on the left.
MX Linux 23 -- The welcome window
(full image size: 692kB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
Applications
MX ships with a fairly standard collection of open source software, along with a few lighter items not often found in other distributions. Firefox, Thunderbird, and LibreOffice are installed. The VLC media player and Strawberry audio player are installed for us along with multimedia codecs. The Orage calendar is included along with a few games.
We also find a webcam tool, the Asunder CD ripper, and the Xfburn disc burning software. I rarely encounter computers with optical drives anymore, but MX Linux is catering to a wide audience, some of whom still run older and 32-bit machines.
MX Linux 23 -- Browsing the application menu and the Xfce settings panel
(full image size: 721kB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
The distribution includes two file managers, Thunar and the console-based Midnight Commander. Timeshift is included to help make backups of files. Though when Btrfs is used as the root filesystem it isn't set up with the sub-volumes used by Timeshift to make filesystem snapshots.
MX provides a lot of configuration and system administration tools. Xfce includes several desktop configuration modules and its settings panel also offers easy access to modules which help us set up printers and manage the firewall. There are some other, custom tools too which I'll talk about later in this review.
The distribution ships with GNU command line utilities and manual pages. Java is installed for us too. MX runs the SysV init software by default, though systemd is available as an alternative and can be selected at boot time. The distribution runs version 6.1 of the Linux kernel by default, though the AHS build uses version 6.4.
Hardware
I found MX Linux would run well in both of my test environments. When installed in VirtualBox, the distribution ran smoothly and quickly. The Xfce desktop was highly responsive and would automatically resize to match the dimensions of the VirtualBox window.
The distribution also ran well on my laptop. The distribution was able to boot in both Legacy BIOS and UEFI modes. MX ran quickly on my laptop and detected all of my hardware without any issues. Networking and sound worked out of the box. Even with compositing enabled, Xfce was unusually responsive.
A fresh install of MX Linux consumed 3.7GB of disk space, which is about half what most mainstream distribution require. When signed into Xfce the system used about 770MB of RAM. This is on the high end for Xfce, but about average for most distributions running KDE Plasma.
Software management
An icon in the system tray lets us know when new package updates are available. Clicking this green box icon opens a simple update manager which shows us which new packages are available and offers to fetch them for us. This is an all-or-nothing update experience which worked well for me.
Should we wish to have more fine-grained control over packages we can use the Synaptic package manager. Synaptic is a classic, low-level package manager which can find, install, upgrade, and remove packages. It can also manage repositories for us. Synaptic handles actions in batches, locking the software database while it works.
MX Linux 23 -- The Synaptic package manager
(full image size: 179kB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
There is another software manager on the system called MX Package Installer and it also gives us a great deal of flexibility. The MX Package Installer is divided into multiple tabs. In the first tab we are shown a tree-view list of about 30 software categories. Expanding a category lists a handful of popular applications with brief descriptions of each one in the selected category. We can check boxes next to the specific items we wish to install.
The other tabs in the Package Installer give us similar quick access to packages in alternative repositories. This allows us to browse and fetch software from testing and backport repositories which might not normally be available to us. I like how the MX developers have chosen to mostly stick with Debian's Stable repository, but also provide point-and-click access to alternative repositories in case we need more up to date packages.
The final tab in the Package Installer gives us access to Flatpak packages provided by the Flathub repository. We can search for items or browse through the available software. I tried installing a few items, both in the main Deb repositories and the portable bundles from Flathub and they all installed without any problems.
MX Linux 23 -- Browsing available packages
(full image size: 627kB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
MX Tools
One of the key components of the MX Linux distribution is its collection of system administration tools. These utilities are accessible through the application menu, but are also helpfully grouped together in a panel called MX Tools. The MX Tools window launches these utilities which can be used to set boot loader options, manage user accounts, and manage Samba's configuration. There is a handy utility which can turn our current operating system into a live USB thumb drive image, which is great for sharing or backing up the system.
MX Linux 23 -- The MX Tools panel and the MX Tweaks tool
(full image size: 500kB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
There are also tools for installing NVIDIA drivers and media codecs. One tool helps us handle the Xfce panel's placement and behaviour. Plus there are shortcuts to documentation and window manager settings.
I used most of these tools during my trial and liked them. They aren't as streamlined as some equivalents we might find under other desktop environments (such as GNOME), but they offer more functionality than the settings panels of most distributions. The MX Tools collection worked well, was stable for me, and provided easy access to a lot of options people are likely to want.
Conclusions
MX Linux does a great job of presenting the user with all the benefits of Debian's Stable branch (long-term support, stable packages, large repositories of software, and great hardware support) while improving on the experience. On top of Debian's solid base, MX has added a faster, more user friendly system installer, enough applications to cover a wide range of use cases without overly crowding the application menu, and provided lots of friendly tools and documentation.
Not many Linux distributions provide great documentation and fewer include their documentation on the install media. This alone makes MX Linux stand out. The MX Tools though are what really make this distribution shine. There is a lot of useful functionality packed into the MX Tools collection, particularly the custom package installer which works across multiple repositories (including backports) and portable packages (Flatpaks).
Not only did MX Linux work well with my hardware, it worked quickly, was stable, and I can't think of a single time I saw an error message during my trial. A lot of this smooth running was probably a credit to MX's parent, Debian, but MX also ships with a lot of custom tools and they all worked well for me too.
Some people might find the vertical desktop panel unusual. Personally, I like it as it reduces my mouse movement, especially if I switch window buttons to the left side of the windows. People who don't like the panel placement can move it to a more conventional horizontal orientation with a couple of mouse clicks.
I'm of the opinion MX Linux is one of the most capable, friendly, reliable desktop distributions currently available. It runs on a wide range of hardware, from older computers to more modern machines. It offers an experience which improves from its parent on multiple fronts without introducing any problems. Some of the tools and the installer might be a little overwhelming for a complete Linux newcomer, I'm not sure I'd say MX Linux is an ideal first distribution. However, I would recommend it for most people for just about any desktop experience.
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Hardware used in this review
My physical test equipment for this review was an HP DY2048CA laptop with the following
specifications:
- Processor: 11th Gen Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-1135G7 @ 2.40GHz
- Display: Intel integrated video
- Storage: Western Digital 512GB solid state drive
- Memory: 8GB of RAM
- Wireless network device: Intel Wi-Fi 6 AX201 + BT Wireless network card
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Visitor supplied rating
MX Linux has a visitor supplied average rating of: 8.1/10 from 791 review(s).
Have you used MX Linux? You can leave your own review of the project on our ratings page.
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| Miscellaneous News (by Jesse Smith) |
Linux Containers adopts new fork of LXD, FreeBSD 13.1 reaches its end of life, OpenELA formed
A few weeks ago we reported that Canonical, the maker of Ubuntu and creator of the LXD container management software, was withdrawing LXD from the Linux Containers community project and managing it under Canonical's own infrastructure. This left a bit of a gap in the container management community and LXD was quickly forked by Aleksa Sarai and the new fork, called Incus, has joined the Linux Containers project. "The Linux Containers project is excited to announce its latest addition, Incus!
Incus isn't a completely new project however, it's a fork of LXD created by Aleksa Sarai. Aleksa Sarai is most known for his work on runc, umoci and other OpenContainers projects as well as contributions to the Linux kernel.
But in addition to all that, he's also been the long time packager of LXD in openSUSE. Aleksa created the fork shortly after Canonical's decision to take LXD away from Linux Containers with the name Incus being introduced immediately following the LXD 5.16 release. This fork was first intended as a personal project, but has since gathered quite a bit of interest both from the community as well as from former LXD contributors.
After some discussion with Aleksa and a fair bit of encouragement from our community, we have made the decision to take Incus under the umbrella of Linux Containers and will commit to it the infrastructure which was previously made available to LXD.
The goal of Incus is to provide a fully community led alternative to Canonical's LXD as well as providing an opportunity to correct some mistakes that were made during LXD's development which couldn't be corrected without breaking backward compatibility."
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The FreeBSD project sent out a reminder this week notifying users that FreeBSD 13.1 has reached the end of its supported life. People still running version 13.1 are advised to upgrade to 13.2. "As of August 2nd, 2023, FreeBSD 13.1 reached end-of-life and is no longer supported by the FreeBSD Security Team. Users of FreeBSD 13.1 are strongly encouraged to upgrade to a newer release as soon as possible." The notice also points out the FreeBSD 12.x series will reach the end of its supported life at the end of 2023.
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Back in July we reported on Red Hat changing its policy with regards to sharing the company's source code for Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL). We also talked about how the developers of various clones of RHEL were reacting to the news and adjusting their own distributions. This past week CIQ, Oracle, and SUSE announced a new organization called the Open Enterprise Linux Association (OpenELA) to cooperate in maintaining RHEL compatible distributions. "CIQ, Oracle and SUSE today announced their intent to form the Open Enterprise Linux Association (OpenELA), a collaborative trade association to encourage the development of distributions compatible with Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) by providing open and free Enterprise Linux (EL) source code. The formation of OpenELA arises from Red Hat's recent changes to RHEL source code availability. In response, CIQ, Oracle and SUSE are collaborating to deliver source code, tools and systems through OpenELA for the community." According to the OpenELA website, the source code shared by the organization will be available with "No subscriptions. No passwords. No barriers."
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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) |
Positioning new windows on the desktop
Keeping-windows-in-the-middle asks: I was wondering if there is a way to centre application windows on Xfce? Every time I open a new window, it seems to go to the upper-left part of the screen, and I can't figure out how to make them centred.
DistroWatch answers: Most open source desktops I've used have had some method for centring new windows when they are opened. On Xfce this feature can be found by launching the Window Manager Tweaks tool. This utility can typically be found in the Xfce settings panel or in the application menu.
Within the Window Manager Tweaks utility, select the Placement tab. Under the section called "By default, place windows" select the option "At the centre of the screen".
Placing new windows on Xfce
(full image size: 35kB, resolution: 692x523 pixels)
People running KDE Plasma can access the equivalent feature by opening the System Settings panel and choosing the module called Window Behaviour. Under Window Behaviour, select the "Advanced" tab. This tab includes an option called "Window placement" which can be set to "Centered".
Centring new windows with KDE Plasma
(full image size: 83kB, resolution: 1150x859 pixels)
I asked around about doing something similar with GNOME and was told GNOME Tweaks can adjust starting window positions. I've been unable to confirm this, but that may be due to being a version behind.
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Additional answers can be found in our Questions and Answers archive.
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| Released Last Week |
Rhino Linux 2023.1
Rhino Linux is an Ubuntu-based distribution which offers a rolling release upgrade approach. The distribution's first stable release is available for x86_64, aarm64, Pine64 phones and tablets like the PinePhone, and Raspberry Pi computers. One of the key features of the new 2023.1 release is the unified meta package manager which is called rhino-pkg and can work with Deb, Pacstall, and portable package formats: "hino-pkg (rpk), which is a meta-package manager that combines apt, pacstall, flatpak, and snap into a nice little UI that can be used to install, remove, search, and upgrade all package managers at once. This was also my first time dabbling with i18n, and since it's not a large program, we have translated it into (as of the 6th of August, 2023) 14 different languages along with English, so that hopefully every user can understand what it's doing in their native language." Another key feature of the distribution is its custom Xfce desktop which the project refers to as the Unicorn Desktop. Additional details on the Rhino Linux 2023.1 release can be found in the project's release announcement.
Murena 1.13
The Murena project provides open source images for common smartphones, open source cloud-based storage, calendar, and backup solutions, and sells phones with /e/OS pre-installed. The project's latest release is for version 1.13 which includes a number of fixes and minor improvements. "We are proud to deliver the /e/OS 1.13. Enjoy all the new features and improvements it embeds! We embedded some improvements! App lounge - Categories allows to discover way more apps. If users have to use a Google account, they're advised to use a Google account without any important data. Account added via Calendar can be used within a couple of minute. Translations - Gallery, Music, Advanced Privacy. Software updates - We merged bug fixes and security updates from LineageOS 19.1 source code. FP4 Firmware - Bumped firmware with the May update (FP4.SP29.B.069.20230510).Third-Party App support: we addressed some issues with in-app Maps display; we resolved an issue with a large number of markers on the map; we addressed some issues about network location." Additional details are presented in the project's release notes. Supported devices and download options can be found on the project's devices page.
Window Maker Live 0.95.9-0
Window Maker Live is a Debian-based Linux distribution that applies the Window Maker window manager as the default graphical user interface. The project's latest release is based on Debian 12.1 "Bookworm". " This release is based on stable Debian/Bookworm version 12.1. The current Window Maker 0.95.9 is used as default window manager and exclusive desktop session option. The additional xfce4 desktop session option was removed. Selected components and utilities of Xfce, MATE, and LXQt were seamlessly integrated with Window Maker. A Fail-safe mode session option was added for troubleshooting needs. The GTK3 widget libraries have been recompiled with the gtk3-classic patches from https://github.com/lah7/gtk3-classic. The login manager is now LightDM instead of the former wmlive-gdm. The default web browsers are Pale Moon and Surf. As mail messaging client Claws-Mail has been chosen. Most wmlive-specific scripts have been localized using machine translation for about 17 of the most common European languages used worldwide." The release notes also affirm the distribution has moved from SysV init to systemd.
Window Maker Live 0.95.9-0 -- Running the Window Maker interface
(full image size: 91kB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
Ubuntu 22.04.3
Paride Legovini has announced Canonical has released an update to its Ubuntu 22.04 series. The new update, along with Ubuntu's official community editions, fix a number of security issues. The release announcement states: "The Ubuntu team is pleased to announce the release of Ubuntu 22.04.3 LTS (Long-Term Support) for its Desktop, Server, and Cloud products, as well as other flavours of Ubuntu with long-term support. As usual, this point release includes many updates and updated installation media has been provided so that fewer updates will need to be downloaded after installation. These include security updates and corrections for other high-severity bugs, with a focus on maintaining stability and compatibility with Ubuntu 22.04 LTS. Kubuntu 22.04.3 LTS, Ubuntu Budgie 22.04.3 LTS, Ubuntu MATE 22.04.3 LTS, Lubuntu 22.04.3 LTS, Ubuntu Kylin 22.04.3 LTS, Ubuntu Studio 22.04.3 LTS, and Xubuntu 22.04.3 LTS are also now available." Additional information is available in the release notes.
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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: 2,897
- Total data uploaded: 43.5TB
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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) |
How do you like new windows to be arranged?
In this week's Questions and Answers section we talked about application window placement. Different people like arranging their desktop in various ways. Some people like having new windows centred on the screen, others like to set up tiles of windows side-by-side, while others like to position windows so they mostly overlap with edges sticking out for quick access. How do you like to position windows on your desktop?
You can see the results of our previous poll on protecting files from being overwritten in last week's edition. All previous poll results can be found in our poll archives.
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How do you like to position new application windows?
| Centred: | 451 (35%) |
| Mostly overlapping: | 132 (10%) |
| Randomly: | 58 (5%) |
| Tiled: | 211 (16%) |
| Other: | 137 (11%) |
| Does not matter: | 293 (23%) |
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| Website News |
New projects added to database
Rhino Linux
Rhino Linux is an Ubuntu-based distribution which offers a rolling release upgrade approach. The distribution uses a customized Xfce desktop environment. Rhino features a custom meta package manager which unifies Deb, Pacstall, and Flatpak software management.
Rhino Linux 2023.1 -- Running the customized Xfce live desktop
(full image size: 177kB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
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New distributions added to waiting list
- SDesk. SDesk is an Arch Linux-based distribution which features the GNOME desktop running a Wayland session. It uses the Calamares system installer.
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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, 21 August 2023. Past articles and reviews can be found through our Weekly Archive and Article Search pages. 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)
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| Archives |
| • Issue 1158 (2026-02-02): Manjaro 26.0, fastest filesystem, postmarketOS progress report, Xfce begins developing its own Wayland window manager, Bazzite founder interviewed |
| • Issue 1157 (2026-01-26): Setting up a home server, what happened to convergence, malicious software entering the Snap store, postmarketOS automates hardware tests, KDE's login manager works with systemd only |
| • Issue 1156 (2026-01-19): Chimera Linux's new installer, using the DistroWatch Torrent Corner, new package tools for Arch, Haiku improves EFI support, Redcore streamlines branches, Synex introduces install-time ZFS options |
| • Issue 1155 (2026-01-12): MenuetOS, CDE on Sparky, iDeal OS 2025.12.07, recommended flavour of BSD, Debian seeks new Data Protection Team, Ubuntu 25.04 nears its end of life, Google limits Android source code releases, Fedora plans to replace SDDM, Budgie migrates to Wayland |
| • Issue 1154 (2026-01-05): postmarketOS 25.06/25.12, switching to Linux and educational resources, FreeBSD improving laptop support, Unix v4 available for download, new X11 server in development, CachyOS team plans server edtion |
| • Issue 1153 (2025-12-22): Best projects of 2025, is software ever truly finished?, Firefox to adopt AI components, Asahi works on improving the install experience, Mageia presents plans for version 10 |
| • Issue 1152 (2025-12-15): OpenBSD 7.8, filtering websites, Jolla working on a Linux phone, Germany saves money with Linux, Ubuntu to package AMD tools, Fedora demonstrates AI troubleshooting, Haiku packages Go language |
| • Issue 1151 (2025-12-08): FreeBSD 15.0, fun command line tricks, Canonical presents plans for Ubutnu 26.04, SparkyLinux updates CDE packages, Redox OS gets modesetting driver |
| • 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 |
| • Full list of all issues |
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BeaFanatIX
BeaFanatIX was an Ubuntu-based mini live CD with utilities borrowed from KNOPPIX. It was developed by a small group of developers who have forked the successful, but discontinued BeatrIX distribution and added new features and scripts. The main purpose of BeaFanatIX was to provide a small, installable live CD, with good documentation and easy-to-use applications for a variety of desktop tasks.
Status: Discontinued
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Star Labs - Laptops built for Linux.
View our range including the highly anticipated StarFighter. Available with coreboot open-source firmware and a choice of Ubuntu, elementary, Manjaro and more. Visit Star Labs for information, to buy and get support.
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