DistroWatch Weekly |
DistroWatch Weekly, Issue 1055, 29 January 2024 |
Welcome to this year's 5th issue of DistroWatch Weekly!
Two of the main tasks a distribution takes on are packaging new software for users and supporting those packages with security fixes. This can lead to some distributions maintaining hundreds, even thousands, of patches and customizations. While some projects attempt to stay close to the upstream source and introduce few changes, others need to patch software heavily in order to meet their goals. In this week's Questions and Answers column we talk about which distributions apply the most patches. A lot of distribution patches are applied to security issues, especially in long-term support projects. Does your distribution offer a predictable support cycle, indicating how long a version will receive fixes? Let us know in this week's Opinion Poll. First though we talk about a young project called CNIX OS. The CNIX distribution is based on Debian and runs the Xfce desktop environment. We have details on this young distribution in this week's Feature Story. Then, in our News section, we talk about work happening in the Gentoo and UBports projects as both distributions plan their tasks for the year ahead. Plus we link to an interview with Haiku developer "Waddlesplash" and cover changes happening in the open source, BeOS successor. We are also pleased to share the releases of the past week and list the torrents we are seeding. Finally, we say a grateful thank you to the people who continue to donate to DistroWatch to help us keep the website running. We wish you all a wonderful week and happy reading!
This week's DistroWatch Weekly is presented by TUXEDO Computers.
Content:
- Review: CNIX OS 231204
- News: Gentoo presents ongoing work happening in the project, UBports introduces connectivity and battery improvements, Haiku developer gives interview
- Questions and answers: Distributions patching packages
- Released last week: MX Linux 23.2, Parrot 6.0, BunsenLabs Linux Boron, Gnoppix 24.1.15
- Torrent corner: BunsenLabs Linux, KDE neon, MX Linux, Parrot
- Upcoming releases: Vanilla OS 2 Beta, Linux Lite 6.8, FreeBSD 13.3-BETA1
- Opinion poll: Does your distribution have a scheduled support life span?
- Site news: Donations and Sponsors
- Reader comments
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Feature Story (By Jesse Smith) |
CNIX OS 231204
The CNIX OS distribution has been recommended to me a few times in the past month. This project, which was added to our waiting list in December of 2023, is based on Debian and features the Xfce desktop environment. While information on what the project does or what goals it seeks to achieve are missing from the project's website, the feature highlights mention some generic Linux features such as being open source, a lack of tracking software, and improved privacy compared to commercial operating systems.
The CNIX website also mentions the Nix package and system management utility a few times. The distribution's home page mentions CNIX OS uses "Nix-based security", though I could find no explanation as to which parts of the operating system are pulled from Debian and which are pulled from the Nix repositories or which aspects of the distribution make use of Nix. In fact, apart from a brief FAQ page and the default login credentials for the live media, there is no documentation for CNIX OS. I decided to find out for myself what the highlights of the distribution were and how it made use of Nix.
CNIX is available in a single edition for computers with x86_64 processors. The ISO file is about 1.8GB in size. Booting from this media brings up a text screen briefly which indicates we're running Debian 12 and then the Xfce 4.18 desktop loads.
The Xfce desktop is arranged with a thin panel placed across the top of the screen. This panel holds the application menu and system tray. At the bottom of the screen we find a dock with three launchers on it - one for the Thunar file manager, one for the Firefox web browser, and one for a virtual terminal. On the desktop we find icons for launching the file manager and the Calamares system installer.
CNIX OS 231204 -- Browsing the application menu
(full image size: 1.7MB, resolution: 1680x1050 pixels)
I explored the live media and it appears to be running vanilla Debian software with no custom repositories. There was no evidence of the Nix package manager or its repositories on the live media.
Installer
When I tried to launch the Calamares system installer from its desktop icon a warning popped up on the desktop letting me know this executable file was untrusted. I was asked if I wanted to accept the risk and proceed. No other application launchers cause this warning on the live media. Assuming we proceed, the install experience is typical of the graphical Calamares installer. We're quickly walked through selecting our preferred language, time zone, and keyboard layout.
Disk partitioning can be automated or handled manually with a friendly point-and-click interface. The automated process sets up an ext4 root partition with an optional swap file or swap partition. The installer asks us to make up a username and password for ourselves and then copies its files to our hard drive. The installer notes, while it is working, that CNIX OS is "100% compatible with Debian". This makes sense as it appears to use Debian 12 packages exclusively.
When the installer finished its work it offered to restart the computer. CNIX failed to shut down properly, locking up once the Xfce desktop terminated. I had to force a restart to start exploring my new copy of CNIX.
Early impressions
The CNIX OS distribution boots to a graphical login screen where we can sign into the Xfce desktop. There are no pop-ups, welcome windows, or first-run wizards when we get started. Like Debian running Xfce, CNIX is content to stay out of the way and let us navigate the environment on our own.
On the project's website, there is a comment: "CNIX comes with Telegram Messenger pre-installed on the desktop." This line is mentioned a few times in the FAQ, and I feel it is slightly misleading (depending on one's interpretation). Telegram is installed and available in the application menu, but its launcher is not on the desktop.
The Xfce desktop is snappy, clear of distractions, and doesn't do anything flashy. The experience feels very clean and minimal.
Something I noticed early on is there is a symbolic link in our first user's home directory called "cnix". This link points to /usr/share/cnix which contains icons, branding, and Calamares configuration information. Since this material appears to all be specific to the live desktop and installer, it looks like the cnix directory is left behind by accident.
Hardware
I tested CNIX in a VirtualBox environment and on my laptop. In both environments the distribution ran smoothly, quickly even. The Xfce desktop is pleasantly responsive, the operating system is stable, and the included software all worked as expected. The distribution detected and worked with all of my laptop's hardware. The one issue I ran into was Xfce did not resize itself automatically to fit VirtualBox's window, but I could set the resolution manually through the desktop's settings panel.
CNIX OS 231204 -- The settings panel
(full image size: 1.2MB, resolution: 1680x1050 pixels)
CNIX is unusually heavy, taking up 825MB of RAM just to login to the Xfce desktop. This is about twice as much RAM as Xfce typically uses and I didn't find any immediate culprits which would explain the unusually high memory consumption. A fresh install of CNIX uses 6.1GB of disk space, which is fairly typical for a mainstream Linux distribution these days.
Included software
The distribution ships with a mostly typical collection of open source applications. These include Firefox, LibreOffice, the GNU Image Manipulation Program, FileZilla, and Transmission. There are a few image and document viewers, the Xfburn disc burning software, and the Asunder disc ripping application. The Telegram messaging client is installed for us.
CNIX OS 231204 -- Transferring files with FileZilla
(full image size: 834kB, resolution: 1680x1050 pixels)
CNIX ships with a few media players - including SMPlayer, Audacious, and mpv - and codecs for most media formats. I found the BleachBit disk cleaning software, the Timeshift snapshot program, and Grsync for transferring files between computers. The Xfce settings panel is available to help us customize the environment and it does its usual excellent job.
There were a few surprises. For example, DOSBox is included to help us run old DOS games, though this seems to be the only concession for gamers. The zuluCrypt encryption software is included too along with a user account manager.
CNIX OS 231204 -- Running DOSBox
(full image size: 1.0MB, resolution: 1680x1050 pixels)
Beneath the surface we find the GNU Compiler Collection, the GNU userland utilities, and a full complement of manual pages. CNIX uses the systemd init software and version 6.1 of the Linux kernel, matching its Debian parent.
Throughout my trial the included software worked well and as expected with no problems.
Software management
Despite the CNIX website mentioning Nix multiple times, I could find no indication the distribution is built with or uses Nix. The short documentation page doesn't mention it, all software is pulled from vanilla Debian 12 repositories (and Debian Backports) and there are no Nix management tools on the system. I'm not sure how CNIX might be connected with Nix, but it's not obvious.
The website also mentions both GNOME Software and Synaptic are included with the distribution and this is accurate. Both the GNOME Software application manager and the low-level Synaptic package manager are included. I was able to use both to find, install, remove, and upgrade packages on the system. Both worked smoothly and without problems. For people who prefer working from the command line the APT package manager is included.
CNIX OS 231204 -- Browsing applications in GNOME Software
(full image size: 972kB, resolution: 1680x1050 pixels)
By default, Flatpak and Snap support are not included, though we could add these frameworks from the Debian repositories if we wished.
Conclusions
I was hoping CNIX OS (as its name and website suggest) would provide a Nix-based environment, complete with procedural configuration and package snapshots. However, there do not appear to be any Nix utilities included with the distribution and no packages which were pulled from the Nix repositories, as far as I could tell.
While that was disappointing, what the distribution did provide was a solid, Debian-based experience. This experience is somewhat enhanced by the Calamares system installer which makes setting up the distribution pleasantly straightforward.
On the positive side, CNIX is stable, fast, and provides us with access to Debian's huge repositories of software. On the other hand, as far as I could tell, apart from the system installer, CNIX doesn't appear to add anything to the Debian experience. Running Debian with the Xfce desktop would be virtually indistinguishable from running CNIX OS, apart from the latter using a larger amount of memory.
In short, CNIX is a perfectly fine, desktop operating system. However, apart from speeding up the install process, I'm not sure it offers anything beyond what we'd already enjoy with Debian (or other close relatives of Debian). This makes for a good experience, but not a distinct one. I'm hoping the project develops its own identity and beneficial features over time.
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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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Miscellaneous News (by Jesse Smith) |
Gentoo presents ongoing work happening in the project, UBports introduces connectivity and battery improvements, Haiku developer gives interview
The Gentoo project has published an overview of recent accomplishments along with plans for the 2024 calendar year. Some of the items the developers want to work on include expanding binary package support, creating new profiles of presets and configurations, helping upstream projects migrate to modern C standards, and expanding .NET support. "Binary package hosting: Gentoo shockingly now also provides binary packages, for easier and faster installation! For amd64 and arm64, we've got a stunning >20 GByte of packages on our mirrors, from LibreOffice to KDE Plasma and from GNOME to Docker. Also, would you think 9-year old x86-64-v3 is still experimental? We have it already on our mirrors! For all other architectures and ABIs, the binary package files used for building the installation stages (including the build tool chain) are available for download. New 23.0 profiles in preparation: A new profile version, i.e. a collection of presets and configurations, is at the moment undergoing internal preparation and testing for all architectures. It's not ready yet, but will integrate more toolchain hardening by default, as well as fix a lot of internal inconsistencies. Stay tuned for an announcement with more details in the near future." Additional information can be found in Gentoo's newsletter.
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The UBports team have published a newsletter in which the team discusses device support, progress in Snap package compatibility, and energy savings. Some of the new changes should improve cell connectivity and battery life: "Some progress has been made on stopping UT from dropping out of connection with cell towers. There have also been some battery enhancements. Most of the changes are not dramatic but make small improvements to the overall performance of UT."
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The Haiku project maintains a modern, open source successor to the BeOS platform that gained popularity in the 1990s. One of the project's lead developers goes by the name Waddlesplash. In an interview with Desktop On Fire, Waddlesplash talks about the future of the project and some of the challenges the team faces. "a lot of the 'old guard' that shaped the project into what it is today have far less time to contribute than they did 10 or even 5 years ago. A lot of the kernel & driver hackers I watched and learned from when I first joined are mostly dormant today, only occasionally responding to emails, tickets, or other messages when there are questions, or perhaps contributing a few patches a year. So, I'd say the biggest challenges at the moment and in the next two years are maintaining momentum and interest in development of the core parts of Haiku." The rest of the interview is available on Desktop On Fire.
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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) |
Distributions patching packages
Does-this-look-different asks: Which distributions patch their software the most? Is there a tool, like a script, I can run to see how many changes my distro makes to the kernel?
DistroWatch answers: First, I'd like to address detecting the number (or size) of patches a distribution might apply to a package. The good news here is you don't need a script to go through a piece of software, like the kernel, looking for changes. Most distributions make patches to their packages publicly available, making it easy to count the number of changes and see how many lines of code have been affected. We just need to search a bit for the list of patches and configuration changes.
For example, if we visit the Debian package tracking page it will lead us to the Debian source code for the kernel where we can find a list of patches. Likewise, Gentoo's ebuild scripts list the patches which will be fetched when building the project's generic kernel. The Fedora project involves a little more digging to find the proper repository, but it has a section of the source tree which is dedicated to customizations specific to Fedora and Red Hat. In a similar vein, we can see a list of differences introduced by Canonical to the Ubuntu kernel package. Meanwhile the Arch Linux patches for the kernel can be found relatively easily on the project's GitHub page under the Releases section.
In short, if we're willing to explore the source repositories of our distributions the patches and custom configuration changes are available for us to browse. How you want to measure the amount of changes (by number of patches, number of lines changed, or number of source code lines adjusted) is up to the researcher.
As to which distributions apply the most patches to their software, I'm not sure. However, past experience suggests to me that it's either a mobile operating system (such as postmarketOS or UBports) which requires a lot of adjustments to run properly on custom hardware, or a long-term support (LTS) distribution. Linux distributions which are supported for five years or more usually end up patching software long after it is no longer maintained upstream and LTS distributions need to provide their own security patches. This means distributions such as SUSE Linux Enterprise, Ubuntu Pro, and Red Hat Enterprise Linux often end up supplying up to ten years of security packages for hundreds or even thousands of packages.
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Additional answers can be found in our Questions and Answers archive.
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Released Last Week |
MX Linux 23.2
The MX Linux project, a Debian-based, desktop distribution has published a new update to the distribution's 23.x series. MX Linux 23.2 is based on Debian 12 "Bookworm" and includes a number of fixes and improvements. "Some highlights include: installer updates addressing fstab generation, GUI simplification, and fixes for users of 'toram' live feature. New tool 'MX Locale', for management of system locale information, system default language, etc. New tool 'papirus-folder-colors', which is a fun little tool for making papirus-family themes with different folder colours. AHS Xfce release features the 6.6 liquorix kernel, updated firmware and mesa libraries. An opt-in option for auto-updates is in MX-Packageinstaller -> Popular Apps -> Kernels. The KDE Plasma ISO replaces webcamoid with kamoso. the Xfce and fluxbox isos replace webamoid with guvcview. Fixes to the mx-comfort-themes for some apps that had white text on white backgrounds and black text on blackgrounds. 'build-essential' packages now included on ISO, for those users that might need to compile some driver and not be able to get on-line. Pipewire 1.0." Additional details can be found in the project's release announcement.
Parrot 6.0
Parrot is a Debian-based, security-oriented distribution featuring a collection of utilities designed for penetration testing, computer forensics, reverse engineering, hacking, privacy, anonymity and cryptography. The project's latest release is based on Debian 12, uses version 6.5 of the Linux kernel, and improves wireless networking support. "Debian 12: The system has been updated to be based on the newly released Debian 12, offering enhanced stability and features. Linux Kernel 6.5: Incorporates the latest Linux kernel with additional patches for network sniffing and injection, enhancing cybersecurity capabilities, and of course better performance and native support for the latest Intel and AMD CPUs. Advanced DKMS and Wi-Fi Drivers: Includes backported DKMS modules for Linux kernel 6.5, covering extra Wi-Fi drivers for improved network analysis and the latest Nvidia drivers for better hardware compatibility. Pentesting tools updated: All penetration testing tools have been updated, ensuring users have access to the latest methods and techniques." Additional information can be found in the distribution's release notes.
Parrot 6.0 -- Exploring the MATE application menu
(full image size: 2.0MB, resolution: 1920x1440 pixels)
BunsenLabs Linux Boron
John Raff has announced the release of BunsenLabs Linux Boron, a major new release of the project's lightweight, Debian-based distribution featuring a customised Openbox window manager. This is the project's first build based on Debian 12: "The BunsenLabs team are pleased to announce the release of BunsenLabs Boron. Based on Debian 'Bookworm', this is the best BunsenLabs so far, in our opinion. Some of the new features are: a beautiful graphical user interface by our graphics team, taking Juliette Taka's Debian Emerald wallpaper as a starting point, windows have round corners, the menu has icons and the panel is vertical, as usual, all these details are easily adjusted to users' preferences; alternative GUI themes are easily selected from our BLOB utility, under 'User Preferences' in the menu, there is a dark Boron theme with red highlights, a horizontal panel and no menu icons, users who liked earlier BunsenLabs themes can easily switch to the Beryllium, Lithium, Helium or other desktops; an optional utility will monitor package upgrades and inform the user if any are available; various bugs and annoyances have been fixed throughout the system." Read the release announcement and the release notes for further information.
Gnoppix 24.1.15
Gnoppix is a Debian and Kali Linux-based distribution which can be run from a DVD, USB thumb drive or from a local drive. The project's latest release, Gnoppix 24.1.15, focuses on polishing the Xfce desktop experience and making Tor networking more accessible. "Our Xfce edition features a traditional desktop layout with a bottom panel and Whiskermenu as the application menu. It is using the Qogir GTK theme (vinceliuice) with the Papirus icon theme for a sleek and modern look. Blueman comes installed for all of your Bluetooth needs. The impementation of the Gnoppix AI installer is completed too, you'll be able install hundrets of AI tools with the 1-click option. This edition has taken a lot of work, and we are excited to share it with you all! To earn its privacy credentials the distro routes all Internet-bound traffic through the Tor anonymous network. Earlier, the distro used a launcher script to fetch the latest Tor release from the Internet, but now bundles it by default." Additional information is provided in the project's release announcement.
Redcore Linux 2401
Redcore Linux is a desktop-oriented distribution based on Gentoo. The project's latest release, Redcore Linux 2401, brings updated hardware support through newer kernels and switches the default sound system to PipeWire. "resync with Gentoo Linux' testing tree as of 21.01.2024; Linux kernel v6.6.13 LTS as default, v6.1 LTS and v5.15 LTS available in repositories, for those who want an older kernel; glibc v2.37, gcc v13.2.0, binutils v2.40, clang/llvm v17.0.6, rust v1.74.1 based toolchain; latest mesa, xorg, xwayland and wayland based graphical stack; PipeWire is now the default sound server implementation, replacing both PulseAudio and JACK, modernising the sound stack; OpenSSL v3 is now default, moving away from the good old OpenSSL v1; FFmpeg v6 is now default, moving away from the good old ffmpeg v4." Additional details can be found in the distribution's release announcement.
Redcore Linux 2401 -- Running the KDE Plasma desktop
(full image size: 1.8MB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
Slackel 7.7 "MATE"
Dimitris Tzemos has announced the release of Slackel 7.7 "MATE" edition, a Slackware and Salix-based Linux distribution featuring the MATE 1.26.1 desktop and various graphical utilities developed by the Slackel project. "Slackel 7.7 'MATE' has been released. Includes the Linux kernel 6.6.11, MATE 1.26.2 and latest updates from Slackware's 'Current' tree. Also includes salixtools borrowed from Salix. This release is available for both 32-bit and 64-bit systems. The 64-bit iso supports UEFI/EFI systems as well. This release includes Mozilla Firefox 121.0.1, Mozilla Thunderbird 115.6.1, LibreOffice 7.6.2, GIMP 2.10.36, SMTube 21.10.0, SMPlayer 23.12.0, mpv 0.34.1, MPlayer 20221009, Exaile 4.1.1, Brasero 3.12.2, isomaster 1.3.13, Pidgin 2.14.12, Transmission 2.94; it includes Flatpak so the user has access to dozens of apps to install. GUI tools developed in house also included: instonusb to create a live Slackel USB stick with persistent encryption file; multibootusb to create a live USB including 32-bit and 64-bit live editions of Slackel. SLI (Slackel Live Installer) to install Slackel to internal or external USB SSD or USB stick." Read the rest of the release announcement for further details.
SystemRescue 11.00
SystemRescue, a specialist live Linux distribution based on Arch Linux and designed for administrating and repairing computer systems and rescuing files, has been updated to version 11.0. The new release introduces the 6.6 LTS Linux kernel, provides some bug fixes, and adds several new utilities: "Updated the Linux kernel to the long-term supported Linux 6.6.14; added option 'ssh_known_hosts' in yaml configuration to trust SSH CAs signatures on host keys; fix the 'findroot' boot option when /sbin/init is an absolute symlink; fix the 'findroot' loop when the password to any encrypted device is unknown; update Xfce configuration (enabled screen saver, added battery icon); package 'dstat' has been replaced with 'dool' which is a fork of dstat; added bcachefs-tools (file system utilities for bcachefs, no kernel module yet); added blocksync-fast (block device sync tool for block-based backups); added sleuthkit (tools for raw file system inspection); added timeshift (snapshot-based backup program)." Continue to the changelog for further information.
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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: 2,954
- Total data uploaded: 44.0TB
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Upcoming Releases and Announcements |
Summary of expected upcoming releases
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Opinion Poll (by Jesse Smith) |
Does your distribution have a scheduled support life span?
This week, in our Questions and Answers column, we touched on long-term support distributions and how they often need to maintain security patches for packages, often for several years in accordance with their official support schedules.
This week we'd like to hear whether your distribution has a published support schedule? Do you know for how long your distribution will continue to receive updates?
You can see the results of our previous poll on tools for writing ISO files to USB thumb drives in our previous edition. All previous poll results can be found in our poll archives.
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Does your distro have an official support schedule?
Yes - there is a published schedule: | 638 (49%) |
No - there is no schedule: | 93 (7%) |
Unsure: | 78 (6%) |
I use a rolling release: | 377 (29%) |
I use some distros with and some without a support schedule: | 112 (9%) |
I do not run a Linux distro: | 17 (1%) |
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Website News |
Donations and Sponsors
Each month we receive support and kindness from our readers in the form of donations. These donations help us keep the web server running, pay contributors, and keep infrastructure like our torrent seed box running. We'd like to thank our generous readers and acknowledge how much their contributions mean to us.
This month we're grateful for the $279 in contributions from the following kind souls:
Donor |
Amount |
J Basham | $100 |
M Singh | $25 |
J Sherman | $18 |
R Roddy | $15 |
B Karsdorp | $10 |
S Trading | $10 |
L Freyr | $5 |
J S | $50 |
Jonathon B | $10 |
Sam C | $10 |
Chung T | $5 |
Darkeugene7896 | $5 |
DuCakedHare | $5 |
J.D. L | $2 |
PB C | $2 |
Peter M | $2 |
c6WWldo9 | $1 |
Stephen M | $1 |
R Brooks | $1 |
Shasheen E | $1 |
William E | $1 |
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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, 5 February 2024. 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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Extended Lifecycle Support by TuxCare |
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Reader Comments • Jump to last comment |
1 • Published schedule (by DaveW on 2024-01-29 01:42:45 GMT from United States)
Linux Mint has kind of a slippery schedule. They publish twice a year, two months, more or less, after each Ubuntu release. They never publish an exact date, just do the release when they consider it ready.
2 • End Of Life Mint (by Guido on 2024-01-29 01:50:23 GMT from Philippines)
For Linux MInt you can find the information here: https://endoflife.software/operating-systems/linux/linux-mint
LM 20 will EOL in April 2025
3 • published support (by pengxiun on 2024-01-29 04:43:21 GMT from New Zealand)
I understand that Linux Mint only supports the Linux Mint parts of their releases. LM MATE and Xfce DE releases get nearly all their security support via Ubuntu. So, when Ubuntu drops security support for their release, Linux Mint does not take up the security support for the remainder of the LM release, based on that Ubuntu release, but continue with the support of the LM only parts. Too bad if there is a kernel exploit that Ubuntu doesnt patch.
Firefox may be an exception.
4 • Peppermint (Devuan Daedalus) EOL (by Solicitor on 2024-01-29 08:18:40 GMT from Qatar)
I currently use Peppermint (Devuan Daedalus) that was released on 26 Oct 2023 and there is no published EOL for the stable release, however both Debian (upstream) and Devuan (downstream) support the stable release for around 3 years. Thus, I expect my distro to be supported until Mid of 2026.
5 • poll (by Jazzfelix on 2024-01-29 09:05:29 GMT from Germany)
Yes - there is a published schedule for FreeBSD. Also: I do not run a Linux distro. xD
6 • Linux Mint (by Jesse on 2024-01-29 11:48:39 GMT from Canada)
@2: "I understand that Linux Mint only supports the Linux Mint parts of their releases. LM MATE and Xfce DE releases get nearly all their security support via Ubuntu."
This doesn't really make sense. Linux Mint supports their releases for the same length of time as Ubuntu does upstream. In other words, when Ubuntu no longer supports their packages, Mint doesn't support that release anymore. Their support cycles are the same. Mint doesn't continue support after Ubuntu stops supporting their packages upstream.
7 • Mx-23 (by Kc1di on 2024-01-29 11:51:19 GMT from United States)
The distro I'm using publishes EOL infor MX-23 actives support ends on 10 Jun 26 and Security support ends 10 Jun 28 - So it's got a ways to go yet :) I use other distros Debian that have no clear EOL date.
8 • @5 – “distros” (by SuperOscar on 2024-01-29 13:03:55 GMT from Finland)
Well, as BSD stands for “Berkeley software *distribution*”, I would say the poll question (“Does your distro have…”) still qualifies ;)
9 • distros (by 0323pin on 2024-01-30 05:40:26 GMT from United States)
@8, well yes, but not "Linux" one. The question states Linux. As for official support schedule, yes there is one for my OS but, I don't use it. I run the development branch and build everything from source.
10 • distros @7&8 (by cynic on 2024-01-30 11:58:34 GMT from United States)
One thing I love about Linux is everyone is an expert and also loves to nitpick! (sarc)
11 • EOL (by Jerry on 2024-01-30 13:39:37 GMT from United States)
That's something that's always bothered me about some/many linux distros, the End Of Life thing. I tried to get a handle on the reasons for it, and it came down to what the various experts say, along the lines of, "..end-of-life refers to the point where the software's developers or maintainers stop providing updates, patches, or any form of support for that particular version."
What I don't understand is WHY the software's developers/maintainers STOP providing update/pathes, etc. The most stated reason is that a new version has been developed and released. But, again, WHY? What causes devs to move away from the project to another project with a different number? Why not just continue with patches and all else needed to keep the distro going along the same path as what eventually becomes a new version?
12 • @10 • distros (by Geo. on 2024-01-30 16:15:14 GMT from Canada)
I used to be a pert, now I'm an expert. 😉
13 • published schedule (by John on 2024-01-30 20:11:10 GMT from Canada)
Hard question to answer. My Distro, Slackware, has no formal way in advance "published schedule", but when support is going to be stopped for an old release, the date of sunset is published a well in advance.
I think a release is sun-setted when it gets too difficult to update a package due to old Libs or gcc. 14.0, 14.1 and 14.2 were all sun-setted on Jan 1, 2024 leaving only 15.0. This is the first time in a very long time when only 1 release was being supported.
Some Stats:
14.2 - Supported for 7 years 14.1 - Supported for 10 years 14.0 - Supported for 11 years
14 • @11 • EOL (by Jerry from United States) (by Tom on 2024-01-31 16:28:37 GMT from United States)
1. Development costs time and money. If software doesn't bring money, one is doing it for free.
As we all know, one can't survive solely on love and ideals.
Often, it's hobbyists who start a project for personal purposes, and later they let it fall.
Besides, there are many other reasons. Sometimes people get bored and look for another hobby.
2. Because the toolkits and basic libraries also change over time. GTK2, GTK3, GTK4, GTK5, etc.
Underlaying technology may or may not maintain compatibility and varies from case to case.
Sometimes it makes sense to maintain compatibility, but not in all cases. Backward compatibility can cause a very large overhead. Sometimes, it becomes a security risk.
3. If the numbers didn't change, one wouldn't know the difference between the old and new versions.
The newer versions get features or security issues fixed, and one needs to differentiate among them.
Sometimes just because the naming scheme was inferior. LO 7.6.4.1 is now called 24.2.1, as of today.
4. That's what they do, as long as they work on it and don't give up on their project.
5. Repeat 1 to 4...
15 • CNIX vs. Haiku (by B. Marley, Esq on 2024-01-31 16:36:15 GMT from Denmark)
From the CNIX review: "... what the distribution did provide was a solid, Debian-based experience."
As does Debian. Honestly, distros like CNIX serve no purpose whatsoever. They bring nothing new to the table. They are skinstros, not distros. There is no vision.
Haiku does bring something unique. I hope the lack of new developers doesn't kill it. Different is fun.
16 • SysLinux (by Dave Postles on 2024-02-01 12:18:42 GMT from United Kingdom)
Obviously I shd contact the maker, but can anyone point me quickly to the checksum for SysLinux - I can't find it and I've already downloaded the .iso. Thanks.
17 • SysLinuxOS checksum (by Jesse on 2024-02-01 12:43:39 GMT from Canada)
@16: "can anyone point me quickly to the checksum for SysLinux - I can't find it "
On our front page there is a release announcement for SysLinuxOS at the top. We link to both the ISO files and the checksums in the announcement.
18 • EOL (by Jerry on 2024-02-02 01:04:05 GMT from United States)
@14 How do rolling releases fit in with those explanations? Some of them do have EOL published but some do not. My queries up there in @11 were with the rolling release model in mind, while wondering why that way of doing things could be extended a bit to the notion of a perpetual release.
19 • EOL (by Tom on 2024-02-02 08:17:19 GMT from United States)
@18 • EOL (by Jerry from United States)
Exactly the same, Jerry. The operating system evolves, and eventually inferior components are replaced by the newer and better ones. X is replaced by Wayland, old init systems are replaced by systemd, and so on.
The system consists of the system libraries (needed to run the core operating system) and the software (system) libraries (not needed for the operating system, but needed for the software functionality; e.g. multimedia codecs).
Rolling or not, it makes no difference. Libraries change over time, as does the technology used to build them. The only difference with rolling is that these new libraries reach the end user sooner, are less well tested, and are more likely to cause incompatibilities. In other words, the user is the (rolling) beta tester.
Essential core libraries are not a concern for having a working server OS. All other libraries are a concern because they, combined with poor overall design, will make the system unusable as a desktop OS.
Once I have installed Astro on someone. Soon after, they upgrade the system and Astro breaks, or they keep Astro and can't upgrade the system. The main selling point of Shutter was its ability to take full website screenshots. Some time later, the required library became obsolete and so did Shutter. History repeats itself with the Gimp plugin Resynthesizer.
In 2010, Photoshop introduced the "Content Aware Fill" function in Photoshop CS5. A student named Paul Harrison developed the Resynthesizer plugin in 2005 as a part of his PhD. The plugin, which is one of the main selling points of the Gimp, is slowly disappearing from the repositories. The Resynthesizer plugin requires Python 2.x, which is deprecated and has been replaced by Python 3.x, and if you try to install it on Ubuntu 22.04 for example, it will fail. The workaround is to install the Gimp and the resynthesizer and then use the AppImage Gimp Starter which provides the necessary Python 2.x environment without messing with system components. Adobe's Content Aware Fill implementation was also based on Dr. Paul Harrison's work, and because it was not open source, which is a cost and not a revenue generator, it evolved over time.
These are just a few examples that illustrate why Linux is not the alternative to Windows for virtually nobody. Linux's core concept is great for a server distribution, but its core concept is completely broken for desktop use.
I can still run almost every application from the 90s on my Windows. Try that on Linux. And MacOS shows that one can make it even worse. They have changed both the hardware and the software architecture several times over the years, and not a single application I ever bought runs on the latest Macs.
The best system in the world is worth nothing if there is no software for it. The operating system is just an "app-starter".
20 • Linux 90s software (by Dave Postles on 2024-02-02 10:00:14 GMT from United Kingdom)
Wine will run 90s programmes in Linux, @20. I run MapInfo4, Minitab14, GenMapUk2, and a variety of Windows programmes from the 90s in Wine. What I don't want to do is run Linux-based programmes from the 90s on my Linux desktop.
21 • CNIX (by Rita Marley on 2024-02-02 10:05:26 GMT from The Netherlands)
@15 • CNIX (by B. Marley from Denmark)
"Honestly, distros like CNIX serve no purpose whatsoever. They bring nothing new to the table. They are SKINSTROS, not distros. There is no vision."
DISCLAIMER: If you have no sense of humor, STOP READING NOW! The topics described below are serious, but the comments may not be appropriate for everyone.
If "skinstros" can't provide the proper skin for the OS, what's left?
1. The boot screen (Plymouth) of CNIX OS is lovelessly designed and technically poorly executed.
https://ibb.co/JvPrS6k
It displays the U.S. flag with transparency instead of white, and with completely misaligned text.
This shows a complete lack of creativity. How about a burning flag or some falling-off stars?
2. Bad choice of system theme and wrong default icon theme.
Arc themes are known to be bad because of lack of contrast.
https://ibb.co/JtYr74F
Papirus icon theme is set by default, even if ePapirus is also pre-installed. ePapirus would make some "invisible icons" a bit more visible. Still bad though.
3. The distribution comes without its own logo, using the Debian logo instead.
https://ibb.co/Pg9yLCT
There is nothing wrong with the Debian logo. It is well done and nice, but taking the existing distribution with the goal of improving its appearance and not even making your own logo is just cheap.
https://ibb.co/VQYvhBg
4. Wallpaper... :(
NEVER, NEVER put the distro name on the wallpaper, and if you can't leave it alone, NEVER, NEVER put the large text on the top or left side, but the small text on the bottom right side.
https://ibb.co/rcGCqXV
Speaking of image choices, the barn makes a decent wallpaper, but the cowgirl protecting the barn brings some accotiations...
https://ibb.co/S7wsBxf
5. XFCE with Thunar as a base.
XFCE is broken. Thunar is broken. Anything based on it is broken.
https://ibb.co/R3zMdmw https://ibb.co/BqLg5k7
6. Distro name... CNIX??
CrippleNIX? CrockedNIX? CrudeNIX? CrinklNIX? ClowNIX? ...
My verdict: 1 (red) star.
(https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Californian_Lone_Star_Flag_(1836).svg)
Another fail in the month of fails. First MX Linux, then Bunsen Boron, then the Slackel, and now cNIXos.
22 • WINE (by UnScramble on 2024-02-02 10:49:27 GMT from Japan)
@21 • Linux 90s software (by Dave Postles from United Kingdom) "Wine will run 90s programmes in Linux, @20. I run MapInfo4, Minitab14, GenMapUk2, and a variety of Windows programmes from the 90s in Wine."
Sure, there are some exceptions that work fine, but that's not the rule of thumb. Not only the old stuff often won't run, but also the new stuff often won't work with Linux and some emulators or non-emulators.
Many games from the 90s also had some DRM mechanisms that just won't work with WINE, some games will only run in WINE with some hacks (the game will run in the background, hidden behind the black window, for example), and some applications will expect some components that are missing (XARA for example couldn't be installed because Internet Explorer was missing), or some other applications will install and run, but some of their features won't work properly, or hardware acceleration will be missing, or ... You name it. And if and when something runs, how well? I recently installed the game Victoria, and it ran at 50 fps in Windows, and 1 fps with Steam's non-emulator Proton (WINE).
Thanks, but no thanks.
23 • Windows/Wine (by Dave Postles on 2024-02-02 11:24:45 GMT from United Kingdom)
All my programmes run perfectly in Wine. Personally, I only use my desktop for productivity.
24 • Windows/Wine (by UnScramble on 2024-02-02 12:28:31 GMT from Japan)
@24 • Windows/Wine (by Dave Postles from United Kingdom) "All my programmes run perfectly in Wine. Personally, I only use my desktop for productivity."
If you drop the stone from the 2nd floor, how many floors will it fall before it hits the ground? One or two? ;)
Speaking of "I only use my desktop for productivity", have you ever heard of XARA? Originally it was even British.
https://appdb.winehq.org/objectManager.php?sClass=version&iId=41190
https://appdb.winehq.org/objectManager.php?sClass=application&iId=17927
So, yes, I am happy for YOU that all YOUR programs run perfectly in Wine.
25 • @22: (by dragonmouth on 2024-02-02 13:22:13 GMT from United States)
"6. Distro name... CNIX??" How about "cynics"?
Number of Comments: 25
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