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| Reader Comments • Jump to last comment |
1 • Archcraft (by Steve K on 2024-05-20 01:28:03 GMT from United States)
What an awful, dismal desktop environment! Nothing but shades of dark grey and black. How depressing. Makes me sick. I wouldn't touch this distro with a ten-foot pole.
2 • Use trash cli! (by trash cli user on 2024-05-20 01:30:00 GMT from United States)
Good advice on rm pitfalls. I recommend trash-cli, which interfaces with the XDG trash folder, so I can always pop open my file manager later to handle the trash with the mouse.
3 • "...small home projects..." (by R. Cain on 2024-05-20 02:11:27 GMT from United States)
“...I want to start a series of how-to articles which will explore setting up small home projects on a minimal device like a Raspberry Pi, old laptop, or PinePhone...”
Please stick to projects using old laptops.
The Raspberry Pi is a fine device, but has never been as pervasive (IMHO), nor made the inroads into the general Linux computing community (this is a Linux website, after all) as ALL those older computers which still exist--specifically because of excellent, lightweight Linux distributions.
Pinephone? Tried accessing the Pine64 Blog lately ( https://pine64.org/blog/ ), or even not-so-lately? Everything Pine seems to have been on life support for a very long time now (Pine’s LATEST blogs are dated Mar 17, 2024; Jan 21, 2024: Aug 15, 2023. ALL user comments have been stripped from Community Blogs as far back as I wanted to waste my time on checking). Again, strictly IMHO, much more fertile, interesting, and *productive* options exist outside the area of considering the Pinephone as the basis of a “...small home project...”.
Just sayin'.
4 • 3 • "...small home projects..." (by R. Cain on 2024-05-20 02:17:15 GMT from United States)
Oooops...
This is in response to an entry in Jesse Smith's
“Website News” / “A little housekeeping"
5 • Housekeeping (by Vinfall on 2024-05-20 02:54:25 GMT from Hong Kong)
Regarding the website update, I noticed that the stylesheet was not loaded in my area (SE Asia). Looking at the network tab in developer tools it says the CSS has a NS_ERROR_NET_INTERRUPT error. Probably a Firefox bug with http3 web server, I'm not very sure. All I can say is this does not happen on MSEdge or Chromium.
As a side note, I'm experimenting the same recently and it at least saves me a few bucks by dropping several unnecessary servers with my "local prioritized" strategy. It's a bit annoying I have to swap SD cards during full backup (rsync/zsync works great for small ones though) as I don't like BTRFS, so I'm also trying to set up hypervisor (VM) and eventually use snapshots instead.
So speaking of "small home projects", I think it's fine to try new distros on low-end machines or even embedded devices, but anything beyond that would (IMHO) sound a bit off-topic on a site named "DistroWatch".
6 • Small home projects... (by Michael on 2024-05-20 03:19:09 GMT from Australia)
One project I've had on my to-do list for a while, but haven't yet got around to, is building a Digital Video Recorder (DVR) to replace my Topfield when it finally dies.
The reason I think this will be an interesting project is that it combines an atypical hardware build (a low power, low noise device with some digital TV tuners and with the primary control device being a remote control rather than a keyboard) with a single-purpose software environment (MythTV running on top of a minimal Linux build).
In some ways this is a server build (akin to a NAS or media server) but also a client device (requiring user interaction to browse, select and record programs, and to watch them after recording).
It's definitely a niche project, but I'm going to enjoy doit it.
7 • not just for CLI (by Titus Groan on 2024-05-20 05:17:35 GMT from New Zealand)
When creating a script ,and as I am not a script-kiddie, by any means ( My google-fu has improved no end), I will make a copy of the original, and then work on the copy.
When the copy works closer to intended, and or I have run out of time for the day, then I will rename the original ( usually just add a numeric suffix ) and then rename the copy to the original.
I then to try and break it, and then fix it so it is harder to break, so I can end up with quite a few iterations.
repeat until complete.
A script can take me some time until I am happy with its operation.
This way, if I screw up the script, I can go back to an earlier iteration and try something else.
8 • Congratulations. (by Pete on 2024-05-20 07:41:31 GMT from United Kingdom)
Well done on 23 years of service to the Linux community.
I too remember everything coming on discs and good old 56 k dial up!
Here in the UK you could get ISP discs free from supermarkets (and other places)!
Oh , how I miss watching websites loading up a line at time!
Anyway keep up the good work and here's to the next 23 years
9 • Housekeeping (by Jules on 2024-05-20 08:11:18 GMT from Australia)
Excellent work for the last 23 years of service to the Linux and BSD community.
I remember when everything came on CDs, snail mail and/or dial up modem.
Here in Australia, todays technolgy allow us to get things quick,
whereas years ago (say 23 years), it took 2 - 4 weeks to get this on CDs or snail mail.
If you need help, I am a retired Oracle, MS SQL and My Sql DBA,
so drop me a line if you need SQL done accross these platforms
or need programming in Unix/Linux scripting.
I know some other programming as well, but I will not show off here.
I am willing to be a off-shore volunteer in any Distrowatch upcoming projects.
Let me know.
Cheers to the next 23 years.
10 • @1 Stevie relax a tad (by Simmer on 2024-05-20 08:23:47 GMT from Sweden)
You can change stuff like that to whatever you yourself prefer. And some people like the tones of gray - No need to get so worked up about it :D
11 • Small home projects (by Mr B on 2024-05-20 08:57:59 GMT from United Kingdom)
I'd like to add my congratulations and thanks for 23 years of good work
from Distrowatch too.
Regarding your idea of small home project articles: I think it's a good idea in principle. However, do remember that the bar is set very high for
information of the type you describe. Can you compete with detailed YouTube videos as well as years' worth of articles in MagPi magazine and the like? You will have to pull something special out of the bag to do that, I think. That said, if you go ahead I would read your ideas.
I think a series of articles showing how to repurpose old PCs and laptops would appeal to those of us that hate waste. For example, I have an old laptop that is at least 15 years old with just 1GB of RAM and it runs the latest version of Daphile flawlessly. Having tried various other things, I settled on Daphile as my main music server/player. I think the reason it's not more widespread is the lack of documentation available for it. That would be a great article to do. So would building a NAS (for backup) in a PC where there is only space for a single hard disk (eg SFF desktop PCs). Setting up a simple appliance such as those offered by the Turnkey Linux project would be good too.
For Raspberry Pi there are loads:
Server running UmbrelOS
Server running CasaOS
NAS running OpenMediaVault
LibreELEC or OSMC media player
Volumio/Moode Audio/piCorePlayer music player
Home Assistant setup
Any way to use a Pi Zero 2W without buying extra bits -eg HATs, OTG cables etc
Desktop distros for Pi - Ubuntu, MX Linux, openSUSE, RaspiOS...
It's good that you are seeking ideas from elsewhere. There must be a lot of talented Distrowatch readers. I think you should do the same with the opinion polls. Some topics are interesting, some are really obscure and some are just plain silly. Ask the commenters what they want to know about other Linux users. It's clear from reading the comments that readers want that.
Good luck with it all.
12 • Know what is what (by Breh on 2024-05-20 09:13:41 GMT from Bulgaria)
That's not a 'desktop environment'. That's a WALLPAPER.
13 • preferred system installer style (by Knightron on 2024-05-20 09:29:10 GMT from Australia)
I honestly don't care what style is used but I appreciate customisation. For this reason, I've found that openSUSE's and Slackware's installers to be the best I've used.
One of these is graphical and the other, text menu. Slackware is the only installer I've used with text menu, so I have nothing else to compare it with. I've used many others with a graphical installer however and none have been near as good as the one used for openSUSE.
Not all installers are the same, even if they possesses the same style.
14 • House keeping (by kc1di on 2024-05-20 10:53:08 GMT from United States)
Congratulations on the 23 years of DW. It's been a great journey so far.
As for the small home projects I vote for older computers. Rasberry Pi's get a lot of attention already..
Thanks for being there as a good place to get info on Linux distros.
15 • Polls (by Jesse on 2024-05-20 12:24:53 GMT from Canada)
@11: "I think you should do the same with the opinion polls. Some topics are interesting, some are really obscure and some are just plain silly. Ask the commenters what they want to know about other Linux users. It's clear from reading the comments that readers want that."
A lot of our polls do come from reader suggestions. The questions are often e-mailed to us.
16 • Housekeeping - small home projects (by Too many laptops on 2024-05-20 12:27:49 GMT from United Kingdom)
I have too many laptops - because:
people use smartphones to do everything;
laptops are put away in the attic;
some won't run windows 11 - although a clean install using rufus would get round that;
etc.
What might I do with them?
17 • Congratulations! (by Pope Alexandṛ on 2024-05-20 12:38:55 GMT from Brazil)
I wish I knew you when I was experimenting with Linux distros 17 years ago, but you helped me at least once. Anyway, 23 is an odd number!
18 • Housekeeping / Old Laptops (by Nathan3 on 2024-05-20 12:52:34 GMT from United States)
For #16.
How about putting a simple lite linux distro such as WattOS, Peppermint Mini etc. on the old laptops
and adding Firefox, Chromium and the Zoom client to each. This would simulate "roughly"
a Chromebook laptop. These devices could be donated to school students. Another possibility
is donating to your local Senior Center for those seniors who cannot afford "Market Priced"
laptops.
19 • Preferred system installer method (by Alvaro on 2024-05-20 13:03:06 GMT from Italy)
My favorite installer is the text-based Debian installer: easily understandable, configurable and fast.
20 • Housekeeping article (by Tim on 2024-05-20 13:08:53 GMT from United States)
Kudos on your housekeeping article. I have been using Distrowatch for longer than I can remember. I like the site the way it is and I'm glad you maintain it rather than revamp it. I probably won't make another 23 years, but I hope you and Distrowatch do.
21 • Home projects (by Pogi Americano on 2024-05-20 13:13:40 GMT from United States)
I'm just a user, I don't know much about Linux other than how to install MXLinux from an ISO. I also have a couple of old PCs (16 & 32bit) collecting dust in my attic. They work fine, they were just not good enough to run the next generation Windows. I would like to read about using minimal distros and distros like Raspberry that would let me use the old pcs for things like word processing and maybe one that I can connect to Utube for my tunes while doing word processing on another old pc. Even if I can only get them going with a single purpose, at least they are being used and not collecting dust. Also, maybe with your vast knowledge of Linux in general, you could publish a list of resources for learning new ways of using old pcs. ... Can I also give a shout out to MXLinux folks, GREAT WORK, thank you!
22 • Housekeeping/Home Projects (by PuceLev on 2024-05-20 14:28:44 GMT from Canada)
Congratulations on the 23 years!
@21 (@Pogi Americano), FYI Raspberry (Pi) is not a distro but a small computer.
23 • Linux virtualization on a Mac with ARM processor (by penguinx86 on 2024-05-20 14:47:50 GMT from United States)
This weekend, I successfully got Debian to run as a virtual machine on my Macbook Air with an M1 ARM processor. I used the FREE version of UTM virtualization software available here:
https://mac.getutm.app/
The UTM version on the Apple store costs about $10 for the same thing. Installing it and using it is fairly straitforward, similar to using Virtualbox.
The M1 processor uses the ARM64 architecture also known as 'aarch64'. I downloaded the Debian small CD net install ISO for ARM 64 architecture. I installed it using the Virtualization option in UTM with the Xfce GUI. The only giltch was having to un-attach the ISO file 'CD' before it would boot from the newly installed OS virtual HD. Once I got Debian to boot, it was fast and ran great.
UTM can also emulate x86 processors on a Mac M1 ARM processor, but I didn't try it. It probably runs slower in emulation mode than with native virtualized ARM64 aarch64 mode.
24 • 1, congrats etc & Archthing (by Someguy on 2024-05-20 15:04:55 GMT from United Kingdom)
Reciprocating thanks and congrats for DW, Ladislav & Jesse.
As for the Archthing review, let's not waste more of Jesse' s valued time & expertise? It's same old same old DSL scenario. Plenty of genuinely SMALL distros around - try some of those from the Puppy, EasyOS kennels, for example. Contributors may wish to add their own favourite SMALL offerings.
25 • Congrats on the last 23 years (by Victor on 2024-05-20 16:08:15 GMT from Canada)
As someone who's been visiting the site for just over 17 years I wanted to wish my congrats of the 23 years of service Distriwatch has provided the Linux community. I still remember coming here daily in the early years as I was experimenting with the vast array of choices in the open source world, and this sure was an invaluable source of information and inspiration for ideas on what to try next.
Now that my distro hopping days are mostly behind me I still visit for my weekly dose in the regular newsletter and my Sunday evenings wouldn't be the same without it.
Thanks guys, cheers!
26 • Raspberry Pi Desktop for PC and Mac (by Raspberry Pi Desktop on 2024-05-20 16:11:11 GMT from Singapore)
@22
There is a version of Raspberry Pi Desktop for PC and Mac.
27 • small home projects (by lincoln on 2024-05-20 18:38:11 GMT from Brazil)
“...I want to start a series of how-to articles which will explore setting up small home projects on a minimal device like a Raspberry Pi, old laptop, or PinePhone...”
I would suggest a series of projects exploring the aspects of distributed systems in a heterogeneous cluster between the Raspberry Pi, an old laptop and a PinePhone... I would check the feasibility and performance of peer-to-peer systems, shared memory systems, distributed data management, distributed intelligence (multi-agent systems), P2P-IPS for stored content, ... Testing distributed optimization: convex optimization, stochastic optimization, online learning, ... Evaluate techniques such as: data replication, data partitioning, distributed time, cluster management, communication between nodes, ... Experimenting with: role-based grid architecture, service-based grid architecture, event-based architecture, ...
28 • 17 • Congratulations! (by Pope Alexandṛ ...) (by R. Cain on 2024-05-21 02:00:35 GMT from United States)
"...Anyway, 23 is an odd number! "
It's also a Prime number.
Congratulations to all you people who are responsible such an enduring and outstanding publication. Very apropo for such a prime effort.
Six more years and you do it again!
------------------------------------------------------
Mathematician: "3 is prime; 5 is prime; 7 is prime...by induction, all odd numbers past two are prime."
Physicist: "3 is prime; 5 is prime; 7 is prime; 9 is pri...oops--experimental error. 11 is prime..."
Engineer: "3 is prime; 5 is prime; 7 is prime; 9 is prime; 11 is prime..."
29 • Good job! (by Max on 2024-05-21 14:21:15 GMT from France)
I will not pretending that I'm regularly reading distrowatch for 23 years (I wasn't aware that Linux existed by then) but it's many years that I'm grateful about this website, and the amount of work regularly done. So thank you!
I've got not idea how this website is actually any good from an accessibility pov (a subject much more important today than 20 years ago) but since it's basic HTML/CSS and, for my part, no JS at all, I guess it's pretty accessible.
I've got one remark: I recently being looking for different distro to install on some people I know (since October 2025 seems the new end of world date for some) and since _many_ don't want to bother with updating their OS (except one or two times a decade for major versions), I was looking for some informations about distro lifecycles (rolling aside). I know that is kind of difficult since every distro get their own estimate (LTS, ELTS, entreprise grade, etc.) and can support many version at the same time, but adding the estimated lifetime of the current version(s) for major distro on their pages could be great.
30 • @ 30 • Good job! (by Max... (by R.Cain on 2024-05-21 15:28:46 GMT from United States)
First thing for you to do is read this article ...
https://www.ocsmag.com/linux-2017-the-road-to-hell/
Then install the latest xxxx-POINT THREE version of MX-Linux (or the last xxx.3 version you can find), and don't *ever* look at it--or take any questions about it--again.
31 • estimated lifetime of the current version(s) for major distro (by estimated lifetime on 2024-05-22 05:25:23 GMT from Singapore)
@30
End of support dates could be found on the pages at Wikipedia of the respective distros.
32 • 23 years.... (by mihail from romania on 2024-05-22 05:54:37 GMT from Romania)
bravo for 23 y.o.
and many thanks to DW.
I always liked the simple an clean old looking websites, so easy to find and read information...
modern ones *need* to display fancy methods of pulling the text from under your eyes, spin it and hit you with it either from left side or... also some drop down menus are to sensitive and just dont stay in their handle...
best wishes!
33 • upcoming series (by jazzfelix on 2024-05-22 09:52:21 GMT from Germany)
I would love to read about maintenance! Setting something up is kind of easy. There are many projects providing fully setup systems with simple GUI configurations, like truenas. Also Ubuntu provides a lot of packages which are easy to setup (gitlab-ce). Maintaining those and keeping them up to date for a few years is much harder than setting them up. Also in my experience running a service 24/7 on a system without ECC RAM is very challenging. I ran a Nextcloud on CentOS. I started on 7.0, migrated to Alma Linux later and kept that up to date until 8.7. Then I abandoned it because it got too complicated to keep it up to date (dnf had some problems and it seemed to me that a fresh install on another platform was more time efficient than fixing it). It'd been basically the same for my desktop. Fresh install every 2 years. Now I am running FreeBSD which was the smoothest transition for a major version bump yet (from 13 to 14).
34 • Life cycle (by Jesse on 2024-05-22 10:31:46 GMT from Canada)
@29: " I was looking for some informations about distro lifecycles (rolling aside). I know that is kind of difficult since every distro get their own estimate (LTS, ELTS, entreprise grade, etc.) and can support many version at the same time, but adding the estimated lifetime of the current version(s) for major distro on their pages could be great."
If you're wondering which distributions have longer support cycles, you can visit our Search page and, under Release Model, select "Fixed LTS".
https://distrowatch.com/search.php?ostype=All&category=All&origin=All&basedon=All¬basedon=None&desktop=All&architecture=All&package=All&rolling=Fixed+%28LTS%29&isosize=All&netinstall=All&language=All&defaultinit=All&status=Active#simple
Alternatively, almost all distributions which publish a formal support life cycle have it listed in their feature table, under "End of life" on their information page. A lot of distributions do not have a specific end date, those that do, we list them. You'll find projects with at least 3 years of support or more by using the "Fixed LTS" tag.
35 • 23 years, thank you for all this (by Otis on 2024-05-22 12:37:13 GMT from United States)
A lot to like here if one is a Linux or BSD enthusiast. I also appreciate very much the site operator's habit of asking the users here about suggested or planned changes to Distrowatch.
Generally we've asked that it be kept very much the same for all this time: Simply attractive and easy to navigate the hordes of information here. Once again, thank you!
36 • re: A Little Housekeeping (by Will on 2024-05-22 20:14:49 GMT from United States)
Thanks for sharing the maintenance note. It's not talked about much, but it's more commonly a developer's life than greenfields.
As for what to write about - either old laptop or raspberry pi projects of manageable scope would be fantastic. Lots of people have these devices, the pinephone, not so much. Just my 2 cents. I'd probably lean towards pi, cuz it's more accessible and what's already written is usually very fringe projects - weather balloons, motor control, matrix style camera effects and whatnot - rarely do they give something practical and doable with just the pi itself. Laptop stuff is fine, too.
Will
37 • Home projects (by Jesse on 2024-05-22 20:22:55 GMT from Canada)
> "As for what to write about - either old laptop or raspberry pi projects of manageable scope would be fantastic. Lots of people have these devices, the pinephone, not so much."
I want to address something that's come up a few times in the comments. A few people read my idea for doing a series of projects on a low-spec devices (like an old laptop, PinePhone, or Raspberry Pi) and assumed it was an either/or situation.
Any projects I would be doing would work the same way on each of the three devices, this isn't an exclusive choice. The steps to set up a web servers, file share, seed box, media streamer, etc are the same on each of the three devices.
In other words, I wasn't suggesting I'd do a project exclusively for the Pi or the PinePhone or old laptops. Any series of projects I do will work the same on all three because the underlying Linux systems and the commands required would be identical on all three. Readers could follow along on whichever device they had.
38 • Preferred installer (by Nate on 2024-05-22 21:43:22 GMT from United States)
I often hear or read reviews about Linux distributions which to me place too much importance on the installer. Let me preface my thoughts on the subject with the fact that the three OSes I regularly use are Arch Linux, Void Linux and FreeBSD. The first two are rolling releases, and FreeBSD has fixed releases with a clear upgrade procecdure and rolling releases for ports and packages. What this amounts to is that installation becomes something that you do ONCE in the entire lifetime of your computer. For that reason I always thought Arch did it right by focusing on literally everything else. The installation might not have been for the faint of heart, but since it only ever need be done once, basically who cares? As per usual the wiki is so good that it covers just about any conceivable issue you might have installing the OS.
Now, if you don't want to use a rolling release distro for one reason or another, I still find it silly that people even care what the installer looks like, just that it does the right thing and doesn't surprise you or damage your system. When I installed Void to a Raspberry Pi 4 I was able to just extract a tarball onto the SD card, configure the files and boot. You get to create your own partitions. I find this preferable to an installer that does everything for you but wipes out partitions that you might have wanted to keep, or installs a bootloader without asking your permission.
39 • Installers (by Reyfer on 2024-05-23 01:13:09 GMT from Venezuela)
As nice as Calamares and other graphical installer may be today, I personally believe nothing beats Debian's net install "expert" mode, for control over what gets actually installed
40 • Suggestion for an Opinion Poll, and right here--in these comments. (by R. Cain on 2024-05-23 16:11:13 GMT from United States)
From this week's Reader Comments (with Comment number):
11 "...I think a series of articles showing how to repurpose old PCs and laptops would appeal to those of us that hate waste...Ask the commenters what they want to know about other Linux users..."
14 "...As for the small home projects I vote for older computers..."
15 "...A lot of our polls do come from reader suggestions..."
16 "...I have too many laptops...What might I do with them?"
36 "...either old laptop or raspberry pi projects of manageable scope would be fantastic. Lots of people have these devices, the pinephone, not so much..."
------------------------------------------------------------
Suggested Opinion Poll:
"Of the Following List of Devices, How Many of Each Do You Own?--
a) old laptop / notebook /netbook
b) Raspberry Pi
c) Pinephone"
41 • Poll suggestion (by Otis on 2024-05-24 12:33:30 GMT from United States)
@40 Good idea, but perhaps the whole population of devices DW users own would be more useful in the poll:
a) Old Laptop, Notebook, Netbook, PC
b) Raspberry Pi
c) Pinephone
d) Newer Laptop, Notebook, Netbook, PC
e) Other
Number of Comments: 41
Display mode: DWW Only • Comments Only • Both DWW and Comments
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| • Issue 1161 (2026-02-23): The Guix package manager, quick Q&As, Gentoo migrating its mirrors, Fedora considers more informative kernel panic screens, GhostBSD testing alternative X11 implementation, Asahi makes progress with Apple M3, NetBSD userland ported, FreeBSD improves web-based system management |
| • Issue 1160 (2026-02-16): Noid and AgarimOS, command line tips, KDE Linux introduces delta updates, Redox OS hits development milestone, Linux Mint develops a desktop-neutral account manager, sudo developer seeks sponsorship |
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| • 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 |
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| • 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 |
| • Full list of all issues |
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Stella
Stella was a CentOS-based Linux distribution with focus on user-friendly desktop computing with GNOME 2 and out-of-the-box support for many popular multimedia formats. Besides standard upstream software, the project also maintains its own repository containing LibreOffice and a variety of useful desktop applications.
Status: Discontinued
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