 DistroWatch Weekly |
| DistroWatch Weekly, Issue 1099, 2 December 2024 |
Welcome to this year's 49th issue of DistroWatch Weekly!
How much RAM does my operating system use and how much should it be using? How much does it need to use? These are questions which regularly haunt people, especially those who are working with limited hardware specifications. This week, in our Questions and Answers column, we talk about measuring RAM consumption and discuss what might make RAM statistics change over time. Before that, we begin this week with a look at a distribution which attempts to offer the desktop experience of Windows with the under-the-hood technology of Ubuntu. The project, called Anduin OS, is a recent addition to the DistroWatch database and we report on how this distribution strives to make new Windows-to-Linux migrants feel at home. Then, in our News section, we report on SUSE's ongoing rebranding efforts and share an update on UBports gearing up for its next major release. Plus we talk about Murena's new NFC-free phone and welcome the return of Linux Mint to the top of our page hit ranking chart. Then we share highlights from last week's releases and list the torrents we are seeding. We wish you all a fantastic week and happy reading!
This week's DistroWatch Weekly is presented by TUXEDO Computers.
Content:
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| Feature Story (By Jesse Smith) |
AnduinOS 1.0.1
AnduinOS is an Ubuntu-based distribution featuring the GNOME desktop environment. The project offers a smaller download compared to its parent (1.6GB for Anduin vs 4.8GB for Ubuntu) and Anduin's desktop theme and layout are meant to mimic Microsoft Windows. The goal appears to be to provide an operating system with the capabilities of Ubuntu while offering a familiar look and feel for former Windows users. In other words, picture a more minimal version of Zorin OS.
One key difference between Anduin and Ubuntu, which probably accounts for a big chunk of the differences between the sizes of the ISO files, is Anduin ships different ISO files for each supported language. There are about 20 supported languages and each one is offered through a different ISO file. This means the user needs to start their experience by seeking out their language code (such as en_US or pt_BR) in a list of ISO files and downloading the proper one. Each ISO has its own SHA256 checksum and an associated torrent.
AnduinOS's live media boots to the GNOME desktop. GNOME has been customized with a special, Windows-like layout which places a panel across the bottom of the screen. This panel holds a weather widget, application menu button, some quick-launch icons, and a system tray. The weather widget defaults to showing us what the weather is in California, USA. On the desktop are three icons for opening the file manager, the trash folder, and the system installer.
AnduinOS 1.0.1 -- The GNOME Files file manager
(full image size: 222kB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
The default theme is dark (black with blue) and the mouse pointer has been set up to look and act like the Windows pointer, including the blue spinning "busy" mouse cursor. Clicking on the application menu button opens a window in the middle of the desktop which shows us a grid of application launchers. Above the grid we find a search field for filtering the displayed icons.
Installing
Anduin uses the Ubiquity system installer. This graphical installer, inherited from Ubuntu, does a good job of walking us through picking our language, selecting our keyboard layout, and selecting whether to download updates during the install process. I opted not to fetch updates, but did click a box to indicate I wanted media codecs and third-party hardware support such as wi-fi drivers.
Ubiquity offers guided and manual disk partitioning. The manual approach is pleasantly simple and walks us through a point-and-click experience. The guided approach sets up a single ext4 partition with a swap file. Optionally, we can enable LVM for the root filesystem. Then the system installer asks us to make up a username and password combination and copies its packages to the local drive. When it finishes it offers to restart the computer.
I'd like to comment that finding the controls for logging out or shutting down the computer is not immediately obvious. There is no sign out option in the application menu, and (to my eye) no obvious "user" menu on the desktop. Signing out is accomplished by clicking the system tray (not the clock, but any icon left of the clock). This brings up a series of options I'll mention later. From the list we can choose the "Power Off/Log Out" options.
First impressions
The first time my new copy of Anduin booted it brought me to a graphical login screen that appeared to be missing a few components. There was a panel across the top of the screen and the distribution's name at the bottom. However, there was no login prompt or method by which I could select a user account. The system then locked up and failed to respond to keyboard or mouse input, necessitating a hard restart. The next boot and the next all gave the same result. There weren't any other boot menu options to try and it was looking as though my trial might come to a premature close.
AnduinOS 1.0.1 -- Exploring the application menu
(full image size: 257kB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
Then, when looking through the GRUB settings, I discovered a variable in the kernel command like called "vt_handoff". Disabling this parameter (erasing it from the command line before booting) fixed my issue and the system booted normally, presenting me with a working login screen, and allowing me to sign in.
The default desktop session runs GNOME on Wayland, though there is a second session option for running GNOME on X11. Apart from memory consumption, the two session options seemed to be nearly identical in terms of performance, features, and stability.
Earlier I mentioned the system tray is unusual. The system tray on Anduin also functions as a mini settings panel. Clicking it opens a menu where we can quickly access volume, screen brightness, networking, sign out, and battery options. It's a compact menu of settings that functions a little differently than the trays of most other distributions, but I think it is easy enough to navigate, once we find it. The tray menu also has a button for launching the full featured GNOME Settings panel. The full settings panel helps us find and adjust options for the entire desktop along with theme, privacy controls, touchpad settings, and linked cloud accounts.
AnduinOS 1.0.1 -- The system tray and compact settings panel
(full image size: 296kB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
Included software
The distribution ships with a fairly minimal collection of applications. The Firefox web browser is featured along with the GNOME Files file manager, the gEdit text editor, the Shotwell image manager, and a document viewer. The Cheese webcam utility is installed along with a security key and password manager. The "key" part of this tool seems to work well enough, but I didn't find an obvious way to add new passwords to the manager,
We can also find the Rhythmbox and Totem media players in the application menu. These utilities are accompanied by media codecs for most multimedia formats.
Instead of GNOME Terminal, Anduin ships with a simple virtual terminal called kgx. This terminal works, but doesn't seem to have any options. I couldn't find a way to manage tabs, disable the blinking cursor, or change the font. I will say though that I appreciate the kgx titlebar turns red when we run commands using sudo. While kgx was functional, I eventually downloaded QTerminal, another fairly minimal virtual terminal, which makes it easy to adjust the cursor, layout and font.
In the background we find the GNU command line utilities, the GNU Compiler Collection, and a full selection of manual pages. Anduin runs systemd as its init software and runs on version 6.8 of the Linux kernel.
I'd like to note that Anduin OS 1.0.1 is based on Ubuntu 22.04 "Jammy" and pulls from Jammy's package repositories. However, the kernel included in the distribution appears to be from Ubuntu 24.04 "Noble". Apart from the kernel package, I think everything else is pulled from Ubuntu 22.04. This makes Anduin 1.0.1 over two years old, effectively, at the time of its release.
I'd also like to mention the GNOME documentation is missing. Trying to access the Help option from any of the GNOME applications (such as Totem or Files) had no effect. There appears to be no documentation on the distribution, apart from the command line manual pages.
Hardware
I found Anduin worked well in VirtualBox. The distribution provided average desktop performance, ran smoothly, and integrated well in the virtual machine environment. When running on my laptop, again, everything worked and the distribution was stable. My one issue was with mouse pointer behaviour. The GNOME desktop didn't register taps on the touchpad as clicks, though this could be changed in the settings panel. I also found it awkward that the touchpad used "natural" scrolling while a separate mouse device would use classic scrolling. I'm not a fan of "natural" (or "inverse") scrolling, but I can get used to it. Switching back and forth between the two styles is too weird for me and I also changed this behaviour in the settings panel.
AnduinOS 1.0.1 -- Browsing the settings panel
(full image size: 253kB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
Compared to its parent, Anduin has quite different resource requirements, though in different directions. Anduin used 11.5GB of disk space, plus another 500MB for a swap file, making its size on the disk 12GB in total. Ubuntu 22.04, by comparison, used just 5GB of disk space. On the other hand, Ubuntu 22.04 used 1,000MB of RAM with the same ext4 filesystem and desktop in these test environments while Anduin used 680MB. Or at least it used 680MB when logged into the Wayland session, when signed into an X11 session, Anduin used 770MB of RAM. In any event, the distribution uses a lot less memory than its parent, but consumed about twice as much disk space.
Software management
While using Anduin there were no notifications letting me know when new software updates became available. I also found there is no software centre or update manager. There is an entry in the application grid called "Apps Store". Clicking this entry opens the Firefox browser and shows us documentation which explains we will need to browse for software on-line (on the Anduin store page) and then use the terminal to add packages to our system.
AnduinOS 1.0.1 -- The application store
(full image size: 209kB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
We are shown a list of software categories we can browse. When we find an application we want the website displays the commands we need to paste into the terminal to fetch the software. This is unusually cumbersome and awkward, even compared to classic package managers like Synaptic. The instructions are overly complex too. For example, to install the GNU Image Manipulation Program and configure it we're told to run the following:
sudo apt update
sudo apt install gimp
cd /tmp
#https://github.com/Diolinux/PhotoGIMP.git
mkdir /tmp/PhotoGIMP
git clone https://github.com/Diolinux/PhotoGIMP.git /tmp/PhotoGIMP
mkdir -p ~/.config/GIMP/2.10/
rsync -Aavx --update --delete /tmp/PhotoGIMP/.var/app/org.gimp.GIMP/config/GIMP/2.10/ ~/.config/GIMP/2.10/
rm -rf /tmp/PhotoGIMP
When we compare this to Ubuntu and its community editions where the procedure is to use a software centre and click the Install button next to an application's entry or running "sudo apt install gimp", this is a lot of extra steps.
As I mentioned above, there is no update manager in Anduin, any updates we want to fetch must be handled using the APT command line tools. This approach works, but it's not an ideal situation for people newly arriving from Windows who are unfamiliar with the Linux command line. APT functioned well for me, grabbing over 500MB of updates on my first day with the distribution.
Anduin does not include Snap or Flatpak support. The latter seems like an oversight since finding and installing Flatpak bundles from the Flathub repository seems like a straight forward way to introduce Windows users to fetching applications on Linux.
Conclusions
AnduinOS appears to be a young project and, while it has a nice idea in mind (Ubuntu customized to better suit former Windows users), it isn't doing a lot to cater to people migrating from Windows, apart from using a familiar theme. There isn't any effort to support portable packages, run Windows executables (with WINE), offer first-run tutorials, or even include documentation for all the new applications people will be discovering. Also, the lack of a proper software centre in favour of having users fetch programs using the command line is likely to immediately turn off newcomers.
What we end up with is basically Ubuntu with a Windows-like desktop layout, which is a step in the right direction, but its bare bones nature makes Linux seem like a poor replacement for Windows. It's like a Lite edition of Windows or a cheap clone, with poorer software management rather than the proper replacement it could be. When I compare AnduinOS to other projects with similar goals, such as Zorin OS, the difference becomes more obvious. Zorin is based on the latest Ubuntu LTS release, not a platform two years older, it offers documentation, Windows application compatibility, tools like Zorin Connect for working with mobile devices, and portable application support. It also has full and light editions to cater to a range of hardware requirements.
The AnduinOS project isn't doing a bad job - it is providing a workable, functional operating system that can work well and pull from Ubuntu's massive software repositories. It's easy to set up, and it even looks a little bit like Windows to make people feel more comfortable with the layout of the desktop. However, I don't think it is (at this time) doing a good job of bridging the gap between Windows and Linux for newcomers.
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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
AnduinOS has a visitor supplied average rating of: N/A from 0 review(s).
Have you used AnduinOS? You can leave your own review of the project on our ratings page.
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| Miscellaneous News (by Jesse Smith) |
SUSE continues rebranding efforts, UBports gearing up for next major version, Murena offering NFC phone, Mint rises to the top of the charts
Back in July we reported the SUSE organization had asked openSUSE, its community branch, to rebrand. This rebranding effort is continuing across products and services SUSE provides. ZDNet shares an overview: "SUSE announced a significant rebranding effort, several new product offerings, and the launch of SUSE AI, a secure platform for deploying and running generative AI (gen AI) applications. SUSE has renamed its entire portfolio to make product names more descriptive and customer-friendly. Notable changes include: Rancher, SUSE's Kubernetes offering, is now SUSE Rancher. Liberty Linux, the company's Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL)/CentOS clone and support offering, becomes SUSE Multi Linux Support. Harvester is rebranded as SUSE Virtualization. Longhorn is now SUSE Storage. Why? Well, just look at the names. While Rancher is a well-known Kubernetes management service and program, nothing about the name that said 'SUSE.' The others had even less of a connection with the parent company. Besides, when I say Harvester or Longhorn, do you think virtualization and storage? I don't think so!"
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The UBports team has published an update as the project works towards its launch of version 24.04, estimated to arrive in early 2025. "Music and Calendar core apps have had an update along with Weather and Clock and behind the scenes there has been more work getting ready for Noble.
Marius said that we could expect quite a nice version of 24.04 to be ready early next year but a reasonably functioning build might be released as soon as just before Christmas. Anyone who can is urged to come forward to help with the packaging and compiling work. If you can't get in touch via Telegram you can use the forum. Our new approach will be to announce set launch dates (subject to any delay for safety reasons) and run with what we have by then. Previously we have waited around until we felt that we had 'enough'.
Alfred mentioned that plug-and-play for displays is now working in Mir2. (Actually Mir 1.8.) It has been merged for Focal too so will patch the display dropping bug." The newsletter also discusses new web browser development, VoLTE progress, and third-party app updates.
* * * * *
The Murena project has unveiled a new smartphone which will ship with the organization's /e/OS de-Googled flavour of Android. The new phone, called the CMF Phone 1, provides long battery life, privacy features, and is a non-NFC device. Additional details can be found in the organization's announcement with pre-order options available through the Murena shop.
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Finally, some non-news news. For the past handful of years the MX Linux distribution has been at the top of the DistroWatch page hit ranking charts. The charts don't measure install base, quality, or popularity, it just indicates (on average) how many people visit a particular project's information page. While past distributions to grace the top of the PHR list (such as PCLinuxOS, Ubuntu, and Linux Mint) were usually geared specifically to beginners, MX Linux stood out as being different. While MX Linux isn't difficult to use, its target audience is more experienced people seeking stability and efficient tools, a system that works reliably and stays out of the way.
MX's approach gained it a lot of attention in YouTube reviews and Top Distros of the Year lists by Linux reviewers. This steady flow of attention has kept it at the top of our page hits for a few years. This past week Linux Mint regained its position at the top of the PHR. This follows a strong release with Linux Mint 22 earlier this year, as well as its focus on beginner friendliness. It doesn't hurt Linux Mint 22 appeared at the top of some recommended lists this year. Welcome to all you curious visitors who are interested in Linux Mint and other fantastic projects!
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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) |
Measuring RAM usage
Ballooning-memory asks: This time last year I was running a NuTyX Enlightenment laptop that would boot on 220MB of RAM. I had another laptop that ran Arch with Enlightenment and that used 240MB of RAM at boot.
Now, 12 months on, I am lucky if I can get either distro running under 500MB. The kernel seems to have grown by 200MB and PipeWire seems to have done the rest.
I realise that things move on, but I didn't see any improvement for that doubling of RAM. Any advice?
DistroWatch answers: Two of my favourite questions are: What do we know? And why do we think we know it? These questions remind me to check on my ideas and the assumptions which led me to them.
The reason I bring this up is I can certainly believe a distribution's memory footprint could grow, even double, over the span of a year. People tend to install new programs, pull in new dependencies or fresh versions of packages which add new features, and enable new background services. Sometimes we do these things without even noticing. However, my mind tripped over the idea that the Linux kernel was using 200MB more RAM now than it was a year ago.
The Linux kernel, even on larger or mainstream Linux distributions, tends to be quite a bit smaller than 200MB. Usually the kernel takes up between 10MB and 25MB of memory. For instance, I checked an Ubuntu distribution while writing this response and the kernel was using 19MB of memory. Unless something has gone very wrong, the kernel will not be using 200MB of RAM.
If you are interested in checking the size of your own kernel, we talked about how to do that in a previous article called The size of the Linux kernel. In short, running the command "dmesg | grep Memory" should give you information on how much RAM the kernel is using in kilobytes (kB).
This still leaves us with the question of how the system went from reporting about 220MB of memory usage to 500MB. I suspect there are two possibilities. One is that the memory statistics are being reported by two separate programs (or by the same program in two separate ways). Some utilities will report just how much memory is in use by applications. This is memory which cannot be repurposed for anything else. Other utilities will report the amount of memory being consumed by applications and by cache. Cache is memory which holds files that have been read from the disk and kept in RAM for quick access. Cache can be quickly repurposed and used for other things. We shared the different ways to measure memory in an earlier article called Types of memory usage and running Linux on older computers.
In this instance it is possible one utility is reporting 220MB of RAM is being actively used while another tool is reporting 500MB of RAM is being consumed by applications and cache. Both are correct, they're just reporting the information differently.
Another possibility is the system really is using up more memory now that it was a year ago. Exactly why may be tricky to discover as it could be a case where one new program is using up an additional 250MB of RAM. However, it could also be that 25 programs are using an average of an extra 10MB each. Without having a snapshot of the system in its original state for comparison it'll be hard to track down multiple larger programs.
To see which applications on your computer are the largest memory consumers, and possibly identify the culprit, run the top command as follows:
top -o "%MEM"
The above command shows a list of processes on the system, sorted with the ones consuming the most RAM at the top of the list. This will help us track down which programs are gobbling up memory. You may find a large application or background service which is consuming RAM which you do not need, allowing you to uninstall it.
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Additional answers can be found in our Questions and Answers archive.
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| Released Last Week |
YunoHost 12.0
YunoHost is a Debian-based distribution which strives to make it easy to quickly set up a server and host web applications. The project has relesed a new version based on Debian 12 "Bookworm". "YunoHost now depends on Debian 12. The user portal and SSO (Single Sign On) system have been split into three distinct pieces: SSOwat now only manages the SSO/ACL logic (as a nginx Lua middleware); yunohost-portal-api: A new 'portal API' service delivering authentication cookies and allowing users to retrieve/update infos; yunohost-portal: A new login and homepage web portal. Simplified subdomain addition during app install (they can now be installed with a Let's Encrypt certificate directly from the app install form instead of going through dozens of clicks). The installation script has been reworked with a simpler flow and UI (instead of the old ncurses/whiptail). The base YunoHost setup is now lighter: MySQL/MariaDB and PHP are not installed by default anymore (apps will explicitly depend on them hence everything gets installed only when needed)." Additional information is provided in the project's release announcement.
Emmabuntus DE5-1.03
The Emmabuntüs project is a desktop Linux distribution with editions based on Debian's Stable branch with both the Xfce and LXQt desktop environments available. The project has fixed some issues with the ISO which could cause problems when used with specific image writers. The new Emmabuntüs DE5-1.03 release also improves braille support. The release announcement states: "This new version of our distribution mainly concerns updates of some embedded software, the fix for the use of bootable USB stick creators with the precious help of Thomas, the Xorriso developer, and the addition of the ibus-braille utility enabling 6 dots writing via the keyboard like the Perkins method. Emmabuntüs DE 5 1.03 includes the following new features and enhancements: Based on the Debian 12.8 'Bookworm' operating system; added ibus-braille accessibility function for 6 dots writing via the keyboard like the Perkins method; fix of ISO usage by the bootable USB stick creators Etcher and MintStick, following the evolution of the Syslinux replacement by GRUB-PC; updates: Firefox 128.4.0esr, Thunderbird 128.4.3esr, Warpinator 1.8.6, Cahiers débutant Debian 12.7, deb-get 0.4.3, TurboPrint 2.57."
elementary OS 8.0
The elementary OS project has announced the release of version 8.0 of the project's Ubuntu-based distribution. The new release focuses on adjusting application permissions and expanding the default Flatpak repositories: "Application settings has an all-new design that expands your control over permissions. We now support adjusting the run-time permissions in Flatpak's Permissions Store - these are set when an app explicitly asks for your permission to access a feature while it's running. So if you've previously denied an app access to run in the background or granted an app permission to set the wallpaper, you can change your mind at any time and adjust permissions here. We've also adjusted the language of install-time permissions - aka sandbox holes - to be more clear that these represent advanced system access and the implications of adjusting them. Plus the descriptions of several individual items were changed based on your feedback to use less technical language. And app permission pages now show the app's icon and description." Details on the changes along with screenshots can be found in the release announcement.
elementary Os 8.0 -- The Pantheon desktop
(full image size: 4.4MB, resolution: 2560x1600 pixels)
Armbian 14.11.1
The Armbian team has announced the release of Armbian 24.11.1, the updated build of the project's Debian and Ubuntu-based Linux distribution designed primarily for ARM development boards. The new release updates the Linux kernel to version 6.6.60 and brings other significant improvements: "We are thrilled to announce Armbian release 24.11.1, packed with significant updates across our entire ecosystem. These updates are aimed at enhancing functionality, expanding hardware support and refining the user experience for both developers and everyday SBC users. Core system updates: the updated build system introduces new tools for faster builds and seamless integration; optimized compilation workflows and prebuilt configurations make deploying custom firmware easier and more efficient, especially for developers focusing on specialized projects; Armbian Config Next Generation has seen improvements in hardware control, streamlined service management and automated configuration scripting...." See the release announcement and the release changelog for further details.
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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: 3,123
- Total data uploaded: 46.0TB
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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) |
RAM usage over the years
In our Questions and Answers column this week we talked about RAM usage, how it tends to grow over time, and different ways of measuring it. While the RAM usage of most operating systems tends to rise over time, people can avoid increasing their resource requirements by switching desktop environments, disabling services, or even switching to lighter operating systems.
Linux users in particular have a lot of options from which to choose and can downsize to smaller platforms faster than distributions grow.
We'd like to hear whether your RAM requirements today are higher or lower on your main computer than they were five years ago. Let us know how you're combating bloat in the comments.
You can see the results of our previous poll on including desktop-specific testing distribution in our previous edition. All previous poll results can be found in our poll archives.
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Is your RAM usage higher or lower than it was five years ago?
| Much higher: | 556 (20%) |
| Slightly higher: | 862 (31%) |
| About the same: | 1083 (39%) |
| Slightly Lower: | 42 (2%) |
| Much Lower: | 15 (1%) |
| Unknown: | 209 (8%) |
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| Website News |
DistroWatch database summary
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This concludes this week's issue of DistroWatch Weekly. The next instalment will be published on Monday, 9 December 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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| Archives |
| • Issue 1104 (2025-01-13): DAT Linux 2.0, Silly things to do with a minimal computer, Budgie prepares Wayland only releases, SteamOS coming to third-party devices, Murena upgrades its base |
| • Issue 1103 (2025-01-06): elementary OS 8.0, filtering ads with Pi-hole, Debian testing its installer, Pop!_OS faces delays, Ubuntu Studio upgrades not working, Absolute discontinued |
| • Issue 1102 (2024-12-23): Best distros of 2024, changing a process name, Fedora to expand Btrfs support and releases Asahi Remix 41, openSUSE patches out security sandbox and donations from Bottles while ending support for Leap 15.5 |
| • Issue 1101 (2024-12-16): GhostBSD 24.10.1, sending attachments from the command line, openSUSE shows off GPU assignment tool, UBports publishes security update, Murena launches its first tablet, Xfce 4.20 released |
| • Issue 1100 (2024-12-09): Oreon 9.3, differences in speed, IPFire's new appliance, Fedora Asahi Remix gets new video drivers, openSUSE Leap Micro updated, Redox OS running Redox OS |
| • Issue 1099 (2024-12-02): AnduinOS 1.0.1, measuring RAM usage, SUSE continues rebranding efforts, UBports prepares for next major version, Murena offering non-NFC phone |
| • Issue 1098 (2024-11-25): Linux Lite 7.2, backing up specific folders, Murena and Fairphone partner in fair trade deal, Arch installer gets new text interface, Ubuntu security tool patched |
| • Issue 1097 (2024-11-18): Chimera Linux vs Chimera OS, choosing between AlmaLinux and Debian, Fedora elevates KDE spin to an edition, Fedora previews new installer, KDE testing its own distro, Qubes-style isolation coming to FreeBSD |
| • Issue 1096 (2024-11-11): Bazzite 40, Playtron OS Alpha 1, Tucana Linux 3.1, detecting Screen sessions, Redox imports COSMIC software centre, FreeBSD booting on the PinePhone Pro, LXQt supports Wayland window managers |
| • Issue 1095 (2024-11-04): Fedora 41 Kinoite, transferring applications between computers, openSUSE Tumbleweed receives multiple upgrades, Ubuntu testing compiler optimizations, Mint partners with Framework |
| • Issue 1094 (2024-10-28): DebLight OS 1, backing up crontab, AlmaLinux introduces Litten branch, openSUSE unveils refreshed look, Ubuntu turns 20
| | • Issue 1093 (2024-10-21): Kubuntu 24.10, atomic vs immutable distributions, Debian upgrading Perl packages, UBports adding VoLTE support, Android to gain native GNU/Linux application support |
| • Issue 1092 (2024-10-14): FunOS 24.04.1, a home directory inside a file, work starts of openSUSE Leap 16.0, improvements in Haiku, KDE neon upgrades its base |
| • Issue 1091 (2024-10-07): Redox OS 0.9.0, Unified package management vs universal package formats, Redox begins RISC-V port, Mint polishes interface, Qubes certifies new laptop |
| • Issue 1090 (2024-09-30): Rhino Linux 2024.2, commercial distros with alternative desktops, Valve seeks to improve Wayland performance, HardenedBSD parterns with Protectli, Tails merges with Tor Project, Quantum Leap partners with the FreeBSD Foundation |
| • Issue 1089 (2024-09-23): Expirion 6.0, openKylin 2.0, managing configuration files, the future of Linux development, fixing bugs in Haiku, Slackware packages dracut |
| • Issue 1088 (2024-09-16): PorteuX 1.6, migrating from Windows 10 to which Linux distro, making NetBSD immutable, AlmaLinux offers hardware certification, Mint updates old APT tools |
| • Issue 1087 (2024-09-09): COSMIC desktop, running cron jobs at variable times, UBports highlights new apps, HardenedBSD offers work around for FreeBSD change, Debian considers how to cull old packages, systemd ported to musl |
| • Issue 1086 (2024-09-02): Vanilla OS 2, command line tips for simple tasks, FreeBSD receives investment from STF, openSUSE Tumbleweed update can break network connections, Debian refreshes media |
| • Issue 1085 (2024-08-26): Nobara 40, OpenMandriva 24.07 "ROME", distros which include source code, FreeBSD publishes quarterly report, Microsoft updates breaks Linux in dual-boot environments |
| • Issue 1084 (2024-08-19): Liya 2.0, dual boot with encryption, Haiku introduces performance improvements, Gentoo dropping IA-64, Redcore merges major upgrade |
| • Issue 1083 (2024-08-12): TrueNAS 24.04.2 "SCALE", Linux distros for smartphones, Redox OS introduces web server, PipeWire exposes battery drain on Linux, Canonical updates kernel version policy |
| • Issue 1082 (2024-08-05): Linux Mint 22, taking snapshots of UFS on FreeBSD, openSUSE updates Tumbleweed and Aeon, Debian creates Tiny QA Tasks, Manjaro testing immutable images |
| • Issue 1081 (2024-07-29): SysLinuxOS 12.4, OpenBSD gain hardware acceleration, Slackware changes kernel naming, Mint publishes upgrade instructions |
| • Issue 1080 (2024-07-22): Running GNU/Linux on Android with Andronix, protecting network services, Solus dropping AppArmor and Snap, openSUSE Aeon Desktop gaining full disk encryption, SUSE asks openSUSE to change its branding |
| • Issue 1079 (2024-07-15): Ubuntu Core 24, hiding files on Linux, Fedora dropping X11 packages on Workstation, Red Hat phasing out GRUB, new OpenSSH vulnerability, FreeBSD speeds up release cycle, UBports testing new first-run wizard |
| • Issue 1078 (2024-07-08): Changing init software, server machines running desktop environments, OpenSSH vulnerability patched, Peppermint launches new edition, HardenedBSD updates ports |
| • Issue 1077 (2024-07-01): The Unity and Lomiri interfaces, different distros for different tasks, Ubuntu plans to run Wayland on NVIDIA cards, openSUSE updates Leap Micro, Debian releases refreshed media, UBports gaining contact synchronisation, FreeDOS celebrates its 30th anniversary |
| • Issue 1076 (2024-06-24): openSUSE 15.6, what makes Linux unique, SUSE Liberty Linux to support CentOS Linux 7, SLE receives 19 years of support, openSUSE testing Leap Micro edition |
| • Issue 1075 (2024-06-17): Redox OS, X11 and Wayland on the BSDs, AlmaLinux releases Pi build, Canonical announces RISC-V laptop with Ubuntu, key changes in systemd |
| • Issue 1074 (2024-06-10): Endless OS 6.0.0, distros with init diversity, Mint to filter unverified Flatpaks, Debian adds systemd-boot options, Redox adopts COSMIC desktop, OpenSSH gains new security features |
| • Issue 1073 (2024-06-03): LXQt 2.0.0, an overview of Linux desktop environments, Canonical partners with Milk-V, openSUSE introduces new features in Aeon Desktop, Fedora mirrors see rise in traffic, Wayland adds OpenBSD support |
| • Issue 1072 (2024-05-27): Manjaro 24.0, comparing init software, OpenBSD ports Plasma 6, Arch community debates mirror requirements, ThinOS to upgrade its FreeBSD core |
| • Issue 1071 (2024-05-20): Archcraft 2024.04.06, common command line mistakes, ReactOS imports WINE improvements, Haiku makes adjusting themes easier, NetBSD takes a stand against code generated by chatbots |
| • Issue 1070 (2024-05-13): Damn Small Linux 2024, hiding kernel messages during boot, Red Hat offers AI edition, new web browser for UBports, Fedora Asahi Remix 40 released, Qubes extends support for version 4.1 |
| • Issue 1069 (2024-05-06): Ubuntu 24.04, installing packages in alternative locations, systemd creates sudo alternative, Mint encourages XApps collaboration, FreeBSD publishes quarterly update |
| • Issue 1068 (2024-04-29): Fedora 40, transforming one distro into another, Debian elects new Project Leader, Red Hat extends support cycle, Emmabuntus adds accessibility features, Canonical's new security features |
| • Issue 1067 (2024-04-22): LocalSend for transferring files, detecting supported CPU architecure levels, new visual design for APT, Fedora and openSUSE working on reproducible builds, LXQt released, AlmaLinux re-adds hardware support |
| • Issue 1066 (2024-04-15): Fun projects to do with the Raspberry Pi and PinePhone, installing new software on fixed-release distributions, improving GNOME Terminal performance, Mint testing new repository mirrors, Gentoo becomes a Software In the Public Interest project |
| • Issue 1065 (2024-04-08): Dr.Parted Live 24.03, answering questions about the xz exploit, Linux Mint to ship HWE kernel, AlmaLinux patches flaw ahead of upstream Red Hat, Calculate changes release model |
| • Issue 1064 (2024-04-01): NixOS 23.11, the status of Hurd, liblzma compromised upstream, FreeBSD Foundation focuses on improving wireless networking, Ubuntu Pro offers 12 years of support |
| • Issue 1063 (2024-03-25): Redcore Linux 2401, how slowly can a rolling release update, Debian starts new Project Leader election, Red Hat creating new NVIDIA driver, Snap store hit with more malware |
| • Issue 1062 (2024-03-18): KDE neon 20240304, changing file permissions, Canonical turns 20, Pop!_OS creates new software centre, openSUSE packages Plasma 6 |
| • Issue 1061 (2024-03-11): Using a PinePhone as a workstation, restarting background services on a schedule, NixBSD ports Nix to FreeBSD, Fedora packaging COSMIC, postmarketOS to adopt systemd, Linux Mint replacing HexChat |
| • Issue 1060 (2024-03-04): AV Linux MX-23.1, bootstrapping a network connection, key OpenBSD features, Qubes certifies new hardware, LXQt and Plasma migrate to Qt 6 |
| • Issue 1059 (2024-02-26): Warp Terminal, navigating manual pages, malware found in the Snap store, Red Hat considering CPU requirement update, UBports organizes ongoing work |
| • Issue 1058 (2024-02-19): Drauger OS 7.6, how much disk space to allocate, System76 prepares to launch COSMIC desktop, UBports changes its version scheme, TrueNAS to offer faster deduplication |
| • Issue 1057 (2024-02-12): Adelie Linux 1.0 Beta, rolling release vs fixed for a smoother experience, Debian working on 2038 bug, elementary OS to split applications from base system updates, Fedora announces Atomic Desktops |
| • Issue 1056 (2024-02-05): wattOS R13, the various write speeds of ISO writing tools, DSL returns, Mint faces Wayland challenges, HardenedBSD blocks foreign USB devices, Gentoo publishes new repository, Linux distros patch glibc flaw |
| • Issue 1055 (2024-01-29): CNIX OS 231204, distributions patching packages the most, Gentoo team presents ongoing work, UBports introduces connectivity and battery improvements, interview with Haiku developer |
| • Issue 1054 (2024-01-22): Solus 4.5, comparing dd and cp when writing ISO files, openSUSE plans new major Leap version, XeroLinux shutting down, HardenedBSD changes its build schedule |
| • Issue 1053 (2024-01-15): Linux AI voice assistants, some distributions running hotter than others, UBports talks about coming changes, Qubes certifies StarBook laptops, Asahi Linux improves energy savings |
| • Issue 1052 (2024-01-08): OpenMandriva Lx 5.0, keeping shell commands running when theterminal closes, Mint upgrades Edge kernel, Vanilla OS plans big changes, Canonical working to make Snap more cross-platform |
| • Full list of all issues |
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Featherweight Linux
Featherweight Linux was an installable live CD based on Feather Linux. It was a full featured distribution with a small foot print that was light and fast, even on older machines, but still carries a knockout punch. It comes with a minimal KDE desktop and several favourite applications.
Status: Discontinued
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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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