 DistroWatch Weekly |
| DistroWatch Weekly, Issue 1101, 16 December 2024 |
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Welcome to this year's 51st issue of DistroWatch Weekly!
One of the most incredible things computers can do is share information with other computers. This concept is the basis of the Internet, all on-line communication, website, and on-line gaming. Being able to share bits of information, regardless of CPU architecture or operating system is an incredible feat! There are a lot of ways computers can share information, such as transferring files, and this week we talk about some ways to send files between devices. In our Questions and Answers column we touch upon how to use e-mail, OpenSSH, and KDE Connect to transfer files between computers. Before we explore file sharing we talk about a rare project: a desktop-oriented flavour of one of the BSDs. GhostBSD is a desktop-ready flavour of FreeBSD, featuring MATE or Xfce along with a graphical package manager and a point-and-click system installer. Our Feature Story has more details about GhostBSD's latest release. Then, in our News section, we talk about a new tool from openSUSE which assigns applications to specific GPUs, regardless of which desktop environment is in use. We also talk about GNU's service manager, called Shepherd, reaching version 1.0 while Murena launches its first privacy-focused tablet. Plus we report on Xfce 4.20 being released and a security update from UBports and link to the mobile project's newsletter. This week we are also pleased to list the releases from the last week and share the torrents we are seeding. We wish you all a wonderful week and happy reading!
This week's DistroWatch Weekly is presented by TUXEDO Computers.
Content:
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| Feature Story (By Jesse Smith) |
GhostBSD 24.10.1
GhostBSD is a desktop-oriented member of the FreeBSD family. While FreeBSD mostly caters to servers, network-attached storage (NAS), and embedded systems, GhostBSD strives to provide a friendly desktop experience that is easy to set up. This is achieved by offering a graphical system installer and pre-configuring a desktop environment. GhostBSD officially uses MATE as the default desktop, though there is a community-maintained Xfce edition too.
GhostBSD is available for x86_64 machines only and requires 4GB of RAM. While the typically system uses much less than 4GB of RAM when installed, the live media loads the operating system into memory and claims to need at least 4GB of space in order to do this properly. The live media in question for GhostBSD's MATE edition is 2.6GB in size.
The latest version of GhostBSD removes the choice of installing the operating system on UFS partitions, enforcing the use of the advanced filesystem ZFS, even when the user is accessing custom partitioning options in the system installer. The release announcement also mentions the ability to watch Netflix in the Chromium web browser has been enabled. There are also some comments about improved hardware support in the release announcement:
This release brings system updates from FreeBSD and better hardware compatibility with some old AMD Radeon and FirePro GPU. We resolved live session startup issues with Legacy BIOS and started to fix some issues with Update Station functionality.
Update Station, for those wondering, is a minimum update manager and I'll talk about it later in this review.
The GhostBSD live medium boots to the MATE desktop. When I was testing the operating system on my laptop the desktop displayed two panels, one across the top of the screen and one across the bottom. The top panel held MATE's Applications, Places, and System menus on the left. On the right I found the system tray. The bottom panel held a virtual desktop switcher and a task switcher. When I first booted GhostBSD in VirtualBox both panels were placed at the top of the display, one immediately under the other. This only happened in the live environment and only in VirtualBox; once GhostBSD was installed, the panels were separated and appeared at the top and bottom of the display, respectively.
On the desktop I found icons for opening the Caja file manager and for launching the system installer.
GhostBSD 24.10.1 -- Exploring the Applications menu
(full image size: 1.7MB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
Installing
GhostBSD uses a streamlined, graphical system installer. It walks us through selecting our preferred language, picking our timezone from lists of regions & cities, and asks us to make up a username and password for ourselves.
The installer offers guided partitioning where we can take over an entire disk with ZFS. We can optionally set a pool name for the ZFS volume, reserve a fixed amount of swap space, and set up mirroring. Alternatively we can choose to take a more manual approach to picking a disk or partition for GhostBSD, though we will still be limited to using ZFS.
With these configuration steps out of the way the installer goes to work copying files to the local disk. This takes just a few minutes and then the installer offers to restart the computer or return us to the live MATE desktop. The whole install experience is fairly similar to using Calamares or Ubiquity in the Linux ecosystem.
Hardware
When I started using GhostBSD I found, when running the operating system in VirtualBox, that I was restricted to a minimum desktop resolution, 1024x768 pixels. This was a limitation of the default VMSVGA graphics controller used by VirtualBox. When I switched to the VBoxSVGA controller in VirtualBox's settings, I was given a full range of desktop resolutions I could use in the guest environment.
I ran into one other issue when running GhostBSD in VirtualBox and that was, when using the live session, running Firefox for a few minutes would cause the live desktop to lock up and cease responding. This problem did not occur when testing GhostBSD directly on my laptop's hardware. The system was fairly quick and stable in VirtualBox.
In most ways GhostBSD worked well when running on my laptop. The desktop performance was good, audio worked, and my touchpad was detected. I did notice the touchpad's movement was a little "off". The mouse pointer would glide along with my finger for a while and then pause or stick, a problem I haven't had when running Linux distributions.
Usually the BSDs do not work well with the wireless cards in any of my devices. GhostBSD was an exception and properly detected my laptop's network card, though I did need to "activate" networking in the networking system tray widget before I could scan for local networks. From there I could choose my wi-fi network and sign in, just as I would when using Network Manager under Linux. This was a big step forward for me in terms of using the BSDs and I'm glad to see progress being made in supporting wireless cards.
GhostBSD 24.10.1 -- Streaming YouTube videos
(full image size: 1.4MB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
Audio output worked on my laptop and I could play audio files and YouTube videos. However, the volume control widget in the system tray did not work. Clicking on it showed a slider bar, but no control or knob on which to click. My media keys on the keyboard were not recognized. I was able to adjust the volume by opening the audio controls from the system tray, opening the volume settings window and dragging the volume slider up/down. This limitation only happened when running GhostBSD on my laptop, when run in VirtualBox the system tray widget could adjust the volume.
GhostBSD used about 340MB of active memory and 590MB of wired memory. These are types of memory used by applications and the kernel, respectively, for a total of about 930MB. This is a little heavy when compared to Linux distributions running MATE and a classic filesystem like ext4. However, it's lighter than running a mainstream Linux distribution with GNOME and the ZFS filesystem. (ZFS uses some memory for dedicated cache, usually rising memory consumption by around 300MB to 500MB on desktop machines.)
The operating system took up about 2.6GB of disk space, plus some area I had set aside for swap space. This is on the light side when compared to most mainstream Linux distributions.
GhostBSD 24.10.1 -- Trying a dark theme
(full image size: 1.4MB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
Included software
Along with the MATE 1.28.2 desktop environment, GhostBSD ships with the Firefox web browser, the Evolution e-mail client, the Rhythmbox music player, and the VLC media player. The Atril document viewer and Eye of MATE image viewer are included. I also found the Caja file manager and Shotwell image manager installed. A system monitor and text editor are also in the Applications menu.
MATE is accompanied by the MATE settings panel which provides many configuration modules to help us tweak the desktop. This allows us to change fonts, change the desktop resolution, adjust the theme, and otherwise customize the environment.
GhostBSD 24.10.1 -- The settings panel
(full image size: 1.2MB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
The default shell used by GhostBSD is fish. I tried using this for a while, and appreciated some of its shortcuts, but gave it up in favour of bash after a while. My main complaint was fish used odd colour combinations, especially for directory listings, and this made a lot of text on the screen impossible to read. GhostBSD's implementation of bash defaults to displaying all text in white on black for better contrast.
The operating system also ships with the Clang compiler, manual pages for virtually everything, and it all rests of the FreeBSD 14.1 Stable branch. (Note: "Stable" here refers to the name of a development branch. It is akin to Debian Testing in that it is mostly stable, but hasn't hit final Release status yet.)
A quick note on accessing Netflix. The release announcement mentioned Chromium can be used to stream Netflix, though Firefox is the default browser. I tested Firefox and found it could not stream Netflix content. Then I installed Chromium and it too was unable to stream any content. When I tried to access a show on Netflix an error was shown which indicated I had to go into the Chromium settings (chrome://settings/content/protectedContent) and confirm the "Sites can play protected content" option was enabled. I checked and this option was already enabled, yet Chromium was unable to play any shows on Netflix. It seems this option has been turned on, but still not tested or enabled properly.
GhostBSD 24.10.1 -- Trying to access Netflix
(full image size: 1.8MB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
Software management
GhostBSD ships with two utilities for managing software. Both of these are available through the desktop's System menu. The first is called Update Station. This is a minimal desktop application which checks for available package updates. During my trial no new packages were released and Update Station would simply tell me (correctly) no updates were available and exit.
The other utility is called Software Station. This application is a classic, low-level package manager. It displays package/port categories down the left side of its window and a list of available packages in the selected category to the right. Software Station doesn't display icons, screenshots, or full package descriptions. It just shows package names with a single-sentence description. We can check a box next to items we wish to install. Packages are then fetched in batches, locking Software Station until the new software has been installed.
GhostBSD 24.10.1 -- The Software Station package manager
(full image size: 1.2MB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
In most ways Software Station is like Synaptic in the Debian family of distributions. Its approach is similar, it deals with low-level packages rather than specifically with desktop applications, and processes actions in batches. As with Synaptic, Software Station's categories can be tricky to navigate. There are a lot of categories and it is not always easy to figure out which category is likely to hold the item we want. Some are fairly straight forward like "news" or "science". Others might be tricky due to overlap. For example, would you expect to find an audio/video editor under "audio" or "multimedia"? If you went looking for a chat client under "net" (for network) you might be surprised to find it's actually under a category called "irc". When looking for a low-level tool, are you going to look under "base" or "os" first?
I found it easier to use the search function to find programs by name or description rather than browse categories and, for that matter, it was faster to use the command line pkg package manager than the GUI.
In short, Software Station works, but it's not a particularly friendly way to manage packages compared to most modern software centres.
ZFS and boot environments
Earlier I mentioned GhostBSD enforces the use of the ZFS advanced filesystem. For most people, this focus on ZFS is probably for the best. With ZFS we gain copy-on-write features which protect our data and provide instant filesystem snapshots.
GhostBSD includes a utility called Backup Station which helps the administrator work with boot environments (snapshots of the operating system). This means we can open Backup Station, click a button to create a snapshot, and perform an update. If anything goes wrong with the update, we can rollback the change by rebooting and selecting the snapshot from the boot menu (menu item #8).
GhostBSD 24.10.1 -- Managing boot environments
(full image size: 1.2MB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
The Backup Station tool will also mount previous snapshots and delete snapshots we no longer need, helping us clean up old copies of the operating system.
Conclusions
Evaluating GhostBSD is, for me, a tricky experience. On the one hand, I'd like to look at GhostBSD in a near-vacuum, examining what it adds to (or removes from) its parent, FreeBSD. GhostBSD is FreeBSD at its core, using a mostly-stable development branch which adds additional hardware support without sacrificing much in terms of stability. This gives us better wireless support and more up to date video drivers. GhostBSD does a nice job of taking the solid FreeBSD base and adding conveniences such as a live desktop environment, graphical system installer, a graphical package manager, and pre-configured MATE (or Xfce) desktop. In short, it takes a lot of work out of the experience of setting up FreeBSD as a desktop operating system. Apart from limiting users from installing GhostBSD on UFS volumes, I failed to find any limitations or downsides.
On the other hand, GhostBSD doesn't exist in a vacuum, it lives in a world with other platforms, like Linux distributions. While GhostBSD does a a great job in turning FreeBSD into an install-and-go desktop system, one can't help but notice little issues GhostBSD has that usually do not trouble Linux users. There were little hardware glitches, for example, with my touchpad and volume controls. Nothing show-stopping, but certainly a source of friction.
The package manager, Software Station, works, but it feels primitive compared to other software centres in the open source community. Likewise, while tools such as Backup Station are certainly helpful, they fall short compared to openSUSE's Btrfs snapshot manager. Maybe it's not a fair comparison, GhostBSD is younger and has fewer resources than SUSE, but I couldn't help but notice these little differences.
I was also disappointed that one of the highlights from the release announcement, the ability to stream Netflix, didn't work. This is one of those unfortunate situations where, since I don't stream much content, I probably wouldn't have thought to test the feature or noticed it didn't work if the project hadn't drawn attention to it.
Would I recommend GhostBSD? Possibly, depending on what the user needs. If a person is looking to jump into the BSD community, try something new, or if they already like FreeBSD and want to run it as a desktop operating system - then yes, I'd definitely recommend GhostBSD. It is, without a doubt, the most beginner-friendly, easiest to use, complete desktop-oriented platform I have used in the BSD sphere. The project represents an impressive effort to turn the usually-server-focused FreeBSD into a plug-n-play desktop operating system.
However, I would not recommend GhostBSD to someone coming from another operating system (such as a Linux distribution) who needed specific features, particularly proprietary applications. If you want to stream YouTube and other open sources of entertainment then GhostBSD has you covered. Proprietary streaming services like Netflix and Disney+ seem to still be out of reach. GhostBSD has access to a lot of open source games and I played a few this week. On the other hand, while it is technically possible to get Steam running, but it's not a smooth experience. If you want an office suite, GhostBSD has you covered, but if you need WPS or Microsoft Office, then you're going to run into limitations.
GhostBSD is a solid, useful operating system at its core and well suited to most desktop use. The limitations though, as with any less mainstream platform, start to show up the further one gets from its core functionality and out into the edges where specific applications, hardware components, and services lie.
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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
GhostBSD has a visitor supplied average rating of: 7.2/10 from 51 review(s).
Have you used GhostBSD? You can leave your own review of the project on our ratings page.
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| Miscellaneous News (by Jesse Smith) |
openSUSE provides cross-desktop GPU switching tool, GNU announces Shepherd 1.0, UBports addresses security concerns in new update, Murena unveils its first tablet, Xfce 4.20 launched
The openSUSE team have announced a new utility which can be used to manage multiple GPUs, allowing users to assign applications to a video card without requiring a specific desktop environment to be in use. "Users of openSUSE can now rely on the built-in switcherooctl tool for GPU switching, which is already integrated into our distributions with major desktop environments like GNOME and KDE Plasma. This is a game changer because it eliminates the need for additional tools and simplifies multi-GPU management while enhancing compatibility and performance with users' systems. For years, tools such as suse-prime and bbswitch have been staples in managing NVIDIA Optimus laptops and multi-GPU systems, but advancements in kernel drivers and desktop environments have made these tools unnecessary in most cases. Installations of openSUSE now handle these configurations out of the box, whether using the open-source Nouveau driver or NVIDIA's proprietary drivers." The new tool also works in both Wayland and X11 sessions. Details on the switcherooctl utility can be found in the project's announcement.
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The GNU project has announced the release of GNU Shepherd 1.0, a service manager which is configured using its own language. "Finally, twenty-one years after its inception (twenty-one!), the Shepherd leaves ZeroVer territory to enter a glorious 1.0 era. This 1.0.0 release is published today because we think Shepherd has become a solid tool, meeting user experience standards one has come to expect since systemd changed the game of free init systems and service managers alike. It's also a major milestone for Guix, which has been relying on the Shepherd from a time when doing so counted as dogfooding." Shepherd is not widely used, but it is featured in the Guix System distribution.
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The UBports team recently pushed out an update (20.04 OTA-7) ahead of schedule to deal with a security concern. The team has published an explanation: "The latest OTA is for Focal and we released it quickly because we found a security issue. The trust store settings in PulseAudio have become corrupted and the protection settings made optional. That includes when an attacker or a malicious app talk or tell to unload the security module, it would have full access to microphones without the user having to agree with that. In practical terms that meant that a malicious app could turn on the microphone without the phone user being aware of it. There was some other changes. Confined apps were able to crash PulseAudio on a Bluetooth device when the virtual device was removed." Other improvements, including updated support for printing and hot-plugging external monitors, were also introduced.
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The Murena project provides a de-Googled flavour of Android, called /e/OS, and sells phones with this privacy-focused operating system pre-installed. The organization has announced it will soon sell a tablet which will ship with /e/OS installed. "Featuring a 10.95-inch LCD display with a sharp 2560 x 1600 resolution, this tablet delivers vibrant visuals for both work and play. Powered by the efficient Tensor G2 chip, it ensures smooth performance while keeping your data secure. Enjoy our built-in synchronisation to Murena Workspace that runs on renewable energy." Details on the new tablet can be found on Murena's pre-order page.
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The Xfce project has released a new major version of its middle-weight desktop environment. Xfce 4.20 mostly focuses on transitioning the desktop's code to support Wayland while maintaining X11 support. "The major focus during this development cycle was the preparation of the codebase to be ready for Wayland. So that we meanwhile have experimental Wayland support for most components. More details in the links below. Assuming you have installed Xfce 4.18, here is an overview on the major changes you will see on an upgrade to Xfce 4.20." There are also a number of visual and performance improvements, with several performance tweaks applied to the Thunar file manager.
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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) |
Sending attachments from the command line
Checking-my-mail asks: Is there a way to send e-mail attachments from the command line? Like if I wanted to send a log file or report but without access to a full desktop/web e-mail application?
DistroWatch answers: Most, though not all, command line e-mail clients will allow you to attach files. This can usually be accomplished by passing the "-a" flag to the e-mail program, followed by the name of the file you want to send.
When using the mutt command line e-mail program sending an attachment can be done as follows:
mutt -s "Please see attached" -a /var/log/boot -- my@address
The above command sends an e-mail to my@address and attaches the /var/log/boot file, assuming we have read access to the file. When using the sendEmail program we can accomplish the same thing with a command like this:
sendEmail -f from@address -t my@address -u "Please see attached" -a /var/log/boot
The layout of the command is quite similar, but we need to specify both the "from" and the "to" addresses as parameters rather than at the end.
Thinking outside the box for a moment, there are other ways to automatically share files apart from e-mail. Setting up an e-mail client and making sure it works, just to share notifications or logs, can be overkill if there are other suitable solutions.
For instance, if you want to send a single file on a regular basis to a remote machine, it's usually easier to set up OpenSSH on one of the computers and have the other securely copy the file, using scp. For example, here I tell my laptop to retrieve a file from my server and play a notification sound when the file is finished copying. This could be added to an automated script to save me from manually running the command every day:
scp remote-server:/var/log/boot ./ ; mplayer /usr/share/sounds/alert.ogg
If both computers are on the same network, which is common in most home office and business environments, then we could also use the KDE Connect program. In the past I've written about using the KDE Connect software to link phones, laptops, and workstations. Here I run the KDE Connect command line program to send my log file from the server to my phone. The phone, in this case, has the identifier "8f420d3562d61339" which I discovered using "kdeconnect-cli -l":
kdeconnect-cli -d 8f420d3562d61339 --share /var/log/boot
When the phone receives the file it displays a notification I can tap to view the contents of the file.
E-mail is often a good way to go, especially for long-distance sharing of small amounts of information. OpenSSH is often better for large amounts of data while KDE Connect is ideal for small amounts of information being shared across the same network.
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Additional answers can be found in our Questions and Answers archive.
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| Released Last Week |
Window Maker Live 12.8
Window Maker Live is a Debian-based Linux distribution that applies the Window Maker window manager as the default graphical user interface. The project has released version 12.8 which is based on Debian 12 "Bookworm". "A selection of TeX Live packages for a decent TeX system, and auxiliary tools like AUCTeX for Emacs and the vim-latexsuite were also included. All of Bookworm's outdated GNUstep packages were replaced with current versions recompiled from their still up to date Debian/Trixie sources. The included GNUstep programs are more tightly integrated in the desktop. Only seeing is believing: The GNUstep packages were augmented by a few GUI themes demonstrating GNUstep's theming capabilities. The current Emacs release 29.4 has been added with its GNUstep based GUI. This emacs-gnustep variant is provided as a self-contained component and does not rely on nor conflict with the official Debian emacs packages. The bare bones Surf browser has been replaced with otter-browser since the former's AppArmor based security sandboxing proved too restrictive for casual usage. Also, the GNUstep based netsurf port WebSurf.app was added." The release announcement offers additional details.
Archman Linux 20241207
Muhterem Demiray has announced the release of Archman Linux 20241207, the latest stable build of the project's Arch-based distribution featuring a customised Xfce desktop: "Archman 2024-12 'Xfce' edition, the final stable release of the year, is ready. Archman Linux is an independent, globally-oriented Linux distribution derived from Arch Linux and developed in Turkey. Archman Linux offers a fast, visual, stable and easy-to-use installation and user experience. New features and updates: the latest Xfce desktop environment provides a faster and more stable experience; modernized theme and icon sets offer a more visually appealing user interface; the latest versions of popular software packages are included in this release; the system's security has been enhanced with the latest security patches. Performance improvements: the system startup time has been optimized for faster booting; memory and CPU usage have been improved, resulting in better overall system performance; battery life has been extended for laptops...." See the complete release announcement for more information and known issues.
OpenMandriva 24.12 "ROME"
The OpenMandriva project has published a new snapshot of the distribution's ROME branch, a rolling release which is available in six desktop flavours: Plasma 6 (X11), Plasma 6 (Wayland), Plasma 5, LXQt, GNOME, and COSMIC. "Main features, and changes since ROME 24.07: KDE Plasma 6 desktop by default (x11). Spins featuring latest desktop environments GNOME, LXQt Qt6, Plasma 5 and COSMIC 1.0 alpha. Plasma 6 Wayland ISO provided as well. Please note the Wayland ISO in VirtualBox may boot to a black screen and will not work; VirtualBox users may need to set VMSVGA controller to boot successfully; It works fine on most hardware and in QEMU with KVM. Available in OpenMandriva repository proton and proton-experimental, which make Proton available outside of Steam, without the need to install any non-free code. OM-Welcome Startup and Configuration tool, specifically designed for OpenMandriva KDE Plasma desktop environment, keeps improving with some more convenient modules for easy install of the users' most wished applications." Additional details can be found in the project's release announcement.
OpenMandriva 24.12 "ROME" -- Running the Plasma 6 desktop
(full image size: 733kB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
CentOS 10 Stream
The CentOS project has announced the availability of a new version of CentOS Stream. The new 10 series branch provides a preview of what is coming up in the next release of Red Hat Enterprise Linux. Version 10 ships with Linux 6.12, Python 3.12, and version 47 of the GNOME desktop. "CentOS Stream defines Enterprise Linux. It is a Linux distribution built by Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) engineers, and is used as the major version branch that RHEL minor versions are created from. It has roughly a five year lifecycle and will be maintained until 2030. The exact date will be contingent on the end of the Full Support phase of RHEL 10. Special Interest Groups (SIGs) and other communities use it as a trusted base for their tailored solutions. RHEL customers can use it as a preview of what's coming soon to RHEL.... CentOS Stream 10 includes several exciting new features and enhancements. Some of the highlights include: Linux kernel 6.12; Python 3.12; Go 1.23; Rust 1.82; Valkey 7.2; GNOME 47." Additional details can be found in the project's release announcement and in the release notes.
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Development, unannounced and minor bug-fix releases
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| Torrent Corner |
Weekly Torrents
The table below provides a list of torrents DistroWatch is currently seeding. If you do not have a bittorrent client capable of handling the linked files, we suggest installing either the Transmission or KTorrent bittorrent clients.
Archives of our previously seeded torrents may be found in our Torrent Archive. We also maintain a Torrents RSS feed for people who wish to have open source torrents delivered to them. To share your own open source torrents of Linux and BSD projects, please visit our Upload Torrents page.
Torrent Corner statistics:
- Total torrents seeded: 3,126
- 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) |
Do you use an e-mail client?
This week we talked about sharing files through e-mail attachments in our Questions and Answers section. We'd like to hear how many of our readers use local e-mail clients these days. If you do, do you use a desktop application or command line/console e-mail client?
You can see the results of our previous poll on running Red Hat Enterprise Linux and its clones on laptop and desktop computers in our previous edition. All previous poll results can be found in our poll archives.
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Do you use a local e-mail client?
| Yes - desktop application: | 1072 (38%) |
| Yes - console e-mail client: | 58 (2%) |
| No - web app / webmail: | 1610 (57%) |
| No - I do not use e-mail: | 61 (2%) |
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| Website News |
New distributions added to waiting list
- Aurora. Aurora is a Linux distribution based on Fedora Kinoite. The project adds additional developer tools and drivers enhance hardware support out of the box.
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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, 23 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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| Reader Comments • Jump to last comment |
1 • Email tips & alternatives (by Vinfall on 2024-12-16 01:48:49 GMT from Hong Kong)
While I do use mutt / notmuch + alot along with webmail, the traffic is quite limited.
In terms of personal email (you'd more or less need biz email anyway…), usually you have better alternatives w/o giving away your email in the first place, making email clients much less important.
For software updates & devlogs, use RSS or their native archive interface. Some projects also provide iCalendar you can subscribe as well. For GitHub specifically, you can use gh-dash and gh-notify to handle most stuff. Email notifications are only served for critical warnings.
For random newsletter, use kill-the-newsletter to convert it into RSS.
For services you don't trust and do not contain sensitive information, use temporary email/forwarding services that provide RSS.
Also, with proper tagging and pre-defined rules, you hardly need to "clean up" those 20k+ junk emails. Everything goes into the place it should be as soon as it gets delivered.
2 • E-mail client (by Guido on 2024-12-16 02:01:41 GMT from Philippines)
I would recommend Evolution and Thunderbird for desktop use.
3 • GhostBSD (by Kruger on 2024-12-16 02:18:58 GMT from Australia)
Nice review of GhostBSD.
Considering GhostBSD is maintained by a few people it is a solid BSD distro, however there are things lacking which need to be added, which are already included in other BSD distros like FreeBSD, MidnightBSD and NomadBSD:
1) option for full disk encryption during setup
2) a way to mount Linux partitions that does not involve command line hijinks
There are other issues open in the issue tracker, but personally these 2 would be a priority implementation for me and probably many Linux users who would like to make the switch to a solid BSD distro.
4 • email (by Keebler on 2024-12-16 03:16:08 GMT from United States)
I use thunderbird. I lie to be notified of new emails without having to constantly login with a browser.
I ust wish more clients could do 2FA.
5 • GhostBSD easy firewall (by Thomas on 2024-12-16 04:32:50 GMT from United States)
After installing a Linux distro, the second task (after turning off the screensaver lock) is to get a firewall running. The GhostBSD "Settings Panel" shown in the review has no "firewall" button in the "Internet and Network" section. Is there an easy way to get a simple firewall going on GhostBSD, for a single user PC?
6 • email (by fenglengshun on 2024-12-16 07:09:23 GMT from Japan)
I still just use Outlook tbh. On Linux, I usually access it by either a VM or remoting to a separate device. I just can't be bothered to mess around with email - I just need it send, receive, and filter correctly as it always does. Also, I need it to be able to open .msg, .pst, and .ost files as in every company I've been in it is the standard way of sharing mails/archives.
Plus, at this point I'm just too used to its UX - I can't be bothered to tinker around to make Thunderbird works like Outlook.
7 • Webmail? Really? (by UdoB on 2024-12-16 07:55:33 GMT from Germany)
I would have expected this: "Yes - desktop application: 222 (47%)" to be above 85%. Obviously I am getting old.
While I was a mutt user for several years I must admit Thunderbird running on a "real" (possibly a virtual machine's-) Desktop has some advantages :-)
The indirection required to route IMAP-content through an additional, separate and complex https-Server and the fact that all that confidential content lands in a browser¹ stops me from doing so on a regularly basis. Of course I do use it in rare or urgent situations, as it is a valuable tool for unusual situations.
¹ Actually I do use a separate browser instance to isolate privacy relevant content from "normal browsing". But do "normal users" do that too?
8 • Shepherd (by illumos on 2024-12-16 08:20:19 GMT from Japan)
This is a great achievement!
Users benefit from a diversity of init systems, so it's good to see other init systems developed besides systemd.
Guix is not a "hardcore non-systemd distro" because it uses elogind, but it's still great to see more non-systemd distros.
sysVinit, OpenRC, runit, s6, dinit, sinit, shinit, and Shepherd now!
9 • Linux's diversity (by illumos on 2024-12-16 08:45:57 GMT from Japan)
The strength of Linux is the diversity of distros.
Binaries that run on Debian don't run on Arch as is, the same commands can't be used on Gentoo and Fedora...
If losing the individuality of a distro turns Linux into Windows.
That's why Flatpak, which removes the diversity of package managers, is bad, and unifying distro init systems with systemd is also bad.
The original role of a distro is to take responsibility for maintenance such as security measures and bug fixes for packages.
That's why AUR repositories that are not managed by maintainers should not be included in "packages available on Arch" (all packages are available for all distros if users compile them themselves), and AUR, Flatpak, and systemd take away the diversity from Linux and turn it into Windows or macOS.
10 • Do you use an e-mail client ? (by eb on 2024-12-16 09:05:43 GMT from France)
Yes, Sylpheed, lightweight, simple and fast.
As soon as I complete downloading my mails, I disconnect, for security
( alias i-='sudo /sbin/dhclient -v -r' )
11 • @7 separate browser instances (by picamanic on 2024-12-16 09:33:34 GMT from United Kingdom)
@7: yes, I use separate browser instances for webmail, online buying etc. I would prefer to use a different browser for the wider web, but it uses too much memory.
12 • GhostBSD (by whatever on 2024-12-16 12:30:16 GMT from Luxembourg)
My past experience of GBSD, was that it installed fine, but automatically took pver (hijacked) the boot sector/menu. Had to then reclaim the boot process, trying first lilo then grub, but eith both lilo and grub there was a persistent problem - could not boot GBSD. But this is also true for FreeBSd = same error. No matter how good graphically it is, I wont try it.
13 • email client (by whatever on 2024-12-16 12:32:13 GMT from Luxembourg)
Just an observation, but there is no entry for using both graphical and console client.
14 • GhostBSD firewall (by Jesse on 2024-12-16 12:46:45 GMT from Canada)
@5: "Is there an easy way to get a simple firewall going on GhostBSD, for a single user PC?"
Not really. I mean you can enable the PF firewall (or another FreeBSD firewall), but you almost certainly don't need it. For a single-user desktop PC you probably aren't running any network services or have your PC exposed directly to the Internet. Which means a firewall doesn't have anything to filter.
15 • Multiple email accounts (by AdamB on 2024-12-16 12:55:34 GMT from Australia)
When you have several email accounts, on various platforms, webmail is not a viable solution - a desktop application works well in this situation.
I use Thunderbird, on Linux, Mac OS and Windows.
The Mail app on my iPhone is the equivalent of a desktop application. I check messages on the iPhone, but use Thunderbird, on one or other of my computers ,for message management (archiving to IMAP folders, etc).
16 • File transfer from CLI (by pepa65 on 2024-12-16 12:58:33 GMT from Thailand)
I was surprised the very good CLI apps `croc` (https://github.com/schollz/croc) and the apps in the `wormhole` (like: https://github.com/magic-wormhole/magic-wormhole.rs) family weren't mentioned when talking about filetranfer on the commandline. They are secure and even work when both parties are behind a router. An less secure but very lightweight option: `qft` (https://github.com/pepa65/qft).
17 • Email @9 (by kc1di on 2024-12-16 13:18:48 GMT from United States)
I tend to agree with @9 and use non systemd Distros here.
I've use Thunderbird for a long time and it's always been my go to e-mail client also use proton web mail both work well. Happy holidays All!
18 • Synaptic: (by dragonmouth on 2024-12-16 13:31:11 GMT from United States)
So Synaptic has no pretty pictures, or user ratings, or user opinions, or paragraph-long descriptions of apps like all the Software Centers but it is is still the most flexible package manager out there.
If I want to install a package, what do I care what some refuge from Windows thinks about it?!
19 • Murena and the googleplex (by AnyMouse on 2024-12-16 14:04:28 GMT from United States)
Anyone else find it ironic that Murena wants to run /e/OS a de-googled version of android on a google developed processor (Tensor G2).
20 • Pretty Pictures (by Friar Tux on 2024-12-16 14:34:22 GMT from Canada)
@18 (dragonmouth) Actually Synaptic DOES have "pretty pictures". When you click on a file in the list there is a "Screenshot" option that pops up in the Description dialog that pops up. (I prefer a "pretty picture" as I can tell more about an app/program from that than from most descriptions - but that's just me.)
As for the poll, I have always used Thunderbird. I tried Evolution for a while but it doesn't adhere to the global theme so some of the areas stay brilliant white. (With my eyes, it's like staring at a 60 watt bulb.) I also tried Claws and Sylpheed and both died after an update. Thunderbird has been rock-solid forever, for me.
21 • Email (by Robert on 2024-12-16 14:41:18 GMT from United States)
At work I have to use Outlook, but at least in my limited experience its hands-down the best email client I've used.
In my personal life I use ProtonMail, which has forced me in to webmail whether I like it or not. I could never get their bridge to work, and it doesn't support anything else. Apparently they do have their own desktop application now, but I haven't looked into it at all. Should do that sometime, but I don't care that much.
Before switching to Proton though, I have used KMail and (old) Thunderbird. KMail is just awful. I like KDE in general, but that application epitomizes every bad thing people say about KDE - confusing, buggy, too many options, and hard to work with.
I didn't like Thunderbird either, though I guess it worked. Haven't tried it since their big UI update, though I'm not terribly likely to.
So yeah, webmail is where its at for me. I probably would want a desktop application if I was a heavy email user, but I'm not.
22 • GhostBSD Network Manager (by Happy_Phantom on 2024-12-16 16:26:41 GMT from United States)
I really enjoyed my time evaluating GhostBSD. The thing that holds me back is that the Network Manager has no support for on-demand OpenVPN connections. I guess this issue has been on the back burner for a few years.
23 • Email (by DachshundMan on 2024-12-16 17:21:20 GMT from United Kingdom)
I use Thunderbird and sometimes the Web Mail that my Internet provider offers. The trouble with the webmail is it does not allow me to arrange the mails in the way I like to see them arranged. The trouble with Thunderbird is that it does not allow me to set up all the rules/filters that I would like to have so I need to use the Web client for some of them.
Also I have more than 1 Email address and Thunderbird allows me to show them all in a single tree whereas the Web Mail does not. That is the thing that really got me using Thunderbird.
24 • GhostBSD (by rhtoras on 2024-12-16 17:47:14 GMT from Greece)
First things first: @9 i allways agree in the 99% of illumos comments... great way of thinking...
Now as to GhostBSD i don't hate it but i don't like it either. I like the use of Mate Desktop and the installation procedure but i don't like zfs (ufs is better) and i prefer a real unix filesystem which is not supported. Yes i speak for xfs originally developed for irix. I also do not like the fact that fish is the default shell. If it was using openrc init as it used to i could give some extra points in my criticism.
I prefer the nomadBSD as a standalone project. Still i find freebsd the only way to use freebsd for a complete experience. I also wish Jesse will show us tribblix in the future.
Anyways it is time to check more alternatives.
25 • Xfce (by penguinx86 on 2024-12-16 18:02:09 GMT from United States)
I'm a big fan of Xfce. It's lightweight and avaliable for just about every distro. I sure hope the new release doesn't make it more bloated and slower.
26 • E-mail Client and SCP. (by Gene Alexander on 2024-12-16 14:23:58 GMT from United States)
I responded with "desktop" for the e-mail question as I do use Claws Mail with IMAP on both my FreeBSD and Linux desktops. But I have more than one e-mail account and I sometimes use web-mail with certain accounts. As a Unix systems administrator I also use CLI mail often, but only for local root messages and mostly at work.
Do not use SCP as it is unsafe in certain contexts and is deprecated. I have been using SFTP with bash heredoc and with batch mode reading from a file for my automated server reports at work. Set up a ssh-key for more secure automation with SFTP, do not put passwords in your scripts or on the CLI.
27 • SCP vs SFTP (by Jesse on 2024-12-16 18:35:49 GMT from Canada)
@26: "Do not use SCP as it is unsafe in certain contexts and is deprecated. "
This is not true. The previous protocol used by scp was found to be potentially unsafe and it was replaced by the _protocol_ used by sftp. You can use modern versions of scp safely because both scp and sftp use the same protocol now. There is nothing unsafe about using modern versions of scp and it was never deprecated.
See https://www.openssh.com/txt/release-9.0
28 • mail clients (by PJ on 2024-12-16 21:39:41 GMT from Canada)
I find Thunderbird (though somewhat improved) and Evolution too limiting; I'll stick with both a Mutt variant and Claws Mail.
Why wasn't there a survey response for 'I use both CLI/TUI and GUI mail clients'?
29 • GhostBSD (by Otis on 2024-12-16 23:45:55 GMT from United States)
Thanks for the thorough (as usual) review of this special BSD distro. I like very much the spirit (no pun intended) of GhostBSD.
HOWEVER (dang it): STILL no network joy. "No network card detected." Huh? Been that way for years as I look back over my notes and posts in their forums.
Worth waiting longer, I suppose.
30 • mail client (by Simon Wainscott-Plaistowe on 2024-12-17 01:59:31 GMT from New Zealand)
Thunderbird on Linux Mint, manages several mailboxes without any drama. Has done me well for many years.
31 • Email (by niftybottle on 2024-12-17 05:27:19 GMT from United States)
I use spark for email on my phone/tablet, and webmail on my computers. I find setting up email clients to be a pain that isn’t really worth it in a non-mobile context; I don’t check my mail too often and I don’t want notifications. Webmail can be tricky on mobile, and that’s how I primarily check my email, so a little extra power isn’t wasted.
32 • Fedora (by Reasonable on 2024-12-17 07:18:25 GMT from Austria)
Linux is all about diversity, but diversity doesn't mean it makes sense to keep something just to keep it diverse. Remove the broken... XFCE, KDE...
XFCE is pointless. It generally uses less resources than Gnome or KDE, but not so little as to be usable on old PCs. XFCE can do everything, but nothing right, and Thunar, which can't keep its grid, has been broken for years.
KDE is a Windows copycat. Unlike Windows, it feels unfinished (== MS Windows Pre-Alpha) and looks bad no matter what theme you use, and Dolphin is also broken in a similar way to Thunar, plus it takes up all your screen.
The only good thing about XFCE is that it is extremely easy to customize, and the only good thing about KDE Plasma is that it mimics the (utterly broken) Windows workflow that "muscle memory" types rely on.
As is, if you want a decent distribution, you can take anyone you want, as long as it is Fedora or a Fedora Spin.
Fedora Workstation for laptops and modern computers. Multitouch and finger gestures, no annoying docks, start menus, task bars, and the like.
Fedora LXDE (NOT LxQT!) for older machines. LXDE uses about 1/4 to 1/3 less memory than LxQT in most configurations. That's not much, but if you only have 1 GB of RAM in total, it's "can use the web browser or not".
Fedora LXDE + * Enlightenment e16 for old machines, but also for the brand new ones if you want ultimate productivity.
Fedora because it's not LTS and it has the latest kernels and software releases, which means you don't have to rely on flatpak and/or snaps as you would if you were using LTS. The LTS concept is fine -- for Windows, but it doesn't work for Linux with its repository and package manager concept.
* Enlightenment e16 because it does one thing -- the most important thing -- better than any other GUI. It can actually manage windows and virtual desktops, it can roll and unroll windows and send them to the background, and the Start menu and taskbar are where they should be -- right under your cursor.
33 • @32 (by Traveler on 2024-12-17 07:31:07 GMT from United States)
The only thing I would add is that LxDE looks much better than LxQT, and it also looks better than Plasma.
e16 is still the nicest WM so far, but only if the user is able to find and configure the right GTK, Qt themes, terminal, music and video player skins, icon and cursor themes, etc.
In other words, e16 can be stunning or horrible, depending on the user.
34 • GNOME 3 and systemd (by illumos on 2024-12-17 11:56:58 GMT from Japan)
@32 It's true that Xfce is getting bloated and KDE needs a lot of RAM.
But GNOME 3 is even worse.
First, GNOME 3 is completely dependent on systemd, and it's impossible to use GNOME 3 without elogind.
Therefore, hardcore systemd-less distros like PCLOS don't offer GNOME in the first place.
Second, the GNOME 3 experience is terrible.
In KDE and Xfce, you can easily launch apps from the tree, but in GNOME 3 you have to click the mouse multiple times to launch the app you want.
For a desktop environment for workstations, this design is madness.
It makes sense for a tablet device, but making the design of a workstation desktop environment the same as a tablet device is as foolish as Windows 11.
Also, VOID (runit) and Alpine (OpenRC) can run Xfce normally with 512MB RAM.
The recommended RAM capacity for VOID and Alpine when using the desktop environment is 512MB.
On the other hand, Arch (systemd) has a "minimum" RAM requirement of... wtf!? 512MB!
For reference, VOID's minimum RAM requirement is 96MB, and Alpine's is 128MB.
systemd has become so bloated that it is impossible to get Xfce to run properly with it.
This is not an Xfce problem, it's a systemd problem.
35 • @34 (by DistroWatcher on 2024-12-17 12:08:19 GMT from United States)
Systemd or no Systemd, nobody cares. Most people work with applications, not the OS. The OS is just something the applications need to get started.
GNOME 3 was not a very good experience, but GNOME 3 is gone. Currently we have GNOME 4 and soon GNOME 5, and GNOME 4 is an absolutely great experience, unless someone is a "muscle memory" type, in which case all you can say is "you're using it wrong if you find it a terrible experience".
Taskbar at the bottom, start menu button on the left, and "show desktop" is a horrible experience, and it's sad that a multi-billion dollar company like Microsoft hasn't moved an inch to improve the usability of their OS.
36 • @32 Reasonable: (by dragonmouth on 2024-12-17 12:12:10 GMT from United States)
There is one BIG problem with Fedora. It uses systemd - the INIT that wants to be a distro. Without systemd, Fedora would be a great distro.
37 • Gnome experience (by DistroWatcher on 2024-12-17 12:19:51 GMT from United States)
"In KDE and Xfce, you can easily launch apps from the tree, but in GNOME 3 you have to click the mouse multiple times to launch the app you want.
For a desktop environment for workstations, this design is madness.
It makes sense for a tablet device, but making the design of a workstation desktop environment the same as a tablet device is as foolish as Windows 11."
You are using it wrong.
Laptops are the best-selling PCs today, and Gnome is right to focus on the future, not the past.
In Gnome 4, you can easily flip the applications on the virtual desktops and they will open without you having to hunt for them in some trees or on the taskbar.
The "home" screen can be accessed by swiping your laptop's (or desktop's) touchpad, or by pressing the "Windows" key on your keyboard, or alternatively by pressing the button at the top left of the screen.
38 • @36 (by DistroWatcher on 2024-12-17 12:24:35 GMT from United States)
"There is one BIG problem with Fedora." ... FOR YOU.
The average person doesn't even know the name of the operating system they use. Windows 11 is the wrong answer. It is 21H2, 22H2, 34H2, etc.
39 • @34 (by DistroWatcher on 2024-12-17 12:28:12 GMT from United States)
"Also, VOID (runit) and Alpine (OpenRC) can run Xfce normally with 512MB RAM.
The recommended RAM capacity for VOID and Alpine when using the desktop environment is 512MB.
On the other hand, Arch (systemd) has a "minimum" RAM requirement of... wtf!? 512MB!
For reference, VOID's minimum RAM requirement is 96MB, and Alpine's is 128MB.
systemd has become so bloated that it is impossible to get Xfce to run properly with it.
This is not an Xfce problem, it's a systemd problem."
This is NOT a systemd problem.
Check on Bodhy.
40 • CentOS 10 Stream (by frombadtoworse on 2024-12-17 16:17:03 GMT from Italy)
"Most graphical desktop applications have been removed. This includes: Firefox, Gimp, Libreoffice, Inkscape Thunderbird. RHEL is transitioning to providing desktop applications via Flatpak. CentOS users who want these applications are encouraged to install them from Flathub or request them in EPEL. At this time, CentOS Stream 10 does not work with secureboot enabled." It is definitely not user-friendly. Fewer and fewer users will try it. Much worse than the old CentOS.
41 • User friendlines (by John Doe on 2024-12-17 17:38:48 GMT from United States)
@40: That makes sense for a server. CentOS is not a desktop OS.
42 • @39 RAM consumption (by Microlinux on 2024-12-17 21:08:11 GMT from France)
While I'm a big fan of Void, let's just say the statement about RAM consumption in the handbook is outdated. I've been giving this a spin last week in a KVM guest, and the bare minimum to install Void is 384 MB RAM, not 96 RAM.
This being said, Void is by far the snappiest and fastest distro out there. Here's an installer I wrote last week that turns your minimal Void Linux system into a bells-and-whistles KDE desktop: https://gitlab.com/kikinovak/voidlinux-desktop/-/blob/main/setup.sh?ref_type=heads
43 • @34, 36 SystemD is NOT an init but just works fine (by Noninitzealot on 2024-12-18 01:04:29 GMT from France)
To Dragonmouth first:
SystemD is not an "INIT that wants to be a distro". It is not an init at all.
It's a system management faciliy, inspired by late Solaris' SMF and by MacOS' launchd (the stuff that has enabled so many graphical designer to perform their art with a BSD kernel and a NeXTStep environment without even knowing nothing of them for nearly a quarter of a century).
SystemD doesnot want to be a distro either, at least not any more than Init.
You're failure to understand that it's all about the init's way shortening must explain your dragon fire spitting.
People don't care about their OS system's management. They care about what they can do with their running OS. It happens SystemD works well.
I've been using GNOME 3 and 4 since UbuntuGNOME Remix community edition ran out as a reaction to Ubuntu's Unity (really crappy to use - too many clicks to run an app*). I have suffered no problem with the transitions from Init to Upstart or from Upstart to SystemD.
I'm okay with anything that can make my OS run transparently without requiring a seasoned sysadmin when none should be required. This is a computer world, and computers are made for automation, but Init is so manual.
As for me Init was already a thing of the past for the desktop a quarter of a century ago, when even the PC industry was transitionning to "Plug'n Play".
The only guys i know who complain about SystemD are precisely sysadmins who are too crippled by habits and have a hard time adapting and evolving their skills.
---
Illumos, under GNOME, i always enable the "Applications" and "Places" menus with Tweaks for a classical quicker access to items. That's what makes GNOME the easiest and less obstructive desktop environment for me. Especially with the "Applications" menu, they are never more than 2 clicks away.
Sometimes i try other DEs on an old spare machine, but all are more painful.
44 • @43, Gnome application and places (by Tasio on 2024-12-18 02:06:03 GMT from Philippines)
@43, "i always enable the "Applications" and "Places" menus with Tweaks" I'm also a long-term happy user of Gnome. First: "Applications" and "Places" are not in Tweaks. They are extensions. Second: If I wanted applications and places menus I'd just use Mate or some other. (Gnome Classic is just plain ugly.) Once I've set up Gnome, I have no need of menus and I seldom open the app grid. I use the Dash to Panel extension on the left with all the info I need always visible at a glance, and the Dash2Dock extension at bottom with intellihide, which gives me full vertical use of the screen with no bars top or bottom. This way I get one-click access to all often used apps, and one-click access to shutdown, logout, sleep and restart. I can also use 'Super+(1-10)' to bring up any app by its position on the dock should I be running maximized, or move the cursor to the bottom to show the dock, or 'Super' and scroll to change virtual desktops, or scroll on the left panel to do the same. Why would I need menus?
45 • KISS principle and basic Unix philosophy anyone ? (by Microlinux on 2024-12-18 07:04:58 GMT from France)
It's true, systemd has made our sysadmin life easier mainly by unifying what was once quite a mess. Only to replace it by a unified mess, some might say.
This being said, take a long hard look at runit. This snappy little init system does in 1000 lines of code what systemd is doing worse in way more than a million lines of code.
Install Void and play along with it, and you'll conclude that systemd is just a pathologically overengineered piece of software.
46 • xfce (by keithp on 2024-12-18 09:51:36 GMT from United Kingdom)
"XFCE is pointless. It generally uses less resources than Gnome or KDE, but not so little as to be usable on old PCs. XFCE can do everything, but nothing right, and Thunar, which can't keep its grid, has been broken for years."
Posting off a Thinkpad X60 manufactured December 2006. 4Gb RAM and a cheap SSD. Runs Slackware 15 with xfce 4.16 and Firefox OK. Expecting issues with wayland/4.20 simply because of the graphics processor and current mesa versions.
I think that all of this speed and GUI stuff depends on what software people want to use and the complexity of that software.
What would a Gnome compliant version of something like Blender look like? Or Ardour? See my point?
47 • @42 (by DistroWatcher on 2024-12-18 11:56:31 GMT from United States)
@42 (Microlinux): Correctly, your subject should have been "@34 RAM consumption." ;)
"Bare minimum to install" should be used with caution, as a practical minimum is always at least 2GB of RAM. What's the point of having a desktop PC if it can't open at least half a dozen tabs in any web browser?
As for the measuring...
Astra Orel is based on Debian and KDE, and as such it uses systemd and (modified) Plasma. It also runs with less than 300 MB of RAM, even with systemd.
https://ibb.co/XCgkKnC
Bodhy Linux is based on Ubuntu, and as such also uses systemd. Check how much RAM systemd uses and how much the nm-applet.
https://ibb.co/GkGF2NH
Not really much difference from Porteus XFCE.
https://ibb.co/XLRDyf6
You have to remember to include all those applets, like clock, volume, etc. as they also use RAM and are part of the default XFCE setup. Just counting what the "naked" XFCE WM alone uses won't work. This is not exclusive to XFCE, but also applies to any other WM. TWM as well.
48 • Linux's diversity (by illumos on 2024-12-19 05:47:18 GMT from Japan)
@43 I don't hate systemd.
I think systemd is overly bloated, but it is a choice for distros to adopt systemd.
The problem is that systemd takes away the diversity of Linux.
The problem is that huge projects such as GNOME actively and intentionally depend on systemd, making it difficult for distros to adopt other inits.
This goes against freedom of choice.
The essence of the problem is that systemd and Flatpak are trying to make Linux Windows.
The strength of Linux is diversity, and the existence of various incompatible inits and package managers is what benefits users.
If systemd becomes the only init system for Linux, users will be deprived of the benefits of freedom of choice and diversity.
The reason I avoid distros that use systemd is not because I hate systemd.
By choosing a distro without systemd, I contribute to maintaining the diversity of init systems as a user.
If systemd did not occupy a proprietary position, I would also use distros that use systemd.
Personally, I feel that OpenRC is a "lightweight systemd."
Unlike systemd, it is not bloated, but its operation as an init system and the way it is managed are not much different from systemd.
The existence of OpenRC proves that there is no need for any parts of systemd other than the init system.
49 • In defense of GNOME 3+ (by GNOME Desktop on 2024-12-20 04:53:04 GMT from India)
Replying to @34
"In KDE and Xfce, you can easily launch apps from the tree, but in GNOME 3 you have to click the mouse multiple times to launch the app you want.
For a desktop environment for workstations, this design is madness."
I never use mouse to open applications in GNOME 3+. I just hit the Super key, type few characters of app name, and then hit enter. It works perfectly in devices with physical keyboard. While, it may be difficult in touch only devices.
50 • openrc (by rhtoras on 2024-12-21 16:25:45 GMT from Greece)
@48 openrc has nothing to do with systemD... it is an improved sysVinit with the main benefit being the parallel bootin which btw is not enabled by default (this is freedom)
dinit is a better alternative though
51 • OpenRC (by Jesse on 2024-12-21 17:25:45 GMT from Canada)
@50 OpenRC doesn't really have anything to do with SysV init either. It can be used _with_ SysV as just a service manager or it can replace SysV init. The two aren't really related.
SysV init also allows parallel booting. OpenRC's service management is quite nice, but parallel booting isn't a reason to use it over SysV init.
Number of Comments: 51
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| • Issue 1111 (2025-03-03): Orbitiny 0.01, the effect of Ubuntu Core Desktop, Gentoo offers disk images, elementary OS invites feature ideas, FreeBSD starts PinePhone Pro port, Mint warns of upcoming Firefox issue |
| • Issue 1110 (2025-02-24): iodeOS 6.0, learning to program, Arch retiring old repositories, openSUSE makes progress on reproducible builds, Fedora is getting more serious about open hardware, Tails changes its install instructions to offer better privacy, Murena's de-Googled tablet goes on sale |
| • Issue 1109 (2025-02-17): Rhino Linux 2025.1, MX Linux 23.5 with Xfce 4.20, replacing X.Org tools with Wayland tools, GhostBSD moving its base to FreeBSD -RELEASE, Redox stabilizes its ABI, UBports testing 24.04, Asahi changing its leadership, OBS in dispute with Fedora |
| • Issue 1108 (2025-02-10): Serpent OS 0.24.6, Aurora, sharing swap between distros, Peppermint tries Void base, GTK removinglegacy technologies, Red Hat plans more AI tools for Fedora, TrueNAS merges its editions |
| • Issue 1107 (2025-02-03): siduction 2024.1.0, timing tasks, Lomiri ported to postmarketOS, Alpine joins Open Collective, a new desktop for Linux called Orbitiny |
| • Issue 1106 (2025-01-27): Adelie Linux 1.0 Beta 6, Pop!_OS 24.04 Alpha 5, detecting whether a process is inside a virtual machine, drawing graphics to NetBSD terminal, Nix ported to FreeBSD, GhostBSD hosting desktop conference |
| • Issue 1105 (2025-01-20): CentOS 10 Stream, old Flatpak bundles in software centres, Haiku ports Iceweasel, Oracle shows off debugging tools, rsync vulnerability patched |
| • Issue 1104 (2025-01-13): DAT Linux 2.0, Silly things to do with a minimal computer, Budgie prepares Wayland only releases, SteamOS coming to third-party devices, Murena upgrades its base |
| • Issue 1103 (2025-01-06): elementary OS 8.0, filtering ads with Pi-hole, Debian testing its installer, Pop!_OS faces delays, Ubuntu Studio upgrades not working, Absolute discontinued |
| • Issue 1102 (2024-12-23): Best distros of 2024, changing a process name, Fedora to expand Btrfs support and releases Asahi Remix 41, openSUSE patches out security sandbox and donations from Bottles while ending support for Leap 15.5 |
| • Issue 1101 (2024-12-16): GhostBSD 24.10.1, sending attachments from the command line, openSUSE shows off GPU assignment tool, UBports publishes security update, Murena launches its first tablet, Xfce 4.20 released |
| • Issue 1100 (2024-12-09): Oreon 9.3, differences in speed, IPFire's new appliance, Fedora Asahi Remix gets new video drivers, openSUSE Leap Micro updated, Redox OS running Redox OS |
| • Issue 1099 (2024-12-02): AnduinOS 1.0.1, measuring RAM usage, SUSE continues rebranding efforts, UBports prepares for next major version, Murena offering non-NFC phone |
| • 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 |
| • Full list of all issues |
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CAINE
CAINE (Computer Aided INvestigative Environment) is an Ubuntu-based GNU/Linux live distribution created as a project of digital forensics. It offers a complete forensic environment that is organised to integrate existing software tools as software modules and to provide a friendly graphical interface. The main design objectives that CAINE aims to guarantee are: an interoperable environment that supports the digital investigator during the four phases of the digital investigation, a user-friendly graphical interface, and a semi-automated compilation of the final report.
Status: Active
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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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