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DistributionsNews and Editorials Distributions for the PowerPCJudging from the number of inquiries and search requests for "ppc" or "powerpc" we get at DistroWatch.com, deploying Linux (or *BSD) on this powerful platform is not nearly as rare as some would like us to believe. Whether it is the attraction of elegantly designed and innovative Apple computers, or the sheer power behind the high-end pSeries servers, Linux on PowerPC is alive and well. Here is the list of current distributions that develop PowerPC editions of their products.
Distribution News OpenBSD 3.6 ReleasedOpenBSD 3.6 has been released. "This is our 16th release on CD-ROM (and 17th via FTP). We remain proud of OpenBSD's record of eight years with only a single remote hole in the default install. As in our previous releases, 3.6 provides significant improvements, including new features, in nearly all areas of the system..." Click below for more.
SUSE LINUX Professional 9.2 is availableSUSE LINUX Professional 9.2 has officially been released. Click below for a preview of new features, and places where you can find this release.
Mondo Rescue shut down by legal hasslesMondo Rescue is a well-regarded, GPL-licensed "disaster recovery" tool for both Linux and Windows. The project's web page currently reads: "Due to legal actions brought about by FastServers.net against one of our developers, Mondo as of now is terminated." The details of these actions are hard to come by; bits of information can be found in the Mondo Rescue forum, and, for the other side, in this mondo-devel posting. The end result, however, is that Mondo Rescue seems to have been shut down - for now. (Thanks to Rick Moen).
Musical Linux for productive peopleStartCom Linux has released an add-on CDROM, called StartCom MultiMedia Productivity, meant to be installed in addition to StartCom's latest released distribution, StartCom MultiMedia Edition. The additional CD comes with an autorun installer and a advanced set of audio and video manipulation programs.
Fedora CoreThe fifth release candidate for Fedora Core 3 was released last weekend. This is the probably the final release before the final FC3 release.Fedora Core 2 updates:
UbuntuUbuntu has introduced the Hoary Hedgehog into the wild. Hoary Hedgehog will be the next release of Ubuntu GNU/Linux and will include daily updates from Debian's development branch. A final release of the Hoary Hedgehog is scheduled for April 2005.The first Ubuntu Conference has been announced. This will be no fleeting affair; it takes a full two weeks, from December 5 to 18, in Mataró, Spain. Here is some additional information. Ubuntu has announced the release of the Warty Live CD. The Live CD contains a snapshot of everything in the Ubuntu 4.10 but in a bootable trial form. A new mailing list for all Russian speaking Ubuntu users has also been announced.
New Distributions CCux LinuxCCux Linux is especially optimized for i686 and higher processor architectures. For package management it uses the RPM format in connection with the apt tools, which give it automatic dependency resolving when installing new software and therefore makes the installation of new software much easier. CCux Linux joins the list with the Alpha 0.9.4 release, dated October 14, 2004.
Distribution Newsletters Debian Weekly NewsDebian Weekly News for November 2, 2004 is out. This week's edition has trip reports from Systems 2004 and Kansai OpenSource, successful dist-upgrades from woody to sarge with a real i386, and more.
Gentoo Weekly Newsletter 1 November 2004The Gentoo Weekly Newsletter for the week of November 1, 2004 is out. This week's edition looks at the Linux World Conference & Expo in Frankfurt, and other topics.
Ubuntu Traffic #09Ubuntu Traffic #09 is out, with a summary of the most important mailing list and IRC discussions involving the Ubuntu GNU/Linux distribution during the week of October 16 - 22, 2004.
DistroWatch Weekly, Issue 73The DistroWatch Weekly for November 1, 2004 looks at SimplyMEPIS, OpenBSD and more.
Minor distribution updates Buffalo LinuxBuffalo Linux has released v1.5.0. "Changes: Buffalo 1.5.0 is a 2 CD relaese. The main reason for going to 2 CDs is to provide both kernel 2.6.8.1 and 2.6.9. The new 2.6.9 kernel has issues with some video drivers. The GNOME bundle (gnome-2.6.1-buff-9.bz2), containing 85 packages, was moved to the second CD, along with another 250 packages from Slackware current (30 Oct). These additional packages provide other desktops such as KDE-3.3.1, BlackBox, FluxBox, WindowMaker-0.80.2, and other useful utilities. Firefox-1.0PR and Thunderbird-0.8 were added to the first CD, with over 80 other package upgrades."
Kontron to bundle MontaVista Linux Carrier-Grade Edition with TCA platformsKontron has announced the signing of an OEM agreement that puts MontaVista Linux Carrier Grade Edition (CGE) into Kontron's next generation of Advanced Telecom Computing Architecture (ATCA) and Advanced Mezzanine Card (AMC) platforms.
Quantian release 0.6.9.1 availableQuantian 0.6.9.1 begins a new Quantian series based on Knoppix 3.6 and the corresponding clusterKnoppix release. The iso file of about 2.0 gb contains updates such as new Linux kernels 2.4.27 and 2.6,7, openMosix based on the 20040808 patches to 2.4.27 as well as a kernel shared memory migration patch, KDE 3.2.3, R 2.0.0 and numerous other updates among the over 1900 Debian packages that comprise Quantian. Click below for additional information.
SalvareSalvare has released v0.1.5. "Changes: Apart from bugfixes, the major change is an "install-debian" command which will start an included (and exclusive) Debian installer. It also includes improved bootstrapping code to allow it to boot from a floppy and CD or from a floppy and network. Beta USB support and much improved hardware detection were added."
Source Mage GNU/LinuxSource Mage GNU/Linux has released v0.9.3 for both x86 and PPC architectures. "Changes: This version uses a 2.6.8.1 kernel. NPTL has been removed. There is native support of udev and static /dev. It now installs a bootable system. yaboot, lilo, and grub have been tested with or without a separate /boot partition. All software have been compiled using stable sorcery/grimoire, with few patches."
VLinux version 1.0 is now available (Bioinformatics.org)Version 1.0 of VLinux has been announced. "VLinux Bioinformatics Workbench is a Linux distribution for bioinformatics. It is an easy to use, no installation required, CD-based distribution based on Knoppix 3.3. It includes a variety of sequence and structure analysis packages, and it's an Open Source project released under the GNU GPL license."
Newsletters and articles of interest PDA Freedom with OpenZaurus (Linux Journal)Victor Castro explores OpenZaurus in a Linux Journal article. "Despite Sharp's cancellation of its Zaurus SL-6000 PDA in the US, the Sharp Zaurus continues to have a strong following among Linux gurus in the US and all over the world. No one proves this point better than the people behind the OpenZaurus project. The OpenZaurus Project provides an alternative to the original Sharp Zaurus ROM for different models of the Sharp Zaurus Personal Mobile Tool."
OpenBSD 3.6 Live (O'ReillyNet)Federico Biancuzzi interviews several members of the OpenBSD team about the upcoming OpenBSD 3.6 release, on O'ReillyNet. "FB: At the moment the [SMP] code works on i386 and amd64 platforms. Which platforms do you plan to support in the future?Niklas Hallqvist: Loose plans, not any guarantees made: alpha, ppc, sparc(64), and maybe mvme88k :-) Maybe the new mips port? Who knows. This is work that probably must be done just because it is fun. There's hardly a large demand with funders around the corner. And today, unfortunately, there's not much time left for fun projects anymore. I was very lucky to get paid to do part of this fun work; otherwise it might not have happened."
Distribution reviews Six Weeks with Ubuntu Linux (OSNews)OSNews reviews Ubuntu 4.10. "I was really impressed with the Preview Release. I originally only installed it to see the then brand-new Gnome 2.8 desktop and, as I expected lots of problems within a totally new distribution that I never had heard of before, I planned to reinstall FC2 on the same day. But though there were a few rough edges in the Preview Release, it surely had good beta quality. There were no show-stoppers for me and so I just kept it, "apt-getting" myself through September and October."
First Look: SUSE Linux Professional 9.2 beta (NewsForge)NewsForge reviews SUSE Linux Professional 9.2. "Novell recently opened a limited beta of SUSE Linux Professional 9.2, and I've been using it for my work/production machine ever since I got my hands on the five-CD download. No, using a beta release of an operating system as your production system is generally not a good idea. Yes, there are bugs, as expected in beta software. There are also improvements and refinements, as is also to be expected. But overall, well, read on and see."
Page editor: Rebecca Sobol |
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