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Distributions
News and Editorials
Tools to roll your own distribution
Creating live Linux CDs has become a fairly common pastime. Many of the distributions added to the distributions list in the past year are live CDs tailored to specific purposes. Many people start with a live CD that they like and then add and subtract packages to create the CD of their dreams. Debian-based KNOPPIX remains one of the most popular distributions to use as a starting point.Many major vendors will create a live CD to showcase a current snapshot of a release, and often a live CD is used to showcase some other software package. IBM developerWorks takes a look at how to distribute your software packages on a live Linux CD.
The Slackware-based SLAX-Live CD is another popular starting point. SLAX and many variants use shell scripts from the Linux Live project to tailor their favorite distribution into a live CD.
Canonical Ltd. created Launchpad, a suite of tools (some proprietary, some free) that allows Ubuntu Linux to be easily turned into Kubuntu, Edubuntu, and a host of other variants.
Fedora fans now have the Kadischi Fedora Live CD Project, which has recently created Fedora Core 5 Test 2 live CDs.
This is only a quick view of the growing number of tools for rolling your own Linux distribution.
New Releases
BLAG30002 Released
BLAG Linux and GNU has released BLAG30002 (Johannesburg). "BLAG30002 is based on Fedora Core 3 plus updates, adds apps from Dag, Freshrpms, NewRPMS, and includes custom packages. BLAG30002 is the latest update to the BLAG30k series, using the last updates from Fedora before moving to the Fedora Legacy project."
GoblinX
The GoblinX Linux Project has released GoblinX Premium 2006.1 edition, exclusively at On-Disk.com.
Distribution News
Ubuntu Distro Sprint
Progress on Dapper Drake continues, in spite of the "Distro Plague of Death" that had most of the team down before day 3. Most team members were back at work by Day 4, looking at upstream timezone data structures, klibc build failures on Sparc, remaining X bugs, and more. Here's the Day 5 progress report, and the final report from Day 6.
Ubuntu archive now running on Soyuz (Launchpad)
The migration of Ubuntu's archive to Launchpad's archive management infrastructure, Soyuz, has been completed successfully. For most users this should be completely transparent.
Debian Project Leader Elections 2006: Call for nominations
It's time once again for the Debian Project Leader Elections. Nominations will be open until February 26, 2006.
Extremadura Sessions: the i18n infrastructure session September 2006
The Debian i18n team is planning on a session in Extremadura, Spain next September. Click below for more information.
YDL v4.1 goes Gold-Master --again.
Yellow Dog Linux pulled the gold-master 4.1 ISOs from replication in order to correct some bugs. These have mostly been squashed now, and the gold-master CD-Rs are again on their way to the replication facility. "[One] bug which concerns dual and quad-core G5 Power Macs remains open. We put our best into this issue, but as with all software projects a line must be drawn and the product must ship. As such, this bug is not a show-stopper and the work-around requires less than a minute, post-installation."
Unofficial Fedora FAQ Update
The Unofficial Fedora FAQ has had an update. "Also, fedorafaq.org is proud to announce our new subscription service, The Insider FAQ! We provide answers to all sorts of Fedora and Red Hat questions that are not normal fedorafaq.org questions, but with the same detail and simplicity as fedorafaq.org. :-) Try it out, it's really useful, really cheap, and it helps support fedorafaq.org!"
Fedora Core 5 Test 3 Slip
The Fedora Core 5 test3 release has slipped by a week. Test 3 is now due by February 20, 2006.
New Distributions
Musix GNU+Linux
Musix is a 100% Free Debian-based operating system intended for musicians, audiophiles and other users. It contains an enormous collection of free programs. It can run as a live CD/DVD and can also be installed to a hard drive. Currently supported languages (as of February 2006): English, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Catalán, Vascuence and Gallego.
Distribution Newsletters
Debian Weekly News
The Debian Weekly News for February 7, 2006 covers Debian packages for the Kolab groupware server, an update for the stable Debian release, Finnish Debian community has been honored by the Finnish Linux User's Group (FLUG), the call for Project Leader nominations, graphical installer development, and several other topics.
Fedora Weekly News Issue 32
This week's Fedora Weekly News has the following articles: Red Hat commits to MIT's $100 laptop, Interview with Orv Beach at SCALE, A Report from Solutions Linux 2006, Fedora Core 5 Test 3 Slip, LinuxQuestions.org Members Choice Awards, Create a custom Linux distribution online, and more.
Gentoo Weekly Newsletter
The Gentoo Weekly Newsletter for the week of February 6, 2006 is out. This issue covers GNOME 2.12 moves to stable, Gentoo developer receives a donated Wi-Spy spectrum analyzer, Poppler and KPDF, EUSecWest conference, OSC 2006 (spring edition) in Tokyo, and several other topics.
Born: 'Mandriva Linux Inside' e-mag
The first edition of Mandriva Linux Inside has been released in PDF format. It includes the reborn "Cooker Weekly News", which is also available here.
DistroWatch Weekly
The DistroWatch Weekly for February 6, 2006 is out. "With all eyes on the final stages of development of Fedora Core 5 and SUSE Linux 10.1, other distributions are not resting either; we bring you interesting information about the upcoming releases of Novell Linux Desktop 10 and Kubuntu 6.04. Interested in network security and penetration testing? The brand new BackTrack live CD provides an amazing collection of tools just for this purpose; we'll take a quick look at the first beta released over the weekend. Also in this issue: try the new smart-urpmi for Mandriva and read how a vice president of a large financial firm fell in love with Gentoo. Finally, our January donation, the largest DistroWatch.com has ever made, goes to Gambas and Krusader."
Package updates
Fedora updates
Bug fix updates and upgrades (featuring KDE 3.5.1) for Fedora Core 4: gnome-python2-extras, vixie-cron, selinux-policy-targeted, selinux-policy-strict, libselinux, udev, kernel, autofs, arts, kdeaccessibility, kdeaddons, kdeadmin, kdeartwork, kdebase, kdebindings, kdeedu, kdegames, kdegraphics, kde-i18n, kdelibs, kdemultimedia, kdenetwork, kdepim, kdesdk, kdeutils, kdevelop, kdewebdev, audit, module-init-tools, authd, docbook-style-xsl, cups, audit.
Miscellaneous Articles
Leapsoft launches African Linux distribution (Computer Business Review)
Computer Business Review covers Nigerian distribution, Wazobia Linux. "Lagos, Nigeria-based Leapsoft is aiming to over come those hurdles by providing its Linux distribution in Hausa, Yoruba and Igbo, the three most spoken languages in Nigeria, as well as English. It is also aiming to translate Linux into popular African languages. The operating system comes with translations of the OpenOffice.org 2.0 productivity suite, multiple browsers, desktop search, automated networking tools, multi-media software, and application development tools, amongst other things."
Page editor: Rebecca Sobol
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