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DistributionsNews and Editorials New distributions: Ark Linux, LinuxInstall.org, Yoper and Zool It's a new year, and obviously the time to introduce new Linux distributions. This week we have added four distributions to our list. Linux for the desktop is a hot topic, and three of these four are ready to provide you with an easy to use desktop system.Ark Linux and LinuxInstall.org are based on recent Red Hat releases, pared down for desktop users without all the server software. You'll find them in the Non-technical desktop section of the list. Yoper brings us a Ydesktop release, but they have other uses for their base system, so we've added Yoper to the General Purpose section. Zool Linux is aimed at the mini-distribution/rescue-disk market and has been added to the Floppy-based section although it is possible to burn a CD-ROM version as well. You can find more information on these new releases in the 'New Distributions' section of this page.
Distribution News Debian Weekly News The Debian Weekly News for January 14, 2003 is available. This week looks at what has been happening with Debian sponsor Software in the Public Interest; and much more.
Red Hat Linux 8.1 To Ship in April (CRN) CRN reports that Red Hat plans to release Red Hat Linux 8.1 in April, a 32-bit technical workstation this quarter and a full-fledged corporate desktop in the next six to 12 months. "Red Hat 8.1 was released to the Web in beta form late last month. The update offers an enhanced BlueCurve GUI that made its debut in version 8.0 in September and an updated Linux 2.4.20-2.2. kernel. It also offers new features such as font viewing, the ability to burn files to CDs, a new themes applet, an updated Mozilla 1.2 browser and KDE 3.1 and GNOME 2.2 graphical desktops." Thanks to B. Kosnik
Gentoo Weekly Newsletter -- Volume 2, Issue 2 The Gentoo Weekly Newsletter for the week of January 13th, 2003 is now available. This week's news looks at the portage tree freeze for Gentoo Linux 1.4_rc3/final; gcc changes to Gentoo Linux; and much more.
Slackware Linux Slackware Linux has updated Apache/mod_ssl/PHP packages, out for both Slackware 8.1 and -current (fixing some security issues). KDE in slackware-current has been upgraded to KDE 3.0.5a. If you're interested in KDE 3.0.5a, now's the time to grab these packages as they will likely be replaced with KDE 3.1 packages soon.
Vivitar and Lycoris Announce Desktop/LX Certification of Vivicam Digital Cameras Vivitar and Lycoris announced that many of Vivitar's USB Vivicams have attained full hardware certification on the Desktop/LX Operating System platform.
New Distributions Ark Linux Ark Linux is a Linux distribution designed especially for desktop use, primarily for people without prior Linux experience. Its main goal is ease of use, and the inclusion of many tools end users will need.A brief look at Ark Linux can be found in this Open for Business article and eWeek has a brief interview with Ark Linux founder, Bernhard Rosenkraenzer.
LinuxInstall.org LinuxInstall.org 1.0 is an easy to use, easy to install, desktop system based on Red Hat Linux 8.0.
Yoper Yoper is a high performance distribution hailing from New Zealand. "yOPeR" stands for your operating system, and it strives to be fast and compact. The binaries are compiled on Intel 686 PCs and the system is optimised for these or higher processors. Once the base system has been installed, you can add packages from RPM, .deb or .tgz formats.One of the primary purposes of Yoper is to support commercial conversions of office software from Windows to Yoper. These conversions will be done by trained and certified professionals within the Yoper franchise. That said, Ydesktop-3.2.1 Release Candidate 3, Yoper for the desktop, is available for download. We found Yoper through this DesktopLinux.com interview with Andreas Girardet, founder of Yoper. Thanks to B. E. Irwin
Zool Linux Zool Linux is a project whose goal is to assist in making Linux mini-distributions. It is useful for floppy-based rescue systems, or to check hardware and network connections. It supports many different filesystems and utilities. Zool 1 is a Linux rescue disk based on the 2.2.23 kernel. Zool 2, released January 9, 2003, is based on the 2.4.18 kernel.
Minor distribution updates Eagle Linux Eagle Linux has announced the release of Eagle Linux 2.0. This is a set of instructions which will allow you to create your own educational, Debian-based distributution on a bootable CD-ROM.
Familiar Linux The Familiar Project has released v0.6.1 with minor bugfixes. "Changes: Fixes for missing OPIE files."
Gibraltar Firewall Gibraltar has released v0.99.6 with minor feature enhancements. "Changes: This is mainly a bugfix release, making config handling more fault tolerant, but also containing a few new features like the long-awaited H.323 connection tracking support. It is generally recommended to update to this version."
Mindi Linux Mindi Linux has released v0.81 with minor bugfixes. "Changes: Mindi now functions more reliably than before for Debian, Gentoo, SuSE, and LFS users."
OpenNA Linux OpenNA Linux has released RC1 with major feature enhancements. "Changes: Many features have been added and a lot of bugs have been fixed. The most important changes are the addition of a working GUI based on GNOME 2.0.3, a new Text User interface to install the operating system from scratch, protection of all files from possible buffer overflow attacks, a complete Grsecurity patch implemented into the kernel, and better optimization flags used to compile all binaries."
RxLinux RxLinux has released v1.2.6. "Changes: This release features many new software packages like vixie cron, ntp, and logrotate. Many bugs have been fixed. PPP access to the Internet is now supported as a main connection or as a backup link. The Windows interface has also been updated."
SME Server Mitel Networks announced the SME Server version 5.6 developer release. "This release is based on the Linux 2.4 kernel, uses the "ext3" journalling filesystem, has enhanced Windows and Macintosh client support and the packet filtering code has been upgraded to include stateful packet inspection."
uClinux uClinux has released v2.5.57-uc0 with major feature enhancements. "Changes: The latest kernel updates, exception tables, and other code cleanups."
Warewulf Warewulf has released v1.8. "Changes: The "Node Shell" button has been renamed to "Virtual Node" and "Remote Shell" added to avoid confusion in nodes. 'nodeupdate' no longer writes an /etc/hosts that did not work with SGE (which is very touchy about the format of the /etc/hosts). The Warewulf.pm library has been created and the Warewulf tools rewritten to utilize it. Warewulfd has been changed to use gethostbyname() for node name resolution, thus no requirement to restart warewulfd when changing node configuration. The "Update Nodes" button has been added to 'nodes'. Another tab has been added to 'wwmon', and the data moved to make it more logical."
Distribution reviews Interview with a Grandmother (Linux Journal) In this Linux Journal article, a non-techie grandmother gets a new computer with OEone Homebase Linux installed. "Over the last decade Linux has been gaining in a number of markets, most notably in the server arena. Recently, the march onto the desktop has begun and the PDA market has opened up as well. There are also clusters and supercomputers. However, there is one more market where Linux could make more inroads: the home user. A few articles are around regarding techies who have helped their non-techie friends and family members get running with Linux. But what about the non-techie home user doing it all by themselves? Could a home user, say a grandmother of three, use Linux with no help from anyone but the vendor's normal support system? This is the story of one such grandmother and her entrance into the wonderful world of Tux."
Page editor: Rebecca Sobol |
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