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News and Editorials
Multimedia with dyne:bolic 2.5
Multimedia creation is one area where free software still lags behind proprietary software. The dyne:bolic GNU/Linux distribution does a pretty good job of filling in that gap, and the recently announced 2.5 release has narrowed it further.Dyne:bolic is easy to use and comes as a live CD full of software for multimedia production, all of it Free Software. Simply copying the /dyne directory from the CD to the users hard disk will install the distribution, without destroying the existing OS. Artists are often not technically inclined, so dyne:bolic strives to make it easy for them to get creating without having to understand the technical aspects of hardware detection and operating systems.
Denis "Jaromil" Rojo is the creator of Rasta Software and dyne:bolic:
while ( love & passion ) {
for( fight = 0 ; rights < freedom ; rights++ )
fight = standup( rights );
free( babylon );
}
Jaromil has been joined by an international community of artists, teachers and developers, all of whom help to adapt dyne:bolic to a variety of uses. The core code, bug tracking, and developers lounge can be found at dyne.org. This core is an important part of dyne:bolic, of course, but the additional applications make it a full-featured distribution. Dyne:bolic includes MuSE for streaming audio, FreeJ for realtime video manipulation, and HasciiCam which makes it possible to have live ascii video on the web.
This version of dyne:bolic also has updated versions of Ardour2, Gimp, Audacity, Nicotine+, Pidgin, Ktorrent, Rox and toolkit libraries such as Gtk, Cairo and Wx. New software in this release includes Ekiga, Guarddog and Wireshark plus all the GtkPython and WxPython libraries. Text console usage has been enhanced by a fully functional mail setup with Mutt, Msmtp, Fetchmail, Procmail and Spamassassin. There's also the text based presentation tool TPP and the Rtorrent download client. A graphical desktop repair button and a mount utility for SSH accounts are also new in this release.
As if all this wouldn't be enough, the dyne:bolic community is
blossoming several specialized modules, developed by and for musicians
and media artists ___ _ _
____ ___ _ _ http://lab.dyne.org/DyneModules
New Releases
Foresight Linux 1.4.0 released
Foresight Linux has announced the release of version 1.4.0. The release announcement has more information: "Foresight Linux is a Linux distribution for your desktop that features a rolling release schedule that always keeps your desktop up to date; a revolutionary package manager, Conary; the latest GNOME desktop environment and an innovative set of excellent, up to date packages. Foresight is proud to be the first distribution to ship with GNOME 2.20 and be the basis for the GNOME Live Media available at http://torrents.gnome.org. Foresight Linux 1.4 features the latest GNOME mentioned above, including updates to Evolution Email and Calendar, Tomboy Notes, Power Manager, Epiphany Web Browser the GNOME Image Viewer, Eye of GNOME and more."
Mandriva Linux 2008 RC2 released
Mandriva Linux 2008 RC2 'Kepler' has been released. New features since the release of RC1 include the final release of GNOME 2.20, the inclusion of the new 8.41.7 version of ATI's proprietary driver in the non-free repository to support Radeon HD cards, significant kernel updates that improve support for certain ATA controllers and many audio chipsets, some new features in the urpmi and rpmdrake package management tools, and over 500 bug fixes since RC1.Announcing openSUSE 10.3 RC1
The first release candidate of openSUSE 10.3 is out. Click below to see the recent changes, most annoying bugs, the call for testing and download information. The second release candidate will not be distributed to mirror sites, but live CD images will be available.PC-BSD 1.4 Released
The PC-BSD team has announced the release of PC-BSD 1.4. PC-BSD 1.4 is based on FreeBSD 6-STABLE and includes X.org 7.2, KDE 3.5.7, Compiz-Fusion 0.5.2 and more.Ubuntu's Launchpad 1.1.9 released
Launchpad is the suite of tools used to develop Ubuntu and siblings. Click below to see what's new in version 1.1.9.
Distribution News
New dpkg in Debian experimental
A new version of dpkg is in Debian's experimental branch. "So please test this version. While rewriting/improving dpkg-shlibdeps I dealt with all the outstanding bugs and I made it a bit more strict. Most notably, packages which generate the warning "unable to find dependency information for shared library" will FTBFS. You'll find a list at the end of this mail."
First CFV for Debian Constitutional amendment: reduce the length of DPL election process
A call for votes has gone out on a Constitutional amendment that would reduce the length of the Debian Project Leader election process.Cast your vote for the Fedora 8 Codename!
Those who have a Fedora Account are asked to vote for the Fedora 8 codename before October 5.Mandriva simplifies its new range of products: Mandriva Linux 2008
Mandriva describes the various flavors of Mandriva Linux 2008 that will be available once this version is finalized.Advance notice of discontinuation of SUSE Linux 10.0
SUSE Security has announced that SUSE Linux 10.0 will be discontinued soon. "Having provided security-relevant fixes for more than two years, vulnerabilities found in SUSE Linux 10.0 after November 15th 2007 will not be fixed any more for this product. We expect to release the last updates around November 30th 2007." SUSE Linux 10.0 is not SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 10. The Enterprise Server has a longer support cycle.
2007 Google Summer of Code in Ubuntu - project results
The 2007 Google Summer of Code is over, and most projects mentored by Ubuntu were successfully completed. This code will find its way into forthcoming Ubuntu releases.Ubuntu September 2007 Team Reports
Various Ubuntu teams have made gutsy progress reports. Reports have been included from the Desktop Team, Kernel Team, Kubuntu, MOTU (Masters of The Universe), Mythbuntu, Screencast Team, Server Team, Ubuntu-IRC, Ubuntu Women, and US LoCo Teams Project.
Distribution Newsletters
Gentoo Weekly Newsletter
The Gentoo Weekly Newsletter for September 17, 2007 looks at GWN seeking writers, forums upgrade, GUIs project, Developer of the Week (cla), and several other topics.Ubuntu Weekly News: Issue #58
The Ubuntu Weekly Newsletter for September 22, 2007 covers the Gutsy Gibbon 7.10 beta release, new MOTU members, new Launchpad release, Software Freedom Day organized by the Ubuntu Nicaragua Team, and much more.DistroWatch Weekly, Issue 221
The DistroWatch Weekly for September 24, 2007 is out. "GNOME 2.20 is finally here and we can soon look forward to a range of releases from all the major distributions incorporating the new version into their products; Mandriva Linux 2008 is expected later this week, but openSUSE 10.3 won't be far behind. In other news: Fedora introduces a new desktop theme called Nodoka, Mandriva simplifies its product range before the upcoming release of version 2008, and Ian Murdock reveals some details about Project Indiana, Sun Microsystems' new Solaris-based desktop distribution. The featured story in this week's issue looks at the security and bug fix infrastructure in today's leading distributions, while those readers who were curious about DistroWatch's recent migration from FreeBSD to Debian GNU/Linux will find the answer in the "Site News" section."
Newsletters and articles of interest
Fedora 8 Nodoka Theme
Jonathan Roberts talks with Martin Sourada, creator of the Nodoka theme. "For a while now, Clearlooks has been the default theme in Fedora; in fact, for a long time, Clearlooks has been the default theme in a number of distros thanks to its place as Gnome's default. Aiming to give Fedora its own distinct and modern appearance is Nodoka: based on its own theme engine it's extremely fast, and when seen in combination with the rest of the artwork for Fedora 8 is beautiful."
Distribution reviews
KateOS - Getting Better with Age (TuxMachines)
TuxMachines reviews KateOS 3.6. "KateOS 3.6 was released a few days ago. Since KateOS has always been one of my favorite distributions and since I haven't looked at it recently, I decided to take it for a test run on my HP Pavillion laptop. It always supported the hardware on my desktop, so I was interested to see how it would fare with wireless ethernet and powersaving features. There are two versions available: a full 2.4 GB DVD and a 700 MB live CD. I chose the 700 MB live CD."
The best desktop Linux for Windows users: Xandros 4 (DesktopLinux)
DesktopLinux begins a series on the "best Linux desktop" with a look at the best system for a Windows user. "What's the best desktop Linux? For me, it's SimplyMEPIS 6.5, soon to be replaced by 7.0. But this is both a dumb question and a dumb answer. The real question is: What's the best desktop operating system for you?"
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