DistroWatch Weekly, Issue 828, 19 August 2019

Feature Story (by Joshua Allen Holm)

AcademiX GNU/Linux 2.2 AcademiX GNU/Linux 2.2 is a Linux distribution designed for use in education. It is based on Debian 10 "Buster" with extra packages and a customized MATE desktop environment. The project is based in Romania, so the default language language of the project's website is Romanian, but the site is also available in English, Italian, and Spanish. Like Debian, the distribution supports many additional languages.





AcademiX GNU/Linux 2.2 -- The MATE desktop with application menu

(full image size: 200kB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)



The AcademiX GNU/Linux 2.2 ISO is 1.7GB. The same image can be used to boot a live desktop environment or launch the installer. I began by trying out the live desktop, which worked perfectly on my laptop. My wireless card was detected and worked great. Everything else functioned as well as it does on any other Linux distribution. Overall, the live desktop performed well and provided a good, but slightly inaccurate, preview of the AcademiX experience.



Installing AcademiX GNU/Linux



After I was done exploring the live desktop, I rebooted my computer and selected the install option from the AcademiX boot menu. Unfortunately, there was only a graphical installer option, which would have been okay, but Debian's installer never seems to detect the touchpad on any of my laptops. I had to use the Tab button to navigate through all the options in the installer and select them with the Enter key. Having a text mode installation option, like Debian has, would have made for an easier keyboard-only installation experience.



If the lack of a text mode installer was the only issue, it would have been okay, but I ran into other issues during the installation process. The biggest issue was that the installer lacked the firmware for my wireless card, which, as I noted above, was included in the live image. The first time I just skipped the network setup and went through the rest of the installation steps, but the installer failed to install GRUB because it needed to download the package from the Internet.



Trying to install a second time, I download the firmware files for Debian 10 from the Debian website and copied them to a second flash drive. This time the installer found those firmware files, detected my wireless card, let me pick a wireless network, and successfully completed the installation process. The successful installation process was near identical to the standard Debian installation process, but AcademiX installs a fixed selection of packages instead of asking the user to select a desktop environment (or no desktop) and other package groups.



The installation process was a major headache. If the distribution developers are willing to ship firmware with the live image, they should include the firmware with the installer portion of the image. Tracking down a firmware archive on a different distribution's website is not very user friendly.



The AcademiX GNU/Linux desktop



AcademiX's desktop environment is MATE 1.20 with a single top panel and some custom theming. The default desktop software selection is fairly typical: Firefox ESR 60, LibreOffice 6.1, various MATE applications and utilities, and few other odds and ends. There is very little pre-installed educational software, but there is a specialized installer included for finding/installing educational applications.





AcademiX GNU/Linux 2.2 -- The default MATE desktop

(full image size: 139kB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)



One nice, somewhat atypical, inclusion to the default software selection was a short manual in both Romanian and English. While both versions of this manual are only a couple dozen pages, and focus mostly on the installation process, they provide some nice information for users. I would love to see this manual expanded in future versions, but any easily accessible information is better than making users hunt through a projects website for information.





AcademiX GNU/Linux 2.2 -- The English manual

(full image size: 257kB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)



The MATE desktop featured in AcademiX is customized to provide an AcademiX-branded experience. Some of these changes, like the window decorations and cursor used, are okay, but some changes are suboptimal. The top panel is completely transparent, which means that if the user selects a dark background all the black text and icons in the panel cannot be seen. One of the other things that I noticed when I tried switching to a dark background was that there was no easy way to switch back to the default AcademiX background. I had closed the background wallpaper selection window after I had changed to a dark wallpaper, and when I opened the window again the AcademiX wallpaper was not among the options listed. I had to track down the location of the default wallpaper to be able to pick that image using the file selection dialog. Basically, some of the theming (especially the top panel) needs to be more conservative, but other aspects need to be polished more. If I change to something new from the default AcademiX look-and-feel, I should be able to easily get that default setting back.





AcademiX GNU/Linux 2.2 -- The MATE desktop with dark wallpaper

(full image size: 1.7MB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)



Installing additional software



AcademiX GNU/Linux is Debian 10 plus some added repositories. Because AcademiX has no issues adding repositories for Google Earth, Vivaldi, VirtualBox, plus other application-specific repositories, I found it rather odd that the non-free Debian package repositories are not enabled by default. However, it is easy enough to enable those repositories.





AcademiX GNU/Linux 2.2 -- The Synaptic package manager

(full image size: 140kB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)



There are several tools for installing packages. Synaptic package manager and GNOME Packages are the two main tools for graphically installing software. There is a notification icon in the top panel that notifies users when updates are available. GDebi is also included for installing individual Deb packages. Because AcademiX is based on Debian, dpkg and apt are the command line tools for package management.





AcademiX GNU/Linux 2.2 -- The EDU package manager

(full image size: 333kB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)



What sets AcademiX apart from other distributions is the EDU software manager. This package manager provides curated lists of educational software, which are grouped by subject and by age range. This package manager makes finding educational software really easy. There is software for astronomy, biology, geography, foreign languages, and many other subjects. While there are gaps in the availability of applications covering various subjects, that is a gap in the broader open source application ecosystem, not something specific to AcademiX. While some of the rough edges I noted with the installation process and the desktop customization make me a hesitant to recommend AcademiX to new Linux users, Educational Technology professionals should perhaps try out AcademiX just to use the EDU package manager to explore various open source applications.



While installing and updating software was easy and basically the same experience as any other modern, Debian-based distribution, the fact that some of the packages come from servers in Romania means that some package downloads can be much slower than downloading from the world-wide network of Debian mirrors. For individual packages and small collections of packages this is not too noticeable, but it is still an issue. The frustrating part is the fact that the speeds are not consistent. Sometimes I was downloading at only 40kbps, but other times it was much faster. I experienced the same issue when trying to download the ISO. One download took about 20 minutes for the 1.7GB image but some other attempts took 4 hours.



Final thoughts



AcademiX GNU/Linux is an interesting distribution, but it has some rough edges that need to be cleaned up. Honestly, I really, really wanted to like this distribution (good distributions aimed at the educational market are always needed), but found it to be merely okay. AcademiX has a lot of potential, but it is just not there yet. DebianEdu/Skolelinux is far more polished while serving almost the exact same niche. However, if the AcademiX team cleans up some of the issues I noted above, especially the installer issues, I think future versions of AcademiX might turn out to be worthwhile. The EDU software installer is well organized and aids in discovering educational software, so that is one solid advantage AcademiX offers, but overall the distribution needs more work and polish before I could move it from "this distribution is okay" to "you should give this distribution a try". * * * * * Hardware used in this review



My physical test equipment for this review was an ASUS VivoBook E406MA laptop with the following specifications: Processor: Intel Pentium Silver N5000 CPU

Storage: 64GB eMMC

Memory: 4GB of RAM

Networking: Qualcomm Atheros QCA9377 802.11ac Wireless Network Adapter

Display: Intel UHD Graphics 605 * * * * * Visitor supplied rating



AcademiX GNU/Linux has a visitor supplied average rating of: 9.5/10 from 96 review(s).

Have you used AcademiX GNU/Linux? You can leave your own review of the project on our ratings page.





Miscellaneous News (by Jesse Smith)

UBports testing Unity8 desktop changes, Debian getting FreedomBox desktop spin, Slackware tries more direct method of fundraising, FreeBSD phasing out GCC, Fedora project presents new Enterprise Linux channel The UBports team has been continuing to work on and improve the Unity8 desktop environment, in particular work is being done to improve the Dash - where applications are launched: " We particularly want to see what people think about the new Dash. The changes beneath the surface are very extensive but they will not be directly visible to users. The Dash will be noticed though. Features such as multibranch and workspace have been made possible by the architecture improvements and those will be introduced later on. Various alternatives to the Dash setup have been suggested but it is generally sensible to reduce complexity. It means that there is less to maintain and less to go wrong. The code for the Dash had already been mostly done by Canonical, so why waste their efforts? There is a search for apps in the Dash, just like desktop. There are already some launcher app alternatives in the OpenStore, so you can customise if you wish. " Additional information on work being done to the UBports mobile operating system can be found in the project's recent blog post. * * * * * Sam Hartman, Debian's Project Leader, wrote recently that FreedomBox, a spin of Debian that focused on server software for home users, is planning to also create a desktop build. These spins can be bundled with hardware and sold as turnkey-style solutions for home users. " FreedomBox has recently started focusing more on end users. They have started to sell prepackaged hardware, and have set up end-user facing websites and support channels. I was excited to learn that they are still committed to being a Debian Pure Blend. This will be an interesting challenge for us to work together and see whether the Pure Blends approach can work for an actual end user product. I think the closest thing we've tried so far is Debian Edu. " * * * * * Slackware is the oldest surviving Linux distribution, and the project (while long-lived) still faces challenges. We have written before about problems Slackware's creator, Patrick Volkerding, has run into trying to collect funds from the Slackware store. Slackware fans who wish to support the project can now do so through the Slackware Patreon page. Eric Hameleers, a well known Slackware contributor, has posted confirmation that the Patreon account is legitimate and run by Patrick Volkerding. " Everybody who wanted to support Slackware after it became clear that the Slackware Store had not been paying Patrick and family for a long time, but was not prepared to create a PayPal account in order to donate money: there is now an alternative. Patreon is a community site where 'Patrons support the creators they love in exchange for exclusive membership benefits'. I don't know whether Pat will do stuff like 'exclusive benefits' considering the fact that he already gives away Slackware Linux for free since 26 years... anyway, he created a page there where you can setup a monthly recurring payment of one dollar or more - whatever you can spare. " * * * * * The FreeBSD team is working toward removing the last dependencies on the GNU Compiler Collection (GCC) from the base operating system. Most of the tasks previously performed by GCC are now handled by the Clang compiler and the FreeBSD developers want to finish the transition before FreeBSD 13 is released. " The basic notion is that it's long past time to have a firm plan for EOL GCC 4.2.1 in the tree. There is ample external toolchain support today for platforms that need it to build images, though that integration with buildworld could use some more polish. It's now completely sufficient to move to the next phase of removing GCC 4.2.1 from the tree. " The GNU compiler will still be available as a package users can add to the system post-install. Further details can be found in Warner Losh's mailing list post. * * * * * Extra Packages for Enterprise Linux (EPEL) is a subcommunity of Fedora and CentOS which provides additional packages for Enterprise Linux flavours (such as those provided by Red Hat and CentOS). EPEL packages for version 8 of Enterprise Linux have been published. A new channel, called Playground, is now available too as a way to test new packages. The Playground channel is similar to Fedora Rawhide and is intended for testing rather than general use. " We have added an additional set of channels for EPEL-8 called Playground. It is similar to Fedora Rawhide so packagers can work on versions of software that are too fast moving or will have large API changes compared to versions in the regular channel. " Further information can be found in the announcement for EPEL 8. * * * * * These and other news stories can be found on our Headlines page.





Questions and Answers (by Jesse Smith)

Concerns regarding non-free firmware Firmly against non-free firmware asks: Does it matter if my device driver is open source or not if my hardware, let's say wireless, uses proprietary firmware? Do they both need to be open or does having an open driver protect against closed firmware?



DistroWatch answers: I believe there are three ways of looking at such a situation - one in which you have an open kernel driver and a binary-only firmware blob. Whether this arrangement is good or bad will depend on how you are viewing the situation.



For instance, from a purely technical point of view, if you are wondering if it is possible for non-free firmware to do things you do not want it to do (either due to insecure code or malicious intent) when the kernel driver is open source, then the answer is yes. Any time you have a component running on your system where its actions (or inner workings) cannot be audited then there is potential for it to work in ways you do not want. Ideally it would be nice for all components in an operating system to be open source in order to let people audit, test and improve the code.



From a practical point of view one could argue that whether firmware is open source or not only matters if you (or someone you know and trust) is going to read the source code and act on any problems found. One could argue if you do not audit the source code yourself, or work with someone who does, are you personally any better off than if the code was proprietary? This may seem like an argumentative point, but I feel it is worth mentioning because, ultimately, unless we read and understand a package's code ourselves, we end up trusting someone else.



Personally, I feel that running open source code is almost always a better option because it expands the potential pool of people who will eventually read the code. With closed drivers and closed firmware everyone must rely on the original developers completely, there is no chance of anyone verifying their work. With open source drivers and/or firmware at least a few people can read the code and the odds of someone double-checking its workings go up.



Finally, there is a philosophical angle we can explore. Some people view their operating systems and the openness of those systems in black and white. That is, as far as they are concerned, an operating system is either entirely open and free, or it is not open and free. You may hear them make comments along the lines of "Why would I use a non-free driver? I might as well just use Windows." Their philosophy is absolute, either entirely open or effectively proprietary.



My philosophical stance is less binary, less fixed on things being effectively entirely open or closed. I see open source as akin to a light which brightens a room. Where the light hits, it can reveal dirt or objects in our path (the way code audits reveal bugs and malicious software). A little bit of light in the middle of the room is good because it shows us where to step and what to avoid. More light reveals dirt and more obstacles around the room to be tidied or avoided. In a very well lit room there is no place for dirt or hazards to lurk. In other words, having some open source components in the operating system is good, most components being open is better, having all components open is ideal. The more light (or openness) you have, the fewer places there are where problems can hide.



Ultimately, my recommendation is that it is better to have both drivers and firmware open, when possible. After all, the more light that can be shined into the corners of our computers the better. However, when that is not possible, I suggest taking the path that allows the most pieces of the system to be open while still allowing you to accomplish what you want with your computer. * * * * * Additional answers can be found in our Questions and Answers archive.





Released Last Week

Emmabuntus DE2-1.05



Emmabuntüs is a lightweight, Debian-based distribution designed to run on older computers. The project has published a new update to its Debian 9 "Stretch" branch, Emmabuntüs DE2-1.05. The new release works to reduce install media size, makes it easier to work with light and dark themes, and fixes UEFI mode in VMWare virtual machines. " The Emmabuntüs Collective is happy to announce the release of the new Emmabuntüs Debian Edition 2 1.05 (32-bit and 64-bit editions), based on Debian 9.9 'Stretch' and featuring the Xfce desktop environment. It includes the following fixes and enhancements: based on Debian 9.9 'Stretch'; added Redshift; added the ClipIt utility; added the management of a dark or light theme; added support for languages and localization in the GRUB live mode; fixed automatic partitioning issue during installation; fixed the disconnection by user change within the Xfce action buttons; fixed boot UEFI mode under VMWare Workstation; updated HPLip to 3.19.6, Multisystem to 1.0432, TurboPrint to 2.48-2, Firefox ESR to 60.8.0. " Additional information and a screenshots can be found in the release announcement.



Neptune 6.0



Leszek Lesner has announced the release of Neptune 6.0, the distribution's first stable release based on Debian 10, featuring the KDE Plasma desktop with assorted desktop improvements: " We are proud to announce the release of Neptune 6.0. This new version is based upon Debian 10 "Buster" and it comes with the typical Neptune tweaks and configurations. The base of the system is Linux kernel in version 4.19.37 which provides the necessary hardware support. Plasma 5.14.5 features the stable and flexible KDE-made desktop that is loved by millions. New in this version is an improved display handling which allows switching between different output methods and can be handy for presentations. The lockscreen is now invoked when changing users. Plasma Discover is now able to upgrade firmware and features a more modern and polished look and feel. New improved desktop effects and handling of compositing in the KWin window manager result in a better and more fluid user experience. In terms of applications, version 6.0 uses Chromium 76 as the default web browser. " Continue to the release announcement for further details.





Neptune 6.0 -- Running the KDE Plasma desktop

(full image size: 1.2MB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)



KNOPPIX 8.6



Klaus Knopper has announced the release of KNOPPIX 8.6, a new stable version of the project's Debian-based live CD with a choice of LXDE (default desktop), KDE Plasma 5.14 and GNOME 3.30. Interestingly, the distribution comes with a custom init system called "knoppix-autoconfig" which replaces systemd present in earlier public releases. (There is no mention of this in the release notes; however, the author's rationale is explained in this article of the April 2019 edition of Germany's Linux Magazine.) " Version 8.6 of KNOPPIX is based on Debian 10 'buster', with some packages from Debian 'testing' and 'unstable' for newer graphics drivers or desktop software packages. It uses Linux kernel 5.2.5 and X.Org 7.7 (core 1.20.4) for supporting current computer hardware. Both 32- bit and 64- bit kernel supporting both old and new computers, the 64-bit edition also supporting systems with more than 4GB of RAM and chroot to 64-bit installations for system rescue tasks. The bootloader will start the 64-bit kernel automatically if a 64-bit-capable CPU is detected. "



Redcore Linux 1908



Redcore Linux is a Gentoo-based, rolling release distribution which ships with two editions featuring pre-configured desktop environments: KDE Plasma and LXQt. The project's latest release, Redcore Linux 1908, is based on Gentoo's Testing branch to provide more up to date packages: " Starting with this release, Redcore Linux is based on Gentoo Linux's Testing branch and as such it is now a cutting edge distribution. However, to avoid the cutting part as much as possible we have our own Testing branch and Testing binary repository. We do our resync with Gentoo on a weekly basis, in our Testing branch, then after a while of Testing we push the changes to our Master branch. This works under the following scheme : Gentoo Testing -> Redcore Testing -> Redcore Stable. One can ride on our Testing branch (sisyphus can change the branch for you), and if you do so, please report any issues you find so we fix them before merging to master. " A complete list of changes can be found in the distribution's release announcement.





Redcore Linux 1908 -- Running the LXQt desktop

(full image size: 1.6MB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)

* * * * * Development, unannounced and minor bug-fix releases

Liquid Lemur Linux 4.0.0-alpha1

Absolute Linux 20190811

Clonezilla Live 2.6.2-23

HardenedBSD 12-1200059.3

Obarun 2019.08

KDE neon 20190815

SmartOS 20190815

Project Trident 19.08

OpenMediaVault 5.0.5

antiX 19-beta3 (Announcement)

EndeavourOS 2019.08.17

Raspberry Digital Signage 12.0

Torrent Corner

Upcoming Releases and Announcements

Opinion Poll (by Jesse Smith)

Open source drivers and firmware versus closed drivers and firmware In this week's Questions and Answers section we talked about free and open source drivers and firmware. Open drivers allow the code that makes the computer's hardware work to be audited and fixed when problems are discovered. While most Linux drivers are open source, many video and wireless drivers are either closed or rely on non-free firmware. We would like to hear from our readers as to whether they are using entirely open source firmware and drivers or if they rely on non-free code to make their hardware work.



You can see the results of our previous poll on methods for finding files in last week's edition. All previous poll results can be found in our poll archives.



Open source drivers and firmware versus closed drivers and firmware



I use entirely open source drivers/firmware: 196 (13%) I use some open and some proprietary drivers/firmware: 1182 (78%) I use entirely closed drivers/firmware: 52 (3%) Unsure: 89 (6%)