Ubuntu unveils Intrepid Ibex, Fedora finalises feature list, Mandriva coordinates worldwide install fest, openSUSE explains beta release process, DesktopBSD moves to KDE 4



Welcome to the big Ubuntu release week! The landing of any new version of the world's most popular desktop Linux distribution is the biggest event on many user's Linux calendars and if history repeats itself, we should brace ourselves for another week of unreachable Ubuntu web sites, frantic search for download servers, and generally clogged fibre-optics pipes around the world. Yes, Ubuntu 8.10 "Intrepid Ibex" is about to arrive! Of course, those users who have been through a few releases know better than waiting until Thursday -- firing up "update-manager -d" and performing an online update magic before the big day is always a smart thing to do. For those who are relatively new to the Linux and Ubuntu worlds or those who consider dipping their toes in these uncharted territories for the first time, here is a nice overview of Intrepid, complete with an overview of Ubuntu's history and a list of available editions. But if you prefer to celebrate the event in a group of like-minded individuals, check out the Intrepid Release Parties page to see whether there is anything happening in your city. Finally, for those users who don't have fast Internet connection or who would like to convert a few friends to Ubuntu, don't forget to order your free Ubuntu CDs from ShipIt.







Ubuntu 8.10 "Intrepid Ibex" is about to start hitting the download mirrors

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* * * * * Another big distribution preparing for a stable release is Fedora. Although the project's upcoming version 10 isn't due for another month, this detailed list of 13 prime features reveals a great deal about the release: " With the success of Fedora in Linux distributions, Fedora 10 is perhaps the most anticipated operating system from their library. A faster and advanced distribution is what is proposed by them. Fedora 10, code-named 'Cambridge', is set for release on November 25, 2008. So before you go on and download this new Fedora version, let me give you a detailed idea about what benefits and changes are going to be there in this new Fedora 10. " The list includes a variety of goodies, such as faster start-up, improved printing and audio, an automated recovery tool called First Aid Kit, and security audit features.



* * * * * Continuing its excellent tradition of coordinating worldwide install fests, Mandriva has announced that its next "party", celebrating the recent release of Mandriva Linux 2009, will take place on Saturday, 22 November. Mandriva's community manager Adam Williamson has sent this message to DistroWatch: " Mandriva is coordinating an international install fest for the new Mandriva Linux 2009 release, on November 22nd, 2008. If you are involved with a Linux User Group (LUG) or other community group and would be interested in running a local event as part of the install fest, Mandriva will provide professionally pressed One CDs and other material. Please visit this Wiki page for details of how to organize an event in your area, and for a list of already confirmed events.



* * * * * Last week's delay of the third beta of openSUSE 11.1 has prompted Andreas Jaeger to write up a detailed account of the openSUSE release process. Entitled Why do we release openSUSE on Thursdays - or why do we slip?, the post provides an interesting insight into the complexities of coordinating work of dozens of developers: " During the pre-release testing and the internal testing, many bugs are found. We do not fix all of them directly - instead they are reported via Bugzilla and also noted as 'most annoying bugs' so that other testers know about them. Only if we hit real blockers or ship stoppers, we will fix them and then might not even fix the 'annoying' ones to not introduce further bugs. If we would fix every bug we find internally, we would never release ;). We really concentrate on fixing bugs that block further development or testing on a majority of machines (or for a majority of users). "



For many users, openSUSE is already a perfect distribution, but few would argue that it has one serious defect - its excellent YaST configuration utility lacks a mascot: " YaST (Your awesome Setup Tool) is a impressive and useful tool for administering a Linux system, but it's missing one crucial feature -- a mascot! The YaST team wants to close this bug, so they're putting out a call to the community to help create a mascot that reflects the power of YaST. " The YaST mascot competition is open to all; please see the Marketing Team/YaST Contest page for more details and the first submissions. Of course, the contest winners and runner-ups can expect rewards for their work: " There will be a prize for the winning mascot, the winning mascot name, and two runners-up, and of course all contestants will bask in the everlasting glow of accomplishment from having submitted an entry. "



* * * * * Finally, here is an interesting piece of news from the developer's blog at DesktopBSD, a user-friendly desktop operating system based on FreeBSD. From the Making DesktopBSD ready for KDE 4 blog post: " KDE 4 has been around for some time now and, while many still feel it has not matured enough, it will undoubtedly be the future of the K Desktop Environment. Therefore, it is important to adapt DesktopBSD, which currently uses KDE 3 as its desktop environment, to this new major release. This is rather difficult because of some of the technological changes in KDE 4, in particular that KDE 4 now uses the Qt 4 development framework instead of its predecessor Qt 3 used in KDE 3 and the DesktopBSD Tools. Since Qt 4 is not backwards-compatible, the DesktopBSD Tools would have to be ported to Qt 4 first in order to be able to utilize KDE 4 functionality, a process involving a lot of effort and very few gains. As an alternative, the decision was made to stick with Qt 3 as framework for now and replace all of the KDE functionality in DesktopBSD code so it still works fine under KDE 4 without requiring users to have KDE 3 installed. "



