Redcore Linux 1806 Redcore Linux is a Gentoo-based distribution which ships with a live desktop environment, the Calamares system installer, and a pre-configured LXQt desktop. This makes it very straight forward to test drive and install a Gentoo-like desktop distribution which will then provide the software management tools and flexibility Gentoo is famous for having. I last reviewed Redcore Linux about a year ago and since then the project has made a few changes. Perhaps the most notable one is adopting security practises from the Gentoo Hardened project. This gives the operating system some added protections against common attacks.



Redcore runs exclusively on 64-bit computers and the ISO I downloaded was 2.2GB in size. If booting from the install media goes well then the system displays a graphical login screen where we can sign into the LXQt desktop using the username and password "redcore". (I will cover what happens when booting does not go according to plan a bit later.) Signing in brings up a fairly standard looking desktop environment. A panel with the application menu and system tray sits at the bottom of the screen. Two icons on the desktop offer to launch the system installer and "Ask for help". The latter icon launches the Falkon web browser and connects us to an IRC chat room where we can try to get support. Clicking the installer icon brings up a window asking if we would like to launch the selected script or run it in a terminal. Either option opens the Calamares system installer.



Installing



The Calamares installer is designed to work across multiple distributions and provide an easy, graphical interface for the user. While typically used by Arch-based projects, the Calamares installer functions well on Redcore - with just a few rough points. The installer does a nice job of collecting such information from us as our preferred language, our time zone and our keyboard's layout. The installer gives us a chance to partition the hard drive or wipe the disk and install Redcore on the freed space. The final screen gets us to provide a username and password for ourselves.



There were two minor issues I ran into while going through the Calamares screens. The first was the installer refuses to install Redcore if there is less than 20GB of free space for the root partition. This is not a bug, but it did mean I had to re-think my partition layout as I typically use less space. A full install of Redcore uses up about 8GB of disk space. The second concern I had came during the final stage of the installer when files were being copied from the install media to my disk. The installer's progress bar grew to 32% and then stopped. The installer appeared to freeze at 32% completion for about half an hour. When I checked the task manager I could see work was still being done in the background, but the interface did not reflect this and I suspect many people would give up after half an hour with no apparent progress. The installer did eventually complete its work successfully and then offered to reboot the computer.



Early impressions



The installed copy of Redcore boots to the same login screen the live disc displayed. Signing in brings up the LXQt 0.12.0 desktop. The installer icon is gone from the desktop, but the IRC help icon is still available.



Applications on Redcore use a dark theme. A year ago Redcore mostly used a combination of black menus and borders with a light theme for applications. This high contrast has been replaced with a dark grey that is used almost everywhere. I found this generally pleasant to look at, though it did make it harder to read hyperlinks, which were displayed in dark blue on the dark background.





Redcore Linux 1806 -- Application windows blending together

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Visually, I had two other complaints. The first was that application window edges were very thin, making it difficult to grab and quickly resize windows. I often struggled getting the mouse to line up with the border with the default look. My other concern was that everything looked too small or compressed. Fonts are on the small side and menu items tend to be close together and I sometimes clicked the wrong application launcher or menu entry. These characteristics can be changed through the settings panel.



Hardware



I tried running Redcore on a desktop computer and in a VirtualBox environment. Redcore would boot and run smoothly in VirtualBox, but failed to integrate with the host environment, limiting the system's screen resolution. I could not find VirtualBox guest modules in the project's software repositories and installed generic drivers. The generic modules installed, but failed to work properly. This is a regression for Redcore as previous versions automatically integrated with VirtualBox.



When attempting to run Redcore on my desktop computer, the distribution was unable to boot at all in Legacy BIOS mode. When started in UEFI mode Redcore would display a boot menu and begin the boot process, but failed to completely start up. Instead the system eventually dropped to a rescue console. After double-checking the install media's checksum I tried to boot Redcore on a laptop computer as well with the same disappointing results. This matches my experience last year and it seems hardware support has not improved.



With my trial limited to running in VirtualBox one issue which stood out was Redcore runs the Compton compositor software for a smoother desktop experience. Having Compton running consumed a lot of CPU resources and slowed down the desktop noticeably. I disabled Compton from the LXQt Session Settings module, which made LXQt much more responsive.



The distribution used about 8GB of disk space when freshly installed and consumed 220MB of RAM when signed into LXQt with no additional applications running. This had the unusual effect of making Redcore one of the larger (on disk) distributions I have used in recent months while also requiring less memory than most.





Redcore Linux 1806 -- Running LibreOffice and QTerminal

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Applications



The distribution ships with a small collection of useful software, most (though not all) of it from the KDE/Qt family of applications. Redcore ships with the Falkon (formerly QupZilla) web browser, the Konversation IRC client, qBittorrent, the qpdfview document viewer and LibreOffice. The KGet download manager is present along with the K3b disc burning software, the mpv and VLC media players, and VidCutter to copy clips from videos. Audio and video codecs are included and we can play a range of audio and video files. There is an application called sandbox which opens a terminal and claims to have set up a protected environment. This sandbox is not explained and does not hide processes, or prevent us from affecting the file system so its usefulness is unclear. The GNU Image Manipulation Program is included along with Inkscape and a simple image viewer. A launcher for the Steam gaming portal is included too.



The distribution also features a number of system utilities such as the KDE Partition Manager, AQEMU for managing virtual machines, a printer manager and simple firewall manager. Redcore ships with the GNU Compiler Collection for building software. The distribution uses SysV init with OpenRC providing service management. In the background we find version 4.16 of the Linux kernel.



LXQt settings panel



The desktop environment includes a settings panel which features modules for adjusting the look and feel of the interface. We can adjust the theme, change fonts, set up keyboard short-cuts and adjust visual effects. There are also tools for managing user accounts, tweaking the firewall and setting up printers. The configuration modules all worked as expected and I encountered no problems with any of them.





Redcore Linux 1806 -- The LXQt settings panel

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Sisyphus package manager



Redcore uses a graphical package manager called Sisyphus. It is a simple package manager which simply lists available packages in one long list. We can enter search terms to filter down the list of packages, but otherwise browsing for items is limited. Buttons at the bottom of the window give us the ability to install or remove selected items. Another button will download all available software upgrades.





Redcore Linux 1806 -- The Sisyphus package manager

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At first, clicking the upgrade button appeared to do nothing, it just showed an unmoving progress bar at the bottom of the window. However, the system was using a lot of CPU cycles so I checked and confirmed the lower level emerge package utility was working hard in the background. Eventually Sisyphus reported it had found 215 updates and, over the next hour, it downloaded and installed them all.



Sisyphus is not a particularly attractive or feature rich package manager. It does not have a lot of filters or long descriptions of packages or screen shots, but it did work in performing basic package management.



Conclusions



For the most part, my time with Redcore was disappointing and occasionally frustrating. Disappointing in that, apart from security enhancements, it does not seem as though Redcore has made any significant progress over the past year. Hardware support has not improved (if anything it has become worse for VirtualBox users) and I did not find any significant new features which would suggest the project is bringing new ideas to the community.



Another thing which bothered me was the appearance of the distribution. While I liked the darker theme, the grey background without clear window borders meant that all application windows blended together. If I had three windows all open and overlapping on the desktop there wasn't any way to tell where one ended and the next began. When combined with the smaller 9pt font that is used everywhere, it meant I had to tweak most visual aspects of the interface to make it suitable for my preferences and ageing eyes.



There were some other minor problems. For example, sometimes the application menu would open at the bottom of the screen (next to its button) and other times the application menu would appear at the top of the display, far away from the mouse pointer. This unusual menu placement would continue until I logged out and signed back into LXQt.





Redcore Linux 1806 -- The misplaced application menu

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Personally I do like the idea of what Redcore is doing. Despite the various little problems I ran into, I like the overall concept. I like the idea of a lightweight distro featuring the LXQt desktop and a small collection of desktop applications. The desktop, with Compton disabled, was very responsive and I like how quick the user interface was. I also like combining a binary package initial set up with the option of accessing Gentoo's highly flexible source-based ports system. This means we can install the operating system quickly and then highly customize it over time. The focus recent snapshots of Redcore have placed on security is also welcome.



For me, Redcore was not practical, mostly because it did not work with my hardware. And there are a number of little issues (more style preferences rather than real bugs) which meant I had to spend more time than I would like tweaking the operating system. However, the focus on security, flexibility and performance could make Redcore an attractive option. Especially for people who like Gentoo, but want to get up and running without compiling anything. * * * * * Hardware used in this review



My physical test equipment for this review was a desktop HP Pavilon p6 Series with the following specifications: Processor: Dual-core 2.8GHz AMD A4-3420 APU

Storage: 500GB Hitachi hard drive

Memory: 6GB of RAM

Networking: Realtek RTL8111 wired network card

Display: AMD Radeon HD 6410D video card * * * * * Visitor supplied rating



Redcore Linux has a visitor supplied average rating of: 6.7/10 from 66 review(s).

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