DistroWatch Weekly, Issue 780, 10 September 2018

Feature Story (by Joshua Allen Holm)

Netrunner 2018.08 Rolling edition Netrunner comes in a several different versions. There is a stable release, which is based on Debian; and a rolling release version based on Manjaro, which, in turn, is based on Arch; plus a few others. For this review, I will be looking at the latest version of Netrunner Rolling, version 2018.08.



Installing Netrunner Rolling



I began by downloading the 2.6GB ISO and copying it to a USB flash drive. I then rebooted my computer, disabled Secure Boot (per the Netrunner documentation), and booted from the flash drive. A boot menu appeared with several options for changing things like language and keyboard layout, but I just left everything as is and selected the "Boot: Netrunner.x86_64 kde" option. It took a while for the system to boot to a usable desktop, but once the system was ready, I had a nice live desktop to try out before installing.





Netrunner 2018.08 "Rolling" -- Live media boot options

(full image size: 40kB, resolution: 1280x1024 pixels)



I only spent a short while with the live desktop, but found that it performed well, even when running from a rather slow USB flash drive. I did try to look at the Readme file linked to on the desktop, but that did not work. Clicking on the "Readme" shortcut opened Firefox, but the page on the Netrunner website could not be found. Even as I write this review, a couple of weeks after my initial attempt to view the Readme file, the link is still returning a "page not found" error page.





Netrunner 2018.08 "Rolling" -- The Calamares installer

(full image size: 271kB, resolution: 1366x768 pixels)



Since I planned on exploring the desktop more after I installed Netrunner Rolling, I clicked on the installer shortcut on the desktop and started the install process. The installer used by Netrunner Rolling is Calamares, which provides a pretty standard installation experience. I configured my location and keyboard settings, partitioned the hard drive, created a user account, and then let the installer do its job. Overall, the experience was straightforward, but I did have a problem with the first of my install attempts; when the computer was supposed to reboot itself based on the option I selected in the installer, there was a kernel panic during the shutdown process and after forcing a shutdown and rebooting the computer, Netrunner could not successfully boot. I rebooted using the USB flash drive and reinstalled. Everything worked perfectly this time. The error with the initial installation attempt was probably a random fluke, not something caused directly by the installer, but I still had to install Netrunner twice before I had a working installation.



Netrunner Rolling's KDE desktop



Netrunner Rolling uses KDE Plasma 5.13 with version 18.04 of the KDE applications package for its desktop environment. While the KDE desktop used in Netrunner is close to the standard KDE settings, it comes with a few nice changes from the Breeze or Oxygen look and feel options. Instead of using the Application Launcher widget, Netrunner uses the Application Dashboard widget, which provide a full screen search interface similar to, but not exactly like, GNOME 3 and Unity. There are other various tweaks throughout the desktop, but the different application menu is the biggest one.





Netrunner 2018.08 "Rolling" -- The default KDE Plasma desktop

(full image size: 578kB, resolution: 1366x768 pixels)



While most of the tweaks to KDE are little things here and there, they do add up to a very nice user experience. I switched back and forth between the Breeze look and feel and the Netrunner look and feel to try to spot the differences, and while both are completely usable, I found myself preferring the Netrunner option. The bottom panel was slightly smaller in the Netrunner option and I really liked the Dashboard application menu. Granted, I could easily customize the Breeze look and feel to have the same settings, but Netrunner already made those tweaks for me.





Netrunner 2018.08 "Rolling" -- The application dashboard

(full image size: 870kB, resolution: 1366x768 pixels)



Netrunner Rolling's default application selection



There is a lot of software included by default in Netrunner Rolling. Beyond the KDE applications that make up the basic system utilities. There is Firefox, Thunderbird, Pidgin, Qtransmission, and Skype for Internet applications; GIMP, Inkscape, and Krita for graphic editing; LibreOffice for document editing, though, oddly, Netrunner Rolling ships with LibreOffice 5.4, despite almost every other software package being the latest release (subsequent updates have bumped LibreOffice to version 6.0 and 6.1 is available by installing a different package: libreoffice-fresh); and Audacious, gmusicbrowser, HandBrake, Kdenlive, SMPlayer, vokoscreen, and Yarock for audio and video playback, recording, and editing. There is also a modest selection of games, mostly simple puzzle games, but the Steam client is also included.



While not every program that Netrunner ships with is my preferred application, I found that I was able to do everything I wanted without installing any additional software. I could play audio files and videos, including DVDs, without having to install any additional software. I could edit graphics with any off the installed programs. Browsing the web and accessing my e-mail was easy using Firefox and Thunderbird, but I could not use Thunderbird for IRC until the update to version 60. Before that, Thunderbird would crash whenever I tried to connect to IRC. Overall, Netrunner Rolling comes with a very nice selection of quality open source software, plus a few proprietary applications that might be useful for some users.



Installing & updating packages



Netrunner Rolling provides two graphical options for installing software packages. The Discover application provides a way to search for graphical applications, and Octopi provides access to all the packages in the distribution's repositories. Octopi is the more power-user oriented application, but I found Discover to be well organized and easy to use to install graphical applications. When, on the rare occasion that I needed to install something that was not listed in Discover, I found myself just using the pacman package manager in a terminal to search for and install packages.





Netrunner 2018.08 "Rolling" -- The Octopi package manager

(full image size: 122kB, resolution: 1366x768 pixels)



A notification appears in the bottom panel when updates are available. Clicking on the notification provides a button that opens Discover to handle the update process. The first time a large group of updates were available for Netrunner, I selected the option to install all of them. This process took a while, but no worse than is typical for over a gigabyte of updates.





Netrunner 2018.08 "Rolling" -- System updates in Discover

(full image size: 141kB, resolution: 1366x768 pixels)



After I rebooted and logged back in, a second update tool, this one specific to Manjaro (and Netrunner by extension) told me that a new kernel version was available. This updater listed all the available kernels, and let me update from a kernel in the 4.17 series to the 4.18 series, with several other older and newer options also listed. If I really wanted, I could even update to a pre-release 4.19 kernel.





Netrunner 2018.08 "Rolling" -- Manjaro Settings Manager

(full image size: 451kB, resolution: 1366x768 pixels)



Final thoughts



Netrunner Rolling is a distribution I thoroughly enjoyed using. There we a few minor issues, but overall everything worked great. The distribution came with enough software pre-installed that I really did not need to install any additional software to perform most basic tasks. Were I to use Netrunner Rolling long term, I might want to swap a few of the included programs for ones that were my own personal preference, but the software Netrunner Rolling ships with are good defaults. The only software oddity was being stuck on LibreOffice 5.4 for a while before finally upgrading to 6.0. Most of the other packages are up-to-date, often the absolutely newest possible version, but updates to LibreOffice packages are more conservative.



Users wanting the Arch Linux experience without the effort should give Netrunner Rolling a try. It provides a nice, polished KDE experience with a decent selection of software included by default. Netrunner's KDE customizations create a desktop experience that is simultaneously traditional and modern, providing a nice middle ground between the classic Windows-style desktop and GNOME 3 & Unity. * * * * * Hardware used in this review



My physical test equipment for this review was a Lenovo Ideapad 100-15IBD laptop with the following specifications: Processor: 2.2GHz Intel Core i3-5020U CPU

Storage: Seagate 500GB 5400 RPM hard drive

Memory: 4GB of RAM

Networking: Realtek RTL8723BE 802.11n Wireless Network Adapter

Display: Intel HD Graphics 5500 * * * * * Visitor supplied rating



Netrunner has a visitor supplied average rating of: 8.3/10 from 74 review(s).

Have you used Netrunner? You can leave your own review of the project on our ratings page.





Miscellaneous News (by Jesse Smith)

Fedora improves language support, how to customize Kali, FreeBSD 11.1 nearing end of life The Fedora team is working to improve internalization language and font support, with specific enhancements coming to Chinese, Japanese and Korean fonts. These changes are expected to arrive in Fedora 29 and are currently being tested. " Fedora 29 development and testing is currently in full swing, and Fedora 29 features a range of improvements to Internationalization (i18n) support. Major improvements in Fedora 29 include better font support, and improvements to the iBus input method. All this week, the Fedora i18n Team is running a Test Week to try out these new features. More details on helping out and testing is available at the Test Day wiki page . In Fedora 29, the default font for Chinese, Japanese, and Korean (CJK) languages is now Google Noto. This provides better quality of rendering for Chinese, Japanese and Korean characters. This change provides a Serif face default for Japanese and Korean. Additionally, it provides a Monospace typeface for all of CJK languages, improving visual consistencies among the typefaces. post on Fedora Magazine offers further details. * * * * * Kali Linux is a Debian-based distribution which provides security and forensic software on a live disc. The project has shared steps one Kali user, Jacek Kowalczyk, took to customize Kali to better suit his needs. " We love it when community members come up with new ideas or interesting builds, and this one caught our attention. Jacek Kowalczyk hit us up on Twitter with a really interesting story. His approach to tweaking Kali to be specific to his needs is exactly why this feature is so important to us and we wanted to share his story more widely. Jacek's live-build recipe was for a lightweight version of Kali using his favourite desktop environments, including some nice desktop configurations. We thought it would be best to let Jacek share his process with you step by step, in his own words. " A blog post shares the details of Kowalczyk's process in creating a custom spin of Kali Linux. * * * * * The FreeBSD security team has sent out a reminder that FreeBSD 11.1 will reach the end of its supported life at the end of September 2018. People still running version 11.1 are encouraged to upgrade to version 11.2 to continue receiving security patches. " As of September 30, 2018, FreeBSD 11.1 will reach end-of-life and will no longer be supported by the FreeBSD Security Team. Users of FreeBSD 11.1 are strongly encouraged to upgrade to a newer release as soon as possible. " * * * * * These and other news stories can be found on our Headlines page.





Questions and Answers (by Jesse Smith)

Finding video drivers and switching init implementations Cannot-see-a-thing asks: Where can I find video drivers for Linux? Mine are not working correctly.



DistroWatch answers: Most distributions ship with open source video drivers already installed. If your distribution does not, then you can probably add the appropriate open source driver from your distribution's package repository. On Debian-based distributions video drivers typically have a name like xserver-xorg-video followed by the brand or model of the card. For example, we might install xserver-xorg-video-intel or xserver-xorg-video-ati, depending on which card our system uses. A list of options can be found by running the command apt-cache search xserver-xorg-video The equivalent command on the Arch Linux family of distributions is pacman -Ss xf86-video Most distribution do not ship closed-source video drivers, which often offer improved performance at the potential cost of instability and licensing restrictions. Instead, mainstream distributions tend to provide a driver manager utility which can be found in the application menu. This makes installing alternative drivers a point-n-click experience. If your distribution does not offer a tool for accessing alternative drivers, official video drivers can be downloaded from their respective vendors. NVIDIA and AMD have download pages for accessing their official drivers. * * * * * Changing-init asks: Is it possible to swap out one init for another, how does one do that?



DistroWatch answers: It is technically possible to swap out one implementation of init for another, at least in some cases. However, it should be pointed out that changing such a low-level component of the operating system will have side effects and should be approached with caution. If everything goes perfectly with the swap you will notice very little practical difference (unless your are administrating a server), but if things go poorly then the system may not boot anymore.



Some people are sceptical of distributions like Devuan because it is "just Debian without systemd", but the alternative for people running Debian who want to switch away from systemd is a risky procedure of removing one init package and installing another. Which is why I typically suggest performing a fresh install of a distribution with the desired init software included.



Each distribution family will have a slightly different approach to changing the init process. For those brave enough to want to change their init implementation on a running system I recommend checking out this Arch Linux wiki page and the links at the bottom of the alternatives to systemd page. I also recommend making backups of your system before trying to change low-level components like init. * * * * * Additional answers can be found in our Questions and Answers archive.





Released Last Week

NetBSD 7.2



The NetBSD project develops a lightweight operating system which runs on a wide range of hardware architectures. The project's latest release in the 7.x series is NetBSD 7.2, which offers USB 3.0 support, enhancements to Linux emulation, support for running on the Raspberry Pi 3 computer and updated drivers. " Some highlights of the 7.2 release are: Support for USB 3.0. Enhancements to the Linux emulation subsystem. Fixes in binary compatibility for ancient NetBSD executables. iwm(4) driver for Intel Wireless 726x, 316x, 826x and 416x series added. Support for Raspberry Pi 3 added. Fix interrupt setup on Hyper-V VMs with Legacy Network Adapter. SVR4 and IBCS2 compatibility subsystems have been disabled by default (besides IBCS2 on VAX). These subsystems also do not auto-load their modules any more. Various USB stability enhancements. Numerous bug fixes and stability improvements. " Further information can be found in the project's release announcement and in the release notes.



Nitrux 1.0.15



Nitrux is a desktop-oriented Linux distribution based on Ubuntu, with an innovative desktop called "Nomad". Nomad attempts to extends KDE's Plasma with a special blend of aesthetics and functionality. The distribution's developers have addressed many of the issues reported in early reviews and believe it is now a much more mature, stable and polished product. The latest version is Nitrux 1.0.15, released late last week: " We are pleased to announce the launch of Nitrux 1.0.15. This new version brings together the latest software updates, bug fixes, performance improvements and ready-to-use hardware support. Nitrux 1.0.15 presents an updated hardware stack, among other things. The recently included Linux kernel 4.18.5, as well as an updated graphics stack, adds support for newer computers and hardware in Nitrux. In addition, new patches for system vulnerabilities are included in this release, so you can rest assured that you are using the most secure version of Nitrux. What's new: updated packages from Ubuntu 'Cosmic'; updated Plasma 5 (5.13.4), KDE Applications (18.08), KF5 (5.50.0) and Qt (5.11.1); updated Kvantum to version 0.10.9; added Mesa (18.1.5) drivers for Vulkan, VDPAU and support for VP-API.... " See the release announcement for more details.





Nitrux 1.0.15 -- Running the KDE Plasma desktop

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Univention Corporate Server 4.3-2



Univention Corporate Server (UCS) is a Debian-based server distribution that offers an integrated management system for central administration of servers, Microsoft Active Directory-compatible domain services, and functions for parallel operation of virtualised server and desktop operating systems. The Univention team has published a point release update for the distribution's 4.3 series, Univention Corporate Server 4.3-2. The new version contains mostly bug fixes and minor updates as listed in the distribution's release announcement: " During the upgrade to new UCS release- or patchlevel versions, the Univention Management Console is put into maintenance mode. While the maintenance mode is active, the progress of the update is displayed on a simple web page. Samba has been updated to version 4.7.8. For security reasons, authentication with NTLMv1 is no longer allowed. If there are still old systems or applications in use that absolutely need NTLMv1, this can be reactivated via the Univention Configuration Registry. The AD connector has been enhanced with tools to synchronize individual objects or entire subtrees again and to specifically remove rejects. Various security updates have been integrated into UCS 4.3-2, e.g. Apache2, the Linux kernel and Samba4. " The release notes contain further details.



Tails 3.9



The Amnesic Incognito Live System (Tails) is a Debian-based live distribution with the goal of providing complete Internet anonymity for the user. The project's latest version, Tails 3.9, makes it easier to install additional software when the distribution boots. The new version also supports working with VeraCrypt encrypted storage volumes, along with reading news feeds in Thunderbird. " You can now install additional software automatically when starting Tails. When installing an additional Debian package from Tails, you can decide to install it automatically every time. To check your list of additional software packages, choose Applications->System Tool->Additional Software. The packages included in Tails are carefully tested for security. Installing additional packages might break the security built in Tails, so be careful with what you install. To unlock VeraCrypt volume in Tails, choose Applications->System Tool->Unlock VeraCrypt Volumes. The integration of VeraCrypt in the Files and Disks utilities was done upstream in GNOME and will be available outside of Tails in Debian 10 (Buster) and Ubuntu 18.10 (Cosmic Cuttlefish). " Further information and screen shots can be found in the project's release announcement.



Q4OS 2.6



Q4OS 2.6 has been released. Q4OS is Debian-based Linux distribution which ships with the Trinity desktop (a continuation of the KDE 3 desktop environment) or KDE Plasma 5.8.6 (a version found in Debian 9). This version is a routine update that brings the latest Trinity, version 14.0.5: " An update to the Q4OS 2 'Scorpion' stable LTS is available for download. The new 2.6 release is based on and upgrades to the latest stable versions of the Trinity 14.0.5 desktop and Debian 9.5 'Stretch' projects. Q4OS-specific fixes and patches are revised and provided as well. All the updates are immediately available for existing Q4OS users from the regular Q4OS repositories. Q4OS Scorpion LTS release (supported for 5 years) is based on Debian 9 Stretch and it features the Trinity 14.0.5 and KDE Plasma 5.8 LTS desktop environments. It's available for 64-bit and 32-bit (i686-pae) computers as well as i386 systems without PAE extension. ARM 64-bit (arm64) and 32-bit (armhf) ports are provided as well. Q4OS offers its own exclusive utilities and features, specifically the 'Desktop profiler' application for profiling your computer into different professional working tools.... " Here is the brief release announcement. * * * * * Development, unannounced and minor bug-fix releases

Omarine 4.1

Antergos 18.9

OSGeo-Live 12.0

SystemRescueCd 5.3.0

Parrot Security OS 4.2.1

IPFire 2.21-core123

KDE neon 20180906

OpenMandriva 4.0-alpha

FreeBSD 12.0-ALPHA5

Manjaro Linux 18.0-beta6

Linuxfx 9.4

Torrent Corner

Upcoming Releases and Announcements

Opinion Poll

Open versus proprietary video drivers In this week's Questions and Answers column we talked about how to track down and install free and proprietary video drivers. This week we would like to know if you are currently using open or closed source video drivers on Linux.



You can see the results of our previous poll on verifying ISO downloads in last week's edition. All previous poll results can be found in our poll archives.



Open versus proprietary video drivers on Linux



I use open source drivers: 679 (39%) I use closed source drivers: 369 (21%) I do not know: 98 (6%) I use both across multiple computers: 554 (32%) I am not running Linux: 25 (1%)