by Ostatic Staff - Nov. 14, 2011

A few days ago a pre-brief came in the e-mail announcing the upcoming release of openSUSE 12.1. In it was a lot of the "what's new" I've been struggling to gleen from Wiki pages and developer blogs the last six months.

* OwnCloud

openSUSE is also the first Linux distribution to ship OwnCloud integrated into the desktop and the openSUSE Virtualization and Cloud repository offers the latest versions of Eucalyptus, OpenNebula and OpenStack for openSUSE 12.1. The latest virtualization technologies including Xen 4.1, KVM and VirtualBox can be managed with the latest virt-manager and open-vm-tools.

* Distribution Innovation

The underlying technology of openSUSE 12.1 includes a number of innovations. Snapper, a new and unique tool allows users to view older versions of files and revert changes. The debut of Snapper allows users to take advantage of the snapshot functionality in Linux file system btrfs to compare and revert differences in order to protect against general user mistakes.

* Go programming language

openSUSE is also the first major distribution to ship Go programming language, Google's open-source development language that combine performance with speed. Go is a fast, easy language that helps programmers handle multi-core, networked machines with the convenience of garbage collection and run-time reflection.

* Tumbleweed

For users that want the newest, but stable software, openSUSE 12.1 includes the option to enable Tumbleweed, the project conceived by Greg Kroah-Hartman. Tumbleweed offers a version of openSUSE with rolling updates that contain the latest stable versions of all software. Tumbleweed lessens the significance and change impact of major releases by updating systems continuously.

* Desktop environment enhancements

With Gnome Shell 3.2 the openSUSE interface focuses on deep integration of collaboration tools such as calendar notifications, chat, a new document manager, quick preview in the Nautilus file manager, and a centralized online accounts configuration. The UI elements and workflows are touch-screen friendly, equipped to handle smaller screens and multi-screen setups with enhanced color management and automatic rotation for touch screen devices. Read on for more details on what is new in GNOME 3.2 as well as updates to KDE, XFCE and LXDE desktop environments.