Distro watch

Fresh from the farm.

NOMADBSD 131R

This is a distro designed to be run from a USB flash drive and is based around FreeBSD, this time version 13.1. New features include two images, one using ZFS and one using UFS for the filesystem, with the latter having soft updates journaling. The automated graphics driver has been updated, including support for VIA, and there’s a new display manager: SLiM. To keep the image size down, LibreOffice and some multimedia applications have been removed.

LINUX MINT 21.1 BETA

Linux Mint has been designed to give the classic desktop experience with custom tools to make for a convenient out-of-the-box web-based installation, ideal for beginners. There are custom menus and desktop, and many unique configuration tools. It’s based on Ubuntu and is also compatible with Ubuntu repositories. This new development snapshot includes Flatpak support integrated into the Software Manager, which makes it easy to distinguish between Flatpaks and system packages, and switch between them.

NIXOS 22.11

Originally a research project, this independently developed GNU/Linux distro aims be the state of the art in system configuration management. The entire OS, kernel, apps and system packages are built by the Nix package manager and stored separately from each other. It has reliable rollbacks and a reproducible system configuration. Gnome, KDE Plasma, Cinnamon and other elements have been updated. This release will also check to make sure your passwords are strong enough.

OPENINDIANA 2022.10

A continuation of the OpenSolaris OS, OpenIndiana offers a full open source alternative to Solaris 11. This is the first update for a year and contains updates of many components, including Firefox, Thunderbird, LibreOffice, Perl, Mate desktop, Python and more. Other upgrades include the ability to mount and install media using NFS, the latest Intel and AMD microcode updates, enhancements to BHyVe and the internal SMB server, and updated Nvidia drivers.

To make a neat arrangement of packages, there are no /bin, /sbin, /lib or /usr directories; everything lives in /nix/store.

Aimed at those looking for a simple desktop-focused intro to Linux, it has a fuss-free install and a suite of major apps.

Born out of the uncertainty after Oracle acquired Sun, this has grown into a full community-based open source alternative.

This distro likes to travel on a memory stick. With automated hardware detection and setup, it’s ideal for data recovery.