Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

UserLinux Releases First Beta

Posted by michael on from the luserunix-also-available dept.

MohammedSameer writes "According to DesktopLinux, UserLinux has released their 1st beta CD, based on Debian. The project, led by the long-time open source advocate Bruce Perens, aims to provide businesses with freely available, high quality Linux operating systems accompanied by certifications, service, and support options intended to encourage productivity and security while reducing overall costs."

3 of 316 comments (clear)

  1. Re:yet another distro? by Bruce+Perens · · Score: 5, Informative
    Then you will be happy with UserLinux. We do all of our technical development within the Debian project. Our value-add is support and certification. The only packages in our own repository are configuration, like selecting a list of debian packages and debconf settings for them, and patches that we haven't been able to get into Debian's release (none of those yet).

    Bruce

    --
    Bruce Perens.
  2. Re:So its "fixed"? by Bruce+Perens · · Score: 5, Informative
    The kernel is 2.6.8 at the moment, from the Debian package. It is so fully modular that it loads the IDE driver before it mounts the root drive - IDE isn't compiled in to the kernel, it's a module. Discover and hotplug are used to detect hardware and load drivers. As far as I can tell, it addresses the problem of normal people adding hardware.

    Bruce

    --
    Bruce Perens.
  3. Re:yet another distro? by Bruce+Perens · · Score: 5, Informative
    Well, first look at the advantages of Debian over other distributions.

    • 15,000 packages in one repository with no cross-dependency issues. 3 times Red Hat, 5 times SuSE.
    • 11 architectures (12 if you count AMD64, which will not be "official" for this release but exists and runs fine).
    • Open to participation by all. If you want something in the system and it's free software, you can be a Debian developer and get what you want done.
    • Over 1000 active developers. One of the largest Open Source projects.
    • More than 10 years of successful history. It's older than RH or SuSE.
    Now, add what Debian hasn't been able to do: Commercial support, application vendor certification.

    Regarding your installation issues. Please try the UL installer, which is based on the new Debian installer. It has a "go back" feature and asks for a proxy URL.Bruce

    --
    Bruce Perens.