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Mandriva Linux 2009 Alpha 2 Released
AdamWill writes "The Mandriva Linux 2009 Spring Alpha 2, marking the first public pre-release of the upcoming Mandriva Linux 2009. This alpha introduces several significant changes, most obviously the inclusion of KDE 4 — 4.1 beta 2, specifically — as the default version of KDE, and the latest development version of GNOME, 2.23.4. The kernel has also been updated to release 2.6.26rc7. Another feature of interest to many users will be the addition of orphan package tracking (and optional automatic removal) to the urpmi package manager. Of course, many applications have been updated (although the default version of Mozilla Firefox is still currently 2.0.x), and most of the distribution has been rebuilt with a new GCC version, 4.3. Mandriva warns that this is a true alpha, likely to contain many bugs related to the new version of KDE. Please install it only in a test environment, and especially do not use it as an upgrade from any earlier Mandriva Linux release."
Well, it is a special occasion since 2008 is the year of linux on the desktop.
Knowledge is power. Knowledge shared is power lost.
Having taken a look at this latest release, I'm convinced that THIS IS THE YEAR that Linux will be the dominant desktop OS. Easy installation, advanced package manager, FREE!, and tons of community support; there's really no reason that it won't win the hearts and minds of users everywhere.
And with the cost of oil skyrocketing, people have less money to shell out to Microsoft, so a free OS is just what this ailing economy needs. It's surprising. Just a few months ago I was mentioning to someone just how good Linux was, but at that time he scoffed and said his grandmother still wouldn't be able to use it. However with this latest Mandriva Alpha (cool name) release, I think we're looking at a watershed moment here.
I'm looking forward to upgrading my systems post haste.
Back in the day, when I started using Linux, Mandrake (now Mandriva) was a great distribution that helped newbies like me hit the ground running. But now it seems like Ubuntu has gobbled up that market. Afaict, they don't have much of an "enterprise" market, and they don't have much of a "hacker" market... or am I wrong? What market is Mandriva serving these days?
http://mediagoblin.org/
Not to start a distro flame war, but...
How is an alpha release of Mandriva news?
BECAUSE IT'S AWESOME! Name me another distro that:
- installs easily and with lots of options
- has integrated configuration utilities for GUI AND console that don't mind personal hacking of the config files
- has bleeding edge packages, if you choose
- doesn't exclude dev packages in pursuit of user friendliness
- has native packages for nearly every application you'll use
In other words, they provide a professional, up-to-date Linux environment that is simple enough for newbies, flexible enough for advanced users, and hassle-free for those of us who have no time to waste on configuration and compilation.
Also, it appears to be a rare example of a major distro that still supports multiple desktop environments out of the box.
I'm stoked for Mandriva 2009 and I'm glad to know it's coming...
That said, there's no way in hell I'm installing an alpha of it, so you may have a point. :) But at least I can start prepping my hard disk partitions! WOOO MANDRIVA FTW!!!
Buckle your ROFL belt, we're in for some LOLs.
A beta version of KDE4? A development version of Gnome, and a RC of the kernel?
At least this is only an alpha.
Which makes me wonder how this got to the front page of /..
Help! I'm a slashdot refugee.
Doesn't have anywhere near MDV's range of configuration utilities, which is what the OP was getting at. Also we'd argue our centralized backports repository system is rather better than Ubuntu's "seventy billion PPA" system, for bleeding edge packages. (Yes, for anyone who didn't get the memo yet, I work for Mandriva).
The main point is configuration utilities. Of the other mainstream distros, only SUSE's YaST has anything like the range of the Mandriva Control Center, but it doesn't take kindly to you altering the files it controls manually (it tends to just reset them, completely overwriting your manual modifications). MDV doesn't do this. That was what the OP meant with that point. Ubuntu and Fedora (and derivatives) have nothing like MCC / YaST.
And, yes, of course we're relevant. We're probably the fourth biggest distribution overall (behind Ubuntu, SUSE and Fedora / RH). We're the largest remaining independent commercial desktop Linux distributor (excepting Canonical, which is not really a conventional company but basically entirely funded out of Mr. Shuttleworth's pocket) - if you want a company that exists by providing Linux distributions to end-users (and doesn't do it as a loss leader or a development spin off), Mandriva is basically it. And 2008 Spring got probably the best overall reviews out of the crop released at the same time, as noted by Distrowatch this week.
When you find a package with an error like that, please report it on the forums or (preferably) to Bugzilla - it'll help in getting it fixed. It does happen sometimes, mostly to contrib packages when the package gets rotten (because a maintainer leaves or stops maintaining a package for some reason). For 2009 there should be no such problems within the /main repository, we are working on ensuring that at present.