Slashdot Mirror
Debian GNU/Linux 5.0 "Lenny" Released
Alexander "Tolimar" Reichle-Schmehl writes "The Debian Project is pleased to announce the official release of Debian GNU/Linux version 5.0 (codenamed Lenny) after 22 months of constant development. With 12 supported computer architectures, more than 23,000 packages built from over 12,000 source packages and 63 languages for the new graphical installer, this release sets new records, once again. Software available in 5.0 includes Linux 2.6.26, KDE 3.5.10, Gnome 2.22.2, X.Org 7.3, OpenOffice.org 2.4.1, GIMP 2.4.7, Iceweasel 3.0.6, Apache 2.2.9, Xen 3.2.1 and GCC 4.3.2. Other notable features are X autoconfiguring itself, full read-write support for NTFS, Java programs in the main repository and a single Blu-Ray disc installation media. You can get the ISOs via bittorrent. The Debian Project also wishes to announce that this release is dedicated to Thiemo Seufer, a Debian Developer who died on December 26th, 2008 in a tragic car accident. As a valuable member of the Debian Project, he will be sorely missed."
Yes, the timing has worked out perfectly.
I run Debian testing, so I've been on 3.5 for a long time, and very happily I might add.
Now when sid starts moving again, KDE 4.2 will go in - completely avoiding the earlier, less complete releases that everybody was ranting about.
Couldn't have worked out better, and is a reminder that you don't always need to be on the bleeding edge anyway.
Debian has a very good KDE packaging team, btw.
He was a great hacker, it's nice to know that more people will remember him.
Just reading this (Note I am not a Debian User anymore) has me noticing just how much the quality is in the FOSS field compared to MicroSuck, Adobemedia and any other company that's just in it for the money and not the technical perfection. Despite all marketing gibberish to the contrary.
While I've been using Ubuntu for it's ease of use in recent years and see Debian more as a kind of building kit when I need a more customized Linux setup, it is none-the-less a terrific feat to wrap up a product that meets Debians quality standards, as opposed to those of - let's say - Windows Vista.
Even the slashdot post on the new Debian has more content that a MS press release.
That all observed and said, congrats to the Debian crew for yet another release of a great OS and Software kit.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
Sarge really was the source of these endless jokes. Almost three years, on a Linux that was considerably less mature than it is today was forever. Remember that all releases are tested and mature by the time they are included in stable, so they were at the worst more like four years behind the bleeding edge. Obviously you don't want a server anywhere near the bleeding edge, but damn do I understand all the application developers that said "You're running THAT?! We stopped development on that branch years ago, nobody backports anything not even security fixes anymore". A distro has to be a team effort with the people developing it - you can't expect Debian people to fix 20000 old packages alone. The current situation is just fine for a server OS, though I wouldn't run my desktop on it. I used to run testing until early 2007 but for all the faults Ubuntu has, having semi-annual "packs" is better than the constantly changing flow that testing is.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
I might be missing something here, but aren't there still 84 release-critical bugs open on lenny? I understand a number of them have been deferred to lenny.1, but I had expected this number to drop further before a release was made. Has Debian changed their release policy?
[captcha: prudence]
Buy stuff with Linux support and quit your bitching.
I think I was not bitching but asking a question. The problem is that I would love to buy (yes buy) stuff with Linux support - problem is, that it often simply does not even exist.
My original question was exactly about one of the things I would consider to be of major importance: the ability to play blue-ray movies on the desktop. As far as I can see there is no legal way whatsoever to do this on Linux and there is no legal way in sight either.
I can assure you that I do check for Linux support, but the harsh reality is that, especially in Europe, where the selection of goods is probably a lot smaller than in the US, it is very often simply impossible to get anything decent that also works with Linux. Apart from blue-ray movie playing -- there simply is no decent GPS device that allows me to transfer map data to the device on Linux.
I guess my point is that these are serious problems for making Linux more common for a broader user-base and I would love to see constructive ideas how to deal with them instead of ignoring the problem, routinely putting the blame on hardware companies and disregarding anyone who raises the issue as a troll.