Submitted by It’s rare to see some truly interesting ideas in Linux distributions, as most seem content to just remaster Ubuntu with a different theme. Therefore, we at OSNews are always interested in fresh and interesting distributions that try to add something of value to the landscape. One such distribution is xPUD, a fast-booting, kiosk-like distribution that uses the Mozilla Gecko Runtime to display a simple user interface that allows you to launch normal desktop Linux applications.
xPUD has a boot time of about ten seconds, as you can see in the below YouTube video:
The “Plate” interface consists of four tabs and is created using XUL, and thanks to the binary compatibility with normal desktop Linux applications, you can run your favourite applications on this system that weighs less than 48MB. It could be very useful on netbooks and maybe even media center devices. I can also see this as an interesting second operating system on your normal desktop machine if you quickly want to look something up on the internet or want to play a few .mp3 files.
xPUD is still in heavy development, and they’re very interested in your feedback.
Hi,
I’m not so sure how much they are interesting in our feedback – I posted some comments/questions on their forum and even sent some directly to Peng (boss of the project) with no echo. Even their forum is mainly for Chinese and in Chinese, not mentioned that there is lack of basic information.
Having said all off these, I can only add a big regret, because the idea itself is extremely interesting and they could gain a lot just by developing community by providing open politics.
Best regards
JackL in Hope
Hi Jack:
I’m Ping-Hsun Chen, penk, the project leader of xPUD.
My apology for no one replied your post in February, I should setup some i18n policy in the forum.
This is an on-man project going back to that time, and it’s kind of “reloaded” in the end of March, so we released a new version, with fundamentally improved system and lots of new features.
Best Regards,
penk
Awesome. I wish there were more screenshots. It looks cute and fast. All it needs is a nice repository and I’d take it for a spin.
Hi Ping
Thanks for comment. I saw there are some changes on the website too. I hope you will be able to open your project to wider audience – have you thought about making it a part of ubuntu as ie kiosk mode (similar to media center mode)? That would definitely extend your support with development.
Wishing you all the best
JackL
Coming back to Ubuntu, the next release, jaunty is also booting a lot faster. So its not about themes.
The ‘most seem content to just remaster Ubuntu with a different theme’ comment seems to be directed at distribution(-wannabes) that base themselves on Ubuntu (and arguably don’t offer much more except a cool name and a new theme) – not at Ubuntu itself.
Well, Ubuntu is basically just a remaster of Debian with a different theme.
I liked the clapping at the end
But seriously a KIOSK system or netbook PC could make use of this.
You could use an mplayer mozilla plugin and be able to launch videos with controls drawn in XUL and it could go to fullscreen.
But in that scenario it doesn’t have to launch inside a website, but could be launch from a filemanager drawn in XUL and use the mplayerplugin method to launch it.
Anyway just ideas.
BTW was there a project like this. I forget the name.
I am a strong spiritual supporter of xpud, I really like what penk has been doing 🙂
Ubuntu netbook remix needs to pick up the pace.
Edited 2009-04-08 14:04 UTC
I like this distro a lot, very usefull to use in a VM for kids or friends. The download is very slow though, anyone else having problems?
download is absolutely crawling. It stopped a few times too. Currently 28mins remaining in the download.
We’re almost exceeding the monthly bandwidth limit, so the download page is temporarily pointed to another slower server. It will be back in about 12 hours.
Why don’t you provide a torrent?
Which applications are run on top of XULRunner? I’m a massive XUL fan.
Wondering what a pure XUL desktop would be like?
Looks like the BeIA “BeOS for Internet Appliances” (It was an BeOS system with Opera GUI).
Thom,
Why would you say something so dumb about Linux in general? Ubuntu is hardly the hot bed for new linux technologies compared to distros like openSuse, Mandriva, and especially Fedora. I hate this Ubuntu=Linux crap. Sites which have reported on Linux for years all of a sudden seem to forget who is actually doing all the work just because something shiny and new came along. (Hint: It ISN’T Canonical)
It’s a JOKE. It’s got nothing to do with Ubuntu. Lighten up.
Let’s face it: none of the major Linux distributions are doing anything even *remotely* related to innovation.
bla bla innovation bla bla bla. Innovation won’t put Linux on the desktop. Coherency, support, and applications will.
Maybe true for the “unwashed masses”, but for me the primary reason I’m using it is that with Linux (and OpenBSD, the other non-MS OS I use) I can even approach 10-second boot times.
I suspect though that they have the kernel and drivers pared down to what their particular system needs. I wonder if they can sustain that loading udev and other things that stall the boot somewhat. That said, my full-blown Arch comes up to an XFce desktop in under 30 seconds. I’m not sure Windows Genuine Advantage could even load in that amount of time
Boot time doesn’t matter really. Not like you boot your computer every minute or so. What’s up with people careing too much for a couple seconds less boot time? In an embedded device it makes sense, but in a desktop PC…
There are way more important things in the Linux world than boot time.
Boot time matters to some people who are on the move using their laptop or netbook. There have often been scenarios for me where I’ve needed to get to a document quickly to provide some info over the phone, etc …
It would have been nice in those scenarios if the OS didn’t take so long to boot up, so for me I can see why people are interested in boot times and I applaud any effort to improve boot times.
Well your sarcasm aside, I have been seeing a lot of Ubuntu=Linux from different publications lately. Kind of ticks me off. Nothing against Ubuntu but it isnt the end all be all. xPud looks cool though. But I wonder how much it will be able to offer without starting to get bloated.(bloated at least for what it wants to accomplish) Moblin is already around 1 Gig I think.
I usually read OSNews on my phone and when you add the youtube link in the article I click it and can see the video in youtube for mobile. The embedded video is shown as a blank frame in my phone browser.
Can you, please, add a youtube link to the article so we, the mobile readers, can watch the video?
Thanks.
P.D.: I tried to post this comment from the mobile and I got an error message saying: “you must provide a user name and password” even when I put them in the form.
This is just one more example of the power of open source software. It reminds me of when I set up Arch Linux to boot straight into Firefox with out a window manager just because I could. So thank you for sharing your project and namaste.
Bandwidth Limit Exceeded
Are there any mirrors?
Seriously … I used to set up a three-page menu system using QuikMenu 4 on my Win95 boxes when I brought them over for LAN parties. One page was the public Games page, and that had panels for the various games we wanted to play, one contained some simple applications like Netscape, an e-mail client, some graphics programs, etc., and the third was password-protected and contained the “real” desktop stuff I wanted to install but didn’t want anyone else to have access to.
A screenshot of a PC I still keep configured in this way is here:
http://www.prootwadl.org/visisite/desktops/gamemenu.jpg
You make me want to fire up the old Tribes 1.
While I think the boot times are not really impressive..
If you strip a distribution down that much and do a bit of optimization it’s really not that hard to get Linux booting in <10 secs. Yes I’ve done it, just to try it!
But it really looks like something that would be a good replacement for these BAD netbook OSs. In fact I’ve tried in on my Aspire ONE and it booted in 5 secs (it said – that IS fast!), but it said “Coming soon…” everywhere.
It seems to me that it could be the perfect Distribution for than non-PC user! So please make this project a success! The computer market needs things, like this.
I’ll have a look how it works, maybe I can contribute somehow.