Mandrake Software released the first beta of their Mandrake 8.2 Linux distribution in two ISO CDs. They include kernel 2.4.17, XFree86 4.2, glibc 2.2.4, Window Maker 0.8, apache 1.3.22, Evolution 1.01, KDE 2.2.2, galeon 1.0, mozilla 0.9.7 and a lot of Mandrake Tools-specific changes & updates (screenshots). In related news, RootLinux released version 1.3pre1 which contains many updates and bugfixes. This release uses CUPS as printing system and PureFTPD as the default FTP daemon. The installation has been improved, and ext3 support was added. It also contains Linux 2.4.17, glibc 2.2.5, KDE 2.2.2, and XFree86 4.2.0. Recently, CRUX 0.9.2 was also released with many new features. Both the CRUX and RootLinux developers were interviewed by OSNews three months ago.
Mandrake 8.2 Beta1, RootLinux and CRUX Released
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Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
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I’m a big fan of Mandrake (I have a server and workstation running it) but I think they should have held off on the release for a month or two and waited for Gnome 2, KDE 3 and mozilla 0.98.
This is just a beta. The final release, may very well include all the packages you mentioned. And I am pretty sure that they will, as long the projects make it to release on March. Mandrake-Final will probably be released around April.
Personally, I am wondering if the KDE packages are object-prelinked…
Hi.. I’d need a European mirror, it’s dog slow like that..
Download from <A HREF=”ftp://ftp.surfnet.nl/pub/os/Linux/distr/Mandrake/Mandrake-devel/“&…. More mirrors should be available if you check the Mandrake web page.
I’m not sure if it’s wise to take .0 versions of Gnome and KDE in your distribution – OTOH, Mandrake is not necessarily known for stability.
OK.. thanks… Paris is sloow from Germany, Nancy is full speed.
I use to be a fan of Mandrake, back in the 7.x days, infact, I think that 7.2 is the best release mandrake has ever made………
7.2 had the break through that was missing in 7.0 (which was good) and 7.1 (which was not so good).
everything seemed to have a nice look and feel, it was stable, and it did eveything that it said it would…..also, mandrake update actualy worked!!!!
well, fast forward to the 8.x days……….
poor integration witht the DTE, rushed out quality in the look and feel, and the stability sucked……..8.0 was not that bad(though a step back from 7.2)
and 8.1 was the straw that broke the camel’s back…….it blew chunks……..eveything seemed to be broken…..software update sucked since 8.0, the integration to the DTE was non existent….I could handle 7.x not having integration since it was the first major version with the mandrake control center, but by 8.x I expected more…………finaly……the customer service sucks a whole lot…..E-mail support is horrid….the “profesionals” that are suppose to support their application are rude and do not what to help you.
I then switched around between SUSE and a few others like RH……..RH was ok but did not seem to be moving into the Desktop region of Linux…which makes sence…..SUSE was just as unstable as Mandrake, though their Control panle tools were integrated………..at that point, I gave up on Linux for the time being……until I can use a well integrated system that has a stable UI, I will stick with OSX and Windows……..I hate that too because I love the Linux comand line….
There was a message on the Mandrake-devel mailing list from a Mandrakesoft employee saying that there would be no KDE3 in Mandrake 8.2. If this is the case, then I wouldn’t expect a GNOME2 either, since it is due around the same time as KDE3. There is a good (almost 100%) chance, however, that Mandrake will release separate GNOME2 and KDE3 packages when they are released. I don’t think KDE will be objprelinked, since Mandrake have experienced some stability problems with it (namely, KHTML crashes).
Mandrake is in an unusual situation for a GNU/Linux distributor, in that they sell boxes in Wal-Mart. The latest Mandrake can make a new release and have boxes of it sitting on Wal-Mart shelves in time for the holiday buying season (i.e. December) is October (this is Wal-Mart policy). In that case, expect an 8.3 (or 9.0) in October. If a new release is made every six months, we will see a release around April (six months after October). Mandrake has been working this way for the past few years, and it seems to work rather well. Expect it to continue.
Mandrake is pretty
I have 8.0 on a box at home – was advised to avoid 8.1 and I think i’ll wait for the stable release of 8.2 before I try it. My biggest complaint about linux is its crappy looking widgets, but then thats engineers for you, function over form…
I dont know about what you said about KDE 3 not being included is true because on the screenshot page it says “And Even test drive the new KDE 3.0” i think it was on the last page.
I like the new control center. Very neat design
When is there going to be an update repository like Ximian or QNX?
The only problem I have with this kind of GUI (same as MSWindows, Gnome,…) is that it’s an icon jungle, icons, icons, icons, different colorful icons everywhere, it’s the icon virus invasion, they multiply! I think desktops like gnu-step/windowmaker and xfce3 have a more moderate approach to icons.
That KDE3 wallpaper, look at the right side of the screenshot, doesn’t it remind you of QNX-RTOS6?, just curious:
http://www.linux-mandrake.com/en/demos/Demo/Mandrake8.2/Beta/images…
I think QNX has the best approch to icons, none.
I would use QNX more often if it had an office suite. Linux, Solaris, MSWindows, a QNX openoffice port? I guess it needs one more year to get off.
Hehehe, nice approach to icons Ungoilant. I’m still thinking about this Xerox Star user interface design from the eighties, it’s old yet very well thought:
http://www.cs.uregina.ca/~hoppe/Star%20-%20Desktop%20me…
QNX has a port of abiword available.
I knew about Abiword, I was talking about an office suite, not about a single word proccesor. Abi is great, I like to have various operating systems installed and I use Abiword with BeOs. But Abi right now is lacking the companion of an integrated spreadsheet, drawing and presentation pilot as in Openoffice. The spreadsheet is specially needed in my case. I don’t know of any spreadsheet for QNX, neither I know of a good email client (the pair of email clients I know for QNX need some work). All in all the OS is very promising, but not in prime time for full desktop use.
And we were talking about Mandrake 8.2, the x86 arch is spoiling us a bit, Linux, BeOs, QNX, BSD, MSWin, all in the same machine. I follow the developing of three Linux distros: Slackware, Mandrake and the coming Xandros (former Corel). I’m getting nervious about these Xandros people, they are keeping their thing more secret than the Intel Yamhill engineers. Already mailed em three times, last one asking what was happening.
Why on earth do they use GTK+?!
It looks fugly and sure doesn’t look like the other KDE apps.
They focus on KDE, right? Then maybe Qt would be a better choice?
(Someday I will make a comment without bitching)
Because …
1. Qt doesn’t have bindings for all the languages the mandrake people needed for a control-panel (I think it was perl and python)
2. Qt wasn’t totally free when they started making the Mandrake specific apps and configs
Good point Marques. Soooo many people dont use Linux (or QNX or Be) just because the one app they need is not available or drivers for one of their critical components do not exist.
I cant get bash to work on QNX because it is looking for the network license file which doesnt exist because the machine is standalone. there are other bugs that i could list, but you get my point.
It sucks, but the squeaky wheel gets the grease. Demand creates supply.
Am I the only one who thinks KDE looks terrible? The icons are 80’s-looking, the single-click feature is terrible, and although it functions well, it’s just ugly to me. I can agree that Gnome has its faults, but it’s so much better looking than KDE! I hope Mandrake 8.2 keeps Gnome 1.4x because it’s a pleasure to use.
Mandrake will probably no only keep Gnome in 8.2 – they’ll even include 2.0 it seems.
About the icons – heard of http://kde-look.org/index.php?xsortmode=high&page=0“>icon ?
…and the single-click feature is optional – in Control Center you can choose btw single and double click.
i think adam scheinberg is onto something. kde does lack alot. i remember about a year ago using the storm 2.0.4 (hail storm) and that had kde1. now when i got mandrake 8.0 (only good release of mandrake). i was completely disapointed with kde2, i felt it was too shiney. i loved the plain folders, the X cursor (that i heard so many hated) and the fact that the themes i ran worked great, unlike kde2 which gave me the background of my many great themes… and not much else. maybe kde3 maybe better who knows. that’s all in the past now. i use gnome.
it took me so long to see if i was alone on the subject that mandrake8.1 completly sucked. don’t get my wrong, i like mandrake. it’s just when i was using mandrake 8.1’s update to be able to program using the GCC it didn’t work. but it wasn’t just gcc, there was many programs that would do that.
i had also seen the pattern that mandrake 8 worked alot better than 8.1. oh well.. from what i hear mandrake 7.2 is good so i might download that to see if it’s really true.
me two %.xx
i think adam scheinberg is onto something. kde does lack alot. i remember about a year ago using the storm 2.0.4 (hail storm) and that had kde1. now when i got mandrake 8.0 (only good release of mandrake). i was completely disapointed with kde2, i felt it was too shiney. i loved the plain folders, the X cursor (that i heard so many hated) and the fact that the themes i ran worked great, unlike kde2 which gave me the background of my many great themes… and not much else. maybe kde3 maybe better who knows. that’s all in the past now. i use gnome.
it took me so long to see if i was alone on the subject that mandrake8.1 completly sucked. don’t get my wrong, i like mandrake. it’s just when i was using mandrake 8.1’s update to be able to program using the GCC it didn’t work. but it wasn’t just gcc, there was many programs that would do that.
i had also seen the pattern that mandrake 8 worked alot better than 8.1. oh well.. from what i hear mandrake 7.2 is good so i might download that to see if it’s really true.
me two $.xx
short question: which gcc is used? 2.96(fuck!) or 3.0 or both? perhaps 2.95? Is ist possible to downgrade from 2.96 to 2.95 without problems(rpm)?
carsten