 DistroWatch Weekly |
| DistroWatch Weekly, Issue 1174, 25 May 2026 |
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Welcome to this year's 21st issue of DistroWatch Weekly!
Static, familiar, and reliable or new, ever-changing, and exciting? Using a fixed release distribution or one which is constantly rolling is one of the key decisions to make when selecting a new operating system. There are not many distributions which try to bridge the gap, to be regularly rolling but also consistent. Solus is one of these rare specimens and our Feature Story this week looks at the Solus distribution and the Budgie desktop environment. Read on to learn more about this consistent, rolling operating system. In our News section we talk about the Haiku project extending support to boot on Apple's M1 processors while Fedora retires its Deepin Desktop Environment packages due to a lack of communication over security concerns. We also report on Azure Linux, a Fedora-based distribution from Microsoft, expanding its availability to new environments. While Linux distributions running on serves, desktops, and mobile phones are quite common, it is relatively rare to find a GNU/Linux distribution running on tablets. This week's Questions and Answers column explores why this is. Do you own a tablet running a GNU/Linux distribution? Let us known about it in the Opinion Poll. This week we are also pleased to summarize the new releases of the past week and then we wrap up by thanking the generous people who donated to DistroWatch this past month. We wish you all a wonderful week and happy reading!
This week's DistroWatch Weekly is presented by TUXEDO Computers.
Content:
- Review: Solus 4.9
- News: Haiku boots on Apple M1 processors, Fedora drops Deepin desktop packages, Azure Linux becomes more widely available, Mint improves Nemo performance
- Questions and answers: Running Linux on tablets
- Released last week: NetHydra 2026.2, Zenclora OS 3.0, OpenBSD 7.9, TileOS 2.0, Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10.2 and 9.8, Proxmox 9.2, Quarkos 26.04, PureOS 11
- Torrent corner: PureOS
- Opinion poll: Do you own a tablet?
- Site news: Donations and Sponsors
- Reader comments
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| Feature Story (By Jesse Smith) |
Solus 4.9
Solus is an independently developed, rolling release, desktop distribution. The project typically puts out snapshot releases about twice per year and currently offers four desktop editions: Budgie, GNOME, Plasma, and Xfce. The Solus Linux distribution runs on x86_64 machines only and is unusual in that it uses the eopkg package manager - a classic package manager which has not been widely adopted.
The release announcement for the Solus 4.9 snapshot highlights several changes, with the following being some of the key, visible adjustments:
For this release, we've changed the default privileged group from sudo to wheel. Most software assumes that the wheel group is the default sudo group, and we have to patch several packages to change it to use sudo. Switching to the usual wheel group means that maintaining these packages is easier for us, because we no longer have to worry about rebasing patches when software updates.
Solus now ships with GRUB 2.14 on legacy non-EFI systems. This version is notable in that GRUB now supports Argon2 encryption, meaning that systems can correctly be encrypted with LUKS2.
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Calamares 3.4.1 added an option for hybrid bootloader installation, meaning boot partitions are created for both systemd-boot and GRUB2, and one chainloads the other. We're leveraging this capability on legacy boot systems, eliminating a patch that we were carrying to achieve a similar result.
Now that we are on GRUB 2.14, we have changed the LUKS version used for disk encryption to version 2. Using LUKS2 is more secure than LUKS1, and also enables users to store their encryption key in the system's TPM, so partitions can be unlocked automatically.
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With this ISO, we are once again increasing the default size of the EFI boot partition. As time passes, the size of firmware modules, kernel modules, and NVIDIA packages continues to increase, and we want to remain ahead of these increasing storage requirements. Thus, the default recommended EFI partition size is now 2GB.
The four desktop editions range in size from a 3.6GB ISO for the Xfce edition, up to 4.1GB for the Budgie edition. The four desktop versions available are: Budgie 10.9, GNOME 49.5
KDE Plasma 6.6, and Xfce 4.20. The Budgie, GNOME, and Plasma editions all come with notices letting users know they will all be moving to Wayland-only packages, dropping X11 support in the near future. Xfce is the sole desktop continuing X11 support beyond the next update or two.
Most of the desktop editions do not come with new features, or the release announcement doesn't mention new features. The exception is the Plasma edition which offers three new features along with some accessibility improvements: "New and improved on-screen keyboard. Extract text from screenshots in Spectacle. Connect to a Wi-Fi network by scanning a QR code with the camera."
I decided to try the Budgie desktop edition for the purposes of my trial.
Solus 4.9 -- The Budgie application menu
(full image size: 3.0MB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
Installing
Booting from the downloaded ISO automatically launches the Budgie desktop. A dark, thin panel is placed across the bottom of the screen. On the desktop we find icons for launching the Nemo file manager and the Calamares system installer. Apart from occasionally suffering from a bit of lag, the live desktop worked well and so I dived into the install process.
Running the Calamares graphical installer is a pleasantly streamlined experience which guides us through a handful of questions. We are asked to supply our preferred language, our timezone, and we have the option of selecting a keyboard layout. When it comes to disk partitioning, Calamares offers a friendly manual approach and an automated approach. The latter asks the user to pick a root filesystem (ext4, Btrfs, and F2FS are offered) and we have the option of creating a swap partition or not using swap space. The final screen asks us to make up a username and password for ourselves. The installer then copies its files to the local drive, a process which took about five minutes, and then Calamares offers to restart the computer.
The whole setup experience was pleasantly short and straightforward.
Early impressions
Once we boot the freshly installed Solus distribution, we are presented with a graphical login screen. There is just one session option: Budgie. Signing into our account brings up the same desktop from the live environment, minus the system installer icon.
What stands out about running Solus with the Budgie desktop is there are no extra steps when we get started. There is no welcome window, no first-run account setup, no configuration wizard, and no guided tour. The desktop is, from my point of view, pleasantly quiet. Budgie is not inclined to get in the way or, depending on your point of view, offer a guiding hand.
Hardware support
While testing Solus in a VirtualBox environment and on my laptop I found the distribution would run in both UEFI and Legacy BIOS modes. The distribution ran well in both test environments. When running on my laptop audio worked, keyboard shortcuts worked, and my touchpad was detected and registered taps as clicks. Budgie uses inverse touchpad scrolling by default, though this can be adjusted in one of the settings panels if we wish.
Wireless networking worked, though not quite as I'd expected. There was an icon in the system tray which looked like a networking icon, but clicking on it did nothing. The other icons, for audio and battery, worked as expected. Since I was unable to left- or right-click on the network icon, I opened the control panel and found the networking settings page (it is labelled Wifi) and was able to select a wireless network from there. In short, wireless networking is supported, we just need to search for it more than on other distributions.
Solus 4.9 -- Running LibreOffice Draw
(full image size: 140kB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
The Budgie desktop ran smoothly on my laptop, though it sometimes lagged a little in VirtualBox. This was a result of visual effects which are enabled by default rather than a performance problem with the window manager and we can tweak the settings to disable animations to better suit the environment.
Once installed, Solus took up about 9.2GB of disk space (not including swap space), which is slightly on the heavy side, but not significantly large. When signed into the Budgie desktop, the operating system consumed about 1.0GB of RAM, less than Plasma, GNOME, and COSMIC typically use, but more than Xfce or LXQt typically require.
Included software
Along with the Budgie desktop, Solus ships with the Firefox web browser, Thunderbird e-mail client, and LibreOffice. The GNOME Calendar application is included along with the gedit text editor, an image viewer, and the Nemo file manager.
The Celluloid video player and Rhythmbox audio player are installed for us. I found codecs for playing media files were included and Rhythmbox worked without problems. Celluloid was able to play audio tracks from video files, but failed to display any video. When I installed the VLC media player it was able to play audio and video files without any issues.
Solus 4.9 -- The Nemo file manager
(full image size: 2.7MB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
A utility is included for handling passwords and security keys. This application worked for me, though I found it a little more complex to navigate compared to some other password managers, such as KeePass. Solus includes a system monitor and two settings panels (more on these panels later in the review). There is an Online Accounts application which will attempt to connect us with cloud accounts, such as Microsoft 365, Google, and Nextcloud. I attempted to use Online Accounts to connect with my Nextcloud instance and it failed, reporting a problem with the Let's Encrypt certificate. There is no option to ignore or override this error. Connecting to the Nextcloud instance, using either a web browser or the official Nextcloud client, works. The connection problem seems specific to the Online Accounts tool.
The Solus distribution features manual pages and runs the GNU command line utilities. The systemd suite is present and provides init and service management functionality. In the background we find version 6.18 of the Linux kernel.
Something I appreciated about Solus was the distribution does not ship with many command line aliases, something which tends to get in the way of my console usage on many Arch-based distributions. In fact, just one alias exists which enabled colour output for the ls command.
Something I noticed early on in my trial was, when running commands from a terminal, there was occasionally a short delay before the program ran. This delay was visible, but didn't always happen and didn't appear to correspond to workload or memory consumption on the system. Solus does enable a lot of shell functions, but none of them appear to be slowing down the console responsiveness. The issue was intermittent and I did not find a cause during my trial.
Settings panels
Earlier in this review I mentioned Solus provides two settings panels, at least in the Budgie edition. These panels are named Budgie Control Centre and Budgie Desktop Settings. This naming might not make it immediately clear what the differences in functionality are between these two applications.
The Budgie Control Centre appears to be a rebranded GNOME Settings panel with a few adjustments. From this panel we can configure the underlying operating system, adjusting privacy settings, the display resolution, keyboard and touchpad settings, and connect to networks. We can also create user accounts. I found, when making new user accounts, the control centre demands we apply long, complex passwords. This means we cannot make guest accounts or accounts with simple passwords for home users. Applying simple passwords requires a trip to the command line and using the passwd program.
Solus 4.9 -- The Budgie Control Centre
(full image size: 2.5MB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
The Budgie Desktop Settings application focuses on visible aspects of the Budgie environment. From this application we can adjust the style and theme of the desktop, change desktop icons, and adjust fonts. The default fonts Budgie uses are on the small side and I appreciated being able to easily change them. We can also customize window manager settings, tweak the panel, and enable automatically starting applications when we sign into our account. The Budgie Desktop Settings panel also has a module for customizing Raven. Raven is a secondary panel/widget space which can be accessed by clicking the right-most button on the desktop panel. Raven is a place for displaying volume controls, resource usage, and other small widgets. The Raven panel acts like a drawer we can pull out to check information and then put away when we are finished with it.
Solus 4.9 -- The Budgie Desktop Settings panel
(full image size: 2.2MB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
Software management
Software management on Solus is primarily handled by the Discover software centre. Discover is a friendly, modern software centre which places tabs for categories and settings down the left side of the window and shows applications in a selected category on the right. By default, Discover pulls from both the Solus classic package repositories and from the Flathub repository for Flatpak bundles.
No Flatpak bundles are installed by default. When we are browsing for new applications in Discover, Flatpak and classic packages are mixed together. Packages which are supplied by Flathub are marked as being Flatpak packages next to their Install buttons.
Solus 4.9 -- The Discover software centre
(full image size: 2.6MB, resolution: 1920x1080 pixels)
Something I appreciated about Discover was it did not require a password to perform software updates and, once a password had been provided to perform an install or removal, Discover would remember the credentials. This makes installing multiple packages a smoother experience.
Alongside Discover we can also use command line package tools. Solus provides the Flatpak command line program and the eopkg package manager. The eopkg tool has a lot of options, but most users can probably get by just remembering the sub-commands "install", "search", and "upgrade". Both package managers worked as expected and I encountered no problems. I appreciated that eopkg tended to work quickly and show detailed information about the actions it was about to perform.
Conclusions
On the whole, Solus provided a good experience for me. The distribution has some variety in its desktop environments, it has a friendly installer that worked well for me, and the distribution worked smoothly with my hardware. I enjoyed the default dark theme, with lighter application windows.
The application menu contains enough software for most people to get started with the basics, without being crowded. Adding new programs was easy, thanks to the Discover software centre, which worked smoothly and quickly.
Most of the applications which shipped with Solus worked well, though there were a few issues. The user creation module and the Online Accounts tools either didn't work or didn't suit my needs. The Celluloid application had trouble playing videos, but I was able to replace it. One of the few confusing aspects of the distribution is its use of two separate desktop control panels, one for visual elements and one for behind-the-scenes settings. Having two panels, with similar, non-descriptive names isn't ideal for new users. I was able to explore and get a feel for what distinguished the two panels, but it might not be clear how the tools divide their tasks to some users.
I think what eventually stood out about Solus while I was using it was what it didn't do, rather than what it did do. Solus does not have a first-run wizard or a welcome screen or pop-ups notifying us about new package updates. Solus seems to assume we know what we are doing and generally tries to stay out of the way. It doesn't create command line aliases for us or offer us guided tours or invite us to join the project's community forum.
The Solus project provides us with an operating system, one with some basic utilities and a solid software manager, and then steps out of the way. For me, this is a pretty good experience. The installer, system administration panels, and software centre are friendly. The menus are uncluttered, Budgie is quiet, and the system worked well with my hardware. It got so, after a day or two, I wasn't noticing the operating system; I was just using it. For me, this is a good fit. I can see how, for beginner users, the quiet, hands-off approach offered by Solus might not be ideal. Newcomers would benefit from a little more guidance and easily accessible documentation. For people with a little experience, Solus is a pleasantly practical experience - useful without being overly friendly. It's the sort of distribution I'd suggest to other Linux enthusiasts, but not to non-technical family members and friends.
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Hardware used in this review
My physical test equipment for this review was an HP DY2048CA laptop with the following
specifications:
- Processor: 11th Gen Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-1135G7 @ 2.40GHz
- Display: Intel integrated video
- Storage: Western Digital 512GB solid state drive
- Memory: 8GB of RAM
- Wireless network device: Intel Wi-Fi 6 AX201 + BT Wireless network card
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Visitor supplied rating
Solus has a visitor supplied average rating of: 7.7/10 from 254 review(s).
Have you used Solus? You can leave your own review of the project on our ratings page.
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| Miscellaneous News (by Jesse Smith) |
Haiku boots on Apple M1 processors, Fedora drops Deepin desktop packages, Azure Linux becomes more widely available, Mint improves Nemo performance
One enterprising Haiku developer has managed to get the open source operating system running on Apple M1 hardware. "Booted to desktop on M1 MacBook Air. All 8 cores are running, USB is barely functional, and the screen is in funny colours, but it works." While not yet ready for public consumption, this paves the way for Haiku to run on Apple's range of ARM-powered processors. A forum thread discusses this new port and its capabilities.
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A year after concerns were raised in the Fedora (and openSUSE) communities about the state of Deepin Desktop Environment (DDE) packages and the behaviour of some of the DDE packages, the Fedora project has decided to drop the Deepin packages from the distribution's repository. A summary of the decision explains the dropping of the DDE packages: "Retire all packages maintained by the deepinde-sig group, with the message mentioning the fesco ticket. Ask releng to not unretire those packages if a request is made, unless they passed review again."
Azure Linux, Microsoft's Linux distribution, has existed in one form or another for a few years. The Fedora-based distribution recently caught attention as it is becoming more widely available, running on Microsoft's cloud services and in the Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL). Azure Linux is "an open-source Linux distribution built and optimized for Azure, with sources derived from Fedora Linux. Azure Linux provides a secured, reliable operating system for virtual machines, containers, and bare-metal platforms." The source code for Azure is available through the project's GitHub page.
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The Linux Mint project has published a blog post which discusses recent changes and upcoming features for the distribution. One of the many visible changes is a speed improvement for the Nemo file manager: "We significantly improved the response time and navigation performance in Nemo. In Cinnamon 6.6, a delay of 200ms was used between the moment you clicked on a directory and the moment this directory started to show its content on the screen. Some directories load faster than others, but to guarantee a smooth looking render each took at least 200ms. 200ms might not seem like much, and to be honest it never really bothered us before. But once you notice it, you cannot unsee it. Nemo now uses different rendering modes depending on the situation. It now renders some directories immediately and without delay and looks much more responsive than before." Details on other changes, such as improved themes and interactive search, can be found in the project's May newsletter.
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These and other news stories can be found on our Headlines page.
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| Questions and Answers (by Jesse Smith) |
Running Linux on tablets
Where-have-all-the-tablets-gone asks: Linux on smartphones is a big topic and there are lots of projects working on this. Why aren't there projects creating Linux distros for tablets? Seems like a tablet would have less issues and regulations than a phone, so isn't that the easier target?
DistroWatch answers: The suggestion that a tablet might have fewer issues and regulations than a phone is, I suspect, in reference to phone modems and cellular connectivity. It is true that phones typically require cellular network capabilities and this can be tricky, especially when dealing with VoLTE. Since this extra complexity exists, it does raise the question of why developers might focus more effort on making smartphones work than tablets.
I would suggest that, while tablets might be an easier target than smartphones, they might not be as attractive a target, or as popular a target. I'm fairly certain more people own smartphones than tablets and families typically own more phones than tablets. At least this has been my experience over the past 15 years. And I think it makes sense for phones to be the more popular option.
In my mind, if someone wants to create or accomplish work, they will probably use a laptop. If they want to consume media and do some work they will be best served by a small laptop. People who want to consume content and have a super portable device will probably use a large smartphone. A tablet exists in an awkward middle space where it is not great for creating, gaming, or working (compared against a laptop), but it has a similar size. A tablet performs most of the same functions as a phone, but it is not as portable and cannot make voice calls or send texts. This means one of the few times a tablet makes sense, as a purchase, is when a person wants something with a laptop-sized screen, but want something lighter and a keyboard will not be required. That's a relatively small niche, compared to phones, which virtually everyone in our society has.
Anyway, this would explain why we see fewer projects focusing efforts on bringing Linux to tablets compared to smartphones. With that said, there are Linux-powered tablets available. The options will vary a bit depending on how broad your definition of "Linux tablet" is, whether you consider Android as suitable, whether closed-source components are okay, and whether you want to run a GNU/Linux operating system. Let's look at some options.
The above list gives a number of options, depending on your specific hardware and operating system preferences. Anyone interesting in Linux-powered computers, tablets, or phones can visit our compatible hardware page to find vendors who sell devices with Linux installed.
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Additional answers can be found in our Questions and Answers archive.
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| Released Last Week |
NetHydra 2026.2
The NetHydra team has announced the release of NetHydra 2026.2. Formerly knowns as HydraPWK GNU/Linux, NetHydra is a Debian-based Linux distribution with a collection of penetration-testing tools, including tools for information gathering, scanning, stress testing, exploitation, cracking, reversing engineering and forensics. Besides the standard edition called NetHydra "Express", this version also delivers a new enterprise variant called "SONAR". "Today, NetHydra proudly announces the release of NetHydra 2026.2, one of the biggest updates ever introduced to the NetHydra ecosystem. This release delivers major improvements across the core system, performance enhancements, updated tools, expanded compatibility, and a variety of internal changes designed to improve both flexibility and usability for security professionals. ... As with every NetHydra release, this update also introduces several new tools and package additions, including tools specifically added for the SONAR edition. Here is a quick rundown of some of the new tools included in NetHydra 2026.2: MISP - an open-source threat intelligence and information sharing platform...." Continue to the release announcement for further details and screenshots.
Zenclora OS 3.0
Nixovena Linux & AI Labs has announced the release of Zenclora OS 3.0, the latest version of the project's desktop Linux distribution based on Debian's "Stable" branch and featuring a unified package management system called Zen Package Manager (ZPM). This release offers two desktop variants - GNOME and MATE: "Zenclora 3.0 is officially available. This major update introduces the MATE desktop environment as a lightweight, highly customizable alternative to GNOME, complete with integrated Conky setups. Alongside desktop and kernel performance enhancements, the Zen Package Manager (ZPM) has been completely rebuilt from the ground up in Python. The new ZPM features a modern interface, support for 12 languages, and powerful new toolsets including Zen AI, Zen Security and the all-new Zenthub Flatpak software center. New ZPM tools and features: Zen AI - manage local and online AI models with Ollama, Toolkit, ApiChat and LLM Store; Zen security - new tools including jails (Firejail manager), USBGuard, checksum and an nftables-based firewall; Zenthub - a brand new Python rich CLI-based Flatpak software center...." See the distribution's news and releases pages for further information.
OpenBSD 7.9
The OpenBSD project, which developes a famously security-oriented operating system, has published OpenBSD 7.9. The new version features several improvements to scheduling, LibreSSL 4.3.0, and many fixes for tmux. The project has also introduced new features and fixes for the OpenSSH utilities: "ssh(1): validation of shell metacharacters in user names supplied on the command-line was performed too late to prevent some situations where they could be expanded from %-tokens in ssh_config. For certain configurations, such as those that use a "%u" token in a "Match exec" block, an attacker who can control the user name passed to ssh(1) could potentially execute arbitrary shell commands. Reported by Florian Kohnhäuser. We continue to recommend against directly exposing ssh(1) and other tools' command-lines to untrusted input. Mitigations such as this cannot be absolute given the variety of shells and user configurations in use. sshd(8): when matching an authorized_keys principals="" option against a list of principals in a certificate, an incorrect algorithm was used that could allow inappropriate matching in cases where a principal name in the certificate contains a comma character." Additional information is provided in the release announcement and in the changelog.
TileOS 2.0
Aleksey Samoilov has announced the release of TileOS 2.0, a major update of the project's Debian-based Linux distribution featuring several popular Wayland tiling compositors, including Sway and River, as well as the newly-added Qtile, niri and miracle-wm: "Final stable release of TileOS 2.0 'Sauropod'. What's new? The package database has been updated to Debian 13; the native Debian kernel, which supports Secure Boot, is used by default, the Liquorix kernel, optimized for typical desktop tasks, is also available for installation; the sudo-rs utility, a Rust-based Sudo variant, is used by default; systemd-resolved has been used as the system DNS resolver instead of Dnsmasq, dhcpcd5 has been used instead of isc-dhcp-client; the tileos-kernel-manager utility for installing and removing Linux kernels has been added; the TileOS Welcome utility, which runs at system startup and allows for initial setup and familiarizes the user with necessary information about the distribution, has been added; the Rofi application menu has been replaced with Wofi, which is also used in the source selection interface for screen capture; the swaylock screen locker has been replaced with gtklock; the Btrfs file system is now the default file system for installation during automatic disk partitioning...." Read the detailed release notes for more information.
TileOS 2.0 -- Running the Qtile interface
(full image size: 6.6MB, resolution: 2560x1600 pixels)
Red Hat Enterprise Linux 10.2, 9.8
Red Hat, Inc. has announced the availability of Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) 10.2 and 9.8, updated builds in RHEL's current and legacy branches: "Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) 10.2 and 9.8 are here, evolving the operating system from a foundation to a powerful engine for critical applications, security, and innovation. These updates enhance the core strengths of RHEL to help IT leaders, developers, and administrators accelerate time-to-market, simplify hybrid cloud management, and proactively defend against advanced threats, including quantum computing risks. This integrated strategy enables your organization to innovate, simplify, protect and trust with the world's leading enterprise Linux platform. Innovation in the enterprise depends on giving developers the best tools and reducing friction in the development cycle. RHEL 10.2 and 9.8 deliver a significant enhancement in this area, particularly through cutting-edge AI assistance and a comprehensive refresh of core developer toolsets. The command-line is the core of Linux power, and we're making it smarter than ever. For those who live in the terminal, we're introducing goose, an advanced, optional command-line AI assistant (available in the extensions repository)." This blog announcement provides more information, with comprehensive technical details available in the release notes (RHEL 10.2 and RHEL 9.8).
Proxmox 9.2 "Virtual Environment"
Proxmox is a commercial company offering specialised products based on Debian GNU/Linux. One of the products, "Virtual Environment", has received a new update and is based on Debian 13 "Trixie". "Proxmox VE 9.2 is built on the robust Debian 13.5 'Trixie' and ships with Linux kernel 7.0 as the new stable default. In addition to core system enhancements, this update integrates the latest versions of our key underlying technologies, including QEMU 11.0, LXC 7.0, and ZFS 2.4. Storage capabilities have also been advanced with Ceph Tentacle 20.2.1 as the new default stable release, and Ceph Squid 19.2.3 still available as an option. Here are some of the highlights in Proxmox VE 9.2: new Dynamic Load Balancer for improved cluster resource utilization; expanded SDN with WireGuard as a new fabric protocol; fine-grained BGP/EVPN filtering with route maps and prefix lists; management of custom CPU models from the GUI; new HA arm/disarm functionality; enrollment of Microsoft and Windows UEFI 2023 certificates via GUI and API. This release incorporates numerous bug fixes and performance improvements across the platform." Additional information is provided in the release announcement.
Quarkos 26.04
Quarkos, a desktop Linux distribution based on Ubuntu's long-term support branch (and a sister project of the Q4OS distribution), has been updated to version 26.04. This initial release comes with the KDE Plasma desktop 6.6: "Quarkos 26.04 'Resolute' LTS is now officially stable and available for download. This long-term support release is based on Ubuntu 26.04 'Resolute Raccoon' and features the KDE Plasma 6.6 desktop by default. A Trinity Desktop Environment edition with the latest Trinity 14.1.6 version will also be available for download soon. Quarkos aims to minimize the use of snap-based software in favor of reliable and well established APT packages. The 'Resolute' release follows Ubuntu's standard 5-year LTS support cycle, with support guaranteed until at least May 2031. Since Ubuntu support may be extended to 10 years, Quarkos could remain supported until May 2036, and we plan to maintain support for as long as Ubuntu upstream does. Quarkos is a user-friendly, desktop-oriented operating system based on Ubuntu Linux, featuring Plasma and optionally the Trinity Desktop Environment, along with the added value of integrated Q4OS tools. Its goal is to provide an Ubuntu-based operating system with the convenience and features associated with Q4OS. Unlike Q4OS, which is based on Debian, Quarkos is built on Ubuntu." Read the full release announcement for more information.
quarkos 26.04 -- Running the Plasma desktop
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PureOS 11
Purism has announced the release of PureOS 11, code name "Crimson". PureOS is a privacy-respecting, Debian-based Linux distribution made for laptops, tablets, PCs and phones. The project's latest version is based on Debian 12 and is available in both GNOME and KDE Plasma flavours. "The moment we have anticipated is finally here - PureOS 'Crimson' is released. All devices running PureOS 'Byzantium' will receive the PureOS Upgrade application with their regular software updates. As with many prior updates, reliability and stability continue to play a major role in Crimson. We found and fixed a corner case that could cause systems to suspend unexpectedly when suspend is enabled. We fixed a crash that could occur when disconnecting an external display on the Librem 5 and Librem 11. The Librem 5's hardware killswitches can disable the internal accelerometer and other sensors, but in some cases this could cause the system to act like the sensor reported a value that didn't make any sense. That could cause an unexpected screen rotation. That's fixed now - we'll now keep the last value correctly. PureOS 'Crimson' is designed to be our best PureOS yet. All Purism devices can benefit from this update, including our earliest Librem 13 and 15 computers." Read the rest of the release announcement for more details.
Besgnulinux 4-0
The Besgnulinux development team has announced the release of Besgnulinux 4-0, the latest update of the project's Debian-based Linux distribution featuring the lightweight JWM window manager: "This version is a major release developed as a result of meticulous work carried out since version 3-0. Particular emphasis was placed on stability and lightness. It has been purged of leaking, conflicting or background processes. Healthy, functioning tools have been replaced with alternatives. Some software has been removed while others have been added. It was created with an 'install and use' approach, requiring minimal customization beyond user preferences. To this end, all software necessary for basic needs has been adapted to the system. Both GUI and CLI software have been added for the touchpad. Pavucontrol has been removed and replaced with Pasystray, which performs the same function. A separate process has been implemented for panel icons. Panel icon colors can be changed using the 'Panel Manager' tool. Icons can be added to the panel, menu and desktop. This version includes four different icon sets. Different-looking folders can be changed using the icon color change tool." Continue to the release announcement for more details and screenshots.
Besgnulinux 4-0 -- Running the JWM interface
(full image size: 2.8MB, resolution: 2560x1600 pixels)
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Development, unannounced and minor bug-fix releases
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| Torrent Corner |
Weekly Torrents
The table below provides a list of torrents DistroWatch is currently seeding. If you do not have a bittorrent client capable of handling the linked files, we suggest installing either the Transmission or KTorrent bittorrent clients.
Archives of our previously seeded torrents may be found in our Torrent Archive. We also maintain a Torrents RSS feed for people who wish to have open source torrents delivered to them. To share your own open source torrents of Linux and BSD projects, please visit our Upload Torrents page.
Torrent Corner statistics:
- Total torrents seeded: 3,444
- Total data uploaded: 50.1TB
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| Upcoming Releases and Announcements |
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Summary of expected upcoming releases
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| Opinion Poll (by Jesse Smith) |
Do you own a tablet?
This week we talked about tablets in our Questions and Answers section and why we don't see more resources dedicated to running Linux distributions on them. Do you own a tablet and, if so, does it run a GNU/Linux operating system? Let us know the details about your open source tablets in the comments.
You can see the results of our previous poll on cleaning the filesystem in our previous edition. All previous poll results can be found in our poll archives.
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Do you own a tablet?
| Yes - an iPad: | 196 (12%) |
| Yes - a Google Android tablet: | 446 (28%) |
| Yes - a de-Googled Android tablet: | 80 (5%) |
| Yes - a GNU/Linux tablet: | 35 (2%) |
| Yes - another proprietary tablet: | 71 (4%) |
| Yes - another open source tablet: | 3 (0%) |
| Yes - multiple above options: | 109 (7%) |
| No - none of the above: | 656 (41%) |
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| Website News |
Donations and Sponsors
Each month we receive support and kindness from our readers in the form of donations. These donations help us keep the web server running, pay contributors, and keep infrastructure like our torrent seed box running. We'd like to thank our generous readers and acknowledge how much their contributions mean to us.
This month we're grateful for the $252 in contributions from the following kind souls:
| Donor |
Amount |
|---|
| Jerry B | $100 |
| J S | $50 |
| Sam C | $20 |
| Používateľ Rufus Haymon | $20 |
| Joshua B | $7 |
| Používateľ Jacek Marcin Jaworski | $5 |
| Taikedz | $5 |
| Chung T | $5 |
| Brian59 | $5 |
| John B | $5 |
| Joe Football | $5 |
| AbondonShiP | $5 |
| David R | $5 |
| Sammy | $5 |
| J.D. L | $2 |
| PB C | $2 |
| Stephen M | $1 |
| William E | $1 |
| Kal D | $1 |
| aRubes | $1 |
| Colton D | $1 |
| Lars N | $1 |
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DistroWatch database summary
* * * * *
This concludes this week's issue of DistroWatch Weekly. The next instalment will be published on Monday, 1 June 2026. Past articles and reviews can be found through our Weekly Archive and Article Search pages. To contact the authors please send e-mail to:
- Jesse Smith (feedback, questions and suggestions: distribution reviews/submissions, questions and answers, tips and tricks)
- Ladislav Bodnar (feedback, questions, donations, comments)
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| Tip Jar |
If you've enjoyed this week's issue of DistroWatch Weekly, please consider sending us a tip.
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| Archives |
| • Issue 1175 (2026-06-01): PineTab2 with various distros, less common words of wisdom, Canonical shutting down Ubuntu's Pastebin, Murena nears one million users, DistroWatch turns 25 |
| • Issue 1174 (2026-05-25): Solus 4.9, Linux tablets, Haiku boots on Apple M1 machines, Fedora drops Deepin packages, Mint improves Nemo performance |
| • Issue 1173 (2026-05-18): Sylve on FreeBSD, the benefit of BleachBit, Debian commits to reproducible builds, Debian publishes updated install media, Haiku introduces SMP support on ARM64 processors, Rocky Linux creates opt-in security repository, Fedora reconsiders AI tools, KDE receives generous donation |
| • Issue 1172 (2026-05-11): Fedora 44, dealing with extra fonts, Fedora plans to provide AI tools, problems with Ubuntu's new coreutils, TrueNAS extends its development cycle, postmarktetOS improves the boot splash screen, Redox ports tmux |
| • Issue 1171 (2026-05-04): Xubuntu 26.04, extending memory with VRAM, Ubuntu plans AI features, Devuan developer forks GTK2, Mint introduces hardware enablement builds, Linux running on a PlayStation 5, local kernel exploit found in Linux |
| • Issue 1170 (2026-04-27): ENux 5.2.1, picking a second distro, AlmaLinux expands CPU support, FreeBSD publishes Status Report, Ubuntu MATE skips 26.04 release |
| • Issue 1169 (2026-04-20): Lakka 6.1, free software and source-based distributions, FreeBSD Foundation publishes compatible laptop list, Debian holds Project Leader election, Haiku progresses ARM64 port, Mint to extend development cycle, Linux 7.0 released |
| • Issue 1168 (2026-04-13): pearOS 2026.03, EndeavourOS 2026.03.06, which distros are adopting age verification, Arch adjusts its firewall packages, Linux dropping i486 support, Red Hat extends its release cycle, Debian's APT introduces rollbacks, Redox improves its scheduler |
| • Issue 1167 (2026-04-06): Origami Linux 2026.03, answering questions for Linux newcomers, Ubuntu MATE seeking new contributors, Ubuntu software centre is expanding Deb support, FreeBSD fixes forum exploit, openSUSE 15 Leap nears its end of life |
| • Issue 1166 (2026-03-30): NetBSD jails, publishing software for Linux, Ubuntu joins Rust Foundation, Canonical plans to trim GRUB features, Peppermint works on new utilities, PINE64 shows off open hardware capabilities |
| • Issue 1165 (2026-03-23): Argent Linux 1.5.3, disk space required by Linux, Manjaro team goes on strike, AlmaLinux improves NVIDIA driver support and builds RISC-V packages, systemd introduces age tracking |
| • Issue 1164 (2026-03-16): d77void, age verification laws and Linux, SUSE may be for sale, TrueNAS takes its build system private, Debian publishes updated Trixie media, MidnightBSD and System76 respond to age verification laws |
| • Issue 1163 (2026-03-09): KaOS 2026.02, TinyCore 17.0, NuTyX 26.02.2, Would one big collection of packages help?, Guix offers 64-bit Hurd options, Linux communities discuss age delcaration laws, Mint unveils new screensaver for Cinnamon, Redox ports new COSMIC features |
| • Issue 1162 (2026-03-02): AerynOS 2026.01, anti-virus and firewall tools, Manjaro fixes website certificate, Ubuntu splits firmware package, jails for NetBSD, extended support for some Linux kernel releases, Murena creating a map app |
| • Issue 1161 (2026-02-23): The Guix package manager, quick Q&As, Gentoo migrating its mirrors, Fedora considers more informative kernel panic screens, GhostBSD testing alternative X11 implementation, Asahi makes progress with Apple M3, NetBSD userland ported, FreeBSD improves web-based system management |
| • Issue 1160 (2026-02-16): Noid and AgarimOS, command line tips, KDE Linux introduces delta updates, Redox OS hits development milestone, Linux Mint develops a desktop-neutral account manager, sudo developer seeks sponsorship |
| • Issue 1159 (2026-02-09): Sharing files on a network, isolating processes on Linux, LFS to focus on systemd, openSUSE polishes atomic updates, NetBSD not likely to adopt Rust code, COSMIC roadmap |
| • Issue 1158 (2026-02-02): Manjaro 26.0, fastest filesystem, postmarketOS progress report, Xfce begins developing its own Wayland window manager, Bazzite founder interviewed |
| • Issue 1157 (2026-01-26): Setting up a home server, what happened to convergence, malicious software entering the Snap store, postmarketOS automates hardware tests, KDE's login manager works with systemd only |
| • Issue 1156 (2026-01-19): Chimera Linux's new installer, using the DistroWatch Torrent Corner, new package tools for Arch, Haiku improves EFI support, Redcore streamlines branches, Synex introduces install-time ZFS options |
| • Issue 1155 (2026-01-12): MenuetOS, CDE on Sparky, iDeal OS 2025.12.07, recommended flavour of BSD, Debian seeks new Data Protection Team, Ubuntu 25.04 nears its end of life, Google limits Android source code releases, Fedora plans to replace SDDM, Budgie migrates to Wayland |
| • Issue 1154 (2026-01-05): postmarketOS 25.06/25.12, switching to Linux and educational resources, FreeBSD improving laptop support, Unix v4 available for download, new X11 server in development, CachyOS team plans server edtion |
| • Issue 1153 (2025-12-22): Best projects of 2025, is software ever truly finished?, Firefox to adopt AI components, Asahi works on improving the install experience, Mageia presents plans for version 10 |
| • Issue 1152 (2025-12-15): OpenBSD 7.8, filtering websites, Jolla working on a Linux phone, Germany saves money with Linux, Ubuntu to package AMD tools, Fedora demonstrates AI troubleshooting, Haiku packages Go language |
| • Issue 1151 (2025-12-08): FreeBSD 15.0, fun command line tricks, Canonical presents plans for Ubutnu 26.04, SparkyLinux updates CDE packages, Redox OS gets modesetting driver |
| • Issue 1150 (2025-12-01): Gnoppix 25_10, exploring if distributions matter, openSUSE updates tumbleweed's boot loader, Fedora plans better handling of broken packages, Plasma to become Wayland-only, FreeBSD publishes status report |
| • Issue 1149 (2025-11-24): MX Linux 25, why are video drivers special, systemd experiments with musl, Debian Libre Live publishes new media, Xubuntu reviews website hack |
| • Issue 1148 (2025-11-17): Zorin OS 18, deleting a file with an unusual name, NetBSD experiments with sandboxing, postmarketOS unifies its documentation, OpenBSD refines upgrades, Canonical offers 15 years of support for Ubuntu |
| • Issue 1147 (2025-11-10): Fedora 43, the size and stability of the Linux kernel, Debian introducing Rust to APT, Redox ports web engine, Kubuntu website off-line, Mint creates new troubleshooting tools, FreeBSD improves reproducible builds, Flatpak development resumes |
| • Issue 1146 (2025-11-03): StartOS 0.4.0, testing piped commands, Ubuntu Unity seeks help, Canonical offers Ubuntu credentials, Red Hat partners with NVIDIA, SUSE to bundle AI agent with SLE 16 |
| • Issue 1145 (2025-10-27): Linux Mint 7 "LMDE", advice for new Linux users, AlmaLinux to offer Btrfs, KDE launches Plasma 6.5, Fedora accepts contributions written by AI, Ubuntu 25.10 fails to install automatic updates |
| • Issue 1144 (2025-10-20): Kubuntu 25.10, creating and restoring encrypted backups, Fedora team debates AI, FSF plans free software for phones, ReactOS addresses newer drivers, Xubuntu reacts to website attack |
| • Issue 1143 (2025-10-13): openSUSE 16.0 Leap, safest source for new applications, Redox introduces performance improvements, TrueNAS Connect available for testing, Flatpaks do not work on Ubuntu 25.10, Kamarada plans to switch its base, Solus enters new epoch, Frugalware discontinued |
| • Issue 1142 (2025-10-06): Linux Kamarada 15.6, managing ZIP files with SQLite, F-Droid warns of impact of Android lockdown, Alpine moves ahead with merged /usr, Cinnamon gets a redesigned application menu |
| • Issue 1141 (2025-09-29): KDE Linux and GNOME OS, finding mobile flavours of Linux, Murena to offer phones with kill switches, Redox OS running on a smartphone, Artix drops GNOME |
| • Issue 1140 (2025-09-22): NetBSD 10.1, avoiding AI services, AlmaLinux enables CRB repository, Haiku improves disk access performance, Mageia addresses service outage, GNOME 49 released, Linux introduces multikernel support |
| • Issue 1139 (2025-09-15): EasyOS 7.0, Linux and central authority, FreeBSD running Plasma 6 on Wayland, GNOME restores X11 support temporarily, openSUSE dropping BCacheFS in new kernels |
| • Issue 1138 (2025-09-08): Shebang 25.8, LibreELEC 12.2.0, Debian GNU/Hurd 2025, the importance of software updates, AerynOS introduces package sets, postmarketOS encourages patching upstream, openSUSE extends Leap support, Debian refreshes Trixie media |
| • Issue 1137 (2025-09-01): Tribblix 0m37, malware scanners flagging Linux ISO files, KDE introduces first-run setup wizard, CalyxOS plans update prior to infrastructure overhaul, FreeBSD publishes status report |
| • Issue 1136 (2025-08-25): CalyxOS 6.8.20, distros for running containers, Arch Linux website under attack,illumos Cafe launched, CachyOS creates web dashboard for repositories |
| • Issue 1135 (2025-08-18): Debian 13, Proton, WINE, Wayland, and Wayback, Debian GNU/Hurd 2025, KDE gets advanced Liquid Glass, Haiku improves authentication tools |
| • Issue 1134 (2025-08-11): Rhino Linux 2025.3, thoughts on malware in the AUR, Fedora brings hammered websites back on-line, NetBSD reveals features for version 11, Ubuntu swaps some command line tools for 25.10, AlmaLinux improves NVIDIA support |
| • Issue 1133 (2025-08-04): Expirion Linux 6.0, running Plasma on Linux Mint, finding distros which support X11, Debian addresses 22 year old bug, FreeBSD discusses potential issues with pkgbase, CDE ported to OpenBSD, Btrfs corruption bug hitting Fedora users, more malware found in Arch User Repository |
| • Issue 1132 (2025-07-28): deepin 25, wars in the open source community, proposal to have Fedora enable Flathub repository, FreeBSD plans desktop install option, Wayback gets its first release |
| • Issue 1131 (2025-07-21): HeliumOS 10.0, settling on one distro, Mint plans new releases, Arch discovers malware in AUR, Plasma Bigscreen returns, Clear Linux discontinued |
| • Issue 1130 (2025-07-14): openSUSE MicroOS and RefreshOS, sharing aliases between computers, Bazzite makes Bazaar its default Flatpak store, Alpine plans Wayback release, Wayland and X11 benchmarked, Red Hat offers additional developer licenses, openSUSE seeks feedback from ARM users, Ubuntu 24.10 reaches the end of its life |
| • Issue 1129 (2025-07-07): GLF OS Omnislash, the worst Linux distro, Alpine introduces Wayback, Fedora drops plans to stop i686 support, AlmaLinux builds EPEL repository for older CPUs, Ubuntu dropping existing RISC-V device support, Rhino partners with UBports, PCLinuxOS recovering from website outage |
| • Issue 1128 (2025-06-30): AxOS 25.06, AlmaLinux OS 10.0, transferring Flaptak bundles to off-line computers, Ubuntu to boost Intel graphics performance, Fedora considers dropping i686 packages, SDesk switches from SELinux to AppArmor |
| • Issue 1127 (2025-06-23): LastOSLinux 2025-05-25, most unique Linux distro, Haiku stabilises, KDE publishes Plasma 6.4, Arch splits Plasma packages, Slackware infrastructure migrating |
| • Issue 1126 (2025-06-16): SDesk 2025.05.06, renewed interest in Ubuntu Touch, a BASIC device running NetBSD, Ubuntu dropping X11 GNOME session, GNOME increases dependency on systemd, Google holding back Pixel source code, Nitrux changing its desktop, EFF turns 35 |
| • Issue 1125 (2025-06-09): RHEL 10, distributions likely to survive a decade, Murena partners with more hardware makers, GNOME tests its own distro on real hardware, Redox ports GTK and X11, Mint provides fingerprint authentication |
| • Issue 1124 (2025-06-02): Picking up a Pico, tips for protecting privacy, Rhino tests Plasma desktop, Arch installer supports snapshots, new features from UBports, Ubuntu tests monthly snapshots |
| • Full list of all issues |
| Star Labs |
Star Labs - Laptops built for Linux.
View our range including the highly anticipated StarFighter. Available with coreboot open-source firmware and a choice of Ubuntu, elementary, Manjaro and more. Visit Star Labs for information, to buy and get support.
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| Random Distribution | 
Beehive Linux
Our goal in creating Beehive Linux was to provide a fast, simple, secure i686 optimized Linux distribution without all the cruft and clutter. What we wanted was something that was fast to install and setup, something that didn't by default include 500 megs of stuff we didn't want or need. And something that had native ReiserFS support built in. We just wanted something better. Something tighter. Something cleaner. Beehive Linux was a distribution made by system administrators, for system administrors. It's intent was to provide fast and clean setup of workhorse servers and workstations. If you're looking for wizards and whizbang gizmos, you are in the wrong place. If you want to setup servers with the services you and/or your users need, you are in the right place. Beehive also works well as a workstation and X, E, BlackBox and KDE are included - this was not the primary focus of Beehive but hey, every admin needs a workstation as well right? Beehive Linux was not for the inexperienced, or those new to linux/*nix. Beehive Linux was for people that know what they're doing and want to get the job done as well as possible in the least amount of time.
Status: Discontinued
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Learn more about our full service package and all benefits from buying at TUXEDO.
|
| Star Labs |
Star Labs - Laptops built for Linux.
View our range including the highly anticipated StarFighter. Available with coreboot open-source firmware and a choice of Ubuntu, elementary, Manjaro and more. Visit Star Labs for information, to buy and get support.
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