Arch Linux Newsletter

Summary

Welcome to the Arch Linux Newsletter. This document attempts to give you an "at a glance" look at the world of Arch Linux.

Table Of Contents

Front Page News

1. Voodoo Beta2 ISO release
   
   After one month heavy hacking during the evenings/weekends on archboot.
   0.8 Beta2 Isos are available for i686 and x86_64.
   
   This time only isolinux is used to avoid non booting cd media.
   - switched to kernel 2.6.20.1
   - to boot the ISO 96 MB RAM are recommended, it breaks somewhere between 80 - 90 MB RAM. (calculated like this: kernel image + initrd size + decompressed initrd)
   - fixed many other small things i cannot remember ;)
   
   The 0.8 Isos now run like any installed arch system,
   here are the highlights:
   * pacman is included to allow installation of any other needed package in install environment.
   * complete /etc/rc.d/ and /etc/rc.conf support
   * complete arch network support, including ssh,telnet and portmap services
   * custom config files support:
   any media with /config directory and files will be copied to /etc/ install environment
   * loading packages as addons during boot:
   any media with /packages directory including pacman packages will be installed during bootup.
   * links and naim included to be able to communicate over the internet.
   * complete kexec support
   * updated doku to 0.8
   
   ISOs are on the way to the mirrors so please be patient until they are synced.
   
   i686
   x86_64
   
   Everything mentioned here should be fixed:
   Showstoppers
   
   Forum feedback thread is here:
   Forum
   
   Please test those Isos well and try to break them, we are stepping forward to rc candidates soon :)
   
   Again to clarify Beta2 doesn't mean Arch 0.8 is in beta2 stage, the install environment is meant with beta2.
   
   Have fun and thanks for testing.
   
   
2. Arch64 Unstable Repo
   
   The 'unstable' repository for Arch64 is now live. You can enable unstable in pacman.conf. Currently only xfce-svn is in the repo, but this will be updated soon to include beryl,gaim-svn and other unstable stuff. As always, use unstable at your own risk. Enjoy!
   - (ganja_guru)
   
   
3. Kernel 2.6.20 series went to current
   
   Kernel 2.6.20 series entered current repository, thanks to the people who tested it.
   
   Latest Changes:
   - reverted additional framebuffer support
   
   - Recent Changes:
   Upstream Changes
   
   Nvidia Users consider this New Nvidia Drivers
   
   Have fun and report bugs Thanks
   
   

Devland

1. For those of you who don't follow the pacman 3 development, it's gone into official rc. There's even a package floating around that replaces pacman 2.9.8. Expect to update to pacman 3 very soon now. If you'd like to participate in the testing, please join the pacman-dev ML (http://www.archlinux.org/mailman/listinfo/pacman-dev)
2. Rumours of Woody Gilk's (Shadowhand) resignation are highly exaggerated. Sorry about that. I misread one of his emails to the arch-dev list.
3. The Victoria Arch Linux developers aren't able to make it to LinuxTag this year. Haven't heard much from other North Americans.
4. The repo/scm restructuring discussion has started up again. The people who are interested in making it easier for maintainers to manage packages, repositories, and architectures are in the discussion. If you want to seriously want to contribute the project page is here: http://groups.google.com/group/arch-repos. If you just have a comment to make, please send it to me (jason@archlinux.org) instead of joining the group to post a single message.

Forum Highlights

1. ezzetabi was looking for a good firewall to add another layer of security.
2. cactus made a tool for generating a repository even if you are not using Arch.
3. moire wanted to monitor the temperatures of his hardware under Linux .
4. mrjwalsh wanted opinions on web browsers.
5. lunke is working on a bittorent client for GTK.

Mailing List Highlights

1. Looking for wireless hardware that is well-supported by Arch .
2. Finding e-mail clients that properly support unicode.

Package Highlights

• Kernel 2.6.20 available in current.

FAQ

Q: What is the difference between all the different repositories?

A: The [current] repository is the location of the packages available off of the install CD. The [extra] repository is the collection of packages that are outside of the install CD but maintained by the Arch Linux Developers. When a package is to be tested before release to [extra] or [current] it is placed in [testing]. [unstable] is the collection of packages considered to be unstable by the developers, but popular enough to be packaged for distribution. Finally the [community] repository is the location of packages that are in the AUR and have been adopted by a Trusted User who has packaged them for download.

Q: Why aren't all packages in UNSUPPORTED added to COMMUNITY?

A: There are several reasons for that. The most important is that the package hasn't got many votes. It's also important that you vote for packages that already are in COMMUNITY, otherwise they could be disowned by the TUs and moved to UNSUPPORTED. Other reasons could be that the package is unmaintained upstream or has a licensing problem. Last but not least, no TU wants to do it.

Archstats

To Participate, visit: http://www.archlinux.org/~simo/archstats

Number of registered systems: 1299
Longest recorded uptime: 494 days, 3 hours, 29 minutes, 25 seconds.
Average uptime: 16 days, 12 hours, 16 minutes, 34 seconds.
Average installed packages: 461
Average system memory: 772MB
Slowest CPU (MHz): 198.74
Average CPU (MHz): 1776.32
Fastest CPU (MHz): 3596.98

Seti@Home

To Participate, visit: http://setiathome.berkeley.edu/team_display.php?teamid=116975

Members: 18
Total credit: 551,243.03

folding@Home

Arch Linux Team Page
Extended Team Statistics

Team Number: 45032
Members: 104
Score: 1750961
Ranking: 340 of 47729

Bugs

• AUR: Closed 11 - Opened 7
• Arch: Closed 121 - Opened 124

Closing

That's it for this time folks. If you have any opinions on the newsletter or have some things you wanna add, just send us a mail and we'll look into it.
Very best regards / Team Arch