Sidux 2008-01 has been Released

The Sidux's development team has announced the release of Sidux 2008-01, a desktop distribution based on Debian. Sidux 2008-01 is shipping in roughly 435 MB KDE-lite flavours for AMD64 and i386 (i686) and a combined i386+amd64 release with 1,470 MB KDE for KDE-full.

Sidux is a full featured Debian sid based live CD with a special focus on hard disk installations, a clean upgrade path within sid and additional hard- and software support. The ISO is completely based on Debian sid, enriched and stabilized with sidux' own packages and scripts.

As development team said, Sidux 2008-01 concentrates on KDE 3.5.9, the large changes implied by Kernel 2.6.24.4, the newly added "resolvconf" facilities to deal with DNS settings in combination with "Ceni" and our new build system for sidux. Furthermore a large number of individual functionality enhancements and bugfixes have been applied to the full package line up.

Talking about upstream development, kernel 2.6.24 has merged "i386" and "x86_64" as sub-architectures for the new generic "x86" architecture and offers support for further wireless lan devices like RealTek RTL8180L/ RTL8185, UVC video support for Logitech webcams, high resolution timers and dynamic ticks for amd64 systems. Especially these kernel related changes have imposed a number adaptions on sidux' kernel release process, which is now provided by packages closely following Debian's lead and are finally, accompanied by a number of GPL2 compatible external module packages, available through plain apt-get.

Another major topic has been the dissolution of the former "sidux" menu into the XDG compliant menu categories, which — in combination with the new SVG based artwork — allow for better compatibility with alternative window managers and desktop environments and have been a precondition for future KDE4 or potential GNOME or XFCE support. Likewise a number of packages have undergone major changes or been replaced by new approaches (like Ceni replacing netcardconfig) all together.

You can download Sidux at Here or Here.