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Posted by : slh on Nov 05, 2007 - 09:17 PM Release Notes
Release Notes

It has been a turbulent week behind the scenes of Debian sid, with an accidental glibc upload, a broken openssl version (#449200) affecting wpasupplicant and ries.debian.org (ftp-master) breaking down due to filesystem problems. Nevertheless it is time to continue the preview season with our second preview heading towards our fourth sidux release "Ερως", concentrating on further X.org 7.3/ xrandr 1.2 and X detection testing and finalizing the driver selection for various wlan cards (please report any issues here). As usual the previews are shipping only as a small (≈460 MB), but fully functional, KDE-lite flavour, to ease up testing and xdelta uploads and will be accompanied by ≈700 MB KDE-full variants for the final release.

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.

Release notes for Ερως preview 2

Further efforts have been invested into an advanced USB installation, kernel stabilisation and live persistency framework (feedback welcome). Various updates, fixes and adaptions have been applied to basically the complete package list and a lot of translation and localisation related endeavours were started to improve the situation for our non english/ german speaking users. What can be done for the final release in regard to better localisation support and integration or support for alternative window managers and desktop environments is currently under consideration.

Our special thanks go to everyone involved in enhancing our list of download mirrors and especially all mirror hosters for their efforts regarding sidux.

The full featured final release of sidux 2007-04 "Ερως" will be ready in about 1-2 weeks, intermediate xdeltas will be provided as needed until then.

Now to the interesting topics, like what's on the menu for now:

  • amd64 (AMD64, Intel Core2, newer 64 bit capable AMD Sempron and Intel Pentium 4 CPUs (watch for the "lm" flag in /proc/cpuinfo or use infobash -v3) and i686 (Pentium pro/ Pentium II, AMD K7 Athlon or newer)).
  • Debian sid, as of 2007-11-05.
  • kernel 2.6.23.1 (smp, hard preemption).
  • libata support for parallel ATA systems.
  • X.org 7.3.
  • KDE 3.5.8 (en + de).
  • completely new X.org probing, finally amd64 compatible.
  • new USB fromiso Installer.
  • new artwork created by cleary and the sidux art team.
  • offline manual for en + de directly on the disc, online manuals for more languages online at http://manual.sidux.com/ and available via apt; a big thank you goes to the documentation and translation teams!
    Please note that the offline manual is only available on the running live CD or the installed system.
  • iwlwifi3945/ iwlwifi4965 1.1.19.
  • b43/ b43legacy support for Broadcom wlan cards.
  • rt2x00 2.0.12+git-8647-g130dd8f support for RaLink cards.
  • experimental support for RealTek RTL8185 wlan cards.
  • support for RealTek RTL8187 wlan cards.
  • support for ADMtek ADM8211 wlan cards.
  • support for Intel 82801I, 82566DM-2, 82562GT-2, 82562G-2 and 82562V-2 Gigabit Ethernet cards (ICH9).
  • enhanced hardware support libraries.
  • fw-detect to probe for hardware with non-free needs.
  • memtest86+.
  • overhauled partition and file system detection.
  • basic lvm2 detection and support (no installer support).
  • several X.org 7.3 and kernel 2.6.23 related bug and compatibility fixes.
  • siduxcc overhaul.
  • persistency fixes.
  • bitsetting/ xrandr compatible driver for ATi cards (6.7.195).
  • several X.org detection improvements and bugfixes.
  • /etc/apt/sources.list.d/ superseding the monolithic /etc/apt/sources.list.

What hasn't made it into the preview yet:

  • minor artwork related consolidations.
  • final manual and documentation adaptions.
  • Pinnacle PCTVsat (DVB-S) compatibility.
  • ISO diet.

Hints for hardware with non-free needs:

sidux contains only dfsg free software, so you'll probably want to add contrib/ non-free to your /etc/apt/sources.list and ensure internet access. 

# See sources.list(5) for more information, especially
# Remember that you can only use http, ftp or file URIs
# CDROMs are managed through the apt-cdrom tool.

# Unstable
deb http://ftp.de.debian.org/debian unstable main contrib non-free
# deb-src http://ftp.de.debian.org/debian unstable main contrib non-free

# sidux
deb http://sidux.com/debian/ sid main contrib non-free firmware fix.main fix.contrib fix.non-free
#deb-src http://sidux.com/debian/ sid main contrib non-free firmware fix.main fix.contrib fix.non-free

The required firmware can be determined with the following device/ firmware enumeration or by using the newly developed fw-detect script (packaged in configure-networkcard).

  • ATi Radeon graphics:
    3d acceleration for older cards up to r35x should work, newer Radeon X1xxx cards need non-free drivers for accelerated performance which are not yet compatible with Kernel 2.6.23. Depending on the particular chipset "xmodule=vesa" or "xmodule=fbdev" as cheatcode might be in order for later Radeon X1xxx models.
  • Atheros/ "madwifi" wlan:
    m-a a-i madwifi
  • Atmel AT76c50x 11 MBit/s wlan:
    apt-get install atmel-firmware
  • Broadcom, bcm43xx/ b43/ b43legacy wlan:
    apt-get install bcm43xx-fwcutter b43-fwcutter
  • Eagle USB ADSL modem:
    fetch the firmware from http://eagle-usb.org/ueagle-atm/non-free/ and place it under /lib/firmware/.
  • DVB firmware for various full featured DVB TV cards (most budget cards won't need this):
    fetch the needed firmware (check dmesg) from http://www.linuxtv.org/downloads/firmware/ and place it under /lib/firmware/.
  • Intel ipw2100, 11 MBit/s wlan:
    apt-get install ipw2100-firmware
  • Intel ipw2200, 54 MBit/s wlan:
    apt-get install ipw2200-firmware
  • Intel ipw3945/ iwlwifi, 54 Mbit/s wlan:
    apt-get install firmware-iwlwifi
    please remove iwlwifi-ucode and iwlwifi-3945, if already installed.
  • Intel ipw4965/ iwlwifi, draft-n wlan:
    apt-get install firmware-iwlwifi
    please remove iwlwifi-4965, if already installed.

    feedback regarding iwlwifi 3945 and iwlwifi 4965 is always appreciated.
  • Intersil prism54, 54 MBit/s wlan:
    fetch the firmware from http://prism54.org/firmware/ and place it under /lib/firmware/.
  • nVidia graphics:
    3d acceleration isn't possible with free drivers yet, please use "get-sidux-binary-gfx && install-binary-gfx -a" or "sgfxi" to fetch install scripts for these cards.
  • RaLink rt61 54 MBit/s wlan:
    apt-get install rt61-fwcutter
  • RaLink rt73 54 MBit/s wlan:
    apt-get install rt73-fwcutter
  • Texas Instruments ACX100 (22 Mbit/s)/ ACX111 (54 MBit/s) wlan:
    fetch the firmware from http://www.kazer.org/acx-firmware-20060207.tar.bz2 and place it under /lib/firmware/.
  • ZyDAS zd1201 11 MBit/s wlan:
    fetch the firmware from http://surfnet.dl.sourceforge.net/sourceforge/linux-lc100020/zd1201-0.14-fw.tar.gz and place it under /lib/firmware/.
  • ZyDAS zd1211 54 MBit/s wlan:
    apt-get install zd1211-firmware

We try to provide packages for legally redistributable firmware from our non-free repositories, but not all vendors allow this.

Disclaimer:

This is experimental software. Use at your own risk. The sidux project, it's developers and team members (all represented by the sidux e.V.) cannot be held liable under any circumstances for damage to hardware or software, lost data, or other direct or indirect damage resulting from the use of this software. If you do not agree to these terms and conditions, you are not permitted to use or further distribute this software.

Download URLs, please give the mirrors some time to sync:

Europe

North America

Asia

Africa

Australia/ New Zealand

Our thanks go to all mirror hosters for their efforts regarding sidux.

How to get involved

Getting involved in sidux is easy, just join us at our Forum or even better on IRC (irc.oftc.net, port 6667, channel #sidux) and discuss your patches/ proposals or additions.

We will gladly discuss any dfsg-free patches and contributions, especially regarding alternative window managers (gnome, xfce), mobile network connectivity (GPRS/ UMTS, Bluetooth, but also ISDN, PPP, PPPoE) or general janitorial tasks or translations/ localisations.

Roadmap:

Please understand that the following roadmap is a rough estimate regarding our release schedule and is affected by the status of upstream Debian sid, major system components like X.org, KDE, the linux kernel and our own developments and is subject to changes.

  • sidux 2008-01 "Νυξ" — calendar week 1-2 2008
  • sidux 2008-02 "Ερεβος" — calendar week 13-14 2008
  • sidux 2008-03 "Ωυρεα" — calendar week 25-26 2008
  • sidux 2008-04 "Ποντος" — calendar week 37-38 2008

Special thanks go to the entire sidux development team:

Jose Tadeu Barros (ceti)
Michiel de Boer (locsmif)
Joaquim Boura (x-un-i)
Mikhail Burov (von_Selbst)
Alessio Giustini (alessiog75)
Stefan R. Eissens (eislon)
Roland Engert (RoEn)
Bernard Gray (cleary)
Andreas Hausmann (Bodhi)
Chris Hildebrandt (slam)
Ralph Hokanson Jr. (piper)
Richard Holt (Richard)
Harald Hope (h2)
HarzG
Markus Huber (hubi)
Aedan Kelly (etorix)
Lady_Cuddles
Latino
Stefan Lippers-Hollmann (slh)
Philippe Masson (LjanA)
Kel Modderman (kelmo)
Koslow
Markus Müller (moto)
maslot
Gabriel Palade (ladepa)
Gerald Prock (raider700)
Steven J. Robinson (cathbard)
Philipp Rudolph (Zophod)
Dinko Sabo (cobra)
Florian Schneider (hathe)
Ferdi Thommes (devil)
Horst Tritremmel (hjt)
Trevor Walkley (bluewater)
Niall Walsh (bfree)
Andreas Weber (webera)
Fabian Wuertz (xadras)
zerby
zonker
zulu9

On behalf of the sidux team:
        Stefan Lippers-Hollmann (slh)

 
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