Cutting Free

On a pretty impressive schedule, Paul O’Malley and Brian Brazil have released version 1.1 of gNewSense, just two months and twenty days after version 1.0.

This new version is still based on Ubuntu Dapper, so there’s no new kernel and the other software versions haven’t changed much either.

New stuff 

So what has changed?

The highlights:

• A KDE version.
• A host of new Builder stuff.
• Rebranded Firefox.
• New artwork.
• Bugfixes.

KDE 

There is now a KDE LiveCD. I’m sure this will have been eagerly awaited by many. I find that I’m rather indecisive about the two desktop environments, tending to switch every so often. I’ll stick to Gnome for now, but I do like the visual appeal of KDE.

Builder 

As you will have seen from the interview with Paul and Brian, Builder is very important to them. They are devoted to the idea that anyone should have the freedom to make their own GNU/Linux distribution, the way they want it. They have given us Builder to achieve this. Currently it’s quite specific to gNewSense, but they are working to make it more flexible. This release features a much updated Builder, and has been generated using this version.

Firefox 

gNewSense have restated their commitment to Free Software by rebranding Firefox, to deal with the artwork issue (see "Fire and Ice"), and disabled the automatic links to non-free plugins.

gNewSense have few resources, but their achievements are prodigious. I will be very interested to see when they bring out a new major version. It seems reasonable to expect it shortly after the next LTS Ubuntu release. If they can do so, it should bode well for their future.

Builder is an asset to the Free Software community. The gNewSense team (especially Brian) can be proud of a very real achievement.

Related posts:

• An interview with gNewSense founders Paul O’Malley and Brian Brazil
• An Ubuntu gNewSense
• Fire and Ice

Links:

• gnewsense.org
• Press release
• How to create your own GNU/Linux distribution (Builder howto)