Arch Linux Newsletter

April 03, 2005
1.0.0
Jason Chu jason@archlinux.org
Ben Mazer blm@groknil.org

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

  1. Front Page News
  2. Devland Update
  3. ArchStats
  4. Seti Update
  5. Forum Highlights
  6. Mailing List Highlights
  7. Tur Update
  8. Package Highlights
  9. New Packages
  10. FAQ
  11. Bugs
    1. Closed Bugs
    2. Opened Bugs
  12. New Projects
  13. Closing

Front Page News

  1. Interview on OSNews
    OSNews has recently interviewed some of the Arch Linux developers.

    Check it out here.

Devland Update

  1. mutt-devel will be replaced in unstable with muttng. muttng has all the mutt-devel features and then some.
  2. Jan is working on making firefox our default gecko engine because Mozilla isn't going to release a version 1.8.
  3. Paul Mattal has joined the dev team. He's going to pick up a couple of packages and help manage the AUR. Hi Paul!

Archstats Update

To Participate, visit: http://archstats.coding-zone.com/

Number of registered systems: 984
Date first system was registered: 20031017
Most recent update occurred: 20050403
Longest recorded uptime: 431 days, 10 hours, 22 minutes, 39 seconds.
Average uptime: 6 days, 21 hours, 14 minutes, 45 seconds.
Least packages installed on a system: 44
Average installed packages: 301
Most packages installed on a system: 1230
Slowest recorded CPU (MHz): 198.65
Average CPU speed (MHz): 1623.29
Fastest recorded CPU (MHz): 3749.52

Seti@Home Update

To Participate, visit:http://setiathome.ssl.berkeley.edu/stats/team/team_185479.html

Members: 28
Results Received: 14507
Total CPU time: 16.720 years

Forum Highlights

  1. gof wanted Arch packages to use Deltas. This topic has been discussed a few times and been given serious consideration by the developers. They decided that it added too much complexity for too small a size benefit.
  2. Equivsys created a very nice set of Arch CD labels.
  3. A legal issue over Mozilla branding was discussed and resolved.
  4. Pixel wanted to know about a STABLE Repo for Arch. This topic has been discussed to death. Currently the developers do not have the time to maintain a STABLE repo, but it is on the roadmap (very far down). Some users have attempted to start a STABLE repository with no success.

Mailing List Highlights

  1. Benjamin Krill wanted to know how to get packages into the Arch repos. This problem will be solved with the release of the AUR. A user will be able to submit a package and have other users test it. If it is popular enough, the TUs will adopt it into the COMMUNITY repository.
  2. Riklaunim had trouble mounting Audio CDs. You can't mount an Audio CD; simply play it from a program.

TUR Update

  1. Link has updated many packages in his TUR.
  2. The AUR BETA has successfully closed. Expect the official AUR to open up within a week or two. After this has been done, TUs will begin to migrate over to it.

Package Highlights

  1. gtk-sharp-2 (1.9.x) has made it into TESTING. Now that this package is available, programs like Muine (which have been broken for a long time) can be updated.

New Packages

FAQ

Q: Where can I see other Frequently Asked Questions?
A: There has been a FAQ in every newsletter for over a year, so many common questions have been answered. You can read past newsletters here: http://www.archlinux.org/~jason/newsletters/. In addition, a FAQ has been started on the Wiki that attempts to answer commonly asked forum questions: http://wiki2.archlinux.org/index.php/ArchFAQ. Please add any other questions you've seen answered over and over.

Bugs

Bugs Closed

Bugs Opened

New Projects

  1. A new website, with a variety of contributions has been started: http://user-contributions.org.
  2. An i586 port of Arch is underway. Here is the announcement:
    Hello Community!

    I am proud to announce the start of this project. It will take a long time to get everything sorted out, but we are heading strong and we are making extremely good progress!

    First, allow me to introduce the people working directly or indirectly with this project:

    • Disc-Devil - Project Leader / Project Starter
    • maci - Project Leader
    • syamajala - Repo HosterZaxX - WebSpace Provider (work in progress)
    • FUBAR2 - Compile Farm Provider (work in progress)

    We are still struggling with an assortment of problems; some packages just refuse to build, but we are doing our best to eliminate these bugs.

    As of right now, the repository for the i586 port is already very large. The list that follows is not complete, though more packages get added every day!

    /lib [Done]
    /office [Done]
    /daemons [3 missing]
    /devel [3 missing]
    /base [2 missing]
    /multimedia [Done]
    /system [4 missing]
    /x11 [1 missing]
    /network [5 missing]

    These are the branches that are currently being worked on. The main effort is being put into the glibc package in /base which is currently posing a problem, as it is refusing to build properly.

    In the EXTRA Repo, only xfce4 is built, although the xfprint package remains unbuilt.

    We are still working on organizing the work. The Team has yet to get their hands dirty, and though this project is new, we are foreshadowing a very bright future!

    Thanks to maci, we can all soon look forward to an installation cd, as it is currently being assembled.

    Any further news will be posted on our upcoming website. You can all look forward to a newsletter (which I will do my best to attempt) and many more goodies.

    If any questions should arise, you can contact us in #archlinux-i586 at irc.freenode.org, or you can contact me directly using my email: disc-devil@phreaker.net.

    Any questions/issues about the packages should be sent to us and NOT to the Arch i686 team. They have enough to do.

    Thank You.
    // Disc-Devil w/h Team.

Closing

If you are interested in helping out with the newsletter, specifically writing one section every two weeks, please email Jason or myself. We could use some more volunteers.

That's it for this week, stay tuned for more exciting Arch Linux news.