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. Arch Leadership
   
   Hello everyone,
   
   It's been awhile since I poked my head out to say hi, and now that I have, it is with an air of finality.
   
   I plan to step down as leader of Arch Linux and pass the torch. The reason for this is that I do not have the time to devote towards a leadership role in a project the size of Arch Linux, and Arch deserves someone who does. It needs some work, it needs some unification, and it needs someone at the helm who can devote a lot of time to it.
   
   This has been a very successful project, and I'd like to stay in it in some facet, but not as the leader. Arch has met all my hopes and goals from way back in 2001, and I think it's in a ripe position for someone else to extend those goals and to map out a future for the distribution.
   
   I've given it a lot of thought, and based on the state of things, all-round competencies, initiatives, and willingness, I would like to pass this leadership role on to Aaron Griffin, also known as Phrakture on IRC and the forums.
   
   He's a good jack-of-all-trades and has the time necessary for a project such as this. Please join me in welcoming him as our new Arch Overlord. :)
   
   Though I will still be around for discussions and anything else I can do for Arch (within my feeble time constraints), I feel this is the time to say Goodbye, at least as leader. I will still be around as Arch's Number One Cheerleader, but not as its visionary.
   
   To Developers and Community: Thank you so very very much. You've helped build something that has changed my life in many ways and I look back on the years with a fondness and admiration, still a bit incredulous at all the talent that has formed around Arch Linux. We have much to be proud of.
   
   Thank you all for the last 6 years, and cheers to a bright future together.
   
   - Judd
   
   
2. Changes to repositories
   
   The repository shuffling is over, there are some changes:
   
   The current repository is gone, instead we have the core repository now. A pacman update will add /etc/pacman.d/core and users should change all "current" references and URLs in pacman.conf to "core". We added compatibility symlinks, so old configurations should still work for a while.
   
   Users who haven't updated to pacman3 yet should do so now, as our repositories will become incompatible to pacman2. You can still update by manually downloading the libarchive, libdownload and pacman packages from the ftp and installing them with pacman.
   
   Our recent changes break FTP installations, so use a base CD and do a base installation for now.
   
   For more information, see the mailing list thread at http://archlinux.org/pipermail/arch/2007-September/015430.html.
   
   Update: The FTP installation has been fixed in the latest ISO announcement, below.
   
   
3. 2007.08-2 ISOs released
   
   Hi Arch community,
   
   Arch Linux 2007.08-2, "Don't Panic" has been released. This is the first release to use our new repo layout. There are two ISOs, ftp and core.
   
   Get Archlinux ISOs in /iso/2007.08/{i686,x86_64} on your favorite mirror.
   Download Wiki
   or
   Download Homepage
   
   More information: Here.
   
   
4. AUR 1.4.0
   
   Version 1.4.0 of the AUR has been released!
   
   This is the most exciting release since we launched the AUR. The look-and-feel has been changed to match the main site, and many UI and usability bugs have been squashed.
   
   Thanks to all the hard-working code contributors, especially eliott, tardo, louipc, xilon, and thralas; without your initiative and dedication, we would not have made it here. Thanks also to Roman for helping us manage our bugs and for keeping us honest. Finally, thanks to our tireless translation team who clean up after the textual messes we make!
   
   Check out the full changelog here.
   
   

Devland

1. Since the leadership change Aaron has been posting status reports about developer projects every monday: http://archlinux.org/pipermail/arch-dev-public/2007-October/002112.html, http://archlinux.org/pipermail/arch-dev-public/2007-October/001915.html, http://archlinux.org/pipermail/arch-dev-public/2007-September/001797.html. Most of the things posted here will also be featured in those.
2. devtools has had some updates (I don't know if users really care about this, but TUs might). They will be released once we finish up the chroot building scripts.
3. There has been a lot of talk about orphan cleanups in extra. If packages aren't being maintained and not deemed important enough, they will be moved to community/unsupported. If your favourite package is not maintained (as per the web interface), convince a developer to adopt it now.
4. Varun is back after a long hiatus. Welcome back!
5. The new core repo has a testing policy. All updates to any packages in core have to go to testing first. If you see a signoff thread in the arch-dev-public mailing list, feel free to test out the package(s) and contact the dev.
6. After a brief discussion, it was decided that namcap's depends rule will be modified to display all link-level dependencies, even if they are covered by other dependencies. The reason behind this is to help everyone find the packages that need a rebuild when SONAME updates happen. This change will happen after namcap 2.0 is released soon.
7. Eliott noticed that there's a bug in our db scripts that causes some packages to show up multiple times in the web interface. If you find two packages with exactly the same version showing up, please contact a developer or post on the arch ML.

Forum Highlights

1. heavenquake takes a shot at creating some Arch Linux wallpapers.
2. thayer.w publishes his concept for a new Arch Linux logo.
3. ProzacR ask people for a list of MMORPG 's.
4. poetofnumbers has a big thread going, he wants to know which laptop the Arch Linux community uses the most.

Mailing List Highlights

1. Sergej Pupykin gets confused with pacman-optimize. Personally I think this is a most read to get an insight on what pacman-optimize really does and why.
2. Dan McGee posts: GIT Daemon up on projects.archlinux.org
3. Dan McGee starts a discussion about the future pacman development.

Package Highlights

• GNOME 2.20 has been released to testing.
• Xorg 7.3 has been released to testing.

FAQ

Q: What is this new [core] repository? and how is it different to what [current] was?

A: Some time ago, the developers team discussed a shuffling of the Arch Linux repository structure. The new [core] repository will contain all essential packages for getting a system up and running. In essence these packages are the core of Arch Linux. Everything else from current that is non-essential has been moved to [extra].

Humor

This section is one that I will try to keep fresh for every newsletter. This is an effort to recollect the funniest response on the forum or mailing list. Hope you like it.

This one is from the Arch Linux forum, by audaly:

[root@arch audaly]# pacman -Syu
:: Synchronizing package databases…

:: core [################] 100% 301K 67.9K/s 00:00:04
:: extra is up to date
:: community is up to date

:: Replace Judd with Phrakture from "core"? [Y/n]

Which would have been your answer? Please don't tell, you'll get in trouble. ;)

Archstats

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

Number of registered systems: 1023
Longest recorded uptime: 494 days, 3 hours, 29 minutes, 25 seconds.
Average uptime: 18 days, 15 hours, 10 minutes, 8 seconds.
Average installed packages: 536
Average system memory: 897MB
Slowest CPU (MHz): 198.71
Average CPU (MHz): 1774.08
Fastest CPU (MHz): 3401.00

Seti@Home

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

Members: 22
Total credit: 1,120,412

folding@Home

Arch Linux Team Page
Extended Team Statistics

Team ID: 45032
Members: 147
Score: 3322092
Ranking: 312 of 82678

Bugs

• AUR: 59 open tasks, 307 total tasks. Progress: 4% done
• Arch: 453 open tasks, 7273 total tasks. Progress: 1% done
• Pacman: 114 open tasks, 620 total tasks. Progress: 2% done

Closing

We've come to the end, but just for this week, we sincerely hope you enjoyed reading the newsletter. Please, feel free to contact us, and let us know of any opinions or suggestions you have for the better of this newsletter.

The best for all of you / Arch Linux Team