Current Linux Release
|
The CS Dept runs its own freeze of the Debian "testing" release. Actually, the Debian people will tell you it is not a release at all, since it is always changing, but what else should we call it? This page contains information about the current freeze, and how it differs from the last one.
The Dept also has a local package archive which contains odds and ends including backports, unofficial packages and locally made packages. This is also where all locally built kernel packages can be found.
The current release is codenamed "Chum"
The Summer, 2007 release is the stable release of Debian "Etch" with some minor, frozen modifications. Chum was frozen on Wednesday, May 23rd, 2007.
The last freeze was codenamed "Bruce" and was frozen from Debian "Etch" on Monday, June 5th, 2006.
The exact number of packages installed on our desktop machines varies over time, but at the time of this upgrade both Bruce and Chum had 2271. 222 packages were removed (though some were replaced by new packages with different names) and 222 new packages were added, so there was no net change in the package count.
The tstaff has compiled a complete inventory of the 2090 packages added, removed or upgraded in the transition from Bruce to Chum:
| bruce2chum.html | (in HTML) |
| bruce2chum.txt | (the raw text) |
Bruce to Chum Upgrade Highlights
Here are some of the more notable changes that accompany this upgrade:- atlas / blas / lapack
- ATLAS (Automatically Tuned Linear Algebra Software) version 2 is replaced by version 3. The older BLAS (Basic Linear Algebra Subroutines) library is replaced by refblas3, which is binary-incompatible with blas. The LAPACK library is no longer available.
- g++
- The default version of the gnu compiler suite is now 4.1. Note that 4.1 is more strict than 4.0, so test your code!
- thunderbird & mozilla renamed
-
Most of you know that the debian-packaged version of firefox is now
called iceweasel. With this upgrade, thunderbird and mozilla join
the fun. Here are the new names:
- firefox -> iceweasel
- thunderbird -> icedove
- mozilla -> iceape
- gaim
- The popular gnu instant messaging client goes from 1.5.0 to 2.0.0 beta. The non-beta release of pidgin (the new name for gaim) did not make it into this release.
- octave
- The matlab-workalike GNU octave language moves from 2.0.17 to 2.1.73 with this release.
- procinfo
- New with this release is procinfo - a command that prints information about your computer, gathered from /proc.
- python
- The default python is now 2.4, up from 2.3.
- scigraphica
- This data analysis and graphing application is gone.
- smlnj
- The Standard ML of New Jersey compiler is gone.
- sodipodi
- The sodipodi vector graphics editor is no more. Use inkscape instead.
- swi-prolog
- The SWI-Prolog interpreter is missing from this release.
- vim
- The popular Vi-IMproved version changes with this release from 6.4 to 7.0. (If anyone can find a good summary of the changes from 6.4 to 7.X, please email problem.)
- vmware
- With this release, we've bumped the version of vmware from 5.5.1 to 6.0.0.
- xv
-
Gone. Sorry, we liked it too. What to use instead:
If you... then use view images feh ..also print them or browse
directories of imagesgqview
gthumb..also edit/crop images gthumb do screengrabs gimp
gnome-screenshot
scrotlike kde gwenview
Kernel Upgrade
All 2.6.17 custom CS Dept kernels will be upgraded to 2.6.18 Debian standard issue kernels.| Page Owner: John Bazik | Last Modified: Fri Jun 8 15:14:40 2007 |