SparkyLinux 5.5 “Nibiru” Rolling Release Offers Latest Updates from Debian Testing Repositories
Experience a Faster and More Secure System with the SparkyLinux 5.5 “Nibiru” Rolling Respin
SparkyLinux, the popular Linux distribution based on Debian, has just released the latest respin of their 5.5 “Nibiru” Rolling images. The new release includes all the latest software and security updates from the Debian Testing repositories, making it a top choice for users seeking a fast and secure operating system.
Synced with Debian Testing Repositories
The SparkyLinux 5.5 “Nibiru” Rolling images have been synced with the Debian Testing repositories as of September 17, 2018. This means that users will have access to the latest Linux kernel (version 4.18.6), the Calamares 3.2.1 installer, as well as the newest GCC system compiler (version 8).
As a result, the previous GCC 7 has been completely removed to ensure a faster and more efficient system.
Live System Updates
The SparkyLinux 5.5 “Nibiru” respins have made some significant changes to their live systems. The MinimalGUI/CLI now uses Debian’s Linux kernel 4.18.6 as default, while the LXQt edition has switched to Sparky’s Linux kernel 4.18.8 due to a loading issue with the desktop. However, the Debian kernel is still available as an alternative.
New Package Additions
The respin also includes several new packages such as Seahorse and rxvt-unicode for Openbox users, and FeatherPad and qps for LXQt users. On the other hand, some packages have been removed, including XTerm from the Openbox edition, and Notepadqq, Leafpad, and LXTask from the LXQt edition.
Additionally, certain packages like ImageMagick, Vim, systemd-ui, libpam-gnome-keyring, and sparky-gexec have been removed from all images for a cleaner and more optimized system.
Other Changes
The MinimalGUI (Openbox) edition has disabled the Thunar daemon after issues were reported with automatic mounting of new partitions created by the Calamares installer. Furthermore, the installer now removes the Cryptsetup packages if the system is not encrypted.
Upgrade Instructions
The SparkyLinux 5.5 “Nibiru” Rolling respin ISO images are available for download in MinimalCLI, MinimalGUI, and LXQt editions for both 64 and 32-bit architectures. For existing SparkyLinux 5 users, simply run the following command in the terminal emulator to receive all the above changes:
sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get dist-upgrade
