Mandriva Linux 2009 Titbits
Mandriva Linux 2009 was recently released to the public. Here we provide some titbits from Mandriva One, one of the free editions of Mandriva Linux 2009. The other editions are:Mandriva Free, and Mandriva Powerpack. Mandriva Powerpack is the commercial edition, available for purchase from the Mandriva website.
- The installer has been overhauled and is completely different from the previous installers. Even then, it’s not as good as the old (Mandrake 8.2) installer
- The installer does not support Linux logical volume manager (LVM). We think that LVM configuration is likely supported in the Powerpack edition, but until we can take that for a spin, we couldn’t say for certain. So if you are looking for a Linux distro that supports LVM, Mandriva (Linux 2009) One is not it
- The desktop is the K Desktop Environment 4.1 (KDE 4.1), and it looks very polished. If you are a KDE fan, you will not be disappointed.
- It ships with System Sweeper 1.1, an application which helps to remove unwanted traces a user leaves behind. This is the first Linux distro we have reviewed that has System Sweeper installed by default
- Like its Gnome equivalent, the Network Manager applet can now display wired and wireless NIC information, and has the option to manage VPN connections
- The Control Center is now even better than in the last stable edition. You can configure every aspect of the system without ever using the cli (command line)
- A gui firewall client is installed and configured to allow normal Internet traffic
We should be providing a much more detailed review of Mandriva (Linux 2009) One shortly.
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finid
Ok, now that Free is up and running, I need to make it work just like One. Number one: FF needs a flash plugin …. See the point I was making it a previous comment. With One, I didn’t have to know what a flash plugin is
Given that Free’s installer has all the features I expect to see in a Linux installer, I actually prefer Free to One. It deserves a review page of its own. Stay tuned, again
finid
If you’ve ever used gNewSense, you’ll understand the point I was trying to make about Mandriva Free. In any case, now that I’ve actually downloaded and installed Free, it looks like it could actually be better than One. At least the installer for Free is more “advanced”.
Other than the fact that Free’s installer has more customizable options, they (the installers) are essentially the same.
Adam Williamson
Sort of, but not really
. Free doesn’t have any non-free stuff on it, but it will automatically set up the non-free repository after installation, and you can add whatever non-free stuff you need from there. For hardware, if you need a non-free video driver, just do this:
http://wiki.mandriva.com/en/Installing_proprietary_video_card_drivers
if your wireless network relies on something non-free, just run through drakconnect (the network config wizard, it’s in the Control Center on the network tab, named “add a new interface” or something like that) after the non-free repo is enabled and it will automatically install any non-free packages needed.
For anything else in non-free you can just install it from rpmdrake.
Good luck
Let us know how it goes.
finid
It’ll be great to have LVM support in Mandriva Free, but the reason we did not consider using Free is the same reason we don’t recommend gNewSense to anybody if what they want is an OS that just works.
I’m sure you understand that users of Mandriva Free will have to configure it to be just like Mandriva One if they want to enjoy using it.
I hope I’m wrong about Free, but one way to find out is to take it for a “road test”. Looks like Mandriva Free is about to be the subject of post. Stay tuned.
Adam Williamson
The One installer is not the ‘new’ installer discussed in the release notes. One has always used a completely different installer from Free or Powerpack – it has to, being a live CD. The One installer has actually not changed at all in 2009 compared to 2008 Spring.
If you installed Free or Powerpack, you would see the ‘new’ traditional installer that the notes talk about.
I think LVM is supported in Free / PWP, but I can’t really say for sure, I’ve never used it myself.
Thanks for looking at Mandriva!
FACORAT Fabrice
+ net_applet ( Mandriva Network Manager ) exist since a long time and support wireed/wireless and VPN connection since a long time too.
Even better, when used with Interactive Firewall, it will notify the user about network attacks( mostly network scans ). It will allow to blacklist or whitelist the computers.
+ The firewall exist since a long time too. It use shorewall, and so users can do some very complicated setup by customizing shorewall config files, while using drakfirewall for the more simple stuff.
+ the firewall tool ( drakfirewall ) support also the ability to notify users about network attacks. For this please enable Interactive Firewall ( and be sure to have mandi package installed and the corresponding service started ).