It’s with a very heavy heart that I must announce that today marks the end of the Ubuntu 16.04-based Feren OS era. This means the following versions of Feren OS have finally joined 2015.X in having reached End of Life:

• Feren OS 2016.0/1
• Feren OS 2016.2 (including Updates 1 and 2)
• Feren OS 2017.0
• Feren OS August 2017 Snapshot
• Feren OS October 2017 Snapshot
• Feren OS January 2018 Snapshot
• Feren OS April 2018 Snapshot

The end of these releases marks the end of an era for not just Feren OS, but me personally. I was a very different person back…

You know, I should probably answer this question. One thing I do hear mentioned frequently in Feren OS reviews that have a section concerning the design is the corners. They’re sharp in windows, it’s been a thing ever since Feren OS’s conception back in late 2014 (before releasing in 2015), in fact, the design dating back to ‘Zuro UI for Windows’.

That still begs, the question, however: Why the sharp corners?

It’s simple — I can’t think of any good way to handle titlebar buttons on the current design in a rounded corners setting.

Right now, the current titlebar design…

Today, I’m proud to announce the release of the Feren OS April 2021 Snapshot. Snapshots are a regular occurence that usually occur every 4 months and provide the latest updates to Feren OS at the time of the ISO’s release right from the get-go.

Updating to the April 2021 Snapshot

As always, it’s simple to update to the April 2021 Snapshot. Just go into the Update Manager, hit Refresh, and install any updates that might be there. Once you’ve done that, congrats, you’re now on the April 2021 Snapshot!

However, a bug with unattended-upgrades did affect some users when doing the updates from Plasma 5.20 to…

To celebrate the start of April, I’m finally proud to announce a new Feren OS theme change that’s coming today. That’s right, I changed Feren OS’s theme again!

When making this new Feren OS theme, I wanted to make sure that the theme could be better maintained to be more in-line with KDE Plasma, so for this theme change I’ve decided to be as close as possible to KDE Plasma’s own theme while keeping the Feren OS brand.

Now, we would change the colour scheme to Breeze Light, too, to further match KDE Plasma’s own theme, but we decided that…

NOTE: Anything referenced in this article is for educational purposes, please don’t go on witchhunts or anything against them — if anything just provide constructive criticism to them.

I feel the need to make this article for a fundamental reason — no one’s talking about this problem. It’s probably for the best — all the talk is usually going to stopping toxicity instead, but… I can’t let this problem go unanswered either as it provides its own implications for the future of Linux software quality.

To say the least, it’s definitely a good thing everyone’s focusing on toxicity tackling right…

Yeah… I updated Feren OS’s ISO. That’s all there is to this announcement.

It now has KDE Plasma 5.21, and all the latest updates currently available for Feren OS pre-installed, too, so have fun with it.

You can get Feren OS, and Feren OS Classic, from https://ferenos.weebly.com/get-feren-os.html as always.

For the Plasma 5.21 announcement, check https://medium.com/feren-os/kde-plasma-5-21-has-arrived-in-feren-os-14867a9cec0d.

Unfortunately it appears that the KDE Plasma 5.21 update’s releasing broke the Desktop for some Feren OS users who didn’t manually install the updates.

The worst part? I’m theorising it’s because of a program Feren OS includes from upstream sources that I don’t control (aside from telling it the sources that it should automatically update packages from), and even though I’ve since updated the configuration to prevent this happening in the future it’ll still break Plasma 5.21 …

I’m proud to announce that KDE Plasma 5.21.2 has just landed in Feren OS’s latest release, now available from Update Manager!

You can see what the changes to KDE Plasma upstream are at https://kde.org/announcements/plasma/5/5.21.0/

Feren OS specific patches

This Plasma version has something special going for it in Feren OS: Its patches.

Plasma 5.22’s Adaptive Panel Transparency

You heard that right — Feren OS’s Plasma 5.21 backports a new feature from the upcoming Plasma 5.22 release, being Adaptive Panel Transparency.

For those from Feren OS Classic, you may be familiar with this feature already as it was prevalent in Feren OS Classic for multiple years by default. …