Feren OS 2023.07 Alpha 1 is now available for testing
Today, I would like to announce the release of Feren OS 2023.07 Alpha 1, the first alpha release of Feren OS 2023.07. This Alpha introduces a whole slew of changes from the current stable release of Feren OS, as well as introducing a few changes from the prior Pre-Alpha builds of Feren OS 2023.07.
This alpha represents thoroughly incomplete software — a lot is missing, and a lot could change out of nowhere — do not use this as a daily driver, but please do test it as a candidate for a daily driver that is not relied on.
Changes from Feren OS 2023.01
A whole metric ton of things have changed between 2023.01 and this alpha. The following is but a summary of the changes made:
Now powered by Ubuntu 22.04 LTS
Feren OS 2023.07 is now powered by an Ubuntu 22.04 LTS base, being the first Feren OS release to do so. This mere change brings with it a whole slew of updates and changes for the underlying system, and the applications available for and in Feren OS.
KDE Plasma 5.27
The final release of KDE Plasma 5, KDE Plasma 5.27, finally makes its Feren OS debut in this alpha release of 2023.07. Enjoy the ultimate culmination of all the work that went into KDE Plasma throughout version 5.0 and onwards, all with the typical Feren OS twist you know.
Feren OS has been heavily refactored
The package-set Feren OS has, the packages specifically for Feren OS, all of it has been rethought for this release, to be stripped down to the very essentials that make Feren OS work. This should make Feren OS smaller in size, and hopefully considerably faster than it currently is.
Additionally, 2023.07 and onwards should now be way harder to break from package accidents (hopefully), as there is now an emphasised importance for Feren OS’s package-set to stay installed in APT.
Furthermore, the repository has also been heavily rethought, with a lot of packages either being removed due to being redundant, or renamed and their internals reorganised. Because of this, I would highly recommend NOT trying to update Feren OS 2023.04 to 2023.07 via unofficial methods, as it would be a miracle if you don’t end up in an ‘impossible package situation’ by doing so.
Pipewire
Pipewire is now the default sound server in Feren OS, starting from this release. With Pipewire, you get an improved audio experience, as well as unifying the prior audio servers.
Introducing Solstice
Solstice sees its debut in Feren OS 2023.07, bringing with it support for a new type of application, Website Applications! In later builds, when the Store is reintroduced, you will be able to install a large variety of Website Applications from their own dedicated part of the Store, search, or the Store’s home page.
Solstice supports a huge variety of browsers, with a lot of care and consideration put into how the general website application experience is — all without failing to provide the tightly integrated experience the Ice project, that inspired Solstice, provided.
‘firefox’ now installs the official Mozilla Firefox Flatpak
A change that has been promised for a while now, and a change nonetheless, the firefox package will now install Mozilla Firefox from Flathub instead of our upstream’s choice of Mozilla’s Snap Store installable Firefox.
Even though Mozilla had Canonical make Firefox a Snap in Ubuntu, as per their distribution agreement, the decision to install Mozilla Firefox from Flathub instead was made for numerous reasons:
- Mozilla Firefox on Flathub is also an official version of Mozilla Firefox (being recommended before the Snap on Mozilla’s helpguide)
- Mozilla Firefox on Flathub, so far in years long testing, has kept the ‘InstallID’ (which needs to be a specific value in order for Mozilla Firefox to even use your existing ‘profile’) the exact same throughout
- Flatpak’s cross-platform nature should make your Mozilla Firefox ‘profiles’ a no-thrills experience to transfer over to other Operating Systems using it from Flathub, because of the consistent ‘InstallID’
- Transitioning existing Mozilla Firefox users over to the Firefox Flatpak is a breeze, because of the consistent ‘InstallID’ it has
- Flatpak allows Feren OS to leverage important per-application-workarounds, that would otherwise be significantly more complex and hacky to implement, which makes working around Firefox issues, such as feren-theme#3, easier and consistent
- Mozilla Firefox from Flathub was already the main focus for optional content, as well as Solstice’s browser compatibility
- Users who have updated from Feren OS July 2020 Snapshot, who installed Firefox beforehand, are already using Mozilla Firefox from Flathub
- Users who have installed Mozilla Firefox from Web Browser Manager are already using Mozilla Firefox from Flathub
These factors all aligned with proceeding with this change, especially compared to the other options which would only re-expose issues that are worked around using the Firefox Flatpak, and/or be incompatible with Feren OS’s own tweaks/integrations for the browser.
‘epiphany-browser’ now installs the official GNOME Web Flatpak
A change nearly everyone voted for in a poll on Twitter, Mastodon, and Discord: epiphany-browser, as a package, will now install GNOME Web from Flathub instead of our upstream’s version of GNOME Web.
This change was considered as:
- The Ubuntu version becomes considerably old quite fast, making it a remarkably subpar experience compared to the experience you can get from Flathub
- Epiphany from Flathub is the official version of itself, linked by its own developers (see https://wiki.gnome.org/Apps/Web) — by moving people to its Flathub equivalent, updates will be controlled by its developers, just like most popular browsers are
- Epiphany from Flathub is the latest version of itself, containing major Quality of Life improvements not seen in Ubuntu’s version, such as its upcoming complete Extensions support, hardware rendering, compatibility with more websites, and more
Furthermore, users who have installed GNOME Web from Web Browser Manager in the last 2 years will have GNOME Web from Flathub installed anyway, meaning this change will not have any effect on a sizable portion of the current user-base.
See the poll results, for making this change, yourself at Twitter, Mastodon, and Discord.
What is missing
A program to generate Solstice shortcuts with
This will ultimately arrive in the form of Store, but… see the Store section below for why this is not the case yet.
For the time being, you can manually generate .desktop files to use Solstice with, and by doing so, you will be able to use Solstice’s Beta 1 release. Alternatively, you can always compile Feren Storium’s work in progress builds yourself to use that to generate some shortcuts, while you wait for the first beta of Feren OS 2023.07 to release.
Store
Feren Storium is nowhere near being finished yet, hence no work has started yet on the all-new Feren OS Store. Therefore, there is no pre-installed graphical way to install, update, and remove packages on the system yet.
The all-new Feren OS Store’s development will be started once Feren Storium’s modules are finalised, being a fork of the work on Storium to give it its intended Feren OS-specific interface.
Updates, Browsers, Sources, and Drivers Management
See Store section above.
Management of Snap and Flatpak
See Store section above. Snap and Flatpak are not currently pre-installed, and there are no plans yet to do so, but they will be seamless to install through Store.
Automatic Updates
Automatic Updates are planned to return as an option in the all-new Store. Because of this, there is currently no automatic updates implementation in this alpha.
System Maintenance
The future of System Maintenance is also currently under consideration (keep it, split it into multiple system tools, or consider in 2023.10?), meaning it currently is not in this alpha release to save wasting effort getting it pre-installed again.
Tour
Tour is going to undergo a major revamp and be completely rewritten in this release, once the Store is complete. It is going to be a lot simpler, instead driving users to tasks to begin their time in Feren OS by doing.
Feren OS theme for GTK3 applications
GTK3 applications use Adwaita in this alpha by default. This is purely for experimentation (to survey how much Feren OS relies on GTK+) and is not planned to be a permanent change — the Feren OS theme for GTK3 applications will return by Release Candidate 1.
Folders in Files’s sidebar
The folders in Files’s sidebar are normally added by Feren OS first login setup scripts, but they are currently not implemented in this alpha, meaning folders in Files’s sidebar are missing and might not be translated to non-English languages.
Bootscreen
Like with the Feren OS on 20.04 Alpha builds, the bootscreen… broke (again)… so it is not here in this Alpha. Instead, enjoy scrolling text when turning on, restarting, or shutting down your Feren OS device, while using this alpha.
Once fixed, the bootscreen will be provided as an update to existing Alpha users.
Installable themes, icon sets, and backgrounds from prior releases
You currently cannot install these, via the usual means, as they have not yet been brought over to this release’s repositories. Bringing them over is a low-priority task on the todo list before the final release, so expect them to arrive between 2023.07 release candidate releases.
Feren OS’s alternative themes
Feren OS’s alternative themes are not installed, and will fail to install if you attempt to install them, as they are in a semi-broken state right now, and fixing them is a low-priority task. Expect (most of) them to come back in Release Candidate 1, though.
Fixes for other bugs
There are a bunch of other bugs already documented and pending fixes in this alpha build, which you can find here:
Conclusion
That’s it for the changes in the first alpha of Feren OS 2023.07. The plan is to release a series of Alphas, then Betas and Release Candidates, of Feren OS 2023.07 as it reaches specific points in its development, all the way to the release of Feren OS 2023.07.
You can check out what’s still pending for Feren OS 2023.07 before it can be considered stable over here: https://github.com/orgs/feren-OS/projects/11
Otherwise, you can download Feren OS 2023.07 Alpha 1 at https://ferenos.weebly.com/test-feren-os-202307.html. Make sure to report any bugs you find in these releases, and until the next Alpha release, enjoy!
