14 DAY TRIAL // Alpine Linux, a security-oriented, lightweight Linux distribution based on musl libc and Busybox, which make up the terminal, has just been upgraded to version 3.1.0 and it comes with a large number of updated packages.
Alpine Linux is not your average distribution and it's not built for beginners, that much is clear right from the start. By default, it only runs in a terminal and there is no desktop environment, although installing something like Xfce is a rather simple procedure if you have the time and the patience to do it.
Like most of the other Linux OSes out there, you can do pretty much anything you want from a terminal, so this is a product for people who don't really care about having a GUI or a mouse pointer.
In fact, Alpine Linux has been around for quite some time and some of the older users have already heard about it and its existence is not really news. It's part of a small niche of Linux distros that are aimed at some particular users. It's also a good way to learn to use Linux starting from the bottom up, which is always the best method.
Alpine Linux 3.1.0 is a major update
Many of the previous updates for this distro have been pretty mild in comparison. Some new packages here and there, but for the most part it was pretty much pretty tame. Now, the latest 3.1.0 release is quite impressive and it should provide a much needed boost for the OS.
"Alpine Linux is built around musl libc and busybox. This makes it smaller and more resource efficient than traditional GNU/Linux. A container with a fully usable base system takes no more than 7-10 MB. This makes it ideal for containers and diskless systems. Less disk usage also means less disk I/O and fewer cache misses which makes the system more responsive."
"The OS tries to be simple and stay out of the way for the user. It uses the OpenRC init system (similar to gentoo) and provides a very simple – but fully usable – default, while still giving the option to choose more advanced tools," is noted in the official announcement.
The developers also explained that openvswitch is now supported, Firefox has been updated to version 31.2.0, VLC 2.1.5 has been implemented by default, GIMP has been upgraded to version 2.8.14, and a new built has been made available for the Rasberry PI.
The complete changelog can be found on the official website. You can download Alpine Linux 3.1.0 right now from Softpedia. The developer of the OS has extensive documentation on his website, if you feel that the distro is too complicated to use.
