The time has come for Fedora fans to test the Beta release of the upcoming Fedora 12 (Constantine) Linux distribution, announced a few minutes ago by the Fedora Project developers. This release is powered by Linux kernel 2.6.31.4, and it includes the KDE 4.3.2 and GNOME 2.28.0 desktop environments. Moblin support was also added in this release, as well as better power management, audio, webcam and video codec support. GNOME Shell is also available for testing, in the default software repository, and it will offer a preview of how GNOME 3 will look like. However, checking the feature list for Fedora 12, it appears that the developers completed all of them.

Fedora 12 Beta

Highlights of Fedora 12 Beta:

· Linux Kernel 2.6.31.4;
· Dracut, the new booting system;
· Plymouth graphical boot splash;
· KDE 4.3.2;
· GNOME 2.28.0;
· New artwork;
· Empathy Instant Messenger;
· Moblin support;
· Better webcam support;
· Spanning desktop support;
· Improved HD video codecs;
· Network Manager mobile broadband for GSM networks;
· EXT4 is the default filesystem;
· x86 optimized for the Intel Atom processors (compiled for i686);
· RPM XZ compression;
· Guest virtual machines for KVM;
· Automatic bug reporting tool (ABRT);
· New NetworkManager with better IPv6 and Mobile Broadband support;
· Improved power management support;
· Support for Intel BIOS-RAID;
· Better support for Intel hardware;
· Clustered Samba support;
· Improved PulseAudio;
· Improved PackageKit;
· Improved KVM virtualization;
· Fedora Studio;
· BSoD (Bluetooth Service On Demand);
· NFS4;
· NetBeans 6.7;
· Ogg Theora 1.1.0;
· PolicyKit 1.0;
· Improved SystemTap.

Fedora 12 Beta Boot Screen

Fedora 12 Beta Login Screen

There are other many other minor features in this Beta release, so make sure you check out the official release notes for Fedora 12. The release cycle will continue with a Release Candidate version, scheduled for the 4th of November, and the final release on November 17th, 2009.

Release Schedule:

August 25th, 2009 - Alpha release
October 20th, 2009 - Beta release
November 4th, 2009 - Release Candidate
November 17th, 2009 - Fedora 12 final release

Download Fedora 12 Beta right now from Softpedia.

Remember that this is a beta release and it should NOT be installed on production machines. It is intended to be used for testing purposes only. Please report bugs to the Red Hat Bugzilla.