14 DAY TRIAL // SparkyLinux 2.1 Beta 1 with MATE desktop environment, a lightweight, fast and simple Linux distribution designed for both old and new computers featuring customized Enlightenment and LXDE desktops, was announced by the SparkyLinux team of developers.
SparkyLinux comes in various flavors, depending on what desktop environment is using. Just a few days ago, SparkyLinux 2.1 “Eris” Ultra Edition, based on Openbox, was announced.
SparkyLinux 2.1 Beta 1 for MATE (Gnome 2 fork) has been made available for download. Just like it's other stable brothers, this particular distribution is built on Debian Wheezy, which is the testing branch.
“A few years ago, when I started my adventure with Linux, GNOME 2 was my favorite graphical interface. ‘Evolutionary’ changes of GNOME 3 completely discouraged me to it. But I found a big potential in other desktops – Xfce, e17, LXDE and Openbox. But the sentiment remained.
“My hope revived with MATE, I have been following its development almost from the beginning. Today MATE is in very good condition so I decided to restore the glory of GNOME 2 for myself (and others),” stated one of the developers.
Highlights of SparkyLinux 2.1 Beta 1 “Eris” MATE Edition:
• Linux kernel 3.2.0-4 has been implemented; • mate-core 1.4.0 and mate-desktop 1.4.2-1 has been added; • Iceweasel 10.0.12, Icedove 10.0.11-1, Brasero 3.4.1, CUPS 1.5.3, Exaile 0.3.2.2, GIMP 2.8.2, Gparted 0.12.1, and LibreOffice 3.5.4 are just a few of the most important applications implemented in this release.
For now, only the 32-bit version has been released. The 64-bit version will be published as Release Candidate after fixing the first bugs.
Minimum hardware requirements for “Ultra Edition” are pretty low: an i386 or x86_64 CPU, 384 MB RAM memory, a 512 MB SWAP partition, a DVD drive or USB Flash Disk, 5GB of disk space (minimum) for hard drive installation (10GB is recommended).
Check out the official announcement for a complete list features and instructions. Download SparkyLinux 2.1 Beta 1 for MATE right now from Softpedia. Remember that this is a beta version and it should NOT be installed on production machines. It is intended for testing purposes only.