Release Candidate version now available for download

Apr 4, 2015 04:23 GMT  ·  By

Paweł Pijanowski has announced the immediate availability for download and testing of the RC (Release Candidate) version of the upcoming SparkyLinux 4.0 computer operating system. This distribution comes now in two flavors, with the LXDE and Openbox desktops.

SparkyLinux 4.0 Release Candidate contains a great number of updated package from the upstream Debian 8 “Jessie” (Testing), as well as SparkyLinux software repositories, a new flat theme called Sparky4, a new flat iconset dubbed Ultra-Flat-Icons, and a new wallpaper named Vortex.

Additionally, the new release integrates the look of all the system’s elements, implements numerous visual improvements, replaces Gnome-Alsamixe with Pulse Audio Mixer in the LXDE edition, replaces XChat with HexChat as the default IRC client, removes Wbar, and updates the Live Installer.

“I am happy to announce SparkyLinux 4.0 RC. The new iso images provide the release candidate, before the final version of 4.0 will be out,” says Paweł Pijanowski. “Many of the changes and improvements have been made thanks to suggestions of our small but strong community.”

A complete system rebranding is in plan for SparkyLinux 4.0

The Release Candidate version of SparkyLinux 4.0 also introduces a traditional layout for the desktop consisting of a single panel located on the bottom edge of the screen, updates the Boot-Repair utility in the Live CDs, updates the Sparky Backup System ISO building tool to work in a terminal environment or by using the Yad GUI.

A complete system rebranding is in plan for the final release of SparkyLinux 4.0, which means that the distribution will no longer be identified as Debian GNU/Linux, but as Sparky GNU/Linux. Of course, many other small improvements have been implemented, and several bugs have been fixed for Sparky applications, which have been moved to SourceForge git repositories.

Download SparkyLinux 4.0 RC LXDE and SparkyLinux 4.0 RC Openbox editions right now from Softpedia. Keep in mind, though, that they are unstable operating systems, thus not suitable for deployment on production environments. Both 64 and 32-bit computer platforms are supported at this time.