14 DAY TRIAL // Webconverger 24, an evolution of the hybrid client for deployment in places like offices or Internet cafes, where only web applications are used, has been released and is now available for download.
Webconverger is not your average Linux distribution. In fact, it's very different from anything you could possibly find out there. It's being designed and developed with a single goal in mind, namely to provide the best Kiosk experience possible.
Kiosk operating systems are a little different from the normal distributions out there and they usually serve a much simpler function. For example, you can set up a computer that provides free access to the Internet, but it will not allow the users to roam free in the rest of the operating system.
“It has been 3 months since the Webconverger 23 release which has been a fine stable release. Now it's time to upgrade for Live users for security reasons and a couple of new features mainly driven by Firefox,” says the developer in the official announcement.
Probably the most notable change in the new Webconverger 24 version is the upgrade to the new version of Mozilla Firefox 28. This is a very important update for both the users of Webconverger and Firefox, as Mozilla implemented a large number of security fixes and improvements. Webconverger uses Firefox as the main interface for the operating system, so you can imagine why any Firefox update is of paramount importance.
A number of flash security updates have been implemented, but the users have been asked to try HTML5 video instead. This will allow developers to try to deprecate Flash in the future.
The Linux kernel has been updated to version 3.12, which is an LTS branch. This should ensure that the operating system can stay installed longer, without the need to upgrade the OS to a new Linux kernel branch.
Also, a new API that complements the new and yet to be launched filter.webconverger.com service for fine grained blacklisting has been released. This is very similar with the OpenDNS project, but it's better and cheaper.
“For install users of 23.0, the upgrade delta is about 178M, when automatically upgrading. Github does throttle your connection or if you are on a poor internet connection, upgrading can be quite a long winded process,” also noted the developers.
For more details, you can read the official announcement. Download Webconverger 24 right now from Softpedia.