Dec 21, 2010 09:40 GMT  ·  By

The X.Org Foundation has announced the release of X.Org 7.6, the latest update to the X Windows System. X.Org 7.6 comes with X.Org Server 1.9, which has been available for a while now, and brings several main new features and changes, along with the usual bug fixes and small updates.

"The X.Org Foundation and the global community of X.Org developers announce the release of X11R7.6 - Release 7.6 of the X Window System, Version 11," the X.Org Foundation announcement read.

"This release is the seventh modular release of the X Window System. The next full release will be X11R7.7 and is expected in 2011. X11R7.6 supports Linux, BSD, Solaris, MacOS X, Microsoft Windows and GNU Hurd systems," it added.

"It incorporates new features, and stability and correctness fixes, including improved autoconfiguration heuristics, enhanced support for input devices, better documentation, and takes the next step in migrating to the XCB client APIs," it explained.

The HAL framework has been dropped on Linux and X.Org now relies on udev to discover new input devices and hot-plugging. HAL is still used on all other platforms.

X.Org 7.6 is the first release to come with the X protocol C-language Binding (XCB) included in the katamari collection by default. XCB replaces Xlib and is required by several modules including libX11, xlsatoms, xlsclients and xwininfo.

The X.Org 7.6 katamari is a bit late, but managed to land in 2010. It was originally aimed at an August launch, but was pushed back with only the X.Org Server 1.9 being made available then.

The second deadline was November, but the team wasn't able to make that either. Still, it has now been released and the next version, X.Org 7.7, is expected to be available next year, probably around this time as well.

X.Org 7.6 is available for download here.