Salix Ratpoison 14.0.1beta1

[gapan]

Just when everyone thought that we have probably abandoned it, here's an update on our Ratpoison edition! This is a beta release for 14.0.1 and as our previous Ratpoison releases, it is intended to be used without a mouse at all!

In terms of bundled applications, some things changed. This time we have included Wordgrinder, a word processor that has minimal features but as a command line application, it can be used only with the keyboard. Also the SC spreadsheet is available from the ratmenu as well. Pidgin has been replaced by a combination of the popular IRSSI IRC client and the MCabber Jabber client. Also, Alpine has replaced Mutt as the default mail application, as it is a lot easier to setup than the latter. Otherwise, it's mostly the same applications that were included in previous Ratpoison releases.

A new system configuration tool has been included in this release for the first time; reposetup. You can find it in the System section of the ratmenu and it will allow you to easily configure the package manager with a repository mirror that is fast for you. It is recommended that everyone runs this tool after installation, as the repository mirror that is included by default might not be the fastest for everyone. By the way, reposetup is also available to users of all our other editions as well, as long as you have kept up with package upgrades.

With this release, a non-PAE, i486 kernel has be included as well as the i686 PAE kernel included in our Xfce and KDE editions. In order to use the non-PAE, i486 kernel, you'll have to input "huge.s" in the initial prompt you get as soon as the installation medium is booted.

A word of warning: this is not your average newbie-friendly distribution. There is no graphical login screen, when you login, you enter the linux terminal. You are expected to run "startx" to start ratpoison itself. Even then, it is not much more newbie-friendly than the linux terminal. You'll have to use keyboard combinations to do anything. Some hints:
* the "Ctrl-t ?" keyboard combination will show a screen with all available keyboard combinations. They all start with "Ctrl-t" and then another key/keyboard combination.
* you can get the ratmenu by hitting "Ctrl-t r". This menu is keyboard driven only as well.
* the Vimprobable2 browser is started with "Ctrl-t v"
* use "f" to follow links in Vimprobable2. Make sure you read the manpage too.
* the terminal is started with "Ctrl-t c"
* all ratpoison configuration is done in your ~/.ratpoisonrc
* the menus themselves are scripts in the ~/.ratmenu directory.
* run "man ratpoison"to get more information on setting up ratpoison. It can really be scripted to do just about anything with keystrokes.

So, after all that, here are the download links:

Salix Ratpoison 14.0.1beta1 (i486 and i686, 32-bit):
(size: 531MB, md5: 80b7e5c0d23c922cfd65c9e22ba3aeb4)
http://sourceforge.net/projects/salix/f ... o/download

Salix64 Ratpoison 14.0.1beta1 (x86_64, 64-bit):
(size: 467MB, md5: d7bbaa9570063e34bb0645d0e102c228)
http://sourceforge.net/projects/salix/f ... o/download

Please help us with testing this release! Thanks!

[gapan]

Known issues with the beta so far:
* The exposé function from the menu doesn't work. It's because it needs a perl module that has deprecated. We'll just remove it from the menu and the ratpoison package, as there is no fix.
* In Basic mode, there is a "Manage Printing" menu item that doesn't work, as cups is not installed. The menu item will be removed.
* Gmountman wouldn't work. slapt-get -i udisks, and it's fixed (you need to restart ratpoison).

[sqlpython]

RatPoison is always a welcomed alternative.
Thanks for the continued work.

[mrstordal]

I've been using the Salix 13.37 Ratpoison edition until now, and installed this new beta version yesterday!
Looking forward to explore the Wordgrinder! Everything looks great so far...

[gapan]

RC1 isos are ready: http://forum.salixos.org/viewtopic.php?f=17&t=4951