Simon Peter, the creator of the AppImage self-contained package format, has published the release of the helloSystem 0.8.1 distribution, based on FreeBSD 13 and positioned as a system for ordinary users that macOS lovers who are dissatisfied with Apple's policies can switch to. The system is devoid of the complications inherent in modern Linux distributions, is under complete user control and allows former macOS users to feel comfortable. To get acquainted with the distribution kit, a boot image has been generated, 941 MB in size (torrent).
The interface resembles macOS and includes two panels - the top with the global menu and the bottom with the application bar. The panda-statusbar package developed by the CyberOS distribution kit (former PandaOS) is used to form the global menu and status bar. The Dock application bar is based on the work of the cyber-dock project, also from the developers of CyberOS. To manage files and place shortcuts on the desktop, the Filer file manager is being developed, based on pcmanfm-qt from the LXQt project. The default browser is Falkon, but Firefox and Chromium are optional. Applications are delivered in self-contained packages. To launch applications, the launch utility is used, which finds the program and analyzes errors during execution.
The project develops a series of its own applications, such as a configurator, an installer, a mountarchive utility for mounting archives into a file system tree, a utility for recovering data from ZFS, an interface for partitioning disks, a network configuration indicator, a screenshot utility, a Zeroconf server browser, an indicator for configuration volume, a utility for setting up a boot environment. For development, the Python language and the Qt library are used. Supported application development components include PyQt, QML, Qt, KDE Frameworks, and GTK, in descending order of preference. ZFS is used as the main file system, and UFS, exFAT, NTFS, EXT4, HFS+, XFS, and MTP are supported for mounting.
Main changes in helloSystem 0.8.1:
- Implemented the ability to access the network when connected via USB to an Android smartphone (USB tethering).
- Added support for USB systems with 5.1 surround sound such as BOSE Companion 5.
- Disks larger than 80 GB have a swap partition enabled by default.
- Saved language and keyboard settings to UEFI NVRAM.
- Implemented loading the kernel and modules without displaying text on the screen (to display diagnostic messages during boot, press "V", to boot into single-user mode - "S", and to show the bootloader menu - Backspace).
- The volume control menu shows manufacturers and models of audio devices with USB interface.
- Added graphics driver information to "About This Computer" dialog
- The menu has auto-completion of paths starting with the characters "~" and "/".
- The ability to create users without administrator rights, delete users, and enable/disable automatic login has been added to the user management application.
- The interface of the utility for creating Live assemblies has been improved.
- The development of a utility for creating backups using the capabilities of the ZFS file system has begun.
Source: opennet.ru