It has been a while since my latest blog post, so I thought it would be good to talk a bit about the goings-on.
First about the Slackware web server. I know, people, that we have been without http://www.slackware.com/ for a few weeks now, but rest assured that the site will eventually be back. Either we put the old web site code on a temporary server or we wait a little longer and publish a new site based on a new CMS. It all pretty much depends on how much time we can volunteer for this – it is mostly handled by a few people in the coreteam. Pat should focus on Slackware and make sure we get a new stable release at some point – there is a lot to do still on that front.
And then about my own packaging activities.
There was a new release of LibreOffice yesterday, and I am currently building packages for that. If there are no issues with the build then you can expect those packages tomorrow.
KDE release team is in the process of releasing the first beta of KDE SC 4.9, and I intend to make packages for that. There was a heated discussion about this beta when the new release manager announced he was going to call off the beta1 release… but all issues have been resolved yesterday and new tarballs are going to be made available ahead of time to the packagers. There are quite a few changes compared to KDE 4.8.x so it will cost me a while to work out the updates to the KDE.SlackBuild framework.
I also hope that VLC releases their version 2.0.2 soon. It has been lingering just around the corner for a while, but a recent fall-out between several of the core developers threatened the whole project’s existence when their most important Linux developer quit the team out of frustration. That animosity has now subsided, the team is whole again, and development is progressing toward a new release.
I also want to thank the kind people who donated a few bucks after all the upheavals about the Slackware webserver’s outage. Although I work on Slackware in my spare time, because I like it, it’s my main hobby so to speak, getting some funds enabled me to buy a new and faster build box last year, and now I ordered a Raspberry-Pi (finally…) and I am also looking for a good tablet which allows the installation of a different OS than only Android… so that I can put my unfinished port of Slackware to modern ARM architectures on it and finally release that. A release does not make sense if it runs on only one device (the Trim Slice). Perhaps I will buy some more ARM hardware too. Even Pat was becoming excited about this ARM port.
Eric
All right
man, it’s good to hear you’re alive 🙂
you should make it a habit to post some update or just say hello world every week or two 😉
btw i’ve heard great stuff about this libre office release..
Thanks, Eric – looking forward to the new KDE beta. On another note, I never install the k3b package. I usually get it from git and build it with some extra stuff that isn’t stock. That said, I can’t find a singular slackbuild for only k3b, except for an old one that does not use cmake. I gave up trying to modify one, but I am going to try again someday. I really need to learn how to do that anyway. 🙂
Thanks for that update Eric. We will be eagerly waiting for LibreOffice and KDE 4.9 beta
Interesting rambling! I look forward to the new slackware.com. I am also quite confident in the opinion that we all are quite appreciative of the work you do for our distro and great stuff you provide the community….cheers!
All-righty, then. I used a template from Slackbuilds.org and made an almost proper package. It seems that git has no man, info, or doc stuff, so I had to comment that stuff out. But k3b does work! At least so far…….
I’m very interested in the ARM port for the new devices, owning a tegra2 phone and, since a few days, a raspberry pi, on which I installed the prebuilt armedslack-13.37 distributed in the raspberrypi.org’s forum: I have still to find the time to try -current on it.
Two days ago arrived also the other one (on the opening day I ordered two, one from Farnell and one from RS) and passed it to my Debian fella (that suggested me to have a look at “Micro Men”, and I will very soon) to try raspbian (http://www.raspbian.org/).
I also hinted my 73 years old father, that likes to try technology gimmicks, to give his ipad to my bro’ and buy himself a trasformer prime tf300t: I tried it myself and with a quad core tegra 3 proc. seems a really nice hardware to run slackware on; maybe I’ll steal him (and return it bricked, lol) 😉
just finished watching “Micro Men”, a beautiful movie 🙂
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00n5b92
Look at http://www.slackware.com/ .. we brought the old site back up on connie, our developers’ server. Now that that hurdle is out of the way (after some controlled anger management this afternoon and not stop until it was done) we can now concentrate on a new site without your hot breath in our necks 🙂
Eric
@toudi,
Yeah I will probably ramble a bit more frequently, the last weeks were not good healthwise and my motivation was down to zero. Getting the web server back up was my focus to get out of that bad mood.
LibreOffice packages are ready, I am running 3.5.4 here, I will have to find some time to update the repository with that. Tomorrow I will start on KDE 4.9 beta1.
Eric
Hi ponce
Unfortunately my new port is targeting newer ARM architectures (armv7 with hardfloat) than the one used in the Raspberry Pi (armv6). And ARMedslack will run fine on the R.Pi however ARMedslack does not have support for the device’s FPU which causes it to not use the R.Pi’s full potential.
A Transformer Prime would be an ideal candidate for the new ARM port. The Prime allows for unlocking the bootloader and run another OS than Android (although this will void your warranty). The new KDE 4.8.3 supports multi-touch interfaces and KDE has plasma-mobile which would be a great desktop interface.
I am way behind with my port – I need to (re-)compile all additions to slackware-current since April 7, and I have no KDE yet.
What holds me up is creating the initrd for the installer… that is the biggest puzzle. I only have one device to test it on (my TrimSlice) and that device is also my development machine… I can not get it to run in QEMU.
Eric
My best wishes for the health matters, Eric.
I thought about the raspberry and it can be that while running armedslack-current, I’ll try also raspbian on it, so maybe I’ll have the occasion (need to grasp the few life offers me) to play again with my best friend, Pope Slitta.
If you decide to opt for a Transformer Prime, I’ll get one too myself and try to follow your steps.
Really dunno if I can help in any way, but I will be very glad too. 🙂
sorry: above, too/to
Hi
Besides the upcoming KDE 4.9, do you have plan to make KDE 4.8.4 packages next week ?
Since it would be the last 4.8 release, do you think it can make its way into -current ?
Thanks for your hard work 😀
Cheers
Hi cendryon
I will create a set of KDE 4.8.4 packages next week to replace my 4.8.3 set. I can not say if that will also end up in the next Slackware release.
Eric
I hope we get to test Slackware on the Pi very soon. I won’t even order one until Slackware is ready for it.
@Silviu: armedslack-13.37 is just ready and runs fine on my raspberry; -current will surely run better, being optimized for the ARMv5te cpu, but as Eric said above, it won’t use raspberry’s floating processing unit, so it won’t use the full potential of the raspberry pi cpu (ARMv6).
Today armedslack-current has been updated: as soon as I get home, I’ll try its new miniroot on the raspberry and will report back in the linuxquestions’ dedicated thread.
https://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/slackware-14/armedslack-and-raspberry-pi-915172/
Eric Hameleers… THANK YOU for ALL that you do! That goes for Pat V. and ALL the Slackware team. Since I don’t have the expertise to assist with hands-on projects to help Slackware, I assist with my wallet and my writing abilities. I will continue to do so in the future.
Regards,
~Eric aka Nocturnal Slacker
Hi Eric,
Slackware users helping out other Slackware users are the most important asset to Slackware in my opinion.
It is the reason why people are still drawn to Slackware – if you have sane questions you will get expert answers.
Please continue writing so that others can enjoy and appreciate it. And thanks for the monetary support.
Cheers, Eric
New VLC, new KDE, new LibreOffice, new web server? Super-awesome job there 🙂
New OpenJDK too in the meantime 🙂
I finished the KDE 4.9 Beta1 packages and will upload those today.
Eric