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The SparkyLinux 2023.07 semi-rolling distribution has been released today by the SparkyLinux developers to provide you with some bleeding-edge packages from the Debian Testing repositories.
Powered by the Linux 6.3 kernel series, SparkyLinux 2023.07 brings packages from the upcoming Debian 13 “Trixie” (Debian Testing) and SparkyLinux Testing repositories, from where users can install newer or LTS (Long-Term Support) kernel versions like Linux 6.4, Linux 6.1 LTS, or Linux 5.15 LTS.
The good news for users wanting to install SparkyLinux on their computers with Secure Boot enabled is that the live ISO image of the SparkyLinux 2023.07 rolling release comes with Secure Boot enabled by default. On top of that, the devs added Debian’s non-free-firmware repository for top-notch hardware support.
Among other noteworthy changes in the SparkyLinux 2023.07 release, there’s the addition of the in-house baked sparky-locker screensaver based on i3lock instead of xscreensaver for the Xfce, LXQt, and Openbox editions, removal of all i386 packages from the amd64 ISOs, as well as new artwork.
Furthermore, this release adds the LightDM display manager instead of SDDM for the Xfce, LXQt, and Openbox editions, along with the lightdm-gtk-greeter-settings tool that lets you easily configure various LightDM options.
For the Openbox edition, this release also removes the Lock option from the jgmenu and adds a new LockScreen option to Openbox wm-logout to fix logout issues reported by users from previous SparkyLinux releases.
Under the hood, we find GCC 12.3.0 as the default system compiler, Python 3.11.4, systemd 253-rc2 init system, LibreOffice 7.4.5 office suite, Mozilla Thunderbird 102.13.0 email client, and Mozilla Firefox 102.13.0 ESR web browser (Firefox 115.0.2 ESR is also available in the SparkyLinux repos).
SparkyLinux 2023.07 is available for download right now from the official website as six editions featuring the latest KDE Plasma 5.27 LTS, Xfce 4.18, LXQt 1.2, and MATE 1.26 desktop environments, as well as MinimalGUI (Openbox 3.6.1) and MinimalCLI (text mode) editions.
This will be the base for the next major SparkyLinux stable release, SparkyLinux 8 “The Seven Sisters”, which will be based on the forthcoming Debian GNU/Linux 13 “Trixie” operating system series, due out in 2025.
Last updated 10 months ago
