Announce: Slint64-14.2.1 is released.

[Linux for blind general discussion]

Hello Paul,

Le 01/01/2018 à 06:51, Linux for blind general discussion a écrit :
> Is there any chance of Slint64 acquiring Live DVD capabilities anytime
> soon. I couldn't see any way of test-driving without installing it.
> Note that Salix can do the Live DVD routine:
> <http://guide.salixos.org/212BootingfromaSalixInstallationmedium.html#3_1_2>.

Providing ta Live DVD is in my TODO list, and I even began to work at it
some months ago with the help of Dimitris Tzemos, Slackel maintainer who
also maintain the stuff needed for Salix Live.

One of my goals is to ease installation in languages written with
complex scripts, especially bi-directional ones (like a mix of Persian
and English) or with ideograms like Chinese, Japanese or Korean.

The rationale is that although there be no issue for these languages
in graphical mode, currently the text and dialog based Slint installer,
derived from Slackware, can't lay out properly these languages on the
screen. Additionally the speakup driver included in the kernel we use
works only for the Latin-1 scripts (Samuel Thibault has provided a
patch to solve that, but only applied applied on newer kernel versions).

So the idea is: start Slint live in graphical mode, from there make the
needed disk or SSD partitions (we already ship gparted) and install, if
and when the user is satisfied with the live system.

I will resume work on that when I will have enhanced the documentation
and dealt with most remaining issues with version 14.2.1. Making the
Live version and testing it will then need some time as I don't want to
provide half finished or half working stuff.

To shorten a long story, if I'd be asked for an ETA I'd answer:
hopefully no later than the end of February 2018.

Meanwhile, installing Slint doesn't take long: between 10 and 30 minutes
on an already formatted drive depending on the machine.

The system itself needs a partition of at least 11 or 9G depending if
you install KDE or not (all other packages are always installed). Of
course you'll need some more room to actually used it.

Greetings,

Didier