[Announcement] Window Maker Live 12.8 with GNUstep

[Paul Seelig]

Hello all,

please allow for bringing to your attention the existence and
availability of this Linux distribution project with relevance to GNUstep.

The Linux distribution project Window Maker Live is now available for
download in version 12.8.

Window Maker Live is an installable Linux Live ISO based on the current
Bookworm branch of Debian.  The system uses the Window Maker window
manager as the default graphical user interface. Its components have
been carefully preconfigured and the desktop environment has a
consistent visual appearance. Window Maker Live integrates selected
components from other desktop environments such as XFCE4, MATE, LXQT,
with a special focus on GNUstep.

Window Maker Live can somewhat be considered a poor man's GNUstep Live
DVD, although GNUstep is not the main focus of the distribution. To my
knowledge there is no other Linux distribution out there that comes even
close to this level of usability of GNUstep integration into the
desktop. At the end of the day, the whole project aims at being a
perfectly functional multipurpose user environment providing choices
beyond any specific focus.

Some highlights of what's new in this release besides the much better
integration of GNUstep components:

* Previous [https://sourceforge.net/projects/previous], which implements
the m68k hardware of NeXT computers in software and allows the operation
of the NeXTSTEP and OPENSTEP operating systems.

* 86Box [https://github.com/86Box/86Box], an emulator for x86-based PC's
with support for Intel CPU's up to a maximum of Pentium II. Perfectly
runs both NeXTSTEP and OPENSTEP for Intel.

* scantailor-advanced
[https://github.com/ScanTailor-Advanced/scantailor-advanced], an
excellent program for post-processing scanned book pages.

* TeX Live [https://www.tug.org/texlive], the internationally leading
document production system for TeX and LaTeX.

* .. and so much more that you can find out better in practice.

Unlike other Linux distributions, not included are any of the common web
browsers or office suites and other usual suspects. Instead, the web
browsers PaleMoon [https://www.palemoon.org], GNUstep based netsurf
variant WebSurf.app
[http://web.archive.org/web/20240624015246/https://vcs.vera-visions.com/eukara/WebSurf/],
the Otter-Browser [https://otter-browser.org] and, for the command line,
lynx [https://lynx.invisible-island.net] and 'links'
[http://links.twibright.com] are included.  For mail there are
claws-mail [https://www.claws-mail.org] and GNUMail
[http://www.nongnu.org/gnustep-nonfsf/gnumail], as well as mutt
[http://www.mutt.org] on the command line.

What is not immediately apparent from the graphical interface, and has
therefore been deliberately ignored in all the reviews seen so far, is
the amount and usefulness of the included command line tools.  Pretty
much everything you need for actual system administration and repairing
broken systems is there. This includes all possible and impossible tools
for repairing most file system variants, clonezilla, android tools,
chntpw and ntfs-3g, various partitioning tools, (de)compression
programs, and much more. It should certainly be possible for so inclined
users to be able to do without the graphical interface entirely and,
thanks to screen/tmux, mc, vim/emacs, mutt and so on, still be able to
work relatively comfortably just on the console.

This distribution is almost certainly unsuitable for users who are
rather inexperienced in UNIX matters, as its handling goes beyond the
usage conventions of Windows and MacOS.  For normal users, it is better
to use Mint, MX Linux, Ubuntu, or EndevaourOS instead, where no
historically influenced UNIX rough edges are to be expected.

This description at best actually only scratches the surface and I
didn't want to have to break my fingers writing. Instead of trying to
get an idea based on a necessarily incomplete description, it is
advisable to simply examine the downloaded ISO more closely in a virtual
machine.

The ISO images are available for i386 and amd64. Unfortunately, while
creating an ARM variant (arm64) is easily possible on a Pinebook Pro,
the result cannot be booted on the very same Pinebook Pro due to its
lack of EFI, and how to create an ISO that can be booted with u-boot is
still a mystery to me. The arm64 ISO apparently works as expected in
QEMU, but whether this also works on a real ARM machine is unknown. 
Since there is no other ARM hardware for minimal testing, an arm64 ISO
of unknown quality was not provided for the time being.

https://sourceforge.net/projects/wmlive
https://sourceforge.net/projects/wmlive/files/wmlive-bookworm-12.8

Users can build their own customized ISO from the same build tree source
code
[https://sourceforge.net/projects/wmlive/files/wmlive-bookworm-12.8/wmlive-bookworm-12.8.tar.xz]
which was used to create the very same ISO image.  In fact, a Window
Maker Live system installed to disk already integrates everything
necessary to create its own distribution medium. Obviously, there is a
certain fascination involved with this recursion aspect.

Please have a look and let me know if this has any potential to serve
the GNUstep cause.

Thanks for GNUstep!

Regards,
Paul Seelig