Suvarna Garge (Editor)

DesktopBSD

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Developer
  
DesktopBSD Team

Working state
  
Current

Package manager
  
FreeBSD Ports

OS family
  
Unix-like

Source model
  
Open source

Latest release
  
1.7 / September 7, 2009 (2009-09-07)

DesktopBSD is a Unix-derivative, desktop-oriented operating system based on FreeBSD. Its goal is to combine the stability of FreeBSD with the ease-of-use of K Desktop Environment 3.5, which is the default graphical user interface.

Contents

History and development

DesktopBSD is essentially a customized installation of FreeBSD and is not a fork of FreeBSD. DesktopBSD is always based on FreeBSD's latest stable branch but incorporates certain customized, pre-installed software such as KDE and DesktopBSD utilities and configuration files.

A common misconception about DesktopBSD is that it is intended as a rival to TrueOS as a BSD-based desktop distribution, since they are similar in structure and goals. However, the DesktopBSD project was started approximately one year before the PC-BSD project, despite the fact that the first PC-BSD release came out before DesktopBSD's. Neither the DesktopBSD nor PC-BSD projects intend to rival each other and are completely independent projects with distinctive features and intended outcomes: for example, DesktopBSD uses ports and packages for additional software installation, whereas PC-BSD introduced PBIs.

The current release is 1.7 which was made available on September 7, 2009. The release announcement stated "This is the last and final release of the DesktopBSD project" because the lead developer could no longer contribute the time required to maintain it. As of May 2010 development of DesktopBSD has been restarted under new leadership. Development and announcements stopped soon afterwards, leading to speculation that the project had been dropped again. However, on 10 March 2013, a forum post appeared announcing that the project was "in the process of being revived." The roadmap for DesktopBSD 2.0 was announced in September 2015 on the DesktopBSD site, along with posted screenshots of a GNOME3-based desktop.

Graphical features

  • Installer allowing to partition disks and create users
  • Tool for managing, installing and updating software using FreeBSD ports system
  • Management of network interfaces and mounting/unmounting drives

    • 1.7 release

    The 1.7 release includes

  • FreeBSD 7.2 as base system
  • OpenOffice.org 3.1.1 as feature-rich office suite
  • Pre-installed Java SE 6 environment
  • X.Org release 7.4 with extensive graphics support
  • Large number of enhancements, fixes and minor software updates
  • Supports GRUB bootloader on i386 and includes a graphical configuration tool

    • On 7 September 2009 DesktopBSD 1.7 was made available on the project site.

    References

    DesktopBSD Wikipedia
    (Text) CC BY-SA