Devuan 6 (excalibur) mate testing iso uploaded

greenjeans · 2025-03-14 01:36:12

Well i'll probably catch **** for starting another thread down here, but this seems worth it.

This is NOT an official Devuan release, nor a Vuu-do release. This is a user snapshot
of Devuan 6 (excalibur), updated completely as of 3/13/2025 with the Mate desktop environment.
It's purpose is to provide a quick small iso for those interested in testing the
next version of Devuan.

Hopefully some folks might find it useful. It snapshotted and installed just fine and everything
seems to be working with just some tiny bugs here and there. Updates are still coming fast so
there might be some waiting already. Note this is not the Mate metapackage, just the core and
utilities plus a few selected packages for function and convenience.

https://sourceforge.net/projects/vuu-do … te-mini-6/

Passwords:
(user)devuan=devuan
root=root

This is a liveCD and includes the Refracta-installer for fast simple install.
This is not uefi-enabled. The os-prober has been enabled when you install grub, if you
need to disable it before install, while still in live-session, just edit
/etc/default/grub and /usr/share/grub/default/grub to disable the prober.

In most respects it is identical to current Devuan, I have not "vuu-do-fied" it,
it contains all original files, docs, translations, help files, original configs,
artwork etc. with the following exceptions:

This is a "mini", it contains no browser, office or multimedia programs whatsoever,
just the infrastructure for you to build on and configure as you see fit. There are no
release notes or manual as this is stock Devuan and ample documentation is available
on the site and forum. More info in the readme at the link.

I'll be updating this once every couple of weeks or so until Devuan 6 goes stable
hopefully early in the fall.

deepforest · 2025-04-01 01:06:11

@greenjeans
Woow! Its feels so fast even at my retroPC) Why your Mate-mini feels so fast, how you did that? Usual when i test different distros with Mate its feels very sluggish.
Thanks

greenjeans · 2025-04-01 15:33:55

Glad you like it my friend! But no credit to me on this one, that's all Devuan right there. But yeah, for one thing the mini's are always faster from the get go, and that one is not the whole Mate metapackage, just the core and some extra utilities.

I have noticed in testing, that the Excalibur-based stuff seems very snappy and quick compared to current, really looking forward to seeing how it all performs once declared stable. I think Mate itself has made some improvements too.

One quick tip: The Mate menu is usually the first thing to feel sluggish, Mate does cache icon images, but for some reason still tries to re-size SVG's every time you open the menu, so if you have any large ones being used for menu icons for certain programs, it gets glitchy.

Worst offender is still Handbrake with a 3 mb SVG, really messes up that menu, I make PNG's in proper sizes for it on my own systems and get rid of the SVG.

Most SVG's these days though have gotten a lot better and by that I mean much smaller.

deepforest · 2025-04-01 23:46:29

I have noticed in testing, that the Excalibur-based stuff seems very snappy and quick compared to current, really looking forward to seeing how it all performs once declared stable. I think Mate itself has made some improvements too.

Thanks for explain its interesting. And why when unstable/testing go to stable, why all at stable become not so snappy as in unstable/testing?

One quick tip: The Mate menu is usually the first thing to feel sluggish, Mate does cache icon images, but for some reason still tries to re-size SVG's every time you open the menu, so if you have any large ones being used for menu icons for certain programs, it gets glitchy.

I did not know that. Here question - why devs make icons so fat, no minimalism, kiss and unix way law?

Last edited by deepforest (Yesterday 01:10:03)

greenjeans · Yesterday 16:15:31

Oh they've gotten a LOT better over the years, these days most SVG's are simple and just a few K in size, 10 years ago though there were a lot of them multiple MB's in size. Now there's just a few. And I imagine in a modern machine with 4 or more CPU's, nice graphics cards and tons of fast ram that it's not an issue. But on older machines like mine (2012 model and low-spec even for that time) the difference is very noticeable.

deepforest · Yesterday 21:39:45

Philosophic question, why over time all software are become bloat, as proprietary also as free?

RedGreen925 · Today 04:22:54

Philosophic question, why over time all software are become bloat, as proprietary also as free?

I would go with garbage tools being used by clueless programmers who have not one single idea how to produce good lean code.

greenjeans · Today 17:09:13

As much as I hate bloat, and I think everybody understands the lengths I go to to be rid of it, it's actually pretty understandable when you think about it.

Take for instance the kernel itself, it now has to support 20+ years of widely varied and increasingly complex hardware, it's pretty amazing that it can even do so. And so many other programs have to do some of that too.

But yeah, whole lotta superfluous code out there, for myself I keep looking for ways to slim it down, a small script that ties a couple things together instead of installing one or more additional packages to do it, things like that, trying to solve issues using what I already have onboard as opposed to immediately looking to apt to solve it for me.

The officially official Devuan Forum!

#1 2025-03-14 01:36:12

Devuan 6 (excalibur) mate testing iso uploaded

#2 2025-04-01 01:06:11

Re: Devuan 6 (excalibur) mate testing iso uploaded

#3 2025-04-01 15:33:55

Re: Devuan 6 (excalibur) mate testing iso uploaded

#4 2025-04-01 23:46:29

Re: Devuan 6 (excalibur) mate testing iso uploaded

#5 Yesterday 16:15:31

Re: Devuan 6 (excalibur) mate testing iso uploaded

#6 Yesterday 21:39:45

Re: Devuan 6 (excalibur) mate testing iso uploaded

#7 Today 04:22:54

Re: Devuan 6 (excalibur) mate testing iso uploaded

#8 Today 17:09:13

Re: Devuan 6 (excalibur) mate testing iso uploaded

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