User:Grumbox/sidux

sidux is a desktop-oriented operating system based on the "unstable" branch of Debian, which uses the codename Sid. The distribution consists of a Live CD (bootable CD-ROM) for IA-32 or x86-64 architecture and can be installed to a hard drive through a graphical installer.

sidux is maintained by a team of developers including former Kanotix developer Stefan Lippers-Hollmann (slh). Initial administration was managed by The sidux Foundation, Inc. located in the United States. Now the Berlin, Germany based non-profit organisation sidux e.V. is administering and supporting the project.

Features
sidux is based on Debian's most modern branch, sid. It includes a comprehensive manual and a collection of tools and scripts to make desktop administration easier. sidux's own repository avoids packages which are currently defective in Debian Sid by temporarily uploading corrected packages to the sidux repository until a fixed package propagates into sid.

Live CD - DVD - USB
Each sidux release comes as a Live CD or Live DVD, booting to a graphical desktop without installation. On the Live CD a USB installer is provided to create a Live USB system.

Installer
The graphical installation can be started directly from live mode, without rebooting. sidux can be installed to USB-connected hard disks and USB flash drives, as well as to internal hard disks.

Updates
Once sidux is installed, it can be kept up-to-date with updates from the Debian Sid and sidux repositories. Updates are typically ran from command line using apt-get. Because post and pre install scripts in the debian packages may restart your display manager during updates and cause conflicts with running userspace applications, it is recommended that users upgrade their system out of X.

Warnings regarding upgrades are posted on the main website and in the Upgrade Warnings section of the forum.

Support
 The forum is also a good place for questions and talks, however the reaction time is longer, but it is a good source for searches. 

Multilingual
The default language of sidux releases is English, however German, Croatian, Danish, Dutch, Greek, English (GB), French, Italian, Japanese, Portuguese (BR and PT), Romanian, Russian and Spanish localisations (i18n support) are also provided within the DVD, selectable at boot prompt.

Currently 2009-05-24 the manual is available in 16 languages: DE Deutsch, DA Dansk, EL Greek, EN English, ES Espanol, FR Français, HR Hrvatski, NL Nederlands, PL Polski, PT-br Portuguese-br, RO Român, RU Русский, JA Japanese / 日本語, IT Italiano, BG Bulgarian (Български), HU Hungarian (Magyar).

Packages
sidux comes with a selection of programs, covering system rescue and web surfing. To mention a few: KDE / Xfce desktop, openoffice, iceweasel, amarok, digikam, gparted, gwenview, k3b, kaffeine, koffice, krita, krusader, sane, vdr, virtualbox, wireless-tools, xawtv, yakuake, ...

The complete package list is available for each release in the download directory, named .manifest.

Releases
The releases were usually available in 4 CD versions, however since release 2007-04.5 a fully equipped DVD and two light CDs will be offered here. Since 2008-02 also an ~420 MB large Xfce variant is available. DVD Versions at the end of a year contain more programs and preinstalled languages.

Derivatives
Like many other Linux distributions, sidux has spinoffs, mainly versions of different languages. Some to be named here:  celtux - Irish, Irish/Gaeilge localization Deb-on-Air - French localization myrinix - Digital Home Edition sid-icewm-edu - educational version lxde-sid-lite - resources saving graphical system, for use in netbooks, like eeepc </ul>

Name
The name of the distibution sidux is derived from Debian Sid (Sid Phillips character in Toy Story - usually destroys and tortures his sister Hannah’s toys.) and the common use of -x for Unix derivatives. The names of the releases are taken from the Greek mythology. Writing: sidux is always written in small letters. As well the sidux e.V. is written in small letters, however e.V. is a German abbreviation for "eingetragener Verein" (incorporated society) and must therefore be written with a capital "V".

History
Due to incompatible opinions, a group of former Kanotix developers, accompanied by many users, divided from the Kanotix-project to continue the former goal of Kanotix in a new project with a defined declaration.

The sidux project appeared on 2006-11-24, with the goal of providing a hard disk installable Debian Sid-based Live CD distribution.

The first sidux preview appeared on the 2007-01-24 with the finished release appearing on 2007-02-22, codenamed 2007-01 “Χάος"(chaos).

In February 2007 sidux was awarded by DistroWatch with the donation of US$350.

The second sidux Live CD was released on the 2007-05-28, codenamed sidux-2007-02 "Τάρταρος"(tartaros).

During the linuxtag 2007 (an open source fair in Berlin) a special linuxtag-edition was distributed at the shared booth of KDE e.V. and sidux.

On the 2007-05-31 sidux e.V. (foundation) has been officially registered with the German authorities.

On 2007-11-15 sidux e.V. was accepted as Non-profit organization by German law, retroactively as of 2007-04-01.

Software
sidux releases contain only free software as defined by the Debian Free Software Guidelines (DFSG). To aid proof of compliance, a monolithic tarball containing the source for all packages used in the release is provided alongside the Live CD ISOs. Access to non-free software such as codecs, plugins and wlan firmware can be enabled by configuring contrib and non-free Debian and sidux repositories in /etc/apt/sources.list

In keeping with the evolutionary nature of the "unstable" Debian branch, sidux releases do not provide an upgrade path from previous release versions. Rather, once sidux is installed, incremental updates are performed via regular "dist-upgrades". The idea of a sidux "release" is instead to improve Live CD hardware support, performance, flexibility and reliability, built from the current debian unstable repository. .

System recommendations
sidux is officially supported for the i686 computer architecture.

AMD K6 and VIA C3 Samuel and Ezra cannot be supported because they do not support the full i686 instruction set (missing CMOV support).

sidux e.V.
For permanent support and financing - on 2007-04-01 the non-profit association "sidux e.V." , seated in Berlin, Germany, was founded. Its constitution and goals go beyond the aims of the support and spreading of sidux.