This week saw a major transition in openSUSE Tumbleweed for YaST as it moved to a new major version.

Several other packages like Apache, Redis, GVfs, Vim, KDE Plasma 5.27.9 and Frameworks updated in the rolling release this week.

KDE Plasma 5.27.9 arrives in snapshot 20231025. The latest update for the Plasma Desktop makes implements changes to avoid recursively adding every copied file to the desktop. Its recent files component ensures compatibility with an older Frameworks version of kconfigwidgets. Kwin resolves a misgenerated QHoverEvent and enhances functionality by adding QKeySequence functionality to a part of the Virtual Desktop Manager. An update of firewalld 2.0.1 resolves issues related to the command-line interface (CLI) by ensuring that the --list-all-zones output is consistent and that the default zone attribute is correctly displayed. Active attributes for zones and policies are shown accurately, and the --get-active-zones command includes the default zone. There were also enhancements in the nftables integration, so the main table is now always flushed upon the start. Several other issues were resolved, including the proper usage of IPv6 names for ICMPv6 and the configuration of IP ranges and values for ipsets when working with nftables. Updates for GNOME users also arrived in the snapshot. An update of gnome-control-center 45.1 includes enhancing the ability to close the Cursor Size and Shortcuts dialogs using the Escape key. It also supports more types of processors in the About section. A lower timeout when downloading service files, which leads to improved performance was made in the gnome-maps 45.1. This snapshot also updates gnome-terminal to version 3.50.1, which has checks for alternate terminals within the Flatpak environment and improves the handling of the headerbar preference. The second kernel-firmware of the month to version 20231019 fixes the robot email script, updates AMD CPU microcode and introduces support for sending emails during PR/patch processing. The 7.2.2 version of redis has a critical Common Vulnerability and Exposure fix; CVE-2023-45145 creates a race condition that potentially leads to unauthorized Unix socket permissions upon startup, which had existed since the 2.6.0 release candidate version. Several more packages were updated in the snapshot.

Snapshot 20231023 brought updates of some GNOME packages like gvfs, evolution and gnome-software 45.1. The latter update brings various styling fixes, an ability to report PackageKit GPG-related errors in the graphical user interface and it improves Flatpak permission checks. The update also includes translation updates. With evolution 3.50.1, the personal information management application fixes bugs like correcting the conversion of UTF-16 encoded text files, enabling spell checking for editable fields and updates default calendar colors. A fix warning about the failure to solve a puzzle when loading games was made in the gnome-sudoku 45.2 update. Another GNOME package to update was gvfs 1.52.1. This Virtual filesystem implementation addresses issues including the prevention of returning invalid mount cache entries in the client, fixes authentication problems when using DNS-Service Discovery Uniform Resource Identifiers (URI) and resolves IPv6 URI handling problems in the Network File System component. An update of harfbuzz 8.2.2 fixes a regression from 8.1.0 in shaping fonts with duplicate feature tags and resolves a regression from in parsing CSS-style feature strings. The update ofvirtualbox 7.0.12 addresses multiple CVEs like CVE-2023-22098, CVE-2023-22099 and CVE-2023-22100, which would lead to can lead to unauthorized access and system crashes. Several other packages were updated in the snapshot including rubygem-agama 5, which has enhancements like not reusing pre-existing swap partitions in the storage proposal, extends the Software service to configure selected patterns and adapts storage settings for ALP Dolomite.

The update of apache2 2.4.58 arrives in snapshot 20231022. Apache2 addresses CVE-2023-45802, which relates to stream memory management, and CVE-2023-43622, which addresses a DoS vulnerability. The updates include various improvements like enhanced support for WebSockets via HTTP/2 and the introduction of new directives for better control and logging in various scenarios. A 16.2.14.66 update of ceph takes care of issues related to minimal file system BlueFS and enables a 4K allocation unit for it. The package also enables building for RISC-V. An update of dracut addresses issues related to FIPS (Federal Information Processing Standards) setup that was causing test failures and core dumps in various test scenarios. An update of the Linux Kernel had enhancements for Advanced Linux Sound Architecture among other things. The kernel-source 6.5.8 package has network-related component changes, such as net drivers and protocols, and addresses other issues with audio and sound support like that of ALSA System on Chip for a non-functioning mic on Lenovo 82YM. An update of pipewire 0.3.83 fixes a regression, reduces memory usage in audio conversion and removes the buffer-size limit with JACK. The update of xfce4-terminal 1.1.1 improves X11 and Wayland compatibility. Among the other packages to update were libstorage-ng 4.5.149, yast2-storage-ng 5.0.3, freerdp 2.11.2 and more.

The update of the man package 2.12.0 in snapshot 20231020 addresses manual page portability issues and enables timestamps beyond 2038 for the Y2K38 event that’s a long time away.An update of nftables 1.0.9 introduces improvements like custom conntrack timeouts and better support for dynamic sets. Plus it fixes a crash with a log prefix longer than 127 bytes. The sqlite3 3.43.2 update fixes memory leaks, and enhances the JSON processing performance. The version also adds support for Full-Text Search version 5 (FTS5) Indexes that allows for the deletion of indexed records without retaining the content of the deleted records. A ton of version 5 packages in the snapshot align YaST’s versioning with SUSE versions and the service packs it supports; more than 50 yast2 packages transitioned to version 5 to align with one of SUSE’s next major releases.

KDE Plasma users who did a zypper dup with snapshot 20231019 and later received KDE Frameworks 5.111.0 updates. The KIO made improvements to dbusactivationrunner’s service activation and fixes some object paths. A fix in Kirigami allows customizing ‘donateUrl’ in AboutPage for Donate button removal. KImageFormats brings support for repetition count in the avif format, has fixes for multi-image loading in the raw format, and resolves various issues, including crashes in the High Dynamic Rang and Gimp’s xcf formats. The libnvme 1.6+5 update fixes an issue by avoiding stack corruption caused by unaligned direct memory access to user space buffers, as reported. The regular expressions library oniguruma updates to version 6.9.9 in the snapshot. This update includes updating Unicode to version 15.1.0, introducing a new API called and, addressing issues related to character classes and POSIX brackets. Rendering library virglrenderer had its first major release with version 1.0.0. The update transitions to the Venus protocol, eliminating the experimental label from the Venus configuration option. This release also improves the handling of fences between guest and host for synchronization purposes. More major versions of YaST 5 arrived and there were a few other updates to include a 4.19.2 version of samba.

Only three packages updated in snapshot 20231018 from last week that did not make it in our weekly review. That update includes enhancements and improvements to the kernel module management tools kmod; version 31 includes in-kernel decompression for performance and depmod now supports a separate output directory. Another package to update was python-pytz 2023.3.post1 that is replacing deprecated datetime.utcfromtimestamp() and is adding support for Python 3.12. Text editor vim 9.0.2043 was also in the snapshot and enhances documentation, translations and provides a few fixes.

The refresh of the Human Interface Guidelines in both the content and presentation is something to be proud of, but there were a couple of areas that weren't great. Where we don't quite shine in the area of blueprint illustration style is the contrast for the dark mode. While in many cases a single graphic can work in the two contexts just fine, in other it struggles. And while we tried to address it in the HIG, it became clear we do need to do better.

Inline SVG Stylesheet

there's a little trick I learned from razze while working Flathub — a single favicon working in both dark and light mode can be achieved using a single SVG. The SVG doesn't have inline defined fills, but instead has a simple embedded <style> that defines the g,path,rect,circle and whatnot element styles and sets the fill there. For the dark mode it gets overriden with the @media (prefers-color-scheme: dark){} rule. While generally favicons are a single color stencil, it can work for fullcolor graphics (and more complex rules):

<style>
  rect.fg { fill: #5e5c64; }
  path.bg { fill: #fff; }
  @media (prefers-color-scheme: dark) {
    rect.fg { fill: #fff; } 
    path.bg { fill: #5e5c64; }
  }
</style>

This made me think of a similar approach working for inline images as well. Sadly there's two obstacles. While the support for inline stylesheets in SVGs seems to be quite wide among browsers, Epiphany only seems to respect prefers-color-scheme when using the image directly (or the favicon case), but didn't seem to work when emebded inside and html page as <img>.

The more severe issue is that producing such SVGs is a little cumbersome as you have to clean up the document generated by Inkscape, which likes to use fill attribute or inline css in style. While it generally doesn't remove markup, it will reformat your markup and you will be fighting with it every time you need to edit the SVG visually rather than inside a text editor.

HTML5 Picture

For inline images, the approach that seems more straight forward and I've taken on many occasions is using the HTML5 <picture> element. It works great for providing dark mode variants using source with a media attribute as well as a neat accessibility feature of showing non-animated image variant for people who opt out:

<picture>
    <source srcset="static.png" 
        media="(prefers-reduced-motion: reduce)" />
    <img loading="lazy" src="animated.gif" />
</picture>

Sphinx/RST

GNOME Human Interface Guidelines are written in restructured text/Sphinx, however. Escaping to html for images/pictures would be quite cumbersome, but luckily dark mode is supported in the furo theme (and derivates) using the only-light and only-dark classes. The markup gets a little chatty, but still quite legible. There's some iterations to be made, but in terms of legibility it's finally a bit more accessible.

The refresh of the Human Interface Guidelines in both the content and presentation is something to be proud of, but there were a couple of areas that weren’t great. Where we don’t quite shine in the area of blueprint illustration style is the contrast for the dark mode. While in many cases a single graphic can work in the two contexts just fine, in other it struggles. And while we tried to address it in the HIG, it became clear we do need to do better.

Inline SVG Stylesheet

there’s a little trick I learned from razze while working Flathub — a single favicon working in both dark and light mode can be achieved using a single SVG. The SVG doesn’t have inline defined fills, but instead has a simple embedded <style> that defines the g,path,rect,circle and whatnot element styles and sets the fill there. For the dark mode it gets overriden with the @media (prefers-color-scheme: dark){} rule. While generally favicons are a single color stencil, it can work for fullcolor graphics (and more complex rules):

<style>
  rect.fg { fill: #5e5c64; }
  path.bg { fill: #fff; }
  @media (prefers-color-scheme: dark) {
    rect.fg { fill: #fff; } 
    path.bg { fill: #5e5c64; }
  }
</style>

This made me think of a similar approach working for inline images as well. Sadly there’s two obstacles. While the support for inline stylesheets in SVGs seems to be quite wide among browsers, Epiphany only seems to respect prefers-color-scheme when using the image directly (or the favicon case), but didn’t seem to work when emebded inside and html page as <img>.

The more severe issue is that producing such SVGs is a little cumbersome as you have to clean up the document generated by Inkscape, which likes to use fill attribute or inline css in style. While it generally doesn’t remove markup, it will reformat your markup and you will be fighting with it every time you need to edit the SVG visually rather than inside a text editor.

HTML5 Picture

For inline images, the approach that seems more straight forward and I’ve taken on many occasions is using the HTML5 <picture> element. It works great for providing dark mode variants using source with a media attribute as well as a neat accessibility feature of showing non-animated image variant for people who opt out:

<picture>
    <source srcset="static.png" 
        media="(prefers-reduced-motion: reduce)" />
    <img src="animated.gif" />
</picture>

Sphinx/RST

GNOME Human Interface Guidelines are written in restructured text/Sphinx, however. Escaping to html for images/pictures would be quite cumbersome, but luckily dark mode is supported in the furo theme (and derivates) using the only-light and only-dark classes. The markup gets a little chatty, but still quite legible. There’s some iterations to be made, but in terms of legibility it’s finally a bit more accessible.

Agama es el nuevo instalador en el que están trabajando desarrolladores de SUSE y la comunidad de openSUSE y acaba de publicar la versión de desarrollo 5 para probar.

Agama 5 incluye algunos cambios en los que se ha estado trabajando desde la versión anterior, como una interfaz web traducida o un selector de patrones de software.

Además, introduce un cambio en el área de almacenamiento para no reutilizar particiones de intercambio preexistentes. Y por último, pero no menos importante, ahora puedes iniciar Agama Live a través de PXE.

Veamos todo esto más en detalle.

Nueva interfaz web traducida

El manejo de Agama se realiza mediante una interfaz web y hasta ahora, la interfaz web de Agama sólo estaba disponible en inglés.

Sin embargo, esta nueva versión le permite seleccionar un idioma diferente y ahora está disponible en otros cuatro idiomas: holandés, japonés, español (que realizé yo mismo) y sueco.

Hay que tener en cuenta que seleccionar un idioma diferente no afecta el sistema que está instalando. De hecho, han comenzado a trabajar en una mejor página de “Localización” que permitirá seleccionar un idioma, una distribución de teclado y una zona horaria para instalar el sistema.

Selección de patrones

Una característica importante que se ha estado posponiendo durante algún tiempo es la personalización de la selección de software. No quieren recuperar conceptos complejos y específicos, como los roles del sistema, por lo que han decidio comenzar con un prototipo que muestra la lista de patrones de software disponibles.

Agama 5 incluye un nuevo selector de patrones de software, aunque todavía es un trabajo en progreso. Sin embargo, es aún más importante la discusión que se ha abierto sobre este tema en la lista de correo de openSUSE Factory.

No reutilizar particiones de intercambio preexistentes

Al proponer un diseño de almacenamiento, Agama reutiliza particiones de intercambio preexistentes. Este comportamiento se introdujo en YaST solo por compatibilidad con versiones anteriores y fue heredado por Agama.

Sin embargo, se ha decidido que Agama debería dejar de hacer esto porque resulta confuso. Ahora, las particiones de intercambio preexistentes no se reutilizan.

Arranque a través de PXE

Desde las versiones anteriores de Agama Live, quedó claro que se necesitaba una forma de iniciar el instalador usando PXE.

Recientemente, han comenzado a crear las imágenes que se necesitan para realizar eso. El paquete agama-live contiene algunas notas sobre cómo obtener esas imágenes desde openSUSE Build Service.

Esta característica se basa en Kiwi, por lo que puede ser utilizada por cualquiera que se comprometa a crear un medio de instalación real basado en Agama en el futuro. Después de todo, Agama Live se creó con fines de demostración.

Probar Agama 5

La mejor manera de probar Agama es descargando una de las dos variantes (ALP u openSUSE) de la ISO de desarrollo de Agama Live. Esta imagen se actualiza con cada nueva versión publicada.

Pero si quieres probar lo más reciente, puedes probar las ISO del proyecto en systemsmanagement:Agama:Staging que se actualizan automáticamente con cada cambio realizado en el repositorio Git de Agama.

¿En qué están trabajando para Agama 6?

Agama 6 ya está en desarrollo y se espera tener otra versión lista para finales de noviembre. Para ese lanzamiento, habrá más cambios en el área de internacionalización, soporte para el Centro de Clientes de SUSE y la posibilidad de seleccionar cómo hacer espacio para su nuevo sistema. Además, se está trabajando para facilitar la modificación de la configuración de Agama.

Más información sobre el desarrollo y medios de contacto en el anuncio oficial:

• https://yast.opensuse.org/blog/2023-10-25/agama5

Hoy os traigo una nueva obra de Ramón Miranda que lleva por título «Creación de texturas para Krita» donde nos explica las funciones avanzadas de Krita necesarias si quieres dominar la creación de texturas. Y para hacerlo nada mejor que hacerlo mediante un vídeo donde nos explica todas las opciones.

Creación de texturas para Krita, vídeo de Ramón Miranda

Estas entradas ya son un clásico del blog los vídeos de Ramón Miranda y el fabuloso Krita. Ya han aparecido en esta bitácora 10 trucos para Krita, pintando con Krita el «Tajo de Ronda», perspectiva con Krita y cómo grabar con Krita así que no es de extrañar que esta serie siga creciendo, como es el caso de hoy en el que os presento hoy.

En sus propias palabras:

Si quieres dominar la creación de texturas necesitas saber lo que realmente puedes hacer con las funciones avanzadas de Krita.

El vídeo tiene subtítulos en inglés para la gente con discapacidad auditiva y está separado en partes ya que los tiempos están en la descripción de Youtube. No obstante, para el que solo quiera ver el vídeo lo pongo abajo

Recuerdo bien a Ramón Miranda, al cual tuve el gusto de conocer en la Akademy y Akademy-es de 2013 de Bilbao, y que sigue promocionando Krita con su maravilloso trabajo.

Más información: Krita

¿Qué es Krita?

Para los que no lo sepan, Krita es el software de pintura digital e ilustración basado en las librerías de la plataforma KDE que antes estaba incluido en Calligra Suite.

A diferencia de otras aplicaciones gráficas, se diseño hace énfasis en la creación de imágenes desde cero, es decir, está especialmente orientado para los artistas gráficos como ilustradores, dibujantes de cómics, etc.
Krita es software libre distribuido bajo la licencia GNU GPL y fue lanzado por primera vez como parte de la versión 1.4.0 de KOffice, el 21 de junio de 2005. (Vía: Wikipedia)

Para ver el funcionamiento de esta aplicación nada mejor que ver un vídeo de Odysseas Stamoglou en la que nos muestra como dibujar una chica futurística con Krita.

La entrada Creación de texturas para Krita, vídeo de Ramón Miranda se publicó primero en KDE Blog.

Si te gusta el diseño, ahora tienes la posibilidad de participar en el concurso para el nuevo logotipo de openSUSE y de otros proyectos de la comunidad

¿Tienes aptitudes para el diseño? ¿Lo tuyo es imaginar y plasmarlo en un dibujo? Ahora tienes la posibilidad de participar con tus dotes artísticas en el concurso que celebra el proyecto openSUSE.

La comunidad de openSUSE se complace en anunciar de manera oficial, el concurso para diseñar un nuevo logotipo para openSUSE y también para las cuatro distribuciones de GNU/Linux que desarrolla el proyecto: Tumbleweed, Leap, Slowroll and Kalpa.

Sí, has leido correctamente, la comunidad de openSUSE está considerando renovar el diseño de marca con un nuevo logotipo para que represente el proyecto, basado en el diseño actual del camaleón.

Este nuevo logo debería complementar la identidad de marca del proyecto openSUSE y de las distribuciones de GNU/Linux que desarrolla. El color verde (#73ba25) está reservado como el color principal para el proyecto, pero se agradecerá las sugerencias de otros colores para las diferentes distribuciones y sus logos.

Ha habido ya discusiones al respecto desde hace muchos años, pero entonces no era el momento adecuado, hasta ahora. Como el logo actual del camaleón de openSUSE es similar al antiguo logo de SUSE y el proyecto está en medio de un periodo de transición, ahora parece un momento más idóneo para lanzar esta competición junto con los nuevos logos para las distribuciones.

La forma ancha y las líneas delgadas del logotipo actual de Tumbleweed han causado problemas de visibilidad y reconocimiento, que se pretende evitar con un nuevo logotipo de Tumbleweed. El logotipo de Leap no tiene los mismos problemas, pero los miembros de la comunidad han pensado que debería estar disponible la opción de enviar un nuevo logotipo para Leap.

La intención del concurso es que los diseños del logotipo visualicen una marca unificada. Los logotipos de openSUSE para las distintas distribuciones recientemente añadidos están diseñados con formas y líneas simples para brindar singularidad e interés, generalmente como contornos vacíos, aunque no se excluye la posibilidad de usar relleno.

El concurso para aportar diseños empieza el próximo 1 de noviembre y terminará el 22 de noviembre de 2023.

Tienes todas las reglas y los requisitos que deben cumplir los diseños, y los datos de contacto para enviar tus diseños en el anuncio oficial, en este enlace:

• https://news.opensuse.org/2023/10/25/os-to-have-logos-competition/

Tu diseño será la marca distintiva del proyecto, tanto de openSUSE como de las distintas distribuciones (Leap, Tumbleweed, Slowroll, Kalpa, Aeon).

Anímate a participar y exponer tus mejores diseños en el concurso. (yo echaré de menos al actual Geecko)

Lately I needed to mirror a website as fully as possible, and ended up researching a bit more than my previous times I’ve done so. Here I’m just dropping a note that I ended up doing the following:

wget -mkxp --adjust-extension -e robots=off https://myurl.com/

Here -m is:

-r -N -l inf --no-remove-listing

or in long form:

--recursive --timestamping --level inf --no-remove-listing

and the rest ie -kxp are, in the same order

--convert-links --force-directories --page-requisites

We are aware that the time between Agama releases is usually too long. Recently, we committed to increase the frequency, although it means having smaller releases. You know, "release early, release often".

Agama 5 includes some changes we have been working on for some time, like a translated web interface or a software patterns selector. Additionally, it introduces a change in the storage area to not reuse pre-existing swap partitions. And last but not least, now you can boot Agama Live via PXE.

Translated web interface​

Until now, Agama web interface was only available in English. However, this new release allows you to select a different language and it is now available in another four languages: Dutch, Japanese, Spanish and Swedish. Kudos to Natasha Ament, Yasuhiko Kamata, Victor hck and Luna Jernberg for this first round of translations. Much appreciated!

If you are interested, please, consider helping with the translations. The openSUSE localization guide might be a good starting point. 😉

You can check the pull request #796 if you are interested in the technical details.

Bear in mind that selecting a different language does not affect the system you are installing. For that matter, we have started to work on a better "Localization" page that will allow selecting a language, a keyboard layout and a timezone for the system to install.

Patterns selection​

An important feature that we have been postponing for some time is customizing the software selection. We do not want to bring back complex and specific concepts, like system roles, so we decided to start with a prototype that shows the list of available software patterns.

Agama 5 ships a new software patterns selector, as shown in the screenshot below, although it is still a work in progress. However, it is even more important the discussion we have opened about this topic in the openSUSE Factory mailing list. Please do not hesitate to join if you have anything to say.

Technical details? You can find them in #792, #762, #770 and #772.

Do not reuse pre-existing swap partitions​

When proposing a storage layout, Agama reuses pre-existing swap partitions. This behavior was introduced in YaST just for backward compatibility with old versions and was inherited by Agama. However, we decided that Agama should stop doing this because it is confusing. Now, pre-existing swap partitions are not reused.

Check #806 for further details and screenshots.

Booting via PXE​

Since the earlier releases of Agama Live, it became clear that we needed a way to boot the installer using PXE. Recently, we started to build the images you need for that. The agama-live package contains some notes about how to grab them from openSUSE Build Service.

This feature relies on Kiwi, so it can be used by anyone who commits to create a real installation media based on Agama in the future. After all, Agama Live was built for demonstration purposes.

Other changes​

• Add a label in the storage section to indicate whether a Btrfs system will be transactional (#789).
• Set more restrictive permissions to the archive generated by the agama logs store command (#812).
• Update to Patternfly 5.1 (#800).

Trying Agama 5​

The best way to try Agama is to download one of the two variants (ALP or openSUSE) of the Agama Live devel ISO. This image is built in the systemsmanagement:Agama:Devel OBS project and is updated each time we release a new version.

Are you interested in the bleeding edge? The ISO in the systemsmanagement:Agama:Staging OBS project is for you because it is built automatically from the code on Agama's Git repository.

What's next​

Agama 6 is already under development and we expect to have another version ready by the end of November. For that release, we expect more changes in the internationalization area, support for the SUSE Customer Center and the possibility of selecting how to make space for your new system. Additionally, we are working on making it easier to tweak Agama's configuration.

We appreciate opinions and feedback. Feel free to contact the YaST team at the YaST Development mailing list, our #yast channel at Libera.chat or even the Agama project at GitHub.

Stay tunned!

We are aware that the time between Agama releases is usually too long. Recently, we committed to increase the frequency, although it means having smaller releases. You know, “release early, release often”.

Agama 5 includes some changes we have been working on for some time, like a translated web interface or a software patterns selector. Additionally, it introduces a change in the storage area to not reuse pre-existing swap partitions. And last but not least, now you can boot Agama Live via PXE.

Translated web interface

Until now, Agama web interface was only available in English. However, this new release allows you to select a different language and it is now available in another four languages: Dutch, Japanese, Spanish and Swedish. Kudos to Natasha Ament, Yasuhiko Kamata, Victor hck and Luna Jernberg for this first round of translations. Much appreciated!

If you are interested, please, consider helping with the translations. The openSUSE localization guide might be a good starting point. :wink:

You can check the pull request #796 if you are interested in the technical details.

Bear in mind that selecting a different language does not affect the system you are installing. For that matter, we have started to work on a better “Localization” page that will allow selecting a language, a keyboard layout and a timezone for the system to install.

Patterns selection

An important feature that we have been postponing for some time is customizing the software selection. We do not want to bring back complex and specific concepts, like system roles, so we decided to start with a prototype that shows the list of available software patterns.

Agama 5 ships a new software patterns selector, as shown in the screenshot below, although it is still a work in progress. However, it is even more important the discussion we have opened about this topic in the openSUSE Factory mailing list. Please do not hesitate to join if you have anything to say.

Technical details? You can find them in #792, #762, #770 and #772.

Do not reuse pre-existing swap partitions

When proposing a storage layout, Agama reuses pre-existing swap partitions. This behavior was introduced in YaST just for backward compatibility with old versions and was inherited by Agama. However, we decided that Agama should stop doing this because it is confusing. Now, pre-existing swap partitions are not reused.

Check #806 for further details and screenshots.

Booting via PXE

Since the earlier releases of Agama Live, it became clear that we needed a way to boot the installer using PXE. Recently, we started to build the images you need for that. The agama-live package contains some notes about how to grab them from openSUSE Build Service.

This feature relies on Kiwi, so it can be used by anyone who commits to create a real installation media based on Agama in the future. After all, Agama Live was built for demonstration purposes.

Other changes

• Add a label in the storage section to indicate whether a Btrfs system will be transactional (#789).
• Set more restrictive permissions to the archive generated by the agama logs store command (#812).
• Update to Patternfly 5.1 (#800).

Trying Agama 5

The best way to try Agama is to download one of the two variants (ALP or openSUSE) of the Agama Live devel ISO. This image is built in the systemsmanagement:Agama:Devel OBS project and is updated each time we release a new version.

Are you interested in the bleeding edge? The ISO in the systemsmanagement:Agama:Staging OBS project is for you because it is built automatically from the code on Agama’s Git repository.

What’s next

Agama 6 is already under development and we expect to have another version ready by the end of November. For that release, we expect more changes in the internationalization area, support for the SUSE Customer Center and the possibility of selecting how to make space for your new system. Additionally, we are working on making it easier to tweak Agama’s configuration.

We appreciate opinions and feedback. Feel free to contact the YaST team at the YaST Development mailing list, our #yast channel at Libera.chat or even the Agama project at GitHub.

Stay tunned!

The openSUSE Community is pleased to announce a logo competition for a new openSUSE logo as well as four openSUSE distributions; Tumbleweed, Leap, Slowroll and Kalpa.

You read that correctly; the openSUSE Community is considering a new, distinct openSUSE logo to represent the project; essentially, a new chameleon-inspired design. This new logo should complement the brand identity of the openSUSE Project with its distributions. The color green (#73ba25) is reserved as the primary logo color for the project, but color suggestions for distribution logos are welcome.

There have been discussions of a new openSUSE logo over the years, but the timing to transition to a new logo wasn’t ideal, until now. As openSUSE’s logo is similar to SUSE’s old logo and the project is experiencing a transitional period, now seems like a logical time to have the competition along with the four distribution logos. This should provide an opportunity to strengthen the visual identity of the openSUSE brand and make it discernible and cohesive with its other logos.

The current Tumbleweed logo’s wide shape and thin lines have caused visibility and recognition issues, which we aim to avoid with a new Tumbleweed logo. The Leap logo doesn’t have the same issues, but members of the community felt the option should be available to submit a new logo for Leap.

The intent of the competition is to have the logo designs visualize a unified brand. Newly added openSUSE Distribution logos are designed with simple shapes and lines for uniqueness and interest, typically as empty outlines, although the possibility of using fill is not excluded. The logos use a 16u square canvas with a 1u stroke width, maintaining a relatively square aspect ratio.

openSUSE is a community-driven Linux project that develops, builds and maintains many software packages, tools and infrastructure for its distributions.

Tumbleweed is a pure rolling-release Linux distribution with tested versions of the newest stable software.

Leap is a reliable open-source Linux distribution with a focus on stability for desktops and servers.

Slowroll is an experimental distribution based on Tumbleweed, but has a slower release pace. Big updates come every one or two months, and continous bug fixes and security fixes gradually come in moving toward the big updates. The Slowroll logo should not directly mimic the Tumbleweed logo to maintain differentiation among the distributions from the same source.

Kalpa is the KDE Plasma MicroOS Desktop distribution that is gradually advancing from its Alpha state, and receives updates as a subset of Tumbleweed. While Kalpa has a close relationship with Aeon, their logos should be distinct. Gears and the letter K motifs are acceptable for Kalpa, but it cannot directly use KDE trademarks.

An element of the competition, as stated above, is the desire for submitted logo designs to be similar and integrate well with the newer project logos like Aeon (a GNOME MicroOS Desktop distribution), MicroOS and Leap Micro. There is a desire for all the logos together to show a cohesive brand identity for openSUSE and its distributions.

The logos will be selected for the marketing material at events, on its websites as well as on clothing. All the logos submitted will be voted on using survey.opensuse.org.

To establish the official logo for the Project and distribution going forward, current logos of openSUSE, Tumbleweed, and Leap, must be submitted just like the others. The rules of the contest can be found at https://en.opensuse.org/Logocontest.

The competition starts on Nov. 1.

The winners will receive a “Geeko Mystery Box” as a reward for their creative designs.

The deadline is Nov. 22.

The Rules of the Contest are as follows:

• The logo should be licensed under CC-BY-SA 4.0 and allow everyone to use the logo without attribution (BY) if your work is used as a logo for the openSUSE Project. Note that the attribution is going to be shown on the project’s websites.
• Design must be original and should not include any third party materials.
• Both monochromes and color formats are essential for submission.
• Submissions must be in SVG format.
• Design should reflect the openSUSE communities.

• The logo should avoid the following things:

  • Brand names or trademarks of any kind.

  • Illustrations that may consider inappropriate, offensive, hateful, tortuous, defamatory, slanderous or libelous.

  • Sexually explicit or provocative images.

  • Violence or weapons.

  • Alcohol, tobacco, or drug use imagery.

  • Discrimination based on race, gender, religion, nationality, disability, sexual orientation or age.

  • Bigotry, racism, hatred or harm against groups or individuals.

  • Religious, political, or nationalist imagery.

• The branding guidelines will be helpful to design your logo (optional) https://opensuse.github.io/branding-guidelines/

Please submit your design by doing the following:

• Email: ddemaio@opensuse.org
• Subject: openSUSE/Tumbleweed/Leap/Kalpa/Slowroll – [your name]
• Your name and mail address to contact
• Vector file of the design with SVG format ONLY.
• Post a PNG of the design under the openSUSE, Tumbleweed, Leap Slowroll, or Kalpa headings on https://en.opensuse.org/Logocontest
• File size less than 512 KB.
• Text about philosophy of the design

The designs that are submitted will be added to a survey where the community can vote on the submitted logo designs. The final decision will be made at an openSUSE Community meeting and it may not be the highest scored design.

We recommend the artist to use Inkscape, a powerful, free and open source vector graphics tool for all kinds of design.

Join others on openSUSE’s Marketing Telegram Channel if you want to chat with people about the designs.