Hands on: The changing face of Fedora

With Fedora 7 also came ‘spins’, a method of creating custom builds of Fedora from the software available in the repositories. For example, two spins were created for a KDE and Gnome live CD, and another spin for a DVD installation of Gnome, with a large selection of applications. These spin releases compare well with Ubuntu’s desktop variations ­ one CD for a Gnome desktop, and two others for KDE and XFCE.

In November came the release of Fedora 8. Fedora has often stayed ahead by incorporating some of the latest developments in open-source software. This remained true with Fedora 8, which introduced Pulse Audio, an advanced sound server that offers lots of control over how sound is produced.

The desktops available are the latest versions of Gnome (2.20), KDE (3.5) and XFCE (4.4), together with Compiz Fusion, the impressive compositing manager for 3D desktop effects. Network Manager (also found in Ubuntu) was added to provide better support for wireless networks and switching between networks, and an easy-to-use graphical firewall admin tool is offered for those who want it.

The package management system’s performance was markedly improved, making it somewhat comparable to Debian and Ubuntu’s equivalent, apt. Also included is Policy Kit, an authentication system that allows selected operations of an application to gain super-user (administrator) access, meaning better security and better control over what applications can do.

Both Policy Kit and Pulse Audio are making their debut in Ubuntu 8.04 (Hardy Heron), approximately one release behind Fedora.

Fedora is a completely free distribution and contains only free software not affected by copyright restrictions or patents. In other words, on a plain install, it will play next to none of the popular media file formats. Audio CDs, Ogg Vorbis and Wav files are fine, but MP3, AAC and MPEG4 files or video DVDs will not play. One solution to this is Codeina, a small application that runs when you try to play an unsupported format. This can download and install a plug-in that will enable applications such as Totem to play back the file. A free MP3 plug-in is available for download, but there is a charge for other formats.

Few people will want to pursue this option, especially as it is completely unnecessary. Ubuntu gets around the patent problem by informing the user via a pop-up window that in some countries (the US), patent restrictions may be in place, but will still allow you to download and install the free software. In Fedora there is no such official alternative, which discourages many people from using Fedora as their main desktop. Fortunately, there is an unofficial workaround ­ the Livna repository (see section entitled Livna fills some gaps).

Installation
Fedora will install onto any modern PC desktop or laptop. The recommended specifications for a smooth-running full desktop are typical for a Linux distribution: around 512MB of Ram and a 1GHz processor. As mentioned above, Fedora is released now as a set of official spins, either by direct download or via a torrent.

The standard desktop spin is with Gnome, and is available in Intel/AMD 32-bit (Pentium II or later), 64-bit or Power PC versions. An equivalent KDE-based release is available. For older systems, a standard installation spin for 386 (or better) processors, as well as the 64-bit and Power PC versions, is also available.

For most people, the i686 (32-bit) Fedora Desktop Live Media release is recommended.