Slack 14.2 & Korora 23 Reviewed, Distros for Average Joe

Jesse Smith reviewed Slackware 14.2 in today's Distrowatch Weekly, saying it was stable as always if a bit dated topping Monday's Linux news. Elsewhere, The Everyday Linux User listed his top five distributions for the "everyday Linux user" and DarkDuck test drove Korora 23 Live. Christine Hall gave Mint 18 a solid meh and OpenBSD kicked Linux to the curb.

Slackware 14.2 was featured at Distrowatch.com today by Jesse Smith saying, "Every few years I have enjoyed returning to the distribution." Smith gave Slackware a fair testing, even installing it four times with different settings, but ended up saying that, "With each year that goes by, installing Slackware feels less like coming home and more like visiting an old, stone castle. Getting settled in takes too long and there are no modern conveniences." He said the applications and the install method are too dated after "spending an afternoon tracking down dependencies one at a time to gain access to programs most distributions ship with by default." Nevertheless, Smith concluded that 14.2 "is a solid release" even if it won't appeal to "a wide audience."

A few new packages were uploaded to all Slackware branches addressing security issues. GIMP, PHP, and Bind were updated in Main and GCC et al. were updated in Alien.

DarkDuck reviewed Korora 23 today saying, "Korora 23 Cinnamon is a nice distribution." While there was a sufficient number and variety of applications installed by default, DD said there are "gaps in the list" of available extra applications. Then YUM Extender locked up his live environment, leaving a bad taste in his mouth. Otherwise, he had lots of nice things to say but concluded the implied support cycle is probably too short for many users.

Gary Newell said he keeps getting asked which distribution should a new or average user try, so today, he tried to answer. His top five list began with Linux Mint Cinnamon for its stability and "as good as it gets" software stack. His next two choices are Ubuntu related as well but number four is Arch-based Manjaro and number five is PCLinuxOS because it "is every bit as good as Ubuntu-based distributions."

In other news:

* Point Linux 3.2 Review (by Ivan Sanders)

* Our First Look at Linux Mint 18 Cinnamon

* The subtle art of the Desktop

* OpenBSD 6.0 tightens security by losing Linux compatibility

* Check out these Korora Wallpapers