Ikey Doherty’s Serpent OS is preparing for its initial alpha release, and we have the first scoop on the new features and updates since the last pre-alpha. Ikey Doherty himself briefed us on what to expect from the Serpent OS Alpha, including support for the Framework 13 laptop, default installation of Flatpak apps from Flathub, enhanced AMD Ryzen support, and expanded hardware compatibility.
The Serpent OS Alpha, powered by the latest Linux 6.10 kernel, will by default support the NVIDIA open GPU kernel modules for NVIDIA 560 graphics driver users, and the newly released Mesa 24.2 open-source graphics stack for those using AMD/Intel.
Improvements have also been made to the Rust-based moss package manager. Noteworthy updates include default Flathub support for Flatpak app installations, the integration of power-profiles-daemon and switcheroo-control, enhanced SIGINT handing, better error management for container-based moss, updated support for udisks2, improved management of partial downloads with auto-deletion, and the ability to install the COSMIC desktop environment.
In addition, moss has switched to using sudo-rs instead of sudo as a memory-safe alternative that is audited, eliminating the necessity for a double moss sync -u for transient packages. It will now leverage OS-provided SSL certificates via p11-kit and incorporate a Rust-based helper to maintain its stateless architecture.
“My belief is the tool quality labels are separate from the distro itself, and while we want tooling improvements we can’t lock the fate of the OS to it. So I’m accelerating both sides and one doesn’t determine the other,” said Ikey Doherty exclusively for 9to5Linux.
Ikey Doherty is diligently developing a graphical user interface (GUI) for Serpent OS’s installer (lichen), which aims to simplify the installation process for newcomers. Additionally, the forthcoming Serpent OS Alpha release is expected to feature numerous bug fixes, enhanced tooling, recipes, and more enhancements. You can read more about this on Serpent OS.
Of course, GNOME will be the default live session for Serpent OS Alpha, but the devs are also working on a separate ISO image with the COSMIC Alpha desktop environment preinstalled. Here’s a sneak peek!
Last updated 13 hours ago