System76 has announced the release of COSMIC Desktop Alpha 7, a significant update to its Rust-based desktop environment. This alpha release focuses on incorporating features leading up to its first stable version, Epoch 1. While COSMIC is still in development and won’t fully compete with established desktop environments right away, its progress is noteworthy.
New Features in COSMIC Alpha 7:
Workspace Improvements
The latest version introduces the ability to reorder workspaces by clicking and dragging thumbnails, providing a more intuitive workflow for arranging app sets. Users can also pin workspaces, preventing them from being cleared when not in use, ensuring certain spaces remain available.
Enhanced Accessibility Options
Accessibility aids have been expanded in Alpha 7, which includes:
- A Colour Filter toggle that applies one of three preinstalled LUTs to aid users with colorblindness (Deuteranopia, Protanopia, Tritanopia).
- An Invert Colours option for better differentiation of colors.
- High Contrast Mode and a Greyscale filter.
- A mono sound option merging stereo audio into a singular channel to help users with hearing impairments.
- A magnifier feature now allows the disabling of overlay and adjustment of scrolling behavior.
Global Shortcuts
COSMIC Alpha 7 supports global keyboard shortcuts primarily for X11 applications, allowing users to create app-specific shortcuts that function even when the app is not in focus.
X11 Scaling Control
The new desktop version enhances scaling for legacy X11 applications with settings for fractional scaling. This enables customized scaling behavior, either optimizing for applications or for full-screen and gaming experiences.
Additional Enhancements
Several other features and improvements include:
- Tooltips for app trays and workspaces.
- System shortcut enhancements and an audio balance slider.
- COSMIC Files adds seek ahead search and single-click options to open files.
- Improvements in the COSMIC Media Player and Text applications.
- A Permanently Delete option in the Trash context menu.
- Support for EAP and PEAP network authentication.
- The date applet now highlights the current day.
These updates accompany typical bug fixes and performance improvements, marking steady advancement as the team prepares for a beta release.
Try COSMIC DE in Pop!_OS 24.04You can experience the COSMIC desktop firsthand by downloading the new Pop!_OS 24.04 Alpha ISO, which comes preinstalled with COSMIC Alpha 7. Interested users can flash the ISO to create bootable media or run it in a virtual machine.
For more information, visit the System76 blog.