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Rhino Linux Changelog

What's new in Rhino Linux 2023.4

Dec 21, 2023
  • THE UNICORN DESKTOP:
  • Unicorn #39 has finally been merged, bringing optional auto-tiling to Unicorn. After updating and rebooting, a new applet will appear in the top right section of the panel. To kick start your tiling window experience, you can select the new applet, which will bring up a toggle to enable/disable tiling mode.
  • uLauncher now appears more rounded, and has a slightly different background colour.
  • rhino-pkg
  • If Nala is installed, rhino-pkg update no longer auto-removes packages by default.
  • To clean up unneeded packages or broken dependencies on a system, users can run the new rhino-pkg cleanup command.
  • Beginning with Pacstall 4.3.0, packages may now use Debian’s priority flag. As such, rhino-core and variants are now tagged essential, marking them unremovable to the system. Additionally, Unicorn will no longer automatically be removed when switching between the rhino*-core family. To remove unicorn-desktop or unicorn-mobile, users must first switch to rhino-ubxi-core or rhino-server-core; they will then be able to safely remove the package. This step is also needed if one is switching between rhino-core and rhino-pine-core.
  • Pine64
  • Modem stability fixes have been shipped to both the PinePhone and the PinePhone Pro, as well as GPS support enablement.
  • The PineTab2 now features a more user-friendly experimental WiFi module enablement.
  • All PinePhones and PineTabs now offer flashlight support.
  • All of these changes were brought over directly from Oren Klopfer's Ubuntu Touch port.
  • OTHER NEW FEATURES:
  • The "Your System" application now displays the version number as a pill, and can be copied to the clipboard on click.
  • pacstall-qa is now introduced as a new default package. pacstall-qa is a tool developed by Pacstall as a tool to test pascripts from PR's locally. You can read more about pacstall-qa here.
  • During the 2023.4 development cycle we announced the launch of the The Unicorn Beyond XFCE initiative as a way to create official ports of Unicorn to other desktop environments.
  • The installed kernels for this release are 6.6.7-generic for desktop, 6.7.0-rc5-okpine on Pine64 devices and 6.5.0-raspi for Raspberry Pi.
  • Bug fixes
  • An issue regarding Bluetooth support has been resolved, with our full transition from pulseaudio to pipewire.
  • The bug causing the "Your System" application to be stuck in light mode has finally been resolved.
  • Connecting to WiFi on embedded devices has also been fixed.

New in Rhino Linux 2023.3 (Oct 3, 2023)

  • We are proud to announce the disk image release of Rhino Linux 2023.3. This disk image packs the latest and greatest changes we have made to Rhino Linux over this past month of development. Users already running Rhino Linux will already have these changes providing that their systems are kept up to date.
  • To upgrade to 2023.3 please run:
  • rpk update -y.
  • Some changes to the Unicorn Desktop will require manual intervention, continue reading to learn more.
  • The Unicorn Desktop:
  • You can say goodbye to hideous menu bars and hello to our gorgeous unified menu. Global menus have now been implemented into The Unicorn Desktop to bring a truly modern experience to you.
  • We have fixed a bug within the Unicorn Desktop that the plank dock is not consistent. This has now been solved but due to the current state of Plank, does require manual intervention when the user wishes to modify the position of their dock. The guide can be found here.
  • uLauncher now starts faster.
  • The Unicorn dock now has a subtle zoom when hovering over icons.
  • Setup Wizard:
  • A bug causing the wizard to require a password for rebooting the system has been resolved.
  • As well as:
  • Calamares now uses white text when things are selected.
  • Timeshift now comes preinstalled.
  • Kernel 6.5.5-generic ships by default on Generic ISO disk images.
  • Kernel 6.6.0-rc3-okpine ships by default on Pine64 images.
  • Kernel 6.5.0-raspi ships by default on Raspberry Pi images.

New in Rhino Linux 2023.2 (Sep 1, 2023)

  • Unicorn updates, bug fixes & more:
  • To upgrade to 2023.2 please run:
  • rpk update -y.
  • Some changes to the Unicorn Desktop will require manual intervention, continue reading to learn more.
  • LUKS Disk Encryption:
  • One major issue we had with the launch of Rhino Linux was that LUKS Disk Encryption did not work properly due to an issue. We are happy to say that we have now successfully solved that issue, and in 2023.2 you can install your system with disk encryption if you choose.
  • Unicorn Desktop improvements:
  • The Unicorn dashboard has seen some major UI enhancements, as we have now written a custom theme which allows for a more cohesive and beautiful desktop experience.
  • We tweaked the background colour for the application grid to match our dashboard theming.
  • One of our developers, Elsie, has created an updated bash prompt to spruce up your terminal. This is now shipped default in Rhino Linux. It adds colour coding, and git information making it perfect for developers.
  • Both of these changes require manual intervention on older installations. To install please upgrade your system and then run:
  • sudo cp /etc/xdg/xdg-unicorn/.bashrc ~/.bashrc && xfconf-query -c xfdashboard -p /theme -s unicorn-dashboard
  • As well as:
  • The Pacstall 4.1 series has been released, bringing vital fixes to the user experience of Rhino Linux by introducing a "mask" array. Certain packages within the rhino-core metapackage would be incompatible with other packages offered in our repositories. When one of these incompatible packages were installed, it would remove "rhino-core". The mask array prevents this by "masking" incompatible packages.
  • Linux kernel 6.5 has been packaged and shipped with this disk image release.
  • We have solved a bug with LightDM having issues on certain devices starting the Unicorn Session. We have managed to fix this by including xserver-xorg-video-vesa and xserver-xorg-video-fbdev as Unicorn dependencies.
  • Thunar no longer shows hidden files by default.
  • We have succesfully solved multiple issues with our setup wizard. The first bug was that it would occasionally freeze and crash, which has now been solved. The second issue is that Flatpak, when enabled would not actually install.
  • Our setup wizard now has a beta toggle for Flatpak applications.

New in Rhino Linux 2023.1 (Aug 14, 2023)

  • Rhino Linux has now officially moved out of Beta! We have released Rhino Linux 2023.1 on x86_64, ARM, Pine64 and Raspberry Pi devices.
  • Quite a lot has changed since our first beta release back in April 2023, and so instead of a generic changelog, I want to do something a little different and discuss what actually went into the making of the operating system.