Release Notes - CrunchBang Linux 10 Alpha 1

The first alpha builds of CrunchBang Linux 10 “Statler” are available now. For the first time, CrunchBang is being built with Debian sources, as opposed to Ubuntu.

The LiveCD build process has changed. Previous versions of CrunchBang were built using the remastersys project, this has now been dropped in favour of using the Debian Live Project. CrunchBang builds now take place remotely on a VPS provided by Linode. The VPS, Dr. Bunsen, is funded by generous sponsors to the project. The CrunchBang 10 alpha 1 builds were completed on the 16th & 17th of March 2010 and contain all package updates available at the time from the Debian Squeeze repositories.

This is a new start for the project and a lot has happened. In fact, too much has happened to be able to reasonably detail in full. So instead, here is a short list of the main changes:

• A completely new build process.
• Switched from Ubuntu to Debian sources.
• Now uses a customised Debian text installer, available from the LiveCD boot menu.
• Now available with either a default Openbox or Xfce4 session. The new Xfce offering has been designed to mimic the original CrunchBang Openbox experience, i.e. a minimal desktop with right-click system menu and predefined shortcut keys for popular applications and commands.
• Available for 32 bit and 64 bit architectures, with the 32 bit offering available in i486 and i686 optimised kernel flavours.
• Now includes a minimal set of pre-installed applications. The application line-up will be revised over future releases.

The project has recently invested in 3 new file servers. These file servers have been funded by donations to the project. The file servers are named, Captain Link Hogthrob, Dr. Julius Strangepork & First Mate Piggy. These new servers are all on the OVH network and are all Intel Atom based machines with a 100Mbps connection and a soft bandwidth cap of 2TB a month. A new load-balancing download page has been created to accommodate these new servers, please see the CrunchBang Linux 10 "Statler" downloads page.

This is the first time CrunchBang has been built using Debian sources. You should expect to encounter many issues, your system may even go CRUNCH! BANG!