Honestly, I missed the ROSA 2012 LXDE announcement, which critics say is quite good. So, I decided to download the
ROSA 2012 Gnome release which came in early August. Those who follow the Linux news, would know that all is not well with Mandriva. Having used Mandriva earlier, before shifting to Ubuntu, I decided to test Rosa 2012 Gnome which is a fork of Mandriva Linux.
I downloaded the 1.3 GB ISO from
its site. The boot up in virtualbox was quick but unlike other distros, it asked me my preferred language, location, keyboard, etc. which is quite unusual for modern day Linux. Later, I understood, ROSA supports a lot of European languages like French, German, Italian, Portuguese, Romanian, Russian, Spanish and Ukranian, apart from English. Hence, all these queries before booting up.
The desktop interface is pure Gnome 2. Similar to
Snowlinux 3 Crystal,
it is Gnome 2 with the LTS Linux Kernel 3.0.38 (Snowlinux has 3.2.0). I
like Gnome 2 more than Gnome 3 as it is more customizable, even by a
novice Linux user.
Applications
ROSA 2012 has almost all the essential apps you would expect like complete LibreOffice suite, Chromium browser with default flash support, Pidgin chat, Evolution mail and calendar, Cheese webcam, GIMP, Rhythmbox, etc. All in all, it provides a complete package to you without burdening yourself to download additional apps for regular use. Of course, you can download additional software from the last element in the menu.
There are quite a few games (arcade, board, cards and puzzles) provided by default. I liked them and they are a good times pass, on Sunday lazy afternoon.
Given Gnome shell, the RAM usage is sub-200 MB. However, ROSA 2012 is not as light as a Snowlinux 3, for example.
I liked the refined and clean interface of ROSA Gnome. Out-of-the-box applications are also quite rich in ROSA. Somehow, I wasn't convinced of it's software repository. I may be wrong, but my guess is it is not as rich as a Debian or a Fedora repo. I searched a lot of apps like VLC, Firefox 14, etc. and I couldn't locate them there. So, I wouldn't recommend it over a LinuxMint 13 Mate 1.2 or a Snowlinux, but if you need a smart-looking Gnome 2 distro and you're willing to experiment, you can take this up!
Screenshots are available in my Picasa album.
Thanx 4 review!
ReplyDeleteIsn't it strange that no updates (urpmi says system is updated, and repos are ok) shows up?
(Today is 1.Nov.2012.)
BTW, capcha verification on this page is awful
Yes, no updates is a bit strange! I use Linux Mint 13 Cinnamon and XFCE on regular basis and every week there's some update or the other. So, indeed no update is a bit strange.
DeleteOn Captcha, blame blogspot :).
Regards,
Arindam