14 DAY TRIAL // Black Lab Linux, a Linux distribution that uses Ubuntu 14.04.1 LTS "Trusty Tahr" and the GNOME desktop environment, has just received a Service Release patch.
The Black Lab Linux distribution has been out for some time and the developers now have Service Release 1 available for download. Even the base used for this system, Ubuntu, follows a similar trend but only for the LTS versions. This type of updates are usually focused on security and less on new features, which just happens to be the case with Black Lab Linux.
The distribution had a rocky development cycle and the devs alternated between Xfce and GNOME as the default desktop, but they finally decided on GNOME. The user’s experience should be fairly smooth, as the OS borrows from the classic look. On the other hand, this is still a fresh version of GNOME so all the cool stuff you would expect to find is there.
This is the first major update for Black Lab Linux
The Service Release patch is a rather hefty one and more than 200 packages will be modified. It might seem a lot, but it's really a big deal. It's true that some of the core packages, like the Linux kernel for example, will be upgraded as well, but it shouldn't be a problem.
"The purpose of our service releases is to focus on security and application updates rather than new features. Service Releases are provided every two to three months in between our 6 month release schedule. Black Lab Linux 6.0 is based on LTS technologies so users can be rest assured that you will receive feature and functionality updates until 2017 and security updates until 2020."
"With Service Release 1 we have tweaked the user experience per user and customer feedback to move from a Unity type look to a more traditional GNOME/Mate experience. You also have all security updates from October to December 14, 2014," is noted in the announcement.
The devs also said that the Linux kernel has been updated to version 3.13.0-43.50 (and 3.17.6 for kernel 3.17 users), Firefox 34.x has been added by default, and GNOME 3.10.4 is available as well.
As usual, if you already have the system installed, you can upgrade via the command line (with root):
sudo apt-get dist-upgrade
