Linux Lite 5.6 Is Out for Public Testing, Final Release Expected on September 1st

Linux Lite 5.6 Is Out for Public Testing, Final Release Expected on September 1st

Linux Lite developer and maintainer Jerry Bezencon announced today the general availability for public testing of the Release Candidate (RC) milestone of the upcoming Linux Lite 5.6 distribution.

Still derived from the Ubuntu 20.04 LTS (Focal Fossa) operating system series, most precisely on the Ubuntu 20.04.2 LTS point release, Linux Lite 5.6 looks to be yet another small maintenance update that only updates various of the default apps and core components, and brings new artwork.

The biggest change in the Linux Lite 5.6 release appears to be a change in the Lite Welcome application, which is the first thing you see when you fire up the live system. Lite Welcome has been updated in this upcoming release to make it easier for newcomers to install Linux Lite via an “Install Now” button located at the bottom of the dialog.

Lite Welcome’s new “Install Now” button is, in fact, a shortcut for the Lite Installer, which will kick off immediately after pressing the said button. If you happen to close the Lite Welcome dialog at startup, you can always open the installed using the desktop shortcut.

In addition to this accessibility feature, the Linux Lite 5.6 release brings an updated Papirus icon theme and seven new desktop wallpapers to make your future Linux Lite installations prettier. Of course, there are also many other smaller tweaks and changes for a more stable and reliable Linux Lite desktop experience.

Under the hood, Linux Lite 5.6 RC is powered by the long-term supported Linux 5.4 LTS kernel series from Ubuntu 20.04 LTS, LLVM 11.0, Python 3.8.10, Perl 5.30.0, GCC 9.3, as well as Mesa 20.2.6 and X.Org Server 1.20.9 graphics stacks.

Various updated apps like the Mozilla Firefox 89.0.2 web browser, Mozilla Thunderbird 78.11.0 email client, LibreOffice 6.4.7 office suite, VLC 3.0.9.2 media player, and GIMP 2.10.18 image editor are included as well, and Linux Lite 5.6 is using Xfce 4.14 as default desktop environment.

The final release is expected on September 1st, 2021, but a Release Candidate of Linux Lite 5.6 is available for testing now and you can download it from the forum announcement. Before testing it, please be aware of the known issues, and keep in mind that this is a pre-release version, not suitable for use in a production environment.

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