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There's no uncertainty about this: The Fedora 20, "Heisenbug" beta release is here and is a fantastic sneak peek into the final Fedora 20 release. It's jam packed with fantastic free and open source software, lovingly configured and ready to use.

What is the Beta Release?

The beta release is the last important milestone before the release of Fedora 20. A Beta release is code-complete and bears a very strong resemblance to the third and final release. Only critical bug fixes will be pushed as updates up to the general release of Fedora 20. The final release of Fedora 20 is expected in early December. Meanwhile, download the beta of Fedora 20 and help us make it even better:

https://mirrors.fedoraproject.org/publiclist/Fedora/20-Beta/ppc64/

We need your help to make Fedora 20 the best release yet, so please take some time to download and try out the beta and make sure the things that are important to you are working. If you find a bug, please report it – every bug you uncover is a chance to improve the experience for millions of Fedora users worldwide. Together, we can make Fedora 20 a rock-solid distribution. We have a culture of coordinating new features and pushing fixes upstream as much as feasible and your feedback will help improve not only Fedora but Linux and free software on the whole. (See the end of this announcement for more information on how to help.)

Since it's a beta release, some problems may still be lurking. A list of problems that we already know about can be found at the Common F20 bugs page, found at http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Common_F20_bugs.

10 Years of Fedora

The Fedora 20 release coincides nicely with the 10th anniversary of Fedora. The first Fedora release (then called Fedora Core 1) came out on November 6, 2003.

Since then, the Fedora Project has become an active and vibrant community that produces nearly a dozen "spins" that are tailor made for desktop users, hardware design, gaming, musicians, artists, and early classroom environments.

Power-Specific Features

In addition to all of the standard Fedora 20 features, Fedora 20 for Power also has the following changes:

  • grub2 has replaced yaboot as the DVD bootloader. yaboot is now completely deprecated.
  • All 32-bit packages have been removed from the install media. They are still available online.


Issues and Details

Heisenbug Alpha is a testing release. To report issues encountered during testing, contact the Fedora QA team via the test mailing list or in #fedora-qa on freenode.

As testing progresses, common issues are tracked at https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Common_F20_bugs

For tips on reporting a bug effectively, read http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/How_to_file_a_bug_report .

Please also be aware of the following Power-specific issues:

  • When using Gnome via VNC for the first time, you may see a blank screen. Press Escape to dismiss the blank window and access the desktop.

Note on performance

Fedora development releases use a kernel with extra debug information to help us understand and resolve issues faster; however, this can have a significant impact on performance. Refer to the kernel debug strategy for more details. You can boot with slub_debug=- or use the kernel from nodebug repository to disable the extra debug info.


Contributing to Fedora for Power

More information on Fedora for Power can be found at https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Arch:PPC. To get involved in testing and development of Fedora for Power, join us on IRC in #fedora-ppc on Freenode.

Contributing to The Fedora Project

There are many ways to contribute beyond bug reporting. You can help translate software and content, test and give feedback on software updates, write and edit documentation, design and do artwork, help with all sorts of promotional activities, and package free software for use by millions of Fedora users worldwide. To get started, visit http://join.fedoraproject.org today!