Chrome: The fastest web browser for Linux?
Linux offers a great range of choices when it comes to web browsers, there really is a browser out there for everybody. But which Linux browser is the fastest?
A writer at ZDNet ran some tests and came to the conclusion that Google's Chrome is the best choice for Linux users that want a really fast web browser.
SJVN reports for ZDNet:
Firefox is easily the most popular Linux web browser. In the recent LinuxQuestions survey, Firefox took first place with 51.7 percent of the vote. Chrome came in second with a mere 15.67 percent. The other browsers all had, at most, scores in single percentages. But is Firefox really the fastest browser? I put them them to the test, and here's what I found.
To put Linux's web browsers to the test, I put them through their paces on Ubuntu 16.04, the current long-term support of the popular Linux desktop distribution. This ran on my older Asus CM6730 desktop PC. This has a third-generation 3.4GHz Intel Core i7-3770 processor, an NVIDIA GeForce GT 620 graphics card, 8GB of RAM, and a 1TB hard drive. This four-year-old PC has horsepower, but it's no powerhouse.
Taken all-in-all, I think Linux users should look to Chrome for their web browser use. When it's not the fastest, it's close to being the speediest. Firefox, more often than not, really isn't that fast.
DistroWatch reviews Fatdog64 Linux
Puppy Linux is a lightweight distribution that works well on older or slower computers. Fatdog64 is a distro derived from Puppy Linux that offers more bundled software, hence the name Fatdog.
Joshua Allen Holm reports on Fatdog64 for DistroWatch:
Fatter, of course, is a relative term, so Fatdog64 710, the latest release, is much, much smaller than many other distributions. The ISO is a meagre 377MB. Despite the small download size, it still comes with a decent selection of software packed into the image. It uses Openbox as the default desktop environment with JVM being an alternative option, so no weighty GNOME or KDE, which really helps trim the proverbial fat.
To test Fatdog64 710, I tried it out in several different ways. I started by just running it in a virtual machine using GNOME Boxes. Right away I was impressed by the many options available in the GRUB boot menu. There is the standard boot option, which loads with no special features; an option to use a USB device for the persistence save file to save things between sessions; an option for using multi-session support when booting from a DVD+RW; an option that enables LVM and mdadm support; an option with no savefile; and an option to boot without a graphical desktop environment.
As I poked around the applications menu and tried out the various software packages that come pre-installed, I was very impressed with the selection. A lot of software can fit on a sub-400MB image. LibreOffice is installed and so is The GIMP and VLC media player. There are many other lightweight apps for image editing, note taking, and other sundry tasks.
Of all the software included, the only thing that really bugged me was the ROX file manager. While the file manager is perfectly usable, one of the default settings is to automatically resize the window based on the content. If you are looking at a directory with 5 items in it, there will be a window just big enough to display those items. Open a directory with 25 items and the window gets bigger. Every time you open a new directory, the size of the window changes.
What are some good FOSS video games?
Linux has much to offer in terms of video games these days, but one redditor recently wondered about FOSS games. He posted his question in a thread in the Linux subreddit and got some interesting answers.
Chibinchobin started the thread with this question about FOSS video games:
What are some good FOSS video games?
I've been playing Minetest for quite some time now and lately I've been having a lot of fun with FreeDoom. Playing these games made me curious about other good FOSS games. So, what are some FOSS games you play and enjoy?
His fellow redditors chimed in with their thoughts:
PM_Me_Ur_AyyLmao: “Battle for Wesnoth.”
Syntheticminds: “Super Tux Kart”
Megazell: “Xonotic
AssaultCube
OpenArena
Red Eclipse
CUBE 2
Svkmpn: “OpenTTD, especially when playing with friends, is extremely fun - I have lost many a weekend to it.”
Windowsisspyware: “0ad is a nice AOE remake.”
DraugTheWhopper: “…my favorite: Crossfire, although it can be tricky to get running correctly on Windows.”
Cobra_Fast: “BZFlag - countless childhood hours spent in there. Good times. In the past few years the community and playerbase seems to have mostly died down though.”
Tc655: “Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory is one of the better open source games because it was made by a professional developer studio and published by Activision:
It started as freeware, then the game logic was made open source, then the game engine. Unfortunately the default assets aren't FOSS licensed, so it's not 100% FOSS, technically.”
Ken0201: “I used to play a lot of Urban Terror.. haven't played it in a while. OpenArena.. another I played quite a bit of. Assault Cube... Didn't play it as much as the other two.. but still burned more than a few hours on it.
This was easily 8-9yrs ago, and they had plenty of levels, players, etc. Not sure how it is nowadays, but if I were getting back into it... I'd start by checking those 3.”
Heavensblade2: “Dungeon Crawl: Stone Soup or most free roguelikes really.”
Did you miss a roundup? Check the Eye On Open home page to get caught up with the latest news about open source and Linux.