deepin Linux 20.8 can replace Microsoft Windows 11 on your laptop or desktop
One of the most beautiful operating systems is a Linux distribution from China called deepin. If you are dissatisfied with Windows 11 or macOS, and you are intrigued by Linux, deepin can be a great choice -- especially if you highly value beauty and well-designed user interfaces.
The newest version of that operating system, deepin 20.8 is now ready to be downloaded. This version of deepin gets improvements to the loading times of Wine apps from the App Store, plus new features in the File Manager app. The most notable change in 20.8 is the inclusion of the all-new Deepin Home app.
"In deepin 20.8, a new application 'Deepin Home' is added, which breaks the 'information barrier' between the deepin team and users, and will work on product quality, software and hardware ecology to better serve deepin users. What is more, we have upgraded Qt to version 5.15.6, updated the DTK development library, fixed the underlying vulnerabilities, and further improved system compatibility and security. Besides that, we have developed and integrated a great number of practical functions based on the community users' feedback," explains the deepin development team.
The devs further say, "The new self-developed information-aggregation application 'Deepin Home,' in V1.0.0, has gathered important information platforms, such as GitHub, Wiki, forum, and social media, which supports deepin ID login and sending messages. Here you can receive community news in real-time, interact and communicate with others, participate in questionnaires, etc. In the future, we will establish a perfect tracking system for requirements and bugs, and special feedback channels for software and hardware to make it better for community users."
The deepin developers share an extensive changelog below.
update and optimization
- Upgraded Qt to version 5.15.6.
- Updated DTK development library.
- Fixed the slow unlocking issue of fingerprint scanners from Goodix Technology.
- New deepin app: Deepin Home.
- The system version is changed to 20.8.
- The system logo is dynamic when the system boots up.
Kernel
- UTCS is integrated so Nvidia devices will be automatically detected and installed with proper drivers during system installation.
- LTS kernel is upgraded to version 5.15.77.
- New driver packages are integrated: nvidia-driver-510、nvidia-graphics-drivers-470、nvidia-graphics-drivers-390.
App Store
- Support for decompressing Wine applications during the downloading process, so as to improve their opening speed after the installation is completed.
- Optimized visual effects of the "Updates" and "Manage" pages.
- Comments can be copied.
- Optimized the display when the window had the minimum size.
File Manager
- Replaced the icon of the desktop process in System Monitor.
- "Hide system disk" in settings was changed to "Hide built-in disks".
- Files on the disc can be saved as an image file.
- Removable devices can be renamed and formatted by the context menu.
- "Merge the entries of Samba shared folders" was added in Settings > Mount.
- Support custom screensavers by configuring the path of favorite pictures.
- Supported exiting a search by pressing ESC.
- Improved the overall interaction of the Contacts module.
Browser
- Improved the display of the Back and Forward buttons.
- Improved the copyright information.
- Supported the scroll up and down of bookmarks when they exceed the display area.
- Unchecked "Open URL in the address bar in new tab" by default.
- Supported displaying corresponding addresses at the bottom when hovering on web content with links.
Bug Fixes
DDE
- Fixed: The network icon was not displayed in the Dock and on the lock screen after system installation.
- Fixed: It was shown that updates were from third-party repositories.
- Fixed: When the WLAN list was shown on the lock screen, pressing Alt+Tab, users can enter the desktop and switch windows.
- Fixed: There were no refresh buttons in the list of network and Bluetooth devices in the Dock.
- Fixed: After the system wakeup, the launcher could not be opened and displayed normally.
App Store
- Fixed: When refreshing the "Updates" and "Manage" pages, the download window was hidden automatically.
- Fixed: In Polish, text on buttons was not shown completely.
Kernel
- Fixed: When installing deepin 20.7.1, there was no wireless network if using the built-in network adapter of laptops.
- Fixed: When the power cable is plugged into a Thinkbook 14+ laptop, the screen brightness changed from bright to dark.
- Fixed: The touchpad cannot be used on devices with older system versions after locking the screen for a period of time.
- Improved: No need to manually configure environment variables after selecting the nvidia solution in Graphics Driver Manager.
File Manager
- Fixed: Favorite smb server addresses were cleared after the system was upgraded.
- Fixed: Encrypted external disks can only be ejected after clicking "Safely remove" two times.
- Fixed: On "Bluetooth File Transfer" page, the Next button can be clicked if no Bluetooth device was selected.
Terminal
- Fixed: When the window theme was changed to "System", it actually turned dark.
Font Manager
- Fixed: Cannot use keyboard shortcuts for switches.
Calculator
- Fixed: Displaying error when copying a hexadecimal number with lowercase letters, such as 0x80e12.
Device Manager
- Fixed: Incomplete display of chip information of audio adapters.
Document Viewer
- Fixed: Failed to open attached docx files in emails by Document Viewer on some devices.
Package Installer
- Fixed: It stuck at 90% when installing xnview.deb.
Text Editor
- Fixed: In Polish, "Go to Line" in the context menu was not shown completely.
- Fixed: The text pasted by pressing the mouse middle button cannot be undone.
- Fixed: Colors of the code disappeared when finding text.
- Fixed: When there were brackets in the text, the text cannot be resumed correctly after several deletions and undo.
- Fixed: Files were displayed abnormally with the default encoding format WINDOWS-1252. After changing the encoding format to UTF-16BE, they were displayed properly.
- Fixed: If you changed text and closed Text Editor without saving the file, after reopening it and pressing Ctrl+S, Text Editor crashed.
- Fixed: After opening multiple text files without any activities for a period of time, Text Editor got stuck.
Image Viewer
- Fixed: When switching and viewing images, memory usage continued increasing, resulting in memory leakage.
- Fixed: The text recognition accuracy was low if there was no large blank space around the image.
Album
- Fixed: In Polish, the text on the "Photo info" window was not shown completely.
- Fixed: Photos deleted on the Trash page of Album still exist in the system trash.
Screen Capture
- Fixed: The recording time was not shown at the bottom right.
Others
- Fixed: It was shown that updates were from third-party repositories after adding the internal testing sources.
- Fixed: The manual cannot be accessed by pressing F1 or from the help option of the main menu.
- Fixed: In the fullscreen mode of the launcher, when dragging an app, the dragged app was not the selected one.
- Fixed security vulnerabilities to improve system security.
If you want to download deepin 20.8, you can grab an ISO here. Should you replace Windows with deepin today? Well, maybe not today if you have never used Linux. Before making any decisions, you should try deepin for a while to make sure sure it fully meets your needs.
Image credit: mast3r/depositphotos.com