Debian 7.0 Wheezy
released
May 4th, 2013
After many months of constant development, the Debian project is
proud to present its new stable version 7.0 (code name
Wheezy
).
This new version of Debian includes various interesting features such as
multiarch support,
several specific tools to
deploy private clouds, an improved installer, and a complete set of
multimedia codecs and front-ends which remove the need for third-party repositories.
Multiarch support, one of the main release goals for Wheezy
, will allow
Debian users to install packages from multiple architectures on the same
machine. This means that you can now, for the first time, install both 32- and
64-bit software on the same machine and have all the relevant dependencies
correctly resolved, automatically.
The installation process has been greatly improved: Debian can now be
installed using software speech, above all by visually impaired people who
do not use a Braille device. Thanks to the combined efforts of a huge number of
translators, the installation system is available in 73 languages, and more
than a dozen of them are available for speech synthesis too.
In addition, for the first time, Debian supports installation and booting using
UEFI for new 64-bit PCs (amd64
), although there is no support for
Secure Boot
yet.
This release includes numerous updated software packages, such as:
- Apache 2.2.22
- Asterisk 1.8.13.1
- GIMP 2.8.2
- an updated version of the GNOME desktop environment 3.4
- GNU Compiler Collection 4.7.2
- Icedove 10 (an unbranded version of Mozilla Thunderbird)
- Iceweasel 10 (an unbranded version of Mozilla Firefox)
- KDE Plasma Workspaces and KDE Applications 4.8.4
- kFreeBSD kernel 8.3 and 9.0
- LibreOffice 3.5.4
- Linux 3.2
- MySQL 5.5.30
- Nagios 3.4.1
- OpenJDK 6b27 and 7u3
- Perl 5.14.2
- PHP 5.4.4
- PostgreSQL 9.1
- Python 2.7.3 and 3.2.3
- Samba 3.6.6
- Tomcat 6.0.35 and 7.0.28
- Xen Hypervisor 4.1.4
- the Xfce 4.8 desktop environment
- X.Org 7.7
- more than 36,000 other ready-to-use software packages, built from nearly 17,500 source packages.
With this broad selection of packages, Debian once again stays true
to its goal of being the universal operating system. It is suitable
for many different use cases: from desktop systems to netbooks; from
development servers to cluster systems; and for database, web, or
storage servers. At the same time, additional quality assurance
efforts like automatic installation and upgrade tests for all packages
in Debian's archive ensure that Wheezy
fulfills the high
expectations that users have of a stable Debian release. It is rock
solid and rigorously tested.
You can install Debian on computers ranging from
handheld systems to supercomputers, and on nearly everything in between.
A total of nine architectures are supported:
32-bit PC / Intel IA-32 (i386
), 64-bit PC / Intel EM64T
/ x86-64 (amd64
), Motorola/IBM PowerPC (powerpc
),
Sun/Oracle SPARC (sparc
), MIPS (mips
(big-endian) and
mipsel
(little-endian)), Intel Itanium (ia64
), IBM
S/390 (31-bit s390
and 64-bit s390x
), and ARM EABI
(armel
for older hardware and armhf
for newer
hardware using hardware floating-point).
Want to give it a try?
If you want to simply try it without having to install it, you can use a
special image, known as a live image, available for CDs, USB sticks, and netboot
setups. Initially, these images are provided for the amd64
and
i386
architectures only. It is also possible to use these live
images to install Debian. More information is available from the
Debian Live homepage.
If, instead, you want to directly install it, you can choose among various installation media, such as Blu-ray Discs, DVDs, CDs, and USB sticks, or from the network. Several desktop environments — GNOME, KDE Plasma Desktop and Applications, Xfce, and LXDE — may be installed through CD images; the desired one may be chosen from the boot menus of the CDs/DVDs. In addition, multi-architecture CDs and DVDs are available which support installation of multiple architectures from a single disc. Or you can always create bootable USB installation media (see the Installation Guide for more details).
The installation images may be downloaded right now via bittorrent (the recommended method), jigdo, or HTTP; see Debian on CDs for further information. Wheezy will soon be available on physical DVD, CD-ROM, and Blu-ray Discs from numerous vendors, too.
Already a happy Debian user and you only want to upgrade?
Upgrades to Debian 7.0 from the previous release, Debian
6.0 (codenamed Squeeze
), are automatically handled by
the apt-get package management tool for most configurations.
As always, Debian systems may be upgraded painlessly, in place,
without any forced downtime, but it is strongly recommended to read
the release notes as well as
the installation guide
for possible issues, and for detailed instructions on installing and
upgrading. The release notes will be further improved and translated
to additional languages in the weeks after the release.
About Debian
Debian is a free operating system, developed by thousands of volunteers from all over the world who collaborate via the Internet. The Debian project's key strengths are its volunteer base, its dedication to the Debian Social Contract and Free Software, and its commitment to provide the best operating system possible. Debian 7.0 is another important step in that direction.
Contact Information
For further information, please visit the Debian web pages at https://www.debian.org/ or send mail to <press@debian.org>.