COSMIC Alpha 4 Released For System76's Rust-Based Desktop

System76 today released the newest development/testing version of their Rust-based desktop environment designed for their Pop!_OS Linux distribution.

Since the original Alpha back in August, System76 software engineers have been working to further refine their desktop and address missing features prior to the stable debut with the next major Pop!_OS release. With the COSMIC Alpha 4 release, region and language settings have been added to the COSMIC desktop for adjusting the date / time / numbers formatting. COSMIC also has a new settings pane for setting the default applications to be used for the email client, file manager, web browser, music / video players, image viewers, and calendar.

System76 engineers have also improved the COSMIC Store experience, implemented display power management settings, and worked on early accessibility work such as screenreader support.

Variable Refresh Rate (VRR) support is also now rolling out to the COSMIC desktop. COSMIC's compositor has initial VRR support and there is integration within the COSMIC display settings area.

COSMIC Alpha 4 also brings a number of bug fixes, some performance optimizations, memory leak fixes, and other adjustments.

Download information and more details on the many refinements to find with COSMIC Alpha 4 via the System76 blog.