COSMIC Desktop Alpha 3 Released With More Enhancements

As a nice Halloween treat for Linux desktop users, System76 has published their third alpha version of the Rust-written COSMIC desktop environment.

COSMIC Alpha 3 is still deemed "incomplete" at this stage but continuing to advance toward its first stable release later this year with their in-house Pop!_OS 24.04 distribution.

As for what's complete and what is still ahead for this desktop environment, today's announcement explains:

"The alpha release includes the features most users require for day-to-day use. Applets in the panel provide important functionality including connecting to wireless networks, audio output and input device selection, and connecting to Bluetooth devices.

COSMIC applications for the first release include COSMIC Terminal, COSMIC Files, COSMIC Edit, COSMIC App Store, and COSMIC Settings.

COSMIC Settings includes Desktop and Panel options, Network & Wireless, Bluetooth, Sound, Wallpaper, Appearance, Workspaces, Input Device settings, Display configuration, Power settings, and About.

Screen reader support is now in an early testable state. Currently, Firefox and GNOME apps will work with the Orca screen reader. Over the next month we’ll add support for COSMIC interfaces and applications. Screen reader keybinding support is only on Pop!_OS, unless other distros patch at-spi2-core. This work is meant as a proof of concept that other distros and desktops may choose to adopt for screen readers on Wayland.

Completing Settings pages, fixing bugs, and performance improvements account for most of the remaining work before the first beta release."

There is still more work to complete on the COSMIC Settings, various compositor features like Variable Refresh Rate, more accessibility integration, and other minor features.

More details on the COSMIC Alpha 3 release via System76.com. More screenshots and background information on COSMIC via the earlier Alpha 1 testing.