PC-BSD Releases Updated Lumina Desktop Environment

Besides working toward PC-BSD 10.1.1's release, the PC-BSD crew have also been working on improving their Lumina Desktop Environment.

Nearly a year ago I wrote about PC-BSD developing its own desktop environment and months later it was out in alpha form. The new PC-BSD desktop is called Lumina and it's a homegrown environment catered toward the BSDs. The Lumina desktop is FreeDesktop.org/XDG-complaintand they're hoping for it to be an alternative to GNOME or KDE.

Among the changes in the new Lumina Desktop 0.8.1 release this week are new desktop/panel plug-ins, new slideshow file interactions within their "Insight" file manager, a new backend distribution customization framework, various updated features, and a number of bug fixes.

The new plug-ins is an audio player to play audio files from the desktop, a new home button panel plug-in, and a "start menu" panel plug-in.

Updated features include having desktop plug-ins following the current theme along with the panels, converting the notepad plug-in into a file-based utility, and support for a customized user icon for the user button.

More details on Luminua 0.8.1 can be found via the announcement at PC-BSD.org. Lumina 0.8.1 will be found in the upcoming PC-BSD 10.1.1 release while is also available to users via the PC-BSD "Edge" repository.