Rescatux 0.31 beta 5 released

Rescatux 0.31 beta 5 has been released.

Rescatux 0.31b4 new options: Promote Windows user to Admin and Unlock Windows user
Rescatux 0.31b4 new options: Promote Windows user to Admin and Unlock Windows user

Fixed bugs:

  • Hard disk detection was improved when non standard partitions such as LVM or encrypted ones are present.

Internal improvement:

  • Added cryptsetup packages to default build so that we can mount LUKS partitions later.

Known bugs:

  • Handling of directories with spaces when detecting Windows SAM files is not optimal
  • Double-clicking on directories on desktop opens Iceweasel (Firefox fork) instead of a file manager
  • Bottom bar does not have a shorcut to a file manager as it’s a common practice in modern desktops

Pending features or bugfixes for 0.31 stable release:

  • Select keyboard from Grub2 boot or Isolinux boot so that you can type your correct password when resetting Gnu/Linux password
  • New option: Easy Grub fix: Runs both Restore Grub and Update Grub options
  • New option: Easy Windows Admin that runs: unlock user, promote user to admin and blank admin user password so that you can straight-forward as a windows admin user.
  • Rewriting of Windows chntpw based options so that source code is not repeated

Downloads:

Rescatux 0.31b5 size is about 430 Megabytes.

Distro facts:

Feedback welcome:
I’ve tried myself the distro in my dev environment for the new options, not the old ones and they seem to start ok. Another thing is doing a full test about their complete functionality. Please test the ISO and report back if something that worked on previous stable versions no longer works in this beta version.

Don’t forget that you can use:

Help Rescatux project if you cannot wait:

I am very busy right now at work. So you should expect two, three or four months of Rescatux development stalling. These are some of the funny tasks that anyone can easily contribute to: Making a youtube video for the new options. Make sure documentation for the new options is right. Translate the documentation of new options to Spanish. Make snapshots for new options documentation so that they don’t lack images.

If you want to help please contact us here:

Some thoughts:

Just another iteration in Rescatux development. Now it seems that a big bug has been detected. In some hard disks setup Rescapp was not able to parse all the hard disk names and its sizes correctly. That’s only two lines of code changed but a new release needs to be made public.

The addition of cryptsetup package is for 0.32 or 0.33 development. Don’t expect something related for the final user in the short term. Somehow in the future I will add LUKS support to Rescatux. You can check my personal blog post on Rescatux Development: Detecting LUKS encrypted partitions to help me on that subject.

As I had already said for 0.31 beta 4 version this release uses SG2D 2.00 beta 6 that means that it supports both BIOS and EFI boot. You’re invited to test that functionality too.

Thank you and happy download!

Rescatux 0.31 beta 4 released

Rescatux 0.31 beta 4 has been released.
Update: I add a video from Bóson Treinamentos em Tecnologia which describes quite well the Rescatux 0.31 beta 4 release. Video audio is Portuguese.

Rescatux 0.31b4 new options: Promote Windows user to Admin and Unlock Windows user
Rescatux 0.31b4 new options: Promote Windows user to Admin and Unlock Windows user

New features:

  • Better handle of /boot/grub2 in Fedora installations when running grub-install or update-grub options
  • Update Grub should work in any Grub2 system (previous version only worked on Debian or Ubuntu distributions)
  • New option: Promote a Windows user to Administrator
  • XFE is the new file manager instead of qtfm
  • New option: Unlock a Windows user to re-enable it
  • LVM and RAID support for Restore Grub and Update Grub options (It seems it already worked from 0.30.2)

Known bugs:

  • Handling of directories with spaces when detecting Windows SAM files is not optimal
  • Double-clicking on directories on desktop opens Iceweasel (Firefox fork) instead of a file manager
  • Bottom bar does not have a shorcut to a file manager as it’s a common practice in modern desktops

Pending features or bugfixes for 0.31 stable release:

  • Select keyboard from Grub2 boot or Isolinux boot so that you can type your correct password when resetting Gnu/Linux password
  • New option: Easy Grub fix: Runs both Restore Grub and Update Grub options
  • New option: Easy Windows Admin that runs: unlock user, promote user to admin and blank admin user password so that you can straight-forward as a windows admin user.
  • Rewriting of Windows chntpw based options so that source code is not repeated

Downloads:

Rescatux 0.31b4 size is about 427 Megabytes.

Distro facts:

Feedback welcome:
I’ve tried myself the distro in my dev environment for the new options, not the old ones and they seem to start ok. Another thing is doing a full test about their complete functionality. Please test the ISO and report back if something that worked on previous stable versions no longer works in this beta version.

Don’t forget that you can use:

Help Rescatux project if you cannot wait:

I am very busy right now at work. So you should expect two, three or four months of Rescatux development stalling. These are some of the funny tasks that anyone can easily contribute to: Making a youtube video for the new options. Make sure documentation for the new options is right. Translate the documentation of new options to Spanish. Make snapshots for new options documentation so that they don’t lack images.

If you want to help please contact us here:

Some thoughts:

I think that making Rescatux 0.31 stable is more defined than ever. The keyboard support needs to be there so that Gnu/Linux password change is done with the right password and not another one, and also so that people are not annoyed when trying to use chat. Improve the documentation so that there’s nothing missing and nothing more.

There are also these new easy options that combine individual options functionality into one just to make live easier for everyone also but that doesn’t seem too complex to develop and it will encourage to reuse code and thus improve the rescatux_lib library.

This release uses SG2D 2.00 beta 6, which it will be released soon. That means that it supports both BIOS and EFI boot hopefully. You’re invited to test that functionality too.

Thank you and happy download!

Rescatux 0.31 beta 3 released

Rescatux 0.31 beta 3 has been released.

Boot-repair, Os-uninstalle, Photorec and
Boot-repair, Os-uninstaller, Photorec and Testdisk were added as expert options to Rescapp

Changelog:

  • Razor-qt desktop was updated from 4.x version to 5.x version
  • Added a frame so that embedded webpage is seen inside a grey square.
  • Now xchat nickname shows Rescapp version so that accurate help can be given in the chat.
  • Added the following expert tools:
    • boot-repair
    • clean-ubiquity
    • os-uninstaller
    • testdisk
    • photorec
  • Rearranged as an expert tool:
    • gparted
  • Added these CLI programs for experts:
    • extundelete

Downloads:

Rescatux 0.31b3 size is about 424 Megabytes.

Distro facts:

Feedback welcome:
I’ve tried myself the distro in my dev environment for the new options, not the old ones and they seem to start ok. Another thing is doing a full test about their complete functionality. Please test the ISO and report back if something that worked on previous stable versions no longer works in this beta version.

Don’t forget that you can use:

Some little thoughts
I’ve added these expert tools because, basically, I don’t have to implement boot-repair functionality into Rescapp wizard (And the idea is one or two years old :(). Another reason might be because testdisk, photorec and extundelete can be useful in some situations but… again… I would rather include its functionality into Rescapp script (instead of adding disconnected apps).

Not everything is bad because adding these tools has made me add the Expert tools options menu to Rescapp. Now you can find Gparted inside of Rescapp instead of having to search for it in the Start menu.

I’m not sure if I want to freeze 0.31 beta 3 as it is right now or if I’m going to add one of these things: 1. Add more chntpw-ng functionality to rescapp. 2. Improve the Restore Grub and Update Grub to be able to detect Logical Volumes (LVM).

Thank you and happy download!

Rescatux 0.31 beta 1 released

Rescatux 0.31 beta 1 has been released.

Changelog:

  • System updated to next Debian Stable Wheezy
  • Gparted was updated to 0.12.1 version which includes new option: Attempt data rescue…
  • Gpart package was added so that Gparted attempt data rescue option works ok. It can also be used by expert users.

Downloads:

Rescatux 0.31b1 size is about 396 Megabytes.

Distro facts:

Multi-distro makers warning:

You probably need to update your script to reflect that default kernel is vmlinuz1 instead of old vmlinuz.

Feedback welcome:
I’ve tried myself the distro in my dev environment all the current options and they seem to work ok. Please test the ISO and report back if something that worked on previous stable versions no longer works in this beta version.

Don’t forget that you can use:

Thank you and happy download!

Rescatux 0.30rc1 released

Rescatux 0.30 Release Candidate 1 has been released.

Rescatux 0.30 beta 7 Cdrom or USB ISO for x86 or amd64 MultiMirror #1
Mirror #2
MD5 (372 Megabytes)
Changelog:

  • Beta options are described as (BETA).
  • Syslinux version has AMD64 boot as the default one.
  • Copyright notices were added

So, aproximately in a month time if there is not any special problem I’ll release 0.30 stable at last with a big post aimed at internet press which only copy and paste so that they explain accurately what Rescatux is, what it’s not, and what SGD and SG2D are.

As I said this is Rescatux 0.30 roadmap updated:

Bugs and Feature requests they are found in Forja Cenatic. Thank you Cenatic!

Feature requests

Bugs to be fixed

Issues that need to be addressed before the release

 

Whenever I release a new beta the idea is to copy and paste this roadmap and to replace the dots (..) with the beta version where the feature has been implemented. An example would be: (0.30b3).

Rescatux 0.30b7 released

Rescatux 0.30 beta 7 has been released.

Rescatux 0.30 beta 7 Cdrom or USB ISO for x86 or amd64 MultiMirror #1
Mirror #2 Mirror #3
MD5 (372 Megabytes)
Changelog:

  • Graphical documentation completed.
  • Spanish graphical documentation completed.

As I said this is Rescatux 0.30 roadmap updated:

Bugs and Feature requests they are found in Forja Cenatic. Thank you Cenatic!

Feature requests

Bugs to be fixed

Issues that need to be addressed before the release

 

Whenever I release a new beta the idea is to copy and paste this roadmap and to replace the dots (..) with the beta version where the feature has been implemented. An example would be: (0.30b3).

 

Rescatux 0.30b6 released

Rescatux 0.30 beta 6 has been released.

Rescatux 0.30 beta 6 Cdrom or USB ISO for x86 or amd64 MultiMirror #1
Mirror #2 Mirror #3
Mirror #4
MD5 MD5 at Mirror #4 (367 Megabytes)
Changelog:

  • Ctrl+Q makes Rescapp to exit.
  • New option: Change Gnu/Linux password
  • New option: Regenerate sudoers file
  • New tool: (For experts only): Synaptic
  • New tool: (For experts only): Gparted 0.7

As I said this is Rescatux 0.30 roadmap updated:

Bugs and Feature requests they are found in Forja Cenatic. Thank you Cenatic!

Feature requests

Bugs to be fixed

Issues that need to be addressed before the release

 

Whenever I release a new beta the idea is to copy and paste this roadmap and to replace the dots (..) with the beta version where the feature has been implemented. An example would be: (0.30b3).

 

Rescatux 0.30b5 released

Rescatux 0.30 beta 5 has been released.

Rescatux 0.30 beta 5 Cdrom or USB ISO for x86 or amd64 MultiMirror #1
Mirror #2 Mirror #3
MD5 (361 Megabytes)
Changelog:

As I said this is Rescatux 0.30 roadmap updated:

Bugs and Feature requests they are found in Forja Cenatic. Thank you Cenatic!

Feature requests

Bugs to be fixed

Issues that need to be addressed before the release

 

Whenever I release a new beta the idea is to copy and paste this roadmap and to replace the dots (..) with the beta version where the feature has been implemented. An example would be: (0.30b3).

 

Rescatux 0.30b4 released

Rescatux 0.30 beta 4 has been released.

Rescatux 0.30 beta 4 Cdrom or USB ISO for x86 or amd64 MultiMirror #1
Mirror #2 Mirror #3
MD5 (355 Megabytes)

 

  • Super Grub2 Disk 1.99b1 is included (Actually it boots from it not from isolinux)
  • It autodetects 64bit systems and loads the appropiate kernel accordingly. This will fix most of the errors about not being able to restore Grub.

As I said this is Rescatux 0.30 roadmap updated:

Bugs and Feature requests they are found in Forja Cenatic. Thank you Cenatic!

Feature requests

Bugs to be fixed

Issues that need to be addressed before the release

 

Whenever I release a new beta the idea is to copy and paste this roadmap and to replace the dots (..) with the beta version where the feature has been implemented. An example would be: (0.30b3).

 

Rescatux 0.30 beta 3 released

Rescatux 0.30 beta 3 Cdrom or USB ISO for x86 or amd64 Mirror #1 Mirror #2
MD5 (334 Megabytes)

Source code and other downloads
Useful Rescatux Options:

  • Restore Grub to the MBR
  • Update Grub Configuration
  • Filesystem check (Fix forced)
  • Fix of Windows MBR (Currently in beta status)
  • Blank Windows password
  • Boot Info Script

Changelog:

  • Hard disk order dialog rewritten into python
  • UI was improved with some icons
  • Tried to improve Fix of Windows MBR option

Some comments about the release:

This release does not add any new useful options compared to Rescatux 0.29 so you are not advised to renew your Rescatux disk if you already have Rescatux 0.29.

This is the second release of the Rescatux 0.30 series. It is a beta because there are some many changes in the UI. Please comment your experience on the Rescatux forum. Please say your word at Super Grub mailing list or try to find us at Rescatux chat.

The rewrite of a hard disk dialog into Python usually it is not a reason to make a release not even a beta release. But… it is because the current dialog is quite a nightmare to understand. Now you choose a hard disk press on UP button and it moves upwards.

Now that I have managed to implement such a python dialog I think the rest of the Rescatux 0.30 development will be easier. It’s interesting that some people think that Rescatux lacks an application for installing packages (synaptic). I will think about it.

I have also tried to improve the Fix of Windows MBR option but install-mbr command is deceiving me. I might finally rely on syslinux and setting up active partitions.

Waiting for your feedback!