GNU Guix and GNU's 31st Birthday
GNU Guix (pronounced like "geeks") is a purely functional package manager and a GNU/Linux distribution (officially called the GNU Guix distribution of GNU/Linux) that respects the freedom of computer users. Guix is written in GNU Guile Scheme, the official extension language of the GNU System. In addition to standard package management features, Guix supports transactional upgrades and roll-backs, unprivileged package management, per-user profiles, and garbage collection.
Guix hackathon on GNU's 31st birthday
There's no better way to celebrate the GNU Project's birthday than to hack on GNU software with free software advocates from around the world. To continue the theme set by last year's GNU30 hackathon at MIT, an online hackathon was held in the URL:{#guix} IRC channel on Freenode on September 27 and 28, 2014 to celebrate GNU's 31st birthday. During that time, contributors worked on KDE, Hurd, and Ruby support, fixing bugs in existing packages, a PyPI package importer, package 'linters', and made improvements to the 'guix.el' Emacs user interface. That's a lot of birthday presents!
Guix's role in the GNU System
Guix is currently the only GNU/Linux distribution that is an official GNU project. In addition to building a fully free operating system, the Guix project intends to improve the integration and consistency of GNU software, as well as improve the workflow among GNU hackers and users. Guix aims to maximize build determinism and security by providing reproducible package recipes and not trusting a single binary provider.
Towards the future
Guix is alpha software that currently has approximately a thousand packages available in its default repository. In order to provide a distribution that is useful for all computer users, your help is needed! The Guix project needs volunteers to test out installation images and give feedback, package useful software, keep packages up-to-date, add additional system services, fix bugs, and spread the word about Guix and the GNU Project. For source code, documentation, and contact information, visit the GNU Guix homepage.1 Happy hacking!