openSUSE 12.1 Launch Feedback

openSUSE 12.1 was launched on Wednesday and it’s time to look back at the successful launch of a great distribution.

We’ve seen a lot of positive feedback regarding openSUSE 12.1 via press, social networks, blogs etc. The interest in social media is significant with good conversations and new members, our facebook group has grown the last weeks by several hundred new members, the followers of our @openSUSE twitter increase and the recently launched  Google+ page is in the circles of over 3200 people.

Looking over twitter messages directed to our @openSUSE account, here’re just a few comments about openSUSE 12.1:

Really impressed (I'm not impressed easily) with all of the added configuration and customization @openSUSE 12.1 brings very polished - by [OhHeyItsLou ](https://twitter.com/#!/OhHeyItsLou/statuses/136994574219481089) Grats to the folks @openSUSE for releasing such a kick ass 12.1 super stoked to get owncloud up and running. Just need a native Android app - by [kennonk ](https://twitter.com/#!/kennonk/statuses/137014535189045248) Hats off to the #openSUSE folks - 12.1 is a solid release. The #nouveau team deserves a big high-five too; great driver so far. - by [deckerego ](https://twitter.com/#!/deckerego/statuses/137023288995094528) @openSUSE I'm wearing my #openSUSE t-shirt in celebration of 12.1 being released! - by [OrangutanClyde](https://twitter.com/#!/OrangutanClyde/statuses/136784143810969600) @openSUSE I've just upgraded my main workstation, everything looks so polished and well done! Thank you so much for this release! - by [jfduque](https://twitter.com/#!/jfduque/statuses/137081293283405824)

Reviews by journalists included praise like:

All in all, this looks like one of the most exciting openSUSE releases in some time. - [Joe Brockmeier on Linux.com](https://www.linux.com/learn/tutorials/510731-opensuse-121-arrives-whats-new-and-what-happened-to-120)

Download of openSUSE 12.1

As usual, our download server redirected all incoming traffic to our mirror network. The mirrors reported that we again saturated their connections for a couple of hours after the announcement, e.g.

ftp.halifax.rwth-aachen.de did up to 4.5 GBit/sec for openSUSE just with HTTP.  BitTorrent did 300-800 MBit/sec during the whole time. Total traffic spanning all projects peaked at 5.02 GBit/sec with a daily average of 2.44 GBit/sec.

Our download redirector counted  for the first 24 hours  the download of 93761 media, the distribution over the various types is:

• NonOss Addon CD BiArch:  1452

• 32-bit x86: 48075 (total)

  • Net: 2489

  • DVD: 31840

  • GNOME-LiveCD: 7392

  • KDE-LiveCD: 5561

  • Addon-Lang: 793

• 64-bit x86-64:  44234 (total)

  • Net: 2444

  • DVD: 32927

  • GNOME-LiveCD: 4031

  • KDE-LiveCD: 4378

  • Addon-Lang: 454

Also bittorrent was in high demand, at one point we had 1387 seeders and 2804 leechers but we missed to track the high point.  The tracker counted 12924 complete downloads via bittorrent during the first 24 hours.

Physical Media

We’re producing now PromoDVDs to distribute at events and via the openSUSE ambassadors, a separate announcement on how to get this will come once we have the media. A couple of magazines are doing covermounts as well, e.g. Linux Pro Magazine and Linux Magazine will insert it into their worldwide newsstand subscription distribution.

Also, Open Source Press is producing a German openSUSE 12.1 box which is available soon (details), this retail edition is a version of openSUSE with a complete printed end-user manual, installation media, lot’s of vouchers and more.

Webpages and Infrastructure

Thanks to our translators, we updated the frontpage with localized announcements and even added some new languages for our front page like Polish, Lithuian and Thai.

The infrastructure itself has seen increased traffic due to the launch where many where interested in the new openSUSE 12.1 portal page.

Continue spreading the word!

Please continue spreading the word about openSUSE 12.1 - and answer questions on our forums, social media, mailing lists and in person. If you find articles and blog posts about openSUSE 12.1, add them to our wiki and speak about them.

Thank you

The openSUSE launch  was possible thanks to a world wide infrastructure of ftp mirrors that coordinated the release with us. We’d like to thank all of them. Moreover, we’d like to thank everybody  to make the changes to the websites so users could download their brand new openSUSE 12.1 and find information about it! We’d also like to thank the marketing team and anyone who helped for their awesome work (check out the Product Highlights if you haven’t yet!) and of course all contributors of openSUSE who helped to make this release possible!