Mandriva users from all over the world gather into community spaces to share their interest in new Linux technologies. They help new users get comfortable with Linux basics, providing hints and tips, or telling the tales of ancient Unix commands. This gathering of various different people in a community of passion is what makes Linux and the Mandriva community so unique since the inception of our distribution in 1998.
Access to the Mandriva forums is free and open to all. Posting is limited to humans signed-in with a free Mandriva account: no spam or robots allowed here.
If you want to check for product updates, advisories, lifecycle info, go to the Mandriva security page.
The Wiki contains much useful information about Mandriva and Mandriva Linux, including all the 2009 Release Notes, Errata notes, and new features for each Mandriva Linux release. There is a lot of helpful documentation for new and experienced users on various features of Mandriva, and also information and policies useful to Mandriva contributors and translators.
Contributing to the Mandriva Wiki is open to all, just use your free Mandriva account to identify.
Go to the Mandriva WikiSeveral IRC channels dedicated to Mandriva Linux distribution are available on the Freenode network. For information on using IRC and connecting to the Freenode network, see this page. #mandriva is the main channel, where Mandriva staff and community volunteers provide help and advice to other Mandriva users. If your questions would be better handled in a different channel, the users in #mandriva will guide you.
There are several official Mandriva mailing lists. The main ones are these:
You can subscribe to any discussion list by sending an email to sympa@mandrivalinux.org with "subscribe listName" in the body of the message. Archives of the lists from the year 2002 onwards are here. For information on several other mailing lists, and how to unsubscribe and manage your list memberships, go here.
Register to get your Mandriva account: it just takes a minute and it's free!
Registering an account allows you to use and benefit from Mandriva online services, subscribe to newsletters, and participate in Mandriva Linux development.
"Free software" (or "Open Source Software") refers to the users' freedom to use, copy, distribute, study, change and improve the software.
These "software rights" have generated a large and dynamic development community in the last decades. Linux is one of the most successful examples of Free and Open Source software development projects.
Mandriva Linux is based on the Cooker development project sponsored by Mandriva. Hundreds of passionate free software developers work openly on the core of the distribution. This open, community-driven development system has been in place since 1998, making it one of the longest-standing open source development communities around. The involvement of the Mandriva development community helps us to make Mandriva Linux one of the largest, most up-to-date, integrated, internationalized and standardized distributions available.
To thank the many free software contributors and to promote the use of Free Software, Mandriva is proud to build a special Free Software edition. This edition is made for the discerning users who value software freedom and and don't want to run proprietary software on their machine. Named Mandriva Linux Free, this build does not contain any non-free software packages like proprietary drivers, closed-source applications or plugins. It is available on the network of public Mandriva mirrors as part of the Mandriva Linux release.
To download Mandriva Linux Free, simply go the main download page and choose the Free (Software!) edition.
Please note: Free software is really about Freedom, and has nothing to do with free-of-charge software. The fact that Mandriva One and Mandriva Free are downloadable for free is a totally different matter. We hope you appreciate the difference and will enjoy both of our GNU/Linux based editions of Mandriva Linux.
It's easy to stay up-to-date with the latest Mandriva news - you can find it all here!
Monthly newsletter to stay in touch!
It's easy to get involved in Mandriva in many different ways. You can help to improve not just Mandriva Linux but Linux in general, and get the great feeling that comes with contributing to a community and knowing that your contribution is valued and your voice is heard.
The most direct way to contribute to Mandriva Linux is to get involved with development. Mandriva Linux development takes place in a special edition of the distribution called Cooker. Community volunteers, as well as Mandriva employees, are able to contribute new and updated packages to Cooker, and to work on Mandriva's own tools such as the installer and the Mandriva Control Center. For more information on how Cooker and the Mandriva development process in general works, guides on creating packages for Mandriva Linux, and how to start the process of becoming an approved contributor, visit the Wiki link below.
Mandriva has always been proud of offering its products in a huge range of languages. This is possible thanks to the help of the translation community, who volunteer their time to translate the Mandriva installer and other tools, the Mandriva websites and various other components into their native languages. We're always looking for speakers of languages other than English to help translate Mandriva Linux into their languages. For information on how to help with Mandriva translation, visit the links below.
Finding and fixing bugs is one of the most vital development tasks in any software project. You can help with Mandriva development by finding bugs in Mandriva Linux and reporting them to the Mandriva Bugzilla. Advanced (and adventurous!) users can run the Cooker development distribution and report bugs in it, to directly help the development of the next edition of Mandriva Linux. You can also help with bug management in Mandriva by joining the Bug Squad, a group of volunteers who help the Mandriva developers by managing Bugzilla reports.
If you're a happy Mandriva Linux user, don't keep it to yourself! There are many ways to help spread the word about Mandriva Linux. Write about Mandriva on your personal blog or website - review the latest edition, post a favorite tip or trick, or just write about the latest Mandriva news. Submit Mandriva news to community sites like OS News, Linux Today and Slashdot. You can also help by sharing Mandriva Linux with other users - give One CDs to your friends, or give them away at your local LUG (Linux User Group) meeting.
