Package Management & System Updates#

libgda-sqlite included: The libgda-sqlite package is now installed by default, enabling support for the Copyous extension. This ensures that users can utilize Copyous without manual package installation. For details, see PR #930.

containerd included: The containerd package is now installed by default from EPEL, providing a robust container runtime for users who require container-native workflows and tooling. This enables out-of-the-box support for containerd-based workloads and tools. For details, see PR #927.

jxl-pixbuf-loader included: The jxl-pixbuf-loader package is now installed by default from EPEL, enabling JPEG-XL (.jxl) desktop wallpaper rendering in GNOME Shell. Without this package, GNOME Shell cannot display .jxl wallpapers (including the default Bluefin wallpapers), resulting in blank or black desktop backgrounds. The root cause is that gnome-desktop4 44.5 (EL10 base) loads wallpapers via gdk-pixbuf, not glycin—while glycin-loaders (already installed) provides JXL support for apps like Loupe, GNOME Shell's background rendering goes through gnome-bg → gdk-pixbuf, which requires a separate JXL loader. This package registers the necessary gdk-pixbuf plugin for image/jxl support. For details, see PR #1230.

Kernel & Filesystem#

Bluefin LTS offers two kernel options: bluefin:lts uses the stock CentOS 6.12 kernel, while bluefin:lts-hwe uses the CoreOS kernel (coreos-stable-42) and additional hardware enablement modules (akmods). The bluefin:lts version uses XFS as the default filesystem layout, whereas bluefin:lts-hwe allows users to choose their filesystem. The stock kernel (bluefin:lts) maintains secure boot support, while the -hwe version is set as the default for new users.

GNOME Versions#

The default LTS images (lts-testing, lts-hwe-testing) use GNOME 49 from the jreilly1821/c10s-gnome-49 COPR repository (which tracks Fedora F43 dist-git for GNOME 49). GNOME 49 components are version-locked to prevent automatic upgrades and ensure system stability.

GNOME 50 testing variants are available with the -50 suffix tags for both bluefin and bluefin-dx images. These variants are built through the full parallel build pipeline using the GNOME_VERSION build argument (set to "50"). Both GNOME 49 and GNOME 50 receive identical build treatment—build scripts conditionally select the appropriate COPR repository (c10s-gnome-49 or c10s-gnome-50-fresh) based on the GNOME_VERSION value.

Available GNOME 50 image tags:

• bluefin: lts-testing-50, lts-hwe-testing-50
• bluefin-dx: lts-testing-50, lts-hwe-testing-50 (or ghcr.io/ublue-os/bluefin-dx:lts-testing-50 / ghcr.io/ublue-os/bluefin-dx:lts-hwe-testing-50)

Users can choose between GNOME 49 (stable, default) and GNOME 50 (testing) by selecting the appropriate image tag. GNOME 50 variants are intended for testing and early adoption.

Kernel installation is performed via a kernel swap script that removes existing kernel packages and installs the kernel from mounted akmods containers. For HWE builds, the script selects the CoreOS kernel and installs common akmods (such as xone, openrazer, framework-laptop, v4l2loopback) from a dedicated container. Version locking is applied to maintain kernel package consistency. Details

bcache volume support: The bcache-tools package is now included, enabling support for bcache volumes out of the box. This allows users to utilize bcache for hybrid storage configurations without additional manual package installation.

zram was disabled (January-February 2025): zram (compressed RAM/swap) was completely disabled in Bluefin LTS for approximately one month due to a broken URL in the build script. The issue was caused by an incorrect URL format when fetching the zram-generator.conf file from the Fedora project repository—the URL used a "blob/rawhide" endpoint instead of the correct "raw/rawhide" endpoint, which caused the script to download an HTML page instead of the actual configuration file. Users on affected builds would have had no zram functionality during this period. The issue was resolved in PR #1170, and zram is functional in all builds after this fix was merged.

Nvidia & ZFS Support#

The Nvidia driver installation in Bluefin LTS ensures the kmod-nvidia version matches the nvidia-driver version to avoid mismatches, and includes specific post-install steps to fix black screen issues and enable hardware acceleration for Intel/AMD iGPUs.

Bluefin LTS includes a script to install base server ZFS packages and dependencies. The ZFS install script now attempts to install python3-pyzfs with --skip-broken due to missing dependencies in CentOS Stream 10, and autoloads the ZFS module by writing to /usr/lib/modules-load.d/zfs.conf. The script also fixes depmod not running automatically in ZFS 2.2 and rebuilds initramfs with ostree support. For HWE builds, ZFS modules are installed from the CoreOS kernel akmods container, ensuring compatibility with the selected kernel. Details

User & Group Management#

When enabling devmode, standard Bluefin adds users to the groups: dialout, docker, incus-admin, and libvirt. Bluefin LTS only adds users to the docker group. Additionally, users are unable to add themselves to the correct groups using the ujust dx-group command after enabling dev mode and rebooting, due to a missing dx-group recipe and inconsistent group membership after install or rebase to LTS dx. This differs from the Fedora-based variants and is a confirmed parity bug (details).

Hardware Compatibility#

Bluefin LTS ISO does not boot on older EFI hardware because it is compiled for the x86_64-v3 microarchitecture (CentOS Stream), which requires newer CPU instruction sets (AVX/AVX2, FMA). Older CPUs (e.g., i5-3337U) are not compatible. The regular Bluefin stable ISO supports older architectures and boots successfully on such hardware. Details

ZSA keyboard udev rules included: The ZSA udev rules are now included by default, enabling out-of-the-box support for ZSA keyboards (Moonlander, Ergodox EZ, Planck EZ, Voyager) and their web-based flashing and live training tools. This ensures compatibility with Oryx web flashing, Wally, and Keymapp utilities. For details, see PR #74.

ddcutil included: The ddcutil utility is now installed by default, allowing users to control supported monitor settings (such as brightness and contrast) directly from the command line or compatible graphical tools, without requiring additional package installation.

Virtualization#

There is a reported issue in Bluefin LTS where users cannot add a virtual machine at QEMU/KVM user session due to missing hypervisor options. This is identified as a parity bug compared to Bluefin (details).

Networking#

WireGuard VPN connections added through GNOME's network settings do not work properly in Bluefin LTS. Users experience no internet connection and slow response from the route command when the VPN is active. A workaround using wg-quick commands exists, but the issue persists after reboot and with multiple NICs active. This does not occur in Bluefin GTS or Stable (details).

OpenVPN support is now included in Bluefin LTS via the NetworkManager-openvpn-gnome package. As of now, no parity issues have been reported for OpenVPN connections through GNOME's network settings. Users can configure and use OpenVPN connections natively.

Firewall Configuration and Open Ports#

Firewall Configuration and Open Ports#

Bluefin LTS now configures firewalld to use a "Workstation" zone by default, closely following Fedora Workstation's approach. This configuration opens all unprivileged TCP and UDP ports (1024-65535) for incoming connections, while privileged ports (1-1023) remain blocked except for explicitly allowed services (such as SSH, DHCPv6 client, and Samba client).

Key details:

• Default zone: Workstation (set in /etc/firewalld/firewalld.conf)
• Open ports: All TCP/UDP ports 1024-65535 are open for incoming connections by default
• Privileged ports: 1-1023 are blocked except for allowed services
• Essential services allowed: SSH, DHCPv6 client, Samba client
• Outgoing connections: No restrictions

Benefits:

• Desktop and peer-to-peer applications (e.g., LocalSend, development servers, local media servers) work out of the box without manual firewall changes
• Matches the user-friendly firewall defaults of Fedora Workstation

Security model:

• Maintains a secure-by-default stance for privileged ports
• Only essential services are allowed on low ports
• No changes to outgoing connection restrictions

This change improves compatibility for desktop and development use cases while maintaining strong security boundaries for system services.

UI & Integration#

Bluefin LTS now enables GNOME Mutter's experimental features for improved display scaling and XWayland compatibility by default. Specifically, scale-monitor-framebuffer and xwayland-native-scaling are set in the system gschema override. This provides better HiDPI support and more accurate scaling for XWayland applications, especially on multi-monitor setups and with fractional scaling. For technical details, see PR #124.

If you encounter display issues or want to learn more about these features, refer to the upstream GNOME Mutter documentation for advanced configuration and troubleshooting tips.

GSConnect is unable to find or pair with phones running KDE Connect on the same LAN in Bluefin LTS, preventing device pairing. This works as expected under Bluefin GTS, marking it as a parity issue (details).

Configuration & Recipes#

Several ujust recipes present in other Bluefin variants are missing in LTS, including but not limited to configure-grub (hide/show grub menu at boot) and ptyxis-transparency. This results in configuration and feature gaps between LTS and other variants (details).

For the most up-to-date and complete list of parity issues, always refer to the live query of open parity issues on GitHub.