Yesterday, the ReactOS team announced the release of ReactOS 0.4.11. This release comes with improvements in the kernel for better overall system stability, support for manifests, and more.
Following are some of the updates ReactOS 0.4.11 comes with:
Kernel improvements
ReactOS 0.4.11 comes with substantial updates in the interface that allow operating systems to talk with storage devices. Nowadays, computers generally use SATA connections and the corresponding AHCI interface. To support this interface, ReactOS relies on the UniATA driver. But, this driver was not supported by the 6th generation of Intel’s Core processors (Skylake). The team has now resolved this incompatibility enabling users to test ReactOS on more modern platforms.
Support for manifests
Applications often depend on other libraries in the form of dynamic link libraries (DLLs), which are loaded by the loader (LDR). One way these dependencies are specified is with the help of manifests. In the previous versions of ReactOS, manifests were not properly supported.
ReactOS 0.4.11 comes with sufficient support for manifests, which has also widened the range of applications that can run in ReactOS. With this support added, ReactOS can now run applications like Blender 2.57b, Bumptop, Evernote 5.8.3, Quicktime Player 7.7.9, and many others.
USETUP improvements
ReactOS 0.4.11 comes with major improvements in the USETUP module. The goal behind these improvements was to enable users to upgrade an existing installation of ReactOS. This is also a step forward towards making ReactOS an actual system OS with the ability to update without the loss of any data and configuration.
Testing
In this release, the team has restructured the test results page to better encapsulate the relevant information. In addition to the overall conclusion of the test, users will now also be able to see details such as tracking what drove a particular conclusion and the workarounds that they might themselves attempt.
Support for network debugging and diagnosis programs
ReactOS 0.4.11 now supports various network debugging and diagnosis programs as a result of work done in TCP and UDP connection enumeration. With this update, the ReactOS team aims to make the platform useful for not just running applications, but also to debug them.
To read the full list of updates in ReactOS 0.4.11, check out the official announcement.
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