Six months after the publication of the prototype of the Windows-like operating system C:\Deb the first alpha version of the project was formed, which received a new name – CusDeb OS. Unlike the prototype, which was a regular Linux environment styled as Windows 95/98 using PCManFM, LXPanel and other components, CusDeb OS Alpha 1 offers a full-fledged classic Win32 environment based on custom ReactOS components running through Wine. The user environment is developed as part of CusDeb OS under the name CDEX (CusDeb Desktop Environment X) and is an edition of the ReactOS shell, adapted to work without the kernel of this operating system.
At the current stage, CDEX contains only minimal changes aimed at eliminating various imperfections in the operation of the Win32 environment under Linux. In the future, the developers plan to develop it further, adding features that are not yet implemented in ReactOS.
As in the case of the prototype, the basis of the system remains Debian 13. For download a (894 MB) live system is offered, which can be run in a virtual machine or on a real computer.
The developers of CusDeb OS have set themselves the goal of bringing the system to a state in a year in which it could become a full-fledged alternative to Windows 10. Author project is Evgeny Golyshev, the maintainer of the Elixir package on Debian.
Among the main goals for the second alpha version:
- Transition to a 64-bit version of CDEX (Currently Alpha 1 uses a 32-bit version of CDEX in 64-bit Linux system).
- Direct3D 3-11 support via D7VK and DXVK.
- Migration of graphical environment from Xorg to Wayland.