After a slight delay, the first alpha build of the upcoming Mandriva 2011 has been released. Mandriva 2011 Alpha 1 comes with all the major components and new features expected to land in the stable release.

Some packages have been updated from the initial Technology Preview release and work was finalized on some of the big new features, like the switch to the RPM package management system.

"I am pleased to announce to you that the iso of Mandriva 2011 Alpha 1 just went out, and should be available in devel/isos/2011 directory on your favorite mirror shortly!," Eugeni Dodonov announced.

"As promised some weeks ago, the Mandriva 2011 Alpha1 is following the lead of Mandriva 2011 Technical Preview, sorting out some of the issues we noticed in it," he continued.

Highlights of Mandriva 2011 Alpha 1:

· Linux kernel 2.6.37;
· RPM 5.3.8 (20110125);
· KDE SC 4.6.0;
· GNOME 2.32.1;
· XFCE 4.8.0;
· X.Org Server 1.9;
· Firefox 4 Beta 11;
· Chromium - all branches, stable and unstable;
· Clementine 0.6;
· NetworkManager 0.8.2;
· Systemd 17;
· GCC 4.5.2;
· OpenSSL 1.0.0d;
· Wine 1.3.13.

Mandriva 2011 Release Schedule:

· Mandriva 2011 Alpha - February 15 2011;
· Mandriva 2011 Alpha 2 - February 28 2011;
· Mandriva 2011 Beta 1 - March 14 2011;
· Mandriva 2011 Beta 2 - April 11 2011;
· Mandriva 2011 RC - May 9 2011;
· Mandriva 2011 Final - June 13 2011.

The first alpha of Mandriva 2011 was supposed to land two weeks ago, but some of the architectural changes took longer than anticipated. Rather than just delaying the release, the team provided a Technology Preview build for eager testers to see what's new in Mandriva 2011.

Softpedia.