Raspberry Pi OS update brings Labwc compositor, enhanced UI, and new hardware support

The Raspberry Pi Foundation has released an updated version of their Debian-based Raspberry Pi OS, version 2024-07-04, which brings significant UI improvements and new settings. This update introduces the Labwc Wayland window-stacking compositor as a default alternative to Wayfire. Users can now customize more than two desktops in the panel and PCMan File Manager, with the panel supporting Labwc customization.

Labwc can be enabled via the raspi-config utility, which also includes theme settings in the Pixflat theme and configuration support in raspberrypi-ui-mods. Additionally, raspi-config now supports keyboard settings and PCIe speed adjustments. The piwiz startup wizard allows users to enable or disable Raspberry Pi Connect, which can also be managed through the Recommended Software installer, raspi-config, and rc-gui utilities.

Other notable updates include support for new touchscreens and systemd-inhibit for hardware power key overrides on the Raspberry Pi 5, new udev rules for backlight changes, larger swapfile sizes, and several patches for Wayfire compositor. The release also improves WayVNC handling of virtual displays and encryption, enhances wf-panel-pi panel support for smaller screens, addresses a buffer overflow vulnerability in PiClone, and adds DSI display brightness control. The lastest version of Raspberry Pi OS can be downloaded from the official website here.