Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 (RHEL 6) is out, and it brings a huge set of improvements over RHEL 5 for desktop users. Here is a curated list of highlights that I find particularly useful on an EL6 workstation:

Core System & Filesystems

Boot & Graphics

  • Plymouth: Smooth graphical boot flicker-free animations (Plymouth)
  • Kernel Mode Setting (KMS): Native resolution and smooth transitions during boot (KMS)
  • Xorg 1.7:
    • nouveau open-source driver for NVIDIA cards (Nouveau)
    • R600 3D hardware acceleration for AMD/ATI Radeon (R600 Accel)
    • xrandr 1.3 dynamic monitor handling (LWN Article)
    • Native DisplayPort audio and video support

Performance & Security

  • Tickless Kernel: Significant power savings on idle systems (Tickless Kernel)
  • Tuned: Adaptive power management profiles (Power Management)
  • PolicyKit & XACE: Fine-grained privilege management without root elevation (Polkit)

Desktop & Multimedia

  • GDM PAM Stacks: Support for multiple authentication backends (Multiple PAM in GDM)
  • ConsoleKit Fast User Switching: Seamless desktop switching (Fast User Switching)
  • PulseAudio:
  • IBus: Modern input method framework replacing SCIM (IBus)
  • Evolution 2.28: Native support for Microsoft Exchange 2007+ via OpenChange (OpenChange)
  • OpenOffice.org 3.x: Native support for reading and writing Office Open XML (.docx, .xlsx) documents
  • NetworkManager: System-wide connection profiles managed independently of user logins (System Connections)

Desktop Environments

  • GNOME 2.28 (major upgrade from 2.16 in RHEL 5)
  • KDE 4.3
  • Xfce available via EPEL
  • SPICE: High-performance remote desktop protocol support