Great news from the Wiibrew front! Developer Albert "isobel" Herranz, who's been at work on the Wii-Linux project for a while now, has finally released a real implementation of a Linux system for the Wii with Whiite-Linux v0.1a.

Whiite-Linux basically enables the console for use as a PowerPC-based Linux computer. As pointed out in the program's readme, the Wii is well-suited to become a cheap PowerPC Linux System thanks to its hardware and peripheral options.

The readme also notes that the Whiite-Linux system is non-intrusive, meaning it doesn't modify anything on your Wii, and is merely an extension. Both the kernel and the operating system file are contained in the external SD card.

This version of Whiite-Linux doesn't support the sensor bar as of yet. However, this release does support many USB devices that Linux already handles, like USB keyboards, mice, and even hard drives.

It is strongly recommended to through the documentation included in the download archive for detailed information on the system. Here is a description of the following download files as described by the readme:

• The package debian-etch-4.0+whiite-0.1.tar.bz2 contains a tarball of a standard "barebones" debootstrapped Debian 4.0 (etch) root filesystem targetted for PowerPC systems.
• The package whiite-linux-0.1a.tar.bz2 contains a Linux kernel build designed to run on a Nintendo Wii console.

Download: Whiite-Linux v0.1a
Download: Debian etch v4.0 and Whiite v0.1
Download: Whiite-Linux v0.1a (source code)

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Related links:

• Forum discussion: About Wii Linux
• Wii-Linux Proof of Concept v0.4 - now with USB keyboard support
• Wii-Linux Proof of Concept v0.3
• Wii Linux project: Debian etch v4.0 and Whiite v0.1