The Ark Linux project has recently disappeared from the net after a spammer managed to grab the domain before we could renew it - which is why you won't find this information on arklinux.org.

But that's not a catastrophe, since the project is currently being merged into a greater effort anyway.

I started Ark Linux because at the time - back in 2001 - there was no other Linux distribution that was really suitable for typical end users without much of an understanding of the underlying technology. Later on, we kept it going because other projects addressing end user needs typically were under the control of a corporation, doing whatever is in their financial interest rather than whatever makes most sense.

Fortunately, this has changed in late 2012: With the launch of OpenMandriva, there's a project that is building a nice, end user friendly distribution that made the same decisions we've made -- a strong KDE desktop and the rpm package manager, and that is not under the control of corporate interests (there is absolutely nothing wrong in working with companies such as ROSA or Mandriva - but their needs should not dictate where the development goes).

Given this, there is no need to continue as a separate project - it makes more sense to pool resources and build the best distribution we can.

There might ultimately be another Ark Linux release - one that ultimately is OpenMandriva with a slightly different selection of core packages.