Ubuntu Technical Board Meeting Decisions Regarding The New Release Proposals

<div style="text-align: center;"><img alt="Ubuntu logo" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-vLAGqfY7eyU/UP_WL2A6sGI/AAAAAAAAM4o/__IomtcuFfw/s200/ubuntu-logo.png" /></div><br />In a recent Ubuntu technical board meeting, it was decided to:<br /><ul><li style="text-align: justify;"><b>reduce maintenance period for regular (non-LTS) Ubuntu releases from 18 months to 9 months;</b></li><b> </b><li style="text-align: justify;"><b>enable users to continuously track the development focus of Ubuntu without having to explicitly upgrade.</b></li></ul><br /><a name='more'></a><div style="text-align: justify;">It was also decided to implement the above changes "to the maintenance schedule effective in 13.04 and later". </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">To be honest, I didn't understand exactly what "enable users to continuously track the development focus of Ubuntu without having to explicitly upgrade" does so I've looked for an explanation and <a href="https://plus.google.com/u/0/107109423598372241322/posts/GzwBfHuFHsr">it seems</a> this means that <i>archive.ubuntu.com</i> will get a symlink always pointing to the current development release. So basically, users (although I assume mostly developers will want to use this) will be able to always use the current Ubuntu development release without having to upgrade.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The Ubuntu members that have attended the IRC meeting didn't agree on using the "rolling release" wording for this because technically this isn't exactly a rolling release.<br /><br />So technically, there won't be any rolling release although you'll easily be able to use the current development release if you want to. There are also not going to be any monthly releases, etc. like in the <a href="http://www.webupd8.org/2013/02/official-ubuntu-rolling-release-proposal.html">initial proposal</a>.<br /><br />According to Colin Watson's (Canonical) <a href="http://www.webupd8.org/2013/03/ubuntu-technical-board-meeting.html#comment-834691748">comment</a> below, the changes mentioned above are <b>only part of the changes related to the recent Ubuntu release management proposals</b>.<br /></div><br /><b>What's your opinion about these changes? </b><br /><br /><br />For more info, see:<br /><ul><li><a href="http://ubottu.com/meetingology/logs/ubuntu-meeting/2013/ubuntu-meeting.2013-03-18-21.01.moin.txt">Meeting summary </a></li><li><a href="http://irclogs.ubuntu.com/2013/03/18/%23ubuntu-meeting.html#t21:00">IRC log</a></li></ul><br /><div style="text-align: right;"><i>via <a href="https://plus.google.com/u/0/109175303602657131317/posts/C7V3VgRsz89">Alan Bell</a></i></div>

Ubuntu Technical Board Meeting Decisions Regarding The New Release Proposals

In a recent Ubuntu technical board meeting, it was decided to: reduce maintenance period for regular (non-LTS) Ubuntu releases from 18 month...

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Ubuntu GNOME 13.04 Daily Images Available For Download

<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-2MDy4mujIB0/UUDRew1tDqI/AAAAAAAAOjc/GKQ07zAMJAo/s1600/ubuntu-gnome-daily.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Ubuntu GNOME 13.04" border="0" height="204" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-2MDy4mujIB0/UUDRew1tDqI/AAAAAAAAOjc/GKQ07zAMJAo/s320/ubuntu-gnome-daily.png" title="Ubuntu GNOME 13.04" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">Quick update: now that <a href="http://www.webupd8.org/2013/03/ubuntu-gnome-becomes-official-ubuntu.html">Ubuntu GNOME is an official Ubuntu flavour</a>, it can make use of the Ubuntu infrastructure, and the first daily builds are now available for download:</div><br /><a name='more'></a><blockquote>Currently we have 32-bit and 64-bit images available for download and testing. We do not plan to release PowerPC or "amd64+mac" images unless a group of volunteers commits to test these images for each of the Ubuntu release milestones we participate in. The next release milestone for us is Ubuntu 13.04 Final Beta on 28 March.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: right;"><i>- Matthew Butler @ Ubuntu GNOME <a href="https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-gnome/2013-March/000050.html">mailing list</a></i></div></blockquote><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">Oh, and I've forgot to mention this in the previous Ubuntu GNOME article: if you can help in any way (not just packaging and coding), including reporting bugs, join the (new) <a href="https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-gnome">Ubuntu GNOME mailing list</a> or the #ubuntu-gnome channel on the freenode IRC network.</div><br /><a href="http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/ubuntu-gnome/daily-live/current/">Download Ubuntu GNOME daily images</a>

Ubuntu GNOME 13.04 Daily Images Available For Download

Quick update: now that Ubuntu GNOME is an official Ubuntu flavour , it can make use of the Ubuntu infrastructure, and the first daily builds...

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Ubuntu GNOME Becomes An Official Ubuntu Flavour

<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Zyw_icBDgHw/UT5OBSLQf_I/AAAAAAAAOiM/TjzaGOg4M6o/s1600/gnomeubuntu-vert-wh.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Ubuntu GNOME logo" border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Zyw_icBDgHw/UT5OBSLQf_I/AAAAAAAAOiM/TjzaGOg4M6o/s320/gnomeubuntu-vert-wh.png" title="Ubuntu GNOME logo" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div style="text-align: justify;"><b><a href="http://www.webupd8.org/2012/10/prefer-gnome-shell-download-ubuntu.html">Ubuntu GNOME</a>, an Ubuntu-based Linux distribution that ships with GNOME Shell by default along with other GNOME applications that aren't available by default in Ubuntu, is now an official Ubuntu flavour (starting with 13.04).</b></div><br /><a name='more'></a><div style="text-align: justify;">The news comes from the Ubuntu GNOME <a href="https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-gnome/2013-March/000035.html">mailing list</a>, where it is specified that there won't be a 13.04 beta 1 release this week, but there should be a beta release at the end of the month and daily images should be available within a few weeks. This should make it easier to install and test because right now, there's no way of getting Ubuntu GNOME except for installing another Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail flavour and then <a href="http://www.webupd8.org/2012/10/how-to-get-complete-gnome-3-desktop-in.html">install the Ubuntu GNOME</a> meta packages.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Ubuntu GNOME 13.04 will be released with GNOME 3.6 because Ubuntu 13.04 <a href="http://www.webupd8.org/2012/11/ubuntu-1304-only-some-gnome-components.html">won't ship with GNOME 3.8</a> for the most part and since this is now an official flavour, it can't ship with a PPA, but you can use the <a href="http://www.webupd8.org/2013/03/gnome-38-beta-available-in-ppa-for.html">GNOME 3 PPA</a> which should get the stable GNOME 3.8 once it's released.</div><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">Also, <b>the official name is now "Ubuntu GNOME', without "Remix"</b> which has been used in the previous (unofficial) release:</div><br /><blockquote class="tr_bq">The official name is now "Ubuntu GNOME"; no "Remix", no "Edition". I like the simplicity of this name and the GNOME Foundation Board has made it clear that we are not welcome to use derivative names like GNOMEbuntu as our official name.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: right;">- Jeremy Bicha @ Ubuntu GNOME <a href="https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-gnome/2013-March/000003.html">mailing list</a></div></blockquote><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">We'll let you know when the Ubuntu GNOME beta is released and when you can download the daily builds.</div>

Ubuntu GNOME Becomes An Official Ubuntu Flavour

Ubuntu GNOME , an Ubuntu-based Linux distribution that ships with GNOME Shell by default along with other GNOME applications that aren't...

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Unity To Get New Shutdown Dialogs, Scroll To Switch Between Windows Feature [Video]

<div style="text-align: justify;"><b>Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail: it looks like two interesting changes will land in Unity soon: support for switching between windows of the same application by scrolling on the application icon in the Unity Launcher and a new Unity style for shutdown dialog boxes.</b></div><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">Here's are a few screenshots with the new Unity shutdown / restart / lock screen / suspend dialog boxes:</div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Lycchb5oXAE/UTnMzmh87rI/AAAAAAAAOa4/dTl_TlMcUa4/s1600/ubuntu-new-shutdown-dialog_1.png" imageanchor="1" rel="image_group" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Unity style shutdown dialogs Ubuntu" border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Lycchb5oXAE/UTnMzmh87rI/AAAAAAAAOa4/dTl_TlMcUa4/s500/ubuntu-new-shutdown-dialog_1.png" title="Unity style shutdown dialogs" width="500" /></a></div><br /><a name='more'></a><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-tGO6qkHK3gg/UTnMzhEs3UI/AAAAAAAAOa0/-rCHcDyo790/s1600/ubuntu-new-shutdown-dialog_3.png" imageanchor="1" rel="image_group" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Unity style shutdown dialogs Ubuntu" border="0" height="216" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-tGO6qkHK3gg/UTnMzhEs3UI/AAAAAAAAOa0/-rCHcDyo790/s320/ubuntu-new-shutdown-dialog_3.png" title="Unity style shutdown dialogs" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-fatxw8LSpBo/UTnMzt8k0hI/AAAAAAAAOa8/AYQ3X77BNMc/s1600/ubuntu-new-shutdown-dialog_2.png" imageanchor="1" rel="image_group" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Unity style shutdown dialogs Ubuntu" border="0" height="214" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-fatxw8LSpBo/UTnMzt8k0hI/AAAAAAAAOa8/AYQ3X77BNMc/s320/ubuntu-new-shutdown-dialog_2.png" title="Unity style shutdown dialogs" width="320" /></a></div><br /><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">This change has been implemented by Marco Trevisan and it's not a new idea - the new Unity-like dialog boxes were mentioned in an old "GNOME 3 System Settings changes" <a href="https://docs.google.com/a/canonical.com/document/d/1ILTJDiDCd25Npt2AmgzF8aOnZZECxTfM0hvsbWT2BxA/edit?hl=en_GB">spec</a>. from 2011.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">With the new design, the Restart entry has been removed from the Session Indicator since when selecting "Shut down...", there are options to either shut down or restart the computer. However, I'm not sure if that's a good idea since users will probably look for the restart option in the Session Indicator menu.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Also, one thing that I've found annoying in my test is that you <s>can't close the dialogs using the Esc key which, given its design (similar for instance with the lightbox image viewer used on many websites, including on WebUpd8), I would have expected to work</s>. Update: the code has been updated and the shutdown dialogs can now be closed using the Esc key. <br /><br />Remember: <b> Raring is still in development so this might change.</b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">As for the new option that allows you to <b>switch between windows by scrolling on the application icon in the Unity Launcher</b>, the feature has been implemented by Andrea Azzarone and is basically a continuation of the work to bring a more effective window switching experience for applications with multiple windows using the Unity Launcher, which has begun with the quicklists window switching feature which we've mentioned <a href="http://www.webupd8.org/2013/02/unity-gets-new-quicklists-window.html">a while back</a>.</div><br /><br /><br /><h2>Video</h2><br />You can watch these two new features in action in the video below:<br /><br /><center><iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/gaXYq28jcoM" width="560"></iframe><br />(<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gaXYq28jcoM">direct video link</a>)</center><br /><br /><div style="text-align: justify;"><b>The code for these changes has been proposed for merging last night</b> and the new feature that allows you to switch between windows by scrolling on the app icon has already been merged so it should land in Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail (probably) with the next Unity daily upload, while the new dialogs feature is still pending approval. <b>Update:</b> the new Unity-style shutdown dialogs code has been merged so it should land in Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail soon.<br /><br /><b>Update: these changes are now available by default in Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail.</b></div><br /><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">In other Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail related news, <a href="http://www.webupd8.org/2012/11/new-icons-for-ubuntu-software-center.html">the new Nautilus and Software Updater icons</a> have finally landed, but for now only the Software Updater icon shows up for now because of a symbolic link that points to the old icon in the Ubuntu Mono icon theme, which should be fixed soon. Here are a couple of screenshots with the new icons:</div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-cB8GBU2JJjE/UTnK_l6n-UI/AAAAAAAAOag/RlVZlL6pIxM/s1600/nautilus-software-updater-icons.png" imageanchor="1" rel="image_group" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Ubuntu Raring new icons" border="0" height="138" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-cB8GBU2JJjE/UTnK_l6n-UI/AAAAAAAAOag/RlVZlL6pIxM/s320/nautilus-software-updater-icons.png" title="Ubuntu Raring new icons" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-_8fcPO7xSfU/UTnK_lOP1SI/AAAAAAAAOak/bXxhIb_8bn8/s1600/new-nautilus-software-updater-icons.png" imageanchor="1" rel="image_group" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Ubuntu Raring new icons" border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-_8fcPO7xSfU/UTnK_lOP1SI/AAAAAAAAOak/bXxhIb_8bn8/s1600/new-nautilus-software-updater-icons.png" title="Ubuntu Raring new icons" /></a></div><br />By the way, you can use an icon theme that uses the new Nautilus icon as folder icons (that's now how it has been implemented in Ubuntu 13.04 by the way, the old folder icons are still used in Raring) as well as the new Software Updater icon - see: <a href="http://www.webupd8.org/2012/12/use-ubuntu-1304-software-center.html">Use Ubuntu 13.04 Software Center, Software Updater And Nautilus Icons With My-humanity Icon Theme</a>

Unity To Get New Shutdown Dialogs, Scroll To Switch Between Windows Feature [Video]

Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail: it looks like two interesting changes will land in Unity soon: support for switching between windows of the sa...

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Ubuntu 13.04 To Be Released As Scheduled

<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-AK41wa4O3rk/UTcJz_uo-iI/AAAAAAAAOYk/Ta0GqtFrHvg/s1600/ubuntu-logo-ringtail-ringtail.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="190" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-AK41wa4O3rk/UTcJz_uo-iI/AAAAAAAAOYk/Ta0GqtFrHvg/s320/ubuntu-logo-ringtail-ringtail.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br /><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">In his <a href="http://www.webupd8.org/2013/02/official-ubuntu-rolling-release-proposal.html">rolling release proposal</a>, Rick Spencer, Engineering Director at Canonical, has said that the new rolling model should be implemented now, with Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail, which meant Raring wouldn't be released.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">But according to Jonathan Riddell, the main Kubuntu developer, it was <a href="http://blogs.kde.org/2013/03/05/1304-go-ahead">decided</a> yesterday in an online <a href="http://summit.ubuntu.com/">Ubuntu Developer Summit</a> session that Ubuntu 13.04 will be released as scheduled at the last UDS, especially since Raring is four months into development and people have put time and effort that would be wasted if it wouldn't be released:</div><br /><a name='more'></a><blockquote>Of all the nutty things Canonical has done in the last week wanting to drop 13.04 four months into development and two months before release is one of the more anti-social to the community who have been working on it. Fortunately at the "UDS" session today I poked enough and we seem to have consensus that it'll go ahead on the schedule we agreed at UDS last October. Feature freeze on Thursday my friends, two days to go.</blockquote><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">And regarding the rolling release model, it seems no final decision has been made yet.</div><br /><div style="text-align: right;"><i>image via <a href="http://www.engadget.com/2012/10/18/ubuntu-raring-ringtail/">engadget</a></i></div>

Ubuntu 13.04 To Be Released As Scheduled

In his rolling release proposal , Rick Spencer, Engineering Director at Canonical, has said that the new rolling model should be implemented...

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Install GNOME 3.8 In Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail [PPA]

<div style="text-align: justify;">A while back, it was decided that Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail will <a href="http://www.webupd8.org/2012/11/ubuntu-1304-only-some-gnome-components.html">ship with GNOME 3.6</a> for the most part instead of GNOME 3.8. </div><br /><div style="text-align: justify;"><b>Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail users can use the <a href="https://launchpad.net/~gnome3-team/+archive/gnome3">GNOME 3 PPA</a> to upgrade to the latest GNOME 3.8, including GNOME Shell 3.8 and Nautilus 3.8.</b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Additionally, a second PPA (<a href="https://launchpad.net/~gnome3-team/+archive/gnome3-staging">GNOME 3 Staging PPA</a>) has been created recently and allows Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail users to upgrade other components that aren't available in the main GNOME 3 PPA. The GNOME 3 Staging PPA packages are work in progress or have known regressions so it's not as stable as the main GNOME 3 PPA. Also, if you want to use the GNOME 3 Staging PPA, you'll have to firstly add the main GNOME 3 PPA.</div><br /><a name='more'></a><div style="text-align: justify;">Jeremy Bicha has <a href="https://lists.launchpad.net/ubuntu-gnome/msg00273.html">explained</a> on the Ubuntu-GNOME mailing list that<b> <span style="color: #cc0000;">these PPAs should only be used if you are familiar with ppa-purge and know how to fix a broken system. "This is even more true for the GNOME 3 Staging PPA</span></b> as our normal quality standards do not apply there", said Jeremy.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">And indeed, in my test, I wasn't able to purge the main GNOME 3 PPA properly and I've had to remove some packages, including GNOME Shell and Nautilus and only then purge the PPA, then I've installed those packages back (and it was a lot more difficult with the GNOME 3 Staging PPA). I've reported a bug for ppa-purge <a href="https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/ppa-purge/+bug/1142289">HERE</a> regarding this.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Here are a few GNOME 3.8 screenshots:</div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-I0g6Tq22gv8/UTN8mrSDhfI/AAAAAAAAOVE/vU79Ekd5_WM/s1600/gnome-3.8-beta-frequent.png" imageanchor="1" rel="image_group" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" title="GNOME Shell 3.8"><img alt="gnome shell 3.8" border="0" height="180" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-I0g6Tq22gv8/UTN8mrSDhfI/AAAAAAAAOVE/vU79Ekd5_WM/s320/gnome-3.8-beta-frequent.png" title="gnome shell 3.8" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-bUEuP1-t6xE/UTN8m9G0-pI/AAAAAAAAOVI/ca_DwDOa3qQ/s1600/gnome-3.8-beta-all-apps.png" imageanchor="1" rel="image_group" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" title="GNOME Shell 3.8"><img alt="gnome shell 3.8" border="0" height="180" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-bUEuP1-t6xE/UTN8m9G0-pI/AAAAAAAAOVI/ca_DwDOa3qQ/s320/gnome-3.8-beta-all-apps.png" title="gnome shell 3.8" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-VGhb1th7vbs/UTN8mAZQleI/AAAAAAAAOU8/iT6-LvZLmIk/s1600/gnome-3.8-beta-change-background.png" imageanchor="1" rel="image_group" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" title="GNOME 3.8 change background right click menu"><img alt="gnome 3.8 change background right click" border="0" height="179" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-VGhb1th7vbs/UTN8mAZQleI/AAAAAAAAOU8/iT6-LvZLmIk/s320/gnome-3.8-beta-change-background.png" title="gnome 3.8 change background right click" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-xcarKFf_WxY/UTOCJUNaKoI/AAAAAAAAOVU/QDLl5nPn1v4/s1600/gnome-3.8-beta-notifications.png" imageanchor="1" rel="image_group" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" title="GNOME 3.8 notification settings"><img alt="GNOME 3.8 notification settings" border="0" height="211" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-xcarKFf_WxY/UTOCJUNaKoI/AAAAAAAAOVU/QDLl5nPn1v4/s320/gnome-3.8-beta-notifications.png" title="GNOME 3.8 notification settings" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-z3uBn3KkO7k/UTOCJXVkEvI/AAAAAAAAOVY/knkWsj1DwDk/s1600/gnome-3.8-beta-control-center.png" imageanchor="1" rel="image_group" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" title="GNOME 3.8 Control Center"><img alt="GNOME 3.8 Control Center" border="0" height="254" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-z3uBn3KkO7k/UTOCJXVkEvI/AAAAAAAAOVY/knkWsj1DwDk/s320/gnome-3.8-beta-control-center.png" title="GNOME 3.8 Control Center" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-nwGGbIcofzU/UTOCJ9shEmI/AAAAAAAAOVg/K168j1y7IBE/s1600/gnome-3.8-beta-privacy.png" imageanchor="1" rel="image_group" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" title="GNOME 3.8 privacy settings"><img alt="GNOME 3.8 privacy settings" border="0" height="188" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-nwGGbIcofzU/UTOCJ9shEmI/AAAAAAAAOVg/K168j1y7IBE/s320/gnome-3.8-beta-privacy.png" title="GNOME 3.8 privacy settings" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-uekdLdBUVhs/UTOCKNk1xfI/AAAAAAAAOVs/qIShHfIte18/s1600/gnome-3.8-beta-search.png" imageanchor="1" rel="image_group" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" title="GNOME 3.8 search settings"><img alt="GNOME 3.8 search settings" border="0" height="237" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-uekdLdBUVhs/UTOCKNk1xfI/AAAAAAAAOVs/qIShHfIte18/s320/gnome-3.8-beta-search.png" title="GNOME 3.8 search settings" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/--cd5_VVczBY/UTOCJ7ldPpI/AAAAAAAAOVk/Atb5rJR2NxE/s1600/gnome-3.8-beta-classic-session.png" imageanchor="1" rel="image_group" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" title="GNOME 3.8 new classic session"><img alt="GNOME 3.8 - new classic GNOME session" border="0" height="180" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/--cd5_VVczBY/UTOCJ7ldPpI/AAAAAAAAOVk/Atb5rJR2NxE/s320/gnome-3.8-beta-classic-session.png" title="GNOME 3.8 - new classic GNOME session" width="320" /></a></div><br /><br /><br /><h2>Install / upgrade to GNOME 3.8 In Ubuntu 13.04 (Raring Ringtail)</h2><br /><div style="text-align: justify;"><b>So, with this in mind, if you want to upgrade to the latest GNOME 3.8 in Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail, firstly add the GNOME 3 PPA:</b></div><pre class="linux-code"><code>sudo add-apt-repository ppa:gnome3-team/gnome3<br />sudo apt-get update</code></pre><b>Then launch Software Updater and upgrade the packages.</b><br /><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">GNOME SHell 3.8.1, GNOME Shell Extensions 3.8.1 (which include the <a href="http://www.webupd8.org/2013/02/a-quick-look-at-new-gnome-classic.html">new classic GNOME session</a>), Nautilus 3.8.1, Rhythmbox 2.99.1, GDM 3.8.0, Alacarte 3.9.70, Anjuta 3.7.90, Baobab 3.7.91, Bijben 3.8.1, Caribou 0.4.10, Cheese 3.8.1, Clutter 1.1.4.0, Devhelp 3.8.0, Eog 3.8.0, Epiphany 3.7.91, Evince 3.7.92, File-roller 3.7.92, Gcr 3.8.0, Gedit 3.7.5, GNOME Boxes 3.8.0, GNOME Clocks 3.8.0, GNOME Color Management 3.8.0, GNOME Disks 3.8.0, GNOME Documents 3.7.91, GNOME Icon Theme 3.8.0, GNOME Keyring 3.7.92, GNOME Online Accounts 3.8.1, GNOME Sushi 3.8.0, GNOME Themes 3.7.91, GNOME Tweak Tool 3.8.0, GNOME Weather 3.8.1, GTK 3.8.0, Zenity 3.7.2 and dependencies. A complete list can be found HERE. , GDM 3.7.90, Nautilus 3.7.90, Clutter 1.13.6, GTK 3.7.10, Gedit 3.7.4 and others. You can see a complete package list <a href="https://launchpad.net/~gnome3-team/+archive/gnome3/+packages?field.name_filter=&field.status_filter=published&field.series_filter=raring">HERE</a>.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Like I was saying above, <b>for some packages which are missing from this PPA, you can also add the GNOME 3 Staging PPA</b> (but remember that this PPA contains work in progress packages or packages for which there are known regressions).</div><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">Empathy 3.7.92, Evolution 3.8.1, GDM 3.8.1.1, GNOME Contacts 3.8.1, GNOME Control Center 3.8.1, GNOME Terminal 3.8.0, Gvfs 1.16.1, Network Manager 0.9.8.0, Pulseaudio with Logind support, Samba 3.6.9, Systemd 198 and Vino 3.7.90 and dependencies. You can see a complete list of packages available in this PPA, <a href="https://launchpad.net/~gnome3-team/+archive/gnome3-staging/+packages?field.name_filter=&field.status_filter=published&field.series_filter=raring">HERE</a>.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b>To add the GNOME 3 Staging PPA, use the following commands:</b></div><pre class="linux-code"><code>sudo add-apt-repository ppa:gnome3-team/gnome3-staging<br />sudo apt-get update</code></pre><br /><b>Then, launch Software Updater and do an upgrade.</b><br /><br /><br />If you want to try the <a href="http://www.webupd8.org/2013/02/a-quick-look-at-new-gnome-classic.html">new Classic GNOME session</a>, install the following package:<br /><pre class="linux-code"><code>sudo apt-get install gnome-shell-extensions</code></pre>Then log out and select "GNOME Classic" from the login screen.<br /><br /><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">About reporting bugs, here's what Jeremy has <a href="https://lists.launchpad.net/ubuntu-gnome/msg00273.html">said</a> in his Ubuntu-GNOME mailing list message:</div><br /><blockquote>You can discuss issues with the PPAs in #ubuntu-gnome on Freenode/Ubuntu IRC and I believe it's ok to use Launchpad to report bugs as our work is the foundation for next cycle's packaging.</blockquote>

Install GNOME 3.8 In Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail [PPA]

A while back, it was decided that Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail will ship with GNOME 3.6 for the most part instead of GNOME 3.8. Ubuntu 13.0...

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Official Ubuntu Rolling Release Proposal

<div style="text-align: center;"><img alt="Ubuntu logo" height="200" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-vLAGqfY7eyU/UP_WL2A6sGI/AAAAAAAAM4o/__IomtcuFfw/s200/ubuntu-logo.png" width="200" /></div><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">A while back, Leann Ogasawara, Canonical Kernel Team Manager, has <a href="http://www.webupd8.org/2013/01/ubuntu-might-become-rolling-release.html">said</a> that it has been discussed internally to use a rolling release model for Ubuntu between LTS releases, but that it is just an idea for now. With the new <a href="http://www.webupd8.org/2013/02/canonical-unveils-new-ubuntu-tablet.html">Ubuntu Touch</a>, which needs both "velocity and agility", the rolling release mode seems to be more than just an idea and Rick Spencer, Engineering Director at Canonical, has made a proposal about this on the Ubuntu Devel <a href="https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-devel/2013-February/036537.html">mailing list</a>.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">In the thread named "<i>Let's Discuss Interim Releases (and a Rolling Release)</i>", he states that "we should keep LTS releases, but starting now, stop doing interim releases and start a rolling release".</div><br /><a name='more'></a><div style="text-align: justify;">Basically, he wants to stop making interim releases which are the Ubuntu versions between LTS releases, and instead, <b>users could choose between LTS releases, rolling release updated daily or rolling release updated monthly</b>.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><b>This would be beneficial for both users and developers:</b></div><ul style="text-align: justify;"><li>users who prefer LTS releases would be unaffected by this change while those who prefer more up to date software would get the latest versions of their favourite applications without having to constantly upgrade to newer Ubuntu releases or use PPAs;</li><li>developers would benefit from not having support so many Ubuntu releases, there wouldn't be any pressure / deadlines (features would land when they are ready, developers wouldn't need to rush things to get their app included before an Ubuntu release), etc.</li></ul><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">So Ubuntu <s>13.04</s> Raring Ringtail might become Rolling Release. But before continuing with this, Rick says<b> this needs to be discussed in the Ubuntu community. So what do you think?</b></div><br /><b>You can read the complete proposal <a href="https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-devel/2013-February/036537.html">HERE</a>.</b><br /><br />Rick Spencer will be discussing this on <a href="http://ubuntuonair.com/">http://ubuntuonair.com/</a>, Friday, March 1st at 6pm UTC / 10am Pacific / 1pm EST (the mailing list message says "Friday 27th Feb" but since the message was posted today, the date is clearly wrong).<br /><br /><b>Update: The UbuntuOnAir Hangout in which Ubuntu devs answer questions and discuss the Rolling Release proposal can be watched below:</b><br /><br /><center><iframe width="560" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/z04ndWaVfJs" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe><br />(<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z04ndWaVfJs">direct video link</a>)</center>

Official Ubuntu Rolling Release Proposal

A while back, Leann Ogasawara, Canonical Kernel Team Manager, has said that it has been discussed internally to use a rolling release model...

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Ubuntu GNOME Remix 13.04 Switches To Firefox And LibreOffice By Default, Replacing Epiphany, Abiword And Gnumeric

<div style="text-align: justify;"><b>After a recent <a href="http://launchpad.net/ubuntu/raring/+source/ubuntu-gnome-meta/0.7">update</a>, <a href="http://www.webupd8.org/2012/10/prefer-gnome-shell-download-ubuntu.html">Ubuntu GNOME Remix</a> 13.04 (currently under development) has switched to Firefox and LibreOffice by default, replacing Epiphany, Abiword and Gnumeric.</b></div><br /><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-TnubLHCE2Qg/USYz7B12AQI/AAAAAAAAN-s/itQRCOCw38g/s1600/ubuntu-gnome-remix.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="ubuntu gnome remix" border="0" height="240" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-TnubLHCE2Qg/USYz7B12AQI/AAAAAAAAN-s/itQRCOCw38g/s320/ubuntu-gnome-remix.png" title="ubuntu gnome remix" width="320" /></a></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><a name='more'></a><div style="text-align: justify;">In a <a href="http://lists.launchpad.net/ubuntu-gnome/msg00265.html">message</a> on the Ubuntu GNOME mailing list, Jeremy Bicha, the main UGR developer, has said that even though Epiphany is part of the GNOME Core, GNOME doesn't mind too much that most distros ship with Firefox instead and further more, WebKit is rarely updated in the stable Ubuntu releases, which makes Firefox a better choice for security updates.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">As for the inclusion of LibreOffice by default, there are many reasons, including better support for various file formats and LibreOffice Impress which doesn't really have an equivalent. Further more, Fedora has also switched to LibreOffice recently.<br /><br />This breaks a bit the idea of having an Ubuntu spin that offers a pure GNOME experience, but the reasons behind the change do make sense. However, maybe shipping with both Epiphany and Firefox by default would be a better idea.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">In the same message, Jeremy has also asked for Ubuntu GNOME Remix users' opinion about not shipping with an email client by default, because many use webmail anyway and those who actually use an email client don't have a clear favourite, using both Evolution and Thunderbird. What do you think?</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">This of course doesn't mean you can't install Epiphany, Abiword, Gnumeric, Evolution or Thunderbird - they will be available for installation via Ubuntu Software Center like any other application so these changes will only affect the default application stack.</div><br /><div style="text-align: right;"><i>via LP (<a href="http://launchpad.net/ubuntu/raring/+source/ubuntu-gnome-meta/0.7">1</a>, <a href="http://lists.launchpad.net/ubuntu-gnome/msg00265.html">2</a>), <a href="http://sejalivre.org/ubuntu-gnome-remix-vira-com-firefox-e-libreoffice-porem-sem-clientes-de-e-mail/">sejalivre.org</a></i></div>

Ubuntu GNOME Remix 13.04 Switches To Firefox And LibreOffice By Default, Replacing Epiphany, Abiword And Gnumeric

After a recent update , Ubuntu GNOME Remix 13.04 (currently under development) has switched to Firefox and LibreOffice by default, replacin...

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Unity Gets New Quicklists Window Switching Feature [Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail]

<div style="text-align: justify;"><b>Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail</b>: <b>Unity has been updated today</b> and besides many bug fixes, the update brings a <b>new feature which allows users to switch between multiple windows of an application using quicklists</b>:</div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-_YxpwKj0EEg/USO_iTY3y3I/AAAAAAAAN7c/Cxrzm5_7z7A/s1600/quicklist-window-switching-unity.png" imageanchor="1" rel="image_group" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" title="Unity quicklists window switching: Firefox"><img alt="Unity - switching between windows via quicklists" border="0" height="225" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-_YxpwKj0EEg/USO_iTY3y3I/AAAAAAAAN7c/Cxrzm5_7z7A/s320/quicklist-window-switching-unity.png" title="Unity - switching between windows via quicklists" width="320" /></a></div><br /><a name='more'></a><div style="text-align: justify;">Right clicking an icon in the launcher to easily switch between open windows isn't a new idea and <a href="http://www.webupd8.org/2012/06/unity-window-quicklists-switch-between.html">a while back</a>, we wrote about a script that does the same thing, but with some limitations.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The maximum width of the window switching quicklists is restricted to<b> 300px</b> and longer window titles are ellipsized at the end. Also, <b>the entries only show up if there are two or more windows; if the application has only one window, nothing is displayed, except for the regular quicklists of course</b>.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Here are a few more screenshots with the new quicklists window switching feature for Nautilus and Gedit:</div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-OqVehX0xZ78/USO_yKGC4sI/AAAAAAAAN7k/lvjibrk5YFc/s1600/quicklists-window-switching-unity_3.png" imageanchor="1" rel="image_group" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" title="Unity quicklists window switching: Gedit "><img alt="Unity - switching between windows via quicklists" border="0" height="231" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-OqVehX0xZ78/USO_yKGC4sI/AAAAAAAAN7k/lvjibrk5YFc/s320/quicklists-window-switching-unity_3.png" title="Unity - switching between windows via quicklists" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-jDcfJuJ92Vo/USO_2Dmi0NI/AAAAAAAAN7s/QwehDOLg41U/s1600/window-switching-quicklists-unity_2.png" imageanchor="1" rel="image_group" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" title="Unity quicklists window switching: Nautilus"><img alt="Unity - switching between windows via quicklists" border="0" height="320" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-jDcfJuJ92Vo/USO_2Dmi0NI/AAAAAAAAN7s/QwehDOLg41U/s320/window-switching-quicklists-unity_2.png" title="Unity - switching between windows via quicklists" width="297" /></a></div><br /><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">This seems to be the first part of the work to improve window management / window switching in Ubuntu. According to a <a href="https://bugs.launchpad.net/unity/+bug/1081843">bug report</a>, it looks like Unity might also get support for switching between windows by scrolling on the application icon. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Besides the new quicklists window switching feature, the latest Unity comes with many bug fixes for multiple monitors and more. Also, the workspace switcher icon is no longer added by default on the Unity Launcher, but you can re-add it via System Settings (<i>System Settings > Appearance > Behavior tab > Enable workspaces</i>).<br /><br /><b>Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail is currently under development, so this feature may change until the final release! </b><br /><br />A complete changelog for today's Unity update can be found <a href="https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/raring/+source/unity/6.12.0daily13.02.19.1-0ubuntu1">here</a>.</div><br /><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">Browse our <a href="http://www.webupd8.org/search/label/raring%20ringtail?max-results=10">Raring Ringtail</a> tag for more news about the Ubuntu 13.04 development.</div>

Unity Gets New Quicklists Window Switching Feature [Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail]

Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail : Unity has been updated today and besides many bug fixes, the update brings a new feature which allows users ...

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Xubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail ISO Size Raised To 1GB, GIMP And Gnumeric To Be Installed By Default

<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-1UELa4GO4NA/URvY8CnAR2I/AAAAAAAANpY/F6fWZ8_gG7I/s1600/xubuntu.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="xubuntu logo" border="0" height="73" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-1UELa4GO4NA/URvY8CnAR2I/AAAAAAAANpY/F6fWZ8_gG7I/s320/xubuntu.png" title="xubuntu logo" width="320" /></a></div><br /><br /><div style="text-align: justify;"><b>Xubuntu, the Xfce Ubuntu flavor, will ship with a 1GB ISO starting with Raring</b>. Obviously, after this change, Xubuntu will no longer fit on a CD but this will allow some packages that were dropped in Xubuntu 12.10 to be added back by default.</div><br /><a name='more'></a><div style="text-align: justify;">One of the main reasons for this change is the "amount of developer time currently spent keeping the ISO small enough to fit on a CD". The 1GB ISO change was brought up in a recent Xubuntu team meeting and the votes were 8-0 in favor of raising the ISO size to 1 GB.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The Xubuntu team has also decided that <b>with Xubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail, GIMP and Gnumeric</b>, which were dropped from 12.10 because there wasn't enough space, <b>will once again be installed by default in Xubuntu</b>.</div><br /><br /><i>See also: <a href="http://www.webupd8.org/2012/10/xubuntu-1210-released-with-xfce-410.html">Xubuntu 12.10 Released With Xfce 4.10 [Screenshots, Video]</a></i><br /><br /><br /><div style="text-align: right;"><i>via <a href="http://xubuntu.org/news/xubuntu-goes-1gb-for-raring-gimp-and-gnumeric-are-back/">xubuntu.org </a></i></div>

Xubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail ISO Size Raised To 1GB, GIMP And Gnumeric To Be Installed By Default

Xubuntu, the Xfce Ubuntu flavor, will ship with a 1GB ISO starting with Raring . Obviously, after this change, Xubuntu will no longer fit on...

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Unity Notification Area (Systray) Whitelist Is Obsolete [Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail Changes]

<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-pLwiqaTABNk/URPaka9jxYI/AAAAAAAANcw/EHWJe3jJFiQ/s1600/notification-area.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Ubuntu old notification area" border="0" height="24" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-pLwiqaTABNk/URPaka9jxYI/AAAAAAAANcw/EHWJe3jJFiQ/s320/notification-area.png" title="Ubuntu old notification area" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Old notification area (before AppIndicators)</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">The notification area (systray) was removed from the Unity panel with Ubuntu 11.04, but you could still use it by <a href="http://www.webupd8.org/2011/04/how-to-re-enable-notification-area.html">whitelisting</a> applications which would allow the icons to show up in the notification area. But not any more! </div><br /><a name='more'></a><div style="text-align: justify;"><b>A recent Unity <a href="https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/raring/+source/unity/6.12.0daily13.02.07-0ubuntu1">update</a> in Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail mentions that the "</b><b>Notification area whitelist is obsolete",</b> so you can no longer get notification area icons by whitelisting applications. However, when the notification area whitelist was introduced, there were many applications that didn't come with AppIndicators so it was a pretty big issue back then, but right now most applications that used to come with a tray icon now use AppIndicators, including popular apps like Dropbox, Steam, Skype (with "sni-qt") and so on.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Also, all Qt applications tray icons are automatically converted to AppIndicators thanks to the "sni-qt" package. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-lm-e4DOmV_g/URPclY0P01I/AAAAAAAANc4/vrHybJQXVv0/s1600/appindicators.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Ubuntu appindicators" border="0" height="39" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-lm-e4DOmV_g/URPclY0P01I/AAAAAAAANc4/vrHybJQXVv0/s320/appindicators.png" title="Ubuntu appindicators" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">AppIndicators</td></tr></tbody></table><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">With the retirement of the notification area whitelist, Java and Wine apps have been <a href="https://bugs.launchpad.net/ayatana-design/+bug/974480">hard-coded</a> as the only software still able to use the notification area so this change only affects some old applications that don't come with AppIndicator support. But with the huge number of AppIndicators that exist today, you'll probably find similar or maybe even better alternative. For instance, you can find a huge list of applications that come with Ubuntu AppIndicators on <a href="http://askubuntu.com/questions/30334/what-application-indicators-are-available">AskUbuntu</a>; we've also covered quite a few <a href="http://www.webupd8.org/search/label/appindicator?max-results=10">AppIndicators</a>.</div><br /><br /><i><a href="http://www.webupd8.org/search/label/raring%20ringtail?max-results=10">Click here</a> for more Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail (currently under development) news.</i>

Unity Notification Area (Systray) Whitelist Is Obsolete [Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail Changes]

Old notification area (before AppIndicators) The notification area (systray) was removed from the Unity panel with Ubuntu 11.04, but you cou...

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Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail Changes: Memory Improvements, Two New Default Indicators

<div style="text-align: justify;"><b>The work to "make Ubuntu fit on mobile" has advantages for the desktop users and recently, some changes have landed in Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail (currently under development) which should reduce the memory used by some default packages.</b></div><br /><a name='more'></a><div style="text-align: justify;">For instance, a recent GTK3 <a href="https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/raring/+source/gtk+3.0/3.6.4-0ubuntu6">update</a> comes with a patch to "only load CSS image data when needed, saving a substantial amount of memory". Other such changes include:</div><ul><li style="text-align: justify;">several memory leaks have been fixed for libdbusmenu, update-notifier, upower, whoopsie and more;</li><li style="text-align: justify;">LightDM PPS has <a href="https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/lightdm/+bug/1074279">dropped</a> from 25.7M to 0.6M;</li><li style="text-align: justify;">some processes were changed to exit-on-idle and be restarted-on-demand rather than running all the time (signond, signon-ui);</li><li style="text-align: justify;">some GNOME Settings Daemon plugins were turned off by default for the desktop (and even more for the Nexus setup);</li><li style="text-align: justify;">GNOME Online Accounts is no longer installed by default since it's not used by Unity (it's only required by GNOME Shell);</li><li style="text-align: justify;">code optimization in several desktop services.</li></ul><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">According to the Ubuntu Devel <a href="https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-devel/2013-February/036436.html">mailing list</a>, the memory optimizations performed for Nexus (which include the desktop components mentioned above) has resulted in a drop for the idle memory usage from 600M to 400M. The change probably isn't so drastic for the desktop, but it's nevertheless an important step in the right direction.</div><br /><br /><div style="text-align: justify;"><b>Besides these under-the-hood changes, there are also <a href="https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/raring/+source/unity/6.12.0daily13.02.04.1-0ubuntu1">two new default indicators</a> in Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail: </b></div><ul><li style="text-align: justify;">you're probably familiar with the first one: Sync Menu, an indicator which right now only supports Ubuntu One but later it might support other services such as Dropbox. The indicator has been available starting with Ubuntu 12.10, but it wasn't added by default until now. For now, it can be used to enable/disable Ubuntu One sync, display current and recent transfers or share files, but more features should be available in the future, according to <a href="https://wiki.ubuntu.com/SyncMenu">THIS</a> Ubuntu wiki page;</li><li style="text-align: justify;">the second new default indicator is a <a href="https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/indicator-bluetooth/+bug/1111314">Bluetooth Indicator</a>,  which should replace the old Bluetooth Indicator that is provided by a distro patch over the fallback icon of gnome-bluetooth (the old Bluetooth Applet fallback icon will be dropped along with the <a href="http://www.webupd8.org/2012/11/fallback-mode-classic-session-to-be.html">whole fallback mode with GNOME 3.8</a>). For now there are two bluetooth icons displayed on the top panel, but the Bluetooth Applet will probably be built without AppIndicator support soon to fix this.</li></ul><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-_jvVzTQ2_hA/UQ_qaywmySI/AAAAAAAANPU/W4OhjrT-fGQ/s1600/ubuntu-raring-ubuntuone-indicator.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Sync Menu (indicator)" border="0" height="182" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-_jvVzTQ2_hA/UQ_qaywmySI/AAAAAAAANPU/W4OhjrT-fGQ/s320/ubuntu-raring-ubuntuone-indicator.png" title="Sync Menu (indicator)" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Sync Menu (indicator)</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-CzkmsPCv__0/UQ_qejO6ZII/AAAAAAAANPc/hRzWui4zCXs/s1600/ubuntu-raring-bluetooth-indicator.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="New Bluetooth Indicator" border="0" height="176" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-CzkmsPCv__0/UQ_qejO6ZII/AAAAAAAANPc/hRzWui4zCXs/s320/ubuntu-raring-bluetooth-indicator.png" title="New Bluetooth Indicator" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">New Bluetooth Indicator</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">I also have to mention that Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail is the most stable Ubuntu development version I've used so far. Up until now, I've only encountered one nasty <a href="https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/xserver-xorg-video-intel/+bug/1102654">bug</a> with Intel graphic cards that was fixed a while back. <br /><br />If you want to give it a try, you can download the latest Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail daily ISO from <a href="http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/daily-live/current/">HERE</a>. But, even though it feels quite stable, Ubuntu Raring Ringtail is still in development so things can break! Don't use it on production machines!</div>

Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail Changes: Memory Improvements, Two New Default Indicators

The work to "make Ubuntu fit on mobile" has advantages for the desktop users and recently, some changes have landed in Ubuntu 13.0...

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Ubuntu Might Become A Rolling Release Distribution Between LTS Releases

<div style="text-align: justify;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><img alt="ubuntu logo" border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-vLAGqfY7eyU/UP_WL2A6sGI/AAAAAAAAM4o/__IomtcuFfw/s200/ubuntu-logo.png" /></div><br /><b>Ubuntu may become a <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rolling_release">rolling release</a> distribution, but keeping LTS (Long Term Release) releases every two years.</b></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Leann Ogasawara, Canonical Kernel Team Manager has said in a recent Google+ hangout that it has been discussed to use a rolling release model between LTS releases. This is just a discussion for now, but it could become a reality starting with Ubuntu 14.04:</div><br /><a name='more'></a><blockquote>The plan was by 14.04 to target what we're calling a rolling release and go from a LTS to LTS only model and eliminate these intermediate releases. That was being discussed earlier, we didn't set anything in stone but that's still in the cards as a possibility of happening when we hit the next 14.04 release so <b>it could go from 14.04 to 16.04 and everything in between is what they consider a rolling release</b> [...], following the latest package releases, not only for the Kernel but for the entire distribution [...].<br /><br /><div style="text-align: right;">- Leann Ogasawara (approximate quote from the video)</div></blockquote><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">If this becomes reality, I'm sure a lot of users will be very happy because they'd get the latest updates for all packages (and new packages would be available a lot quicker) without having to upgrade to a newer Ubuntu release. This might have an impact on stability, but some users already consider non-LTS releases to be "glorified betas" so at least this way Ubuntu users would get the latest updates in exchange for the stability offered by a LTS.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Besides possible stability, there's another downside which Canonical takes into consideration: a lot of hype is generated and many users get excited for each Ubuntu release, but using a rolling release model between LTS releases would mean there would be 3 less Ubuntu releases for every 2 years and thus, Ubuntu users would be less enthusiastic.<br /><br />These and probably many other factors count towards taking a decision, but the most important one should be: "will this make Ubuntu users happy?". So, what do you think, would you like Ubuntu to use a rolling release model between LTS releases?</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Below you can watch the full Google+ hangout video with Leann Ogasawara (video embedded from the minute where Leann begins to talk about the rolling release model):</div><br /><center><iframe allowfullscreen frameborder="0" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/AQvOIExkCaw?start=2513&end=3649" width="560"></iframe><br />(<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AQvOIExkCaw#t=41m53s">direct video link</a>)</center><br /><div style="text-align: right;"><i>seen on <a href="http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2013/01/ubuntu-considers-huge-change-that-would-end-traditional-release-cycle/">ArsTechnica</a></i></div>

Ubuntu Might Become A Rolling Release Distribution Between LTS Releases

Ubuntu may become a rolling release distribution, but keeping LTS (Long Term Release) releases every two years. Leann Ogasawara, Canonical ...

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Unity Changes - Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail

<div style="text-align: justify;">As you probably know, there will be <a href="http://www.webupd8.org/2012/10/ubuntu-1304-alpha-releases-dropped-only.html">no alpha milestones</a> for Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail and Unity has got some minor, but interesting changes since the Raring development has begun, so I though I'd make a video showing some of these features so you can see what's new.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-ZL5beWCRHw8/UPoxTaVX_iI/AAAAAAAAMus/FGHeToE4sd8/s1600/unity-dash-ubuntu13.04.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="unity ubuntu 13.04 raring ringtail screenshot" border="0" height="179" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-ZL5beWCRHw8/UPoxTaVX_iI/AAAAAAAAMus/FGHeToE4sd8/s320/unity-dash-ubuntu13.04.png" title="unity ubuntu 13.04 raring ringtail screenshot" width="320" /></a></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">For instance, in an <a href="https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/raring/+source/unity/6.12.0daily13.01.18-0ubuntu1">update</a> last night, the BFB (the Ubuntu logo button used to open Dash) got the new asset (icon) we wrote about a <a href="http://www.webupd8.org/2012/11/new-icons-for-ubuntu-software-center.html">while back</a>. The same update has brought refreshed Launcher tile assets and the removal of the 32px minimum Launcher icon size limit.</div><br /><a name='more'></a><div style="text-align: justify;">Also, a few days ago, some new options were added in <i>System Settings > Appearance > Behaviour</i> tab: "Show desktop icon to the launcher" and "Enable workspaces".</div><br />And some older changes include:<br /><ul><li>Bigger, chameleonic overlay shortcuts (the shortcut hints displayed on the Unity launcher icons which show up when holding the Super key);</li><li>Spread improvements such as a selected window outline, better window titlebar and also, the Spread now works properly with all window themes;</li><li>Improved Dash Previews design (and the previews are a lot faster now by the way);</li><li>The workspace switcher has a new icon which is dynamic, meaning that the current active desktop is represented by the workspace switcher icon;</li><li>New lens icons; </li><li>Overlay scrollbars for Dash.</li></ul><br /><div style="text-align: justify;"><b>You can watch the Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail (with Unity 6.12.0daily13.01.18) video below:</b></div><br /><center><iframe allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen" frameborder="0" height="315" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/JtbvStm0Sp8" width="560"></iframe><br />(<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JtbvStm0Sp8">direct video link</a>)</center><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">Unity has also received many bug fixes and under-the-hood changes and of course, more improvements are expected until the final release.</div><br /><br />In other non-Unity Ubuntu 13.04 news:<br /><ul><li style="text-align: justify;"><a href="http://www.webupd8.org/2012/10/how-to-enable-intel-sna-acceleration-in.html">Intel SNA</a> (a 2D acceleration architecture for the open source Intel Linux graphics driver that provides improved X.Org driver performance) may be turned on by default soon;</li><li style="text-align: justify;">The Intel HDA audio drivers <a href="http://voices.canonical.com/david.henningsson/2013/01/18/upcoming-changes-to-the-intel-hda-drivers/">will be</a> unified, which will make it easier to support new drivers;</li><li style="text-align: justify;">Gvfs has been updated in Raring bringing a new MTP backend which allows users to access Android 4.0 devices which do not support the USB Mass Storage.</li></ul><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail will only have one beta milestone, expected on March 28th, while the final release should be available for download on April 25th.</div>

Unity Changes - Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail

As you probably know, there will be no alpha milestones for Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail and Unity has got some minor, but interesting chan...

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Ubuntu GNOME Remix 13.04 Replaces GNOME Packagekit With Ubuntu Software Center

<div style="text-align: justify;"><a href="http://www.webupd8.org/2012/10/prefer-gnome-shell-download-ubuntu.html">Ubuntu GNOME Remix 12.10</a> uses GNOME Packagekit ("Software") as the default package management application, but this will change in Raring Ringtail.</div><br /><div style="text-align: justify;"><b>A recent <a href="https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/raring/+source/ubuntu-gnome-meta/0.5">update</a> in Ubuntu GNOME 13.04 Raring Ringtail (currently under development) has removed GNOME Packagekit from the default applications, replacing it with Ubuntu Software Center and Ubuntu's Update Manager.</b></div><br /><div style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://netupd8.com/w8img2/gs-usc.png"><img alt="Ubuntu GNOME Remix Software Center" src="http://netupd8.com/w8img2/gs-usc_thumb.png" /></a></div><br /><a name='more'></a><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">According to a <a href="https://lists.launchpad.net/ubuntu-gnome/msg00145.html">post</a> on a mailing list by Jeremy Bicha, the main Ubuntu GNOME developer, GNOME Packagekit is currently "<i>pretty disappointing</i>", while Ubuntu Software Center is "<i>one of Ubuntu's best features with ratings and reviews, screenshots, app icons, access to commercial software, and decent search</i>", so even though this change will slightly affect the pure GNOME3 desktop experience that Ubuntu GNOME Remix is trying to achieve, it will definitely provide a better overall default experience.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Further more, this won't be the first GNOME distribution that ships with its own software management application: Mageia and openSUSE do this too.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Also, as you probably know, Ubuntu GNOME Remix 12.10 includes the classic session by default (along with GNOME Shell, which is the default session, obviously). Well, the same 13.04 update brought another pretty major change: even though Ubuntu 13.04 is likely to <a href="http://www.webupd8.org/2012/11/ubuntu-1304-only-some-gnome-components.html">ship with GNOME 3.6 for the most part</a>, and not 3.8 (which will remove the fallback session), <b>the classic (fallback) session packages were removed from the default Ubuntu GNOME Remix 13.04 Raring Ringtail installation</b>.</div>

Ubuntu GNOME Remix 13.04 Replaces GNOME Packagekit With Ubuntu Software Center

Ubuntu GNOME Remix 12.10 uses GNOME Packagekit ("Software") as the default package management application, but this will change i...

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Ubuntu 13.04: Only Some GNOME Components To Be Updated, GTK Not One Of Them

<div style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-7yuLvq0H1yM/UJFLDw1xJEI/AAAAAAAALeI/_68eE2hQi28/s1600/ubuntu-raring-ringtail-logo.png"><img alt="Ubuntu 13.04 raring ringtail logo" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-7yuLvq0H1yM/UJFLDw1xJEI/AAAAAAAALeI/_68eE2hQi28/s320/ubuntu-raring-ringtail-logo.png" /></a></div><br /><div style="text-align: justify;"><b>According to an <a href="http://uds.ubuntu.com/" title="Ubuntu Developer Summit">UDS</a> session held a few days ago, it was decided to stay with stable GNOME for Ubuntu 13.04 and only update some components. </b><br /><br />This means Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail will ship with GNOME 3.6 for the most part, and not 3.8 (currently under development as 3.7.x), at least according to the current plans. But this might change.</div><br /><a name='more'></a><div style="text-align: justify;">The plan is to update glib, d-conf, gobject-introspection and gvfs and to offer a PPA for the latest GTK. <b>For now, it has been decided not to update GTK, but that might change during the cycle</b> "if there is a good reason for the update", mentions the GNOME Plans Review <a href="https://blueprints.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+spec/desktop-r-gnome-plans-review">blueprint</a>.</div><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">The UDS GNOME Plans Review <a href="http://summit.ubuntu.com/uds-r/meeting/21388/desktop-r-gnome-plans-review/">session notes</a> talk about the reasons why Ubuntu 13.04 won't use the latest GNOME by default:</div><ul><li>tracking unstable GNOME is taking lot of resources</li><li>The Ubuntu desktop is quite less "stock GNOME" than it used to be</li><li>GNOME unstable series and Ubuntu "working every day" are hard to conciliate goals</li><li>GNOME is not communicating early enough on what is coming for us to discuss next cycle at UDS (see nautilus 3.6 in quantal)</li><li>GNOME is shipping stables with transitions half done (see gstreamer 1.0 this cycle) which is not something we want in Ubuntu</li><li>Our "feedback loop" with GNOME is not really working nowadays</li></ul><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">And indeed, this shouldn't affect the Ubuntu desktop too much and should bring <b>more stability</b>, but it does affect GNOME Shell (and thus Ubuntu GNOME Remix) users quite badly, since without the latest GTK, they won't be able to use the latest GNOME Shell either, among others. And that pretty much defeats the whole purpose of Ubuntu GNOME Remix. </div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">But, to solve this issue, <a href="http://www.webupd8.org/2012/10/prefer-gnome-shell-download-ubuntu.html">Ubuntu GNOME Remix</a> might ship with the GNOME 3 PPA enabled by default:</div><br /><blockquote class="tr_bq">[...] if the GNOME remix becomes an official flavor, I was hoping to then ask for permission to include the GNOME3 PPA due to our unique overlap with the flagship Ubuntu release.<br /><br /><div style="text-align: right;">- Jeremy Bicha, main Ubuntu GNOME Remix developer, on the Ubuntu desktop <a href="https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-desktop/2012-October/004018.html">mailing list<br /></a></div></blockquote><br />We'll let you know if the plans change.<br />

Ubuntu 13.04: Only Some GNOME Components To Be Updated, GTK Not One Of Them

According to an UDS session held a few days ago, it was decided to stay with stable GNOME for Ubuntu 13.04 and only update some components....

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Ubuntu 13.04: Alpha Releases Dropped, Only One Beta Milestone

<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-7yuLvq0H1yM/UJFLDw1xJEI/AAAAAAAALeI/_68eE2hQi28/s1600/ubuntu-raring-ringtail-logo.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="ubuntu raring ringtail logo" border="0" height="203" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-7yuLvq0H1yM/UJFLDw1xJEI/AAAAAAAALeI/_68eE2hQi28/s320/ubuntu-raring-ringtail-logo.png" title="ubuntu raring ringtail logo" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div style="text-align: justify;"><b>For Ubuntu 13.04, all alphas and the first beta release have been dropped from the release schedule</b>, so <a href="http://www.webupd8.org/2012/10/ubuntu-1304-codename-announced-raring.html">Raring Ringtail</a> will have only one beta version and obviously, the final stable release.</div><br /><a name='more'></a><div style="text-align: justify;">Nicholas Skaggs, the Canonical QA Community Coordinator, mentions in a <a href="http://www.theorangenotebook.com/2012/10/uds-r-rise-of-the-quality-machines.html">blog post</a> that instead of the old milestones, a bi-weekly testing process will be used throughout the development cycle. He also mentions that the <b>daily ISOs will continue to be published as usual</b> and they will be automatically 'smoke' tested to make sure there are no more broken installers on the published images.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Further more, the freezes (for instance, when the Feature Freeze takes place, the developers stop introducing new features or packages and concentrate on fixing bugs only) have been moved back a few weeks so the development will continue until late in the release cycle.</div><br />The Ubuntu 13.04 Raring Ringtail schedule should now look like this:<br /><ul><li>March 28th: beta release</li><li>April 25th: final Ubuntu 13.04 release</li></ul><br /><div style="text-align: justify;"><b>These changes will only affect the main Ubuntu flavor</b> (with Unity), while the other flavors like <b>Xubuntu, Kubuntu, etc., will have complete control over their releases</b> so we might see different release schedules for each Ubuntu flavor.</div>

Ubuntu 13.04: Alpha Releases Dropped, Only One Beta Milestone

For Ubuntu 13.04, all alphas and the first beta release have been dropped from the release schedule , so Raring Ringtail will have only one...

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Ubuntu 13.04 Codename Announced: Raring Ringtail

<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-mS7h8gs5rnw/UJFPffygZvI/AAAAAAAALfI/4CLUre4g5wU/s1600/raring-ringtail.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="raring ringtail" border="0" height="212" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-mS7h8gs5rnw/UJFPffygZvI/AAAAAAAALfI/4CLUre4g5wU/s320/raring-ringtail.jpg" title="raring ringtail" width="320" /></a></div><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">Mark Shuttleworth has <a href="http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/1195">announced</a> the codename for the next Ubuntu release (13.04): <b>Raring Ringtail</b>.</div><br /><a name='more'></a><blockquote>We’ll make something... wonderful, and call it the Raring Ringtail. See you there soon.</blockquote><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">So Ubuntu 13.04 will be codenamed "Raring Ringtail", but... <b>what's a "ringtail"?</b> According to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ringtail">wikipedia</a>, there are quite a few animals that fit the 'description', including a raccoon, a lemur, mongoose and there are even some birds and a fish that may be referred to as "ringtail". So it looks like the Ubuntu 13.04 mascot will remain a mystery for now.<br /><br /><b>Update:</b> Mark has cleared this up in a comment: it's the raccoon, also known as the "<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ring-tailed_Cat">ringtail cat</a>".</div><br /><div style="text-align: justify;">In the announcement, Mark also mentions that by the time of the next LTS (14.04), the Ubuntu phone, tablet and TV should all be lined up and until then, some things will need special attention, "<i>like battery life, number of running processes, memory footprint</i>".<br /><br />Up Next: Ubuntu 13.10 S S. Will it be codenamed Sensual Sasquatch? Or maybe Super Salamander? Sexy Swordfish? We'll find out in another 6 months! </div><br /><br /><i>Also see: <a href="http://www.webupd8.org/2012/04/from-warty-warthog-to-quantal-quetzal.html">Ubuntu Mascots In Pictures: From Warty WARTHOG To Quantal QUETZAL</a></i>

Ubuntu 13.04 Codename Announced: Raring Ringtail

Mark Shuttleworth has announced the codename for the next Ubuntu release (13.04): Raring Ringtail . We’ll make something... wonderful, and ...

+ Read more »