TechnicalOverview

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As with every new release, packages--applications and software of all kinds--are being updated at a rapid pace. Many of these packages come from an automatic sync from Debian's Unstable branch. For a list of all packages being accepted for 10.10 Maverick Meerkat, please subscribe to maverick-changes: As with every new release, packages--applications and software of all kinds--are being updated at a rapid pace. Many of these packages came from an automatic sync from Debian's Unstable branch. The period of automatic syncs has stopped now, so from now on there will be fewer changes.

For a list of all packages being accepted for 10.10 Maverick Meerkat, please subscribe to maverick-changes:

Introduction

The Ubuntu developers are moving quickly to bring you the absolute latest and greatest software the Open Source community has to offer. The Maverick Meerkat Alpha 2 is the second alpha release of Ubuntu 10.10, bringing with it the earliest new features for the next version of Ubuntu.

This is an alpha release. Do not install it on production machines. The final stable version will be released on October 10, 2010.

Upgrading from Ubuntu 10.04 LTS

To upgrade from Ubuntu 10.04 LTS on a desktop system, press Alt+F2 and type in "update-manager -d" (without the quotes) into the command box. Update Manager should open up and tell you: New distribution release '10.10' is available. Click Upgrade and follow the on-screen instructions.

To upgrade from Ubuntu 10.04 LTS on a server system: install the update-manager-core package if it is not already installed; edit /etc/update-manager/release-upgrades and set Prompt=normal; launch the upgrade tool with the command sudo do-release-upgrade -d; and follow the on-screen instructions.

New features in Maverick

Feature development for Maverick has started. Please see the Maverick blueprint list for details.

Please test and report any bugs you find:

Updated Packages

As with every new release, packages--applications and software of all kinds--are being updated at a rapid pace. Many of these packages came from an automatic sync from Debian's Unstable branch. The period of automatic syncs has stopped now, so from now on there will be fewer changes.

For a list of all packages being accepted for 10.10 Maverick Meerkat, please subscribe to maverick-changes:

GNOME

The GNOME base platform has been updated to the current 2.31 versions. This particularly includes the new dconf and gsettings API. Evolution was updated to the 2.30 version, which operates much faster compared to the version in Ubuntu 10.04 LTS.

KDE

KDE was updated to the current 4.5 RC 1 release.

Qt

Qt was updated to the current 4.7 beta release.

Unity

The new Unity interface is now the default in Ubuntu Netbook Edition. This includes the global menu bar as part of the default interface. Please note that applications still retain the menu in their own window as long as the global menu bar is still being tested and fixed.

Linux kernel 2.6.35

Alpha 2 includes the 2.6.35-6.7 kernel based on 2.6.35-rc3.

This kernel includes new security enhancements. Of major note is the change the default behavior of PTRACE which is used by gdb, strace, ltrace, etc. The behavior for 10.10 is that only child processes can be PTRACEd, due to the default value of "1" in /proc/sys/kernel/ptrace_scope. This value may be inappropriate for some development systems and servers with only admin accounts. If using "sudo" for PTRACE is not desired, please change this value to "0".

New cloud-init features

cloud-init, the configurable initialization process for Ubuntu Server cloud images, has gained new features in Maverick Alpha 2, including pluggable hooks, ebsmount, ext4 support, and new stanzas in the cloud-config format.

Download Alpha 2

Get it while it's hot. ISOs and torrents are available at:

Known issues

As is to be expected at this stage of the release process, there are several known bugs that users are likely to run into with Maverick Alpha 2. We have documented them here for your convenience along with any known workarounds, so that you don't need to spend time reporting these bugs again:

  • Encrypted home directory creation may be broken on some images. (588705)

  • The Audio and Video tasks are uninstallable on Ubuntu Studio images. You may install most of the packages they contain with a package management tool after installation; bitscope, mencoder, and mplayer are currently broken. (588780)

  • When installing Xubuntu, the systray appears in the middle of the screen, with three icons flashing constantly. This prevents the installation from the live environment, and makes the desktop pretty much unusable after any installation completes. There is a workaround to this issue described in the bug report. (586012)

  • Due to a kernel issue, Ubuntu Enterprise Cloud on amd64 is not able to register images out-of-the-box in Alpha 2. A fix is already available: run "sudo apt-get dist-upgrade" to update to the fixed packages. (588861)

Reporting bugs

It should come as no surprise that this alpha release of Maverick Meerkat contains other bugs. Your comments, bug reports, patches and suggestions will help fix bugs and improve future releases. Please report bugs using the tools provided.

If you want to help out with bugs, the Bug Squad is always looking for help.

Participate in Ubuntu

If you would like to help shape Ubuntu, take a look at the list of ways you can participate at

More information

You can find out more about Ubuntu on the Ubuntu website and Ubuntu wiki.

To sign up for future Ubuntu development announcements, please subscribe to Ubuntu's development announcement list at:

MaverickMeerkat/TechnicalOverview (last edited 2010-11-14 11:05:07 by 95-24-107-212)