Introduction

The Ubuntu developers are moving quickly to bring you the absolute latest and greatest software the Open Source community has to offer. The Quantal Quetzal Alpha 2 Release of Ubuntu 12.10 is a developer snapshot to give you a very early glance at the next version of Ubuntu.

Get Ubuntu 12.10

Upgrading from Ubuntu 12.04

To upgrade from Ubuntu 12.04 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 '12.10' is available. Click Upgrade and follow the on-screen instructions. Please read the known issues, before trying this.

To upgrade from Ubuntu 12.04 on a server system: install the update-manager-core package if it is not already installed; launch the upgrade tool with the command sudo do-release-upgrade -d; and follow the on-screen instructions. Note that the server upgrade will utilize GNU screen and automatically re-attach in case of e.g. dropped connection problems.

Download the Alpha 2

This release is for developers only. The Ubuntu Desktop images are now bigger than a standard CD, and you should use a USB for installation.

You can download Alpha 2 ISOs from:

http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/releases/quantal/alpha-2/ (Ubuntu Desktop and Server)
http://cloud-images.ubuntu.com/releases/quantal/alpha-2/ (Ubuntu Cloud Server)
http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/kubuntu/releases/quantal/alpha-2/ (Kubuntu)
http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/lubuntu/releases/quantal/alpha-2/ (Lubuntu)
http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/edubuntu/releases/quantal/alpha-2/ (Edubuntu DVD)
http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/ubuntustudio/releases/quantal/alpha-2/ (Ubuntu Studio)
http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/xubuntu/releases/quantal/alpha-2/ (Xubuntu)

New features in Quantal

Please see the Quantal blueprint list for details.

Please test and report any bugs you find:

• http://help.ubuntu.com/community/ReportingBugs

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; others have been explicitly pulled in for 12.10 Quantal Quetzal.

For a list of all packages being accepted for 12.10 Quantal Quetzal, please subscribe to quantal-changes: https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/quantal-changes

Linux kernel 3.5

Quantal Alpha-2 includes the 3.5.0-2.2 Ubuntu kernel which was based on the v3.5-rc4 upstream Linux kernel. This is an update from the 3.4.0-5.11 Ubuntu kernel which shipped in the Quantal Alpha-1 release and was based on the v3.4 upstream Linux kernel. Other notable changes with the Quantal Alpha-2 kernel include a rework of the brcmsmac regulatory support, an extensive config review for the highbank kernel flavor, and misc bug fixes. As with the Quantal Alpha-1 release, the Quantal Alpha-2 kernel continues to include the transitioning of the i386 generic-pae flavor to become the generic flavor offering, collapsing of the virtual flavor back into the generic flavor, and homogenizing of the entire linux-meta package.

Python 3.0

For 12.10, we intend to ship only Python 3 with the Ubuntu desktop image, not Python 2. Alpha-2 continues this process.

If you have your own programs based on Python 2, fear not! Python 2 will continue to be available (as the python package) for the foreseeable future. However, to best support future versions of Ubuntu you should consider porting your code to Python 3. Python/3 has some advice and resources on this.

Filesystem Stack

The following significant filesystem packages have been updated:

• e2fsprogs updated to 1.42.4 which includes many fixes including those targeting large filesystems > 16TB

• mdadm updated to 3.2.5 with Common raid Disk Data Format (DDF) and Intel Matrix RAID formats enabled and improved udev rules

• autofs updated to 2012-06-01 from 5.0.6 release tag, with many bugfixes and the package name transition autofs5 -> autofs

• btrfs-tools update to 2012-03-28 snapshot bringing basic btrfsck support and many fixes

General

Until Ubuntu 11.10, the Unix group for administrators with root privileges through sudo had been admin. Starting with Ubuntu 12.04 LTS, it is now sudo, for compatibility with Debian and sudo itself. However, for backwards compatibility, admin group members are still recognized as administrators.

Automatic Apport crash reporting has been enabled by default again to catch problems early on. It now checks for duplicates on the client side, which will avoid uploading debug data and creating Launchpad bug reports unnecessarily in many cases now.

Ubuntu

TODO seb128: put in new features

Ubuntu Server

We are continuing to trial the removal of i386 Ubuntu Server CD image. This means that the primary supported installation method is AMD64, the 64-bit release (X86_64).

However, other supported installations mechanisms for i386, such as mini.iso and netboot are still supported, which are an initial minimal download; and install directly from the network.

i386 images for Alpha is also available, but is not declared as part of the Alpha 2 release.

Feedback is most appreciated, if this causes issues for particular hardware.

TODO Daviey: update what sizing is going to be for server for A2 (foreshadowing from A1 may not be 703MB)

Ubuntu Server Cloud images

TODO arosales: updates with what's changed.

Kubuntu

TODO Riddell or ScottK: update with what's changed.

Xubuntu

TODO astraljava: update with what's changed

Edubuntu

• Nepomuk and Akonadi icons are now hidden from menus
• Langpacks have been moved to outside of the live image, a langpack installer is being written for the live image that installs the langpacks from the package pool
• The wallpaper selection has been updated
• Although no ARM release is made for Alpha2, a test build has been done to confirm that Edubuntu packages work on ARM. Stellarium has been dropped in favour of Kstars.

Lubuntu

TODO gilir: update with what's changed

Ubuntu Studio

TODO ScottL: update with what's changed.

Known issues

As is to be expected, at this very early stage of the release process, there are some significant known bugs that developers may run into with the Quantal Alpha 2 Release. The ones we know about at this point (and some of the workarounds), are documented here so you don't need to spend time reporting these bugs again:

Boot, installation and post-install

• Ubiquity displays scrollbars inside of slideshow. (1008717)

Migration

• Upgrade from Precise Desktop with update-manager fails with "can't load DistUpgradeViewGtk (No module named vte)" (1009226) The command line version of the upgrader works correctly (do-release-upgrade -d)

Graphics and Display

• On systems with an ATI Radeon 9200 graphics card the system will boot to a black screen. As a work around edit the kernel command line in the boot loader and add "nomodeset". (725580)

• On some systems, gnome-settings-daemon crashed with SIGSEGV in xft_settings_set_xsettings(). (948347)

Desktop

• Nautilus is missing the Preferences menu item. (999827)

• On Power PC architecture systems the Firefox browser is not available. (1008975, 987421) It is possible to add Firefox manually.

Kernel

• Fujitsu Siemens Amilo M 7400 and Maxdata 7000DX wireless RF kill handling triggers a kernel panic preventing wireless from operating correctly. This may be worked around by editing your kernel command line and adding "noexec=off". (979253)

• Some EFI systems fail to boot in EFI mode, BIOS mode is advised in these situations. (721576)

Ubuntu Server

• ...

Ubuntu Cloud

• ...

Ubuntu Core

• ...

Kubuntu

• update-manager testing has not been tried with Kubuntu yet, and is not recommended at this time.

• krunner crashed with SIGABRT in gnu_cxx::verbose_terminate_handler() (1009602)

Edubuntu

• ...

Xubuntu

• ...

Lubuntu

• Some iso's for A1 are over sized for CD use. (1009896)

Ubuntu Studio

• ...

For a listing of more known issues, please refer to the Quantal Quetzal bug tracker in Launchpad.

Reporting bugs

It should come as no surprise that this Alpha 2 release of Quantal Quetzal contains other bugs. Your comments, bug reports, patches and suggestions will help fix bugs and improve the quality of 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

These images were able to be made available to you thanks to the help of our QA Community

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

• http://www.ubuntu.com/community/participate/

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:

• http://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-devel-announce