Issue188

Contents

Contents

  1. UWN Translations
  2. In This Issue
  3. General Community News
    1. Ubuntu 10.04 LTS Beta 2 released
    2. Countdown Banner is live, help spread the word
    3. Regional Membership Boards: Restaffing
    4. Call for New Operators in the #ubuntu, #kubuntu and #ubuntu-offtopic channels
    5. Patch Day, May 5th 2010
    6. Next Ubuntu Hug Day! - April 15
  4. Ubuntu Stats
    1. Bug Stats
    2. Translation Stats Lucid
    3. Ubuntu Brainstorm Top 5 this week
  5. Launchpad News
    1. –fixes lp:1234
    2. How does bug triage work for you?
  6. The Planet
    1. Daniel Holbach: Being passionate about some things
    2. Chris Johnston: Website Localization Project Meeting
    3. Penelope Stowe: Reviving the Ubuntu Accessibility Team
    4. Martin Albisetti: Ubuntu One contact phone sync opened again
    5. Ubuntu One Blog: Ubuntu One Music Store for Banshee
    6. Amber Graner: 3rd Annual Palmetto Open Source Conference (POSSCON)
  7. In The Press
    1. Ubuntu 10.04 Gets Cloud-Based Contact Syncing
    2. Ubuntu Claims 12 Million Users as Lucid Linux Desktop Nears
    3. New Ubuntu look too destructive
    4. Beta 2 Arrives For Ubuntu 10.04 LTS "Lucid Lynx"
  8. In The Blogosphere
    1. Ubuntu: Canonical Focuses on Wall Street
    2. Dell’s Ubuntu Linux Strategy Extends to China
    3. Eye On Ubuntu 10.10
    4. Lubuntu not joining the ubuntu family until 10.10
    5. Ubuntu 10.04 drops Yahoo! will use Google as search engine
    6. What's coming in the new Ubuntu Linux desktop?
  9. In Other News
    1. Canonical, Upgrading GNOME Bugzilla, and Commercial Sponsorship
    2. Canonical Voices: Ubuntu's News Web Office Integration
    3. Portable Ubuntu Tres Runs 9.10 on Windows Desktops
  10. Upcoming Meetings and Events
    1. Monday, April 12, 2010
      1. Security Team Catch-up
    2. Tuesday, April 13, 2010
      1. Ubuntu Mobile Team Meeting
      2. Developer Membership Board
      3. Ubuntu Bugsquad Monthly Meeting
      4. Desktop Team Meeting
      5. Kernel Team Meeting
      6. Website Localization Meeting
    3. Wednesday, April 14, 2010
      1. Server Team Meeting
      2. Foundation Team Meeting
      3. QA Team Meeting
      4. Jono Bacon @ Home Videocast : Various Topics and Q+A
      5. Edubuntu Meeting
    4. Thursday, April 15, 2010
      1. Ubuntu Java Meeting
    5. Friday, April 16, 2010
      1. Lucid Weekly Release Meeting
    6. Saturday, April 17, 2010
      1. BugJam
      2. DC Loco IRC meeting
    7. Sunday, April 18, 2010
  11. Updates and Security for 6.06, 8.04, 8.10, 9.04, 9.10, and 10.04
    1. Security Updates
    2. Ubuntu 6.06 Updates
    3. Ubuntu 8.04 Updates
    4. Ubuntu 8.10 Updates
    5. Ubuntu 9.04 Updates
    6. Ubuntu 9.10 Updates
    7. Ubuntu 10.04 Updates
  12. Subscribe
  13. Archives and RSS Feed
  14. Additional Ubuntu News
  15. Conclusion
  16. Credits
  17. Ubuntu - Get Involved
  18. Feedback

newspaper-icon3.jpg

Welcome to the Ubuntu Weekly Newsletter, Issue #188 for the week April 4th - April 10th, 2010. In this issue we cover: Ubuntu 10.04 LTS Beta 2 released, Countdown Banner is live, help spread the word, Regional Membership Boards: Restaffing, Call for New Operators in the #ubuntu, #kubuntu and #ubuntu-offtopic channels, Patch Day, May 5th 2010, Next Ubuntu Hug Day! - April 15, Being passionate about some things, Website Localization Project Meeting, Reviving the Ubuntu Accessibility Team, Ubuntu One contact phone sync opened again, Canonical Upgrading GNOME Bugzilla and Commercial Sponsorship, Ubuntu's News Web Office Integration, and much, much more!

UWN Translations

  • Note to translators and our readers: We are trying a new way of linking to our translations pages. Please follow the link below for the information you need.

https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UbuntuWeeklyNewsletter/Translations

In This Issue

  • Ubuntu 10.04 LTS Beta 2 released
  • Countdown Banner is live, help spread the word
  • Regional Membership Boards: Restaffing
  • Call for New Operators in the #ubuntu, #kubuntu and #ubuntu-offtopic channels
  • Patch Day, May 5th 2010
  • Next Ubuntu Hug Day! - April 15
  • Ubuntu Stats
  • Launchpad News
  • Being passionate about some things
  • Website Localization Project Meeting
  • Reviving the Ubuntu Accessibility Team
  • Ubuntu One contact phone sync opened again
  • In the Press & Blogosphere

  • Canonical Upgrading GNOME Bugzilla and Commercial Sponsorship
  • Ubuntu's News Web Office Integration
  • Upcoming Meetings & Events

  • Updates & Security

General Community News

Ubuntu 10.04 LTS Beta 2 released

The Ubuntu team is pleased to announce the second beta release of Ubuntu 10.04 LTS (Long-Term Support) Desktop and Server Editions and Ubuntu 10.04 LTS Server for Ubuntu Enterprise Cloud (UEC) and Amazon's EC2, as well as Ubuntu 10.04 Netbook Edition. Codenamed "Lucid Lynx", 10.04 LTS continues Ubuntu's proud tradition of integrating the latest and greatest open source technologies into a high-quality, easy-to-use Linux distribution.

Ubuntu 10.04 LTS Desktop Edition and Ubuntu 10.04 Netbook Edition continue the trend of ever-faster boot speeds, with improved startup times and a streamlined, smoother boot experience.

Ubuntu 10.04 LTS Server Edition provides even better integration of the Ubuntu Enterprise Cloud, with its install-time cloud setup.

Ubuntu 10.04 LTS Server for UEC and EC2 brings the power and stability of the Ubuntu Server Edition to cloud computing, whether you're using Amazon EC2 or your own Ubuntu Enterprise Cloud.

The Ubuntu 10.04 family of variants, Kubuntu, Xubuntu, Edubuntu, Ubuntu Studio, and Mythbuntu, also reach beta status today.

Ubuntu is a full-featured Linux distribution for desktops, laptops, and servers, with a fast and easy installation and regular releases. A tightly-integrated selection of excellent applications is included, and an incredible variety of add-on software is just a few clicks away.

For more detailed information on the different Ubuntu Beta 2 releases, and a list of the download mirrors, please visit the link below.

https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-announce/2010-April/000131.html

Countdown Banner is live, help spread the word

Matthew Nuzum has announced that the Ubuntu countdown banner is alive and counting down the days until 10.04 LTS is released. Lets help build some excitement by spreading the word! We'll need your help to tell others about the banner. You can start by adding one of the three options to your website, the instructions are at http://www.ubuntu.com/getubuntu/countdown There is also a static banner for those who have website or blogs that don't use Java scripting.

A special thank you goes out to the artists who created this years chosen entries:

  • John Baer for the "change" artwork
  • Immanuel Peratoner for the "orange" artwork
  • Amanda Warzecha for the "lynx" artwork

Congratulations for the great work!

https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-news-team/2010-April/000931.html

Regional Membership Boards: Restaffing

On 2010-05-05 the following members of the Regional Membership Boards will expire:

  • Americas: Cody A.W. Somerville, Elizabeth Krumbach, Mike Basinger, Pedro Villavivencio, Richard Johnson
  • Asia/Oceania: Andi Darmawan, Emmet Hikory, Luke Yelavich, Melissa Draper, Robert Collins, Zak B. Elep, ஆமாச்சு (amachu)
  • EMEA: Alan Pope, Dennis Kaarsemaker, Mark Van den Borre, Matthew Helmke, Stéphane Graber, Szilvester Farkas

We are looking for nominations for the boards. You can either nominate yourself or somebody else. Please add some information about yourself to the mail. (Expiring members can be re-nominated too.)

We have the following requirements for nominees:

  • be an Ubuntu member
  • be confident that you can judge contributions to various parts of our community
  • be available during typical meeting times of the board in question
  • insight into the culture(s) and typical activities within a geographic region covered by the board is a plus

Here a slightly longer version that explains a bit better what kind of community members we are looking for: Those sitting on membership boards are people who are insightful. They are current Ubuntu Members with a proven track record of activity in the community. They have shown themselves over time to be able to work well with others and display the positive aspects of the Ubuntu Code of Conduct. They should be people who can discern character and judge contribution quality without emotion while engaging in an interview/discussion that communicates interest, a welcoming atmosphere, and which is marked by humanity, gentleness, and kindness. Even when they must deny applications, they should do so in such a way that applicants walk away with a sense of hopefulness and a desire to return with a more complete application rather than feeling discouraged or hurt.

To nominate yourself or somebody else, please send a mail to the board you are nominating yourself for (ubuntu-membership-board-emea, ubuntu-membership-board-asia-oceania or ubuntu-membership-board-americas at lists.ubuntu.com). Try to explain your nomination. There is still time for nominations until Fri 23rd April 2010 12 UTC. All nominations will be forwarded to the Community Council who will make the final decision.

A special thanks goes out to the dedication everybody put into their jobs as board members.

https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-news-team/2010-April/000932.html

Call for New Operators in the #ubuntu, #kubuntu and #ubuntu-offtopic channels

The IRCC is now taking applications for a number of new operator positions in the following channels: #ubuntu #kubuntu and #ubuntu-offtopic. The particular area of need is for people with availability between the times of 12am to 7am UTC.

So if you’re active on our IRC channels and you are available in the specified times (or at least part of them), and if you’ve been aching to help, you should consider applying for membership! You might get your chance if:

  • You are great at resolving conflicts
  • You are very patient. Superhuman nerve control is a basic IRC operator feature
  • You can take criticism
  • You are happy when helping and advising others
  • In addition to the Code of Conduct and our IRC Guidelines, you are happy to adhere to some additional guidelines Smile :)

In general, please do not consider becoming an operator because it could be “fun”. It is not, it’s hard work. However, it is often quite rewarding, and you get to operate with a great team of people. You don’t need to be an IRC guru, but you do need to know enough to be able to learn more.

Please be aware that *many* applicants will not become operators for various reasons. This will not necessarily be because we think you would make a bad operator. Only a limited number of operators are ever needed, some timezones are better covered already than others, and so on.

IMPORTANT: Please follow the application process at: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/IRC/IrcTeam/OperatorRequirements and additionally note your available times on your wiki page. Having your wiki page listed on your LP page is also useful to aid us in finding your information.

https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-news-team/2010-April/000926.html

Patch Day, May 5th 2010

The Ubuntu Reviewers Team would like to announce the first Patch Day, which will take place on May 5, 2010. For those of you not familiar with the problem we are trying to solve, I have blogged about it [1].

Patch Day is a concept similar to Hug Days where we will test patches, and forward working patches upstream. If the bug is critical enough, we will try to get the patch applied in Ubuntu immediately. We'd like your help to get these submissions reviewed, and if necessary sent upstream so that they don't bitrot, and to encourage people to continue helping us improve open source software.

We will be following the Review Guide [2] for reviewing patches. Reviewer Leaders can sign up to be contacts on an hourly basis [3]. Contact responsibilities include helping to answer questions from new contributors, unsubscribing the ~ubuntu-reviewers team when required, and answering development-related questions.

If you're a newbie looking for a way to start getting involved with Ubuntu development? Patch review is where we need your help.

  1. http://justanothertriager.wordpress.com/2010/03/16/1801-bugs/

  2. https://wiki.ubuntu.com/ReviewersTeam/GettingInvolved

  3. https://wiki.ubuntu.com/PatchDay

https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-devel/2010-April/030581.html

Next Ubuntu Hug Day! - April 15

The next BugDay will be taking aim at the Software Center.

Inform your team, tell your friends, get involved. Squashing bugs is fun!

https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-news-team/2010-April/000948.html

Ubuntu Stats

Bug Stats

  • Open (78167) +521 over last week
  • Critical (26) +/-0 over last week
  • Unconfirmed (37248) +181 over last week

As always, the Bug Squad needs more help. If you want to get started, please see https://wiki.ubuntu.com/BugSquad

Translation Stats Lucid

  1. English (United Kingdom) (2724) +70 over last week
  2. Spanish (13215) -280 over last week
  3. French (40551) -2245 over last week
  4. Brazilian Portuguese (40766) -1996 over last week
  5. German (61774) -711 over last week

Remaining strings to translate in Ubuntu 10.04 "Lucid Lynx", see more at: https://translations.launchpad.net/ubuntu/lucid/

Ubuntu Brainstorm Top 5 this week

Ubuntu Brainstorm is a community site geared toward letting you add your ideas for Ubuntu. You can submit your own idea, or vote for or against another idea. http://brainstorm.ubuntu.com/

Launchpad News

–fixes lp:1234

Published by Matthew Revell April 9, 2010 in Bug Tracking, Code, Feature Friday

As I’ve said before, Launchpad is pretty big. Getting to know everything you can to do in Launchpad can take a while.

Of course, there are the user guide, the tour and the dev wiki even has a feature check-list. It’s still easy to miss things.

So, I’m turning the fifth day of each week into Feature Friday.

I’m gonna kick off with something I use a lot and that, to be honest, is more a Bazaar feature, than a Launchpad feature:

bzr commit -m "Adds email functionality to the client, thereby obeying Zawinski's law." --fixes lp:1234

Adding --fixes lp:1234 to a commit tells Bazaar that the branch contains a fix for bug 1234 tracked in Launchpad.

The next time you push the branch to Launchpad, Launchpad will create a link between the branch and bug 1234. https://help.launchpad.net/Code/BugAndBlueprintLinks

http://blog.launchpad.net/bug-tracking/fixes-lp1234

How does bug triage work for you?

Published by Matthew Revell April 7, 2010 in Bug Tracking

I want to learn more about how and why people triage bugs, whether that’s in Launchpad or another bug tracker.

So, I’m inviting people who often triage bugs to come to either London or UDS in Brussels to tell me more about their experience.

If we get two or three people somewhere other than London or Brussels, we may also be able to come to you.

All I need is around an hour of your time where, along with my colleague Charline, I’ll ask you to show me how you triage bugs. If you’re interested, or have questions about how it works, mail me: matthew DOT revell AT canonical DOT com

http://blog.launchpad.net/bug-tracking/how-does-bug-triage-work-for-you

The Planet

Daniel Holbach: Being passionate about some things

If you like Open Source software you’ll very quickly find your attention drawn towards certain projects, certain packages, certain tools and pieces that make the Open Source world so great. I guess there’s only a very few people who find themselves attracted to *everything* and treat *everything* with the same attention.

If you were always wondering, how you can help the Open Source world and help Ubuntu, here’s an idea: there’s millions of users of Open Source software (most use one of the big distributions), there’s thousands of Open Source projects. What would you think about acting as a tie between the two gigantic groups.

It’s exactly why we set up the “Adopt-An-Upstream” initiative. We want you to act as a tie between an Upstream project and Ubuntu and its users. We both have a lot to gain from each other and together we make the lives of a lot of users a lot easier.

So if you already

  • read changelogs of an upstream project
  • are addicted to blog posts about your favourite piece of software
  • build the newest upstream source regularly
  • know bug numbers of the projects by heart
  • (or if you’re on the way to saying YES! to at least one of the above)

we want you.

https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Upstream/Adopt is an excellent guide to finding out how to be an ambassador, a tie, a bridge, call-it-what-you-want between two projects.

Help us out! Stay awesome! Make the world a better place!

http://daniel.holba.ch/blog/?p=647

Chris Johnston: Website Localization Project Meeting

I have scheduled a meeting for the website localization project to discuss the beginning of development for the project. The meeting is scheduled for Tuesday, April 13 at 1900 UTC [1]. The meeting will be held in #ubuntu-meeting on freenode.

During this meeting, I hope to define the tasks that need to be completed, who is going to perform the tasks, and when the tasks will be completed so that we can stick to the desired timeline.

Please let me know if you are interested in helping with this project however will not be able to attend the meeting.

  1. http://timeanddate.com/worldclock/fixedtime.html?month=4&day=13&year=2010&hour=19&min=0&sec=0&p1=0

https://lists.canonical.com/archives/ubuntu-website/2010-April/000883.html

Penelope Stowe: Reviving the Ubuntu Accessibility Team

The Ubuntu Accessibility Team will meet April 13, 2010 at 21:00 UTC in #ubuntu-accessibility on freenode.

This is the first time in over 3 years that the team has met. While there’s still a strong level of technical support happening on the mailing list and forums, I’m hoping that we can get some plans set for Maverick Meerkat and come up with the beginnings of a longer term plan. The goal of course is to make it easier for new users who have accessibility needs to use Ubuntu and find the information they need to do so. I encourage anyone with any interest in the project to come to the meeting.

For more information, including an agenda, please look at the Accessibility Team page.

http://pendulumtech.wordpress.com/2010/04/11/reviving-the-ubuntu-accessibility-team/

Martin Albisetti: Ubuntu One contact phone sync opened again

After a few hiccups with our servers, Ubuntu One contact phone sync is open again for new accounts.

Check out the wiki with the instructions to get set up: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UbuntuOne/PhoneSync/

http://beuno.com.ar/archives/191

Ubuntu One Blog: Ubuntu One Music Store for Banshee

Thanks to the hard work by Jo Shields you can now enjoy the Ubuntu One Music Store within Banshee! You’ll need to be running Lucid Beta 2 with all the latest and greatest updates. Watch the screencast at the link below to learn how to install the plugin.

http://voices.canonical.com/ubuntuone/?p=371

Amber Graner: 3rd Annual Palmetto Open Source Conference (POSSCON)

The 3rd Annual Palmetto Open Source Software Conference (POSSCON) will be held in Columbia, South Carolina on April 15th, , April 16th and April 17th, 2010. On Thursday and Friday the events will take place at the Columbia Convention Center and then move to the USC School of Public Health on Saturday, April 17, 2010. 3 days, 2 venues, and a packed line-up of open source speakers and all in Columbia, South Carolina. This is one of the fastest growing Open Source Conferences in the Southeast, boasting attendance from across 4 states, over 200 attendees, 20 speakers, as well as participants from the both private and governmental businesses. With a long list of featured speakers including our own Matt Asay, Canonical Ltd., COO it's sure to be a must attend event.

http://akgraner.com/?p=233

In The Press

Ubuntu 10.04 Gets Cloud-Based Contact Syncing

Lifehacker's Kevin Purdy tells us that along with a built-in music store, Ubuntu 10.04, the free Linux distribution arriving later this month, will offer a 30-day trial of cloud-based contact syncing through its Ubuntu One storage service. It's a promising peek into nifty features to come. "Promising" because, at the moment, Ubuntu One contact syncing is a kind of alpha feature that's being offered as a 30-day trial, free to users of Ubuntu One's standard 2 GB of web storage. It uses Funambol, a background push/sync service often mentioned in the comments around here, and there's already an Ubuntu-branded iPhone app—though any Funambol client on most any phone can also sync to Ubuntu One, as can phones that support SyncML. Adventurous Ubuntu users can read the Phone Sync FAQ for help and suggestions. You'll need an Ubuntu One account to try out contact syncing, which you can create here [1].

http://lifehacker.com/5510481/ubuntu-1004-gets-cloud+based-contact-syncing?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+lifehacker%2Ffull+%28Lifehacker%29

Ubuntu Claims 12 Million Users as Lucid Linux Desktop Nears

Sean Michael Kerner of LinuxPlanet reminds us that Ubuntu Linux is gearing up for the debut of its latest release with Ubuntu 10.04, codenamed "Lucid Lynx" and scheduled for general availability at the end of the month. The Lucid release could also help to further accelerate adoption of Ubuntu, which has been growing over the last several years. In 2008, Canonical, the lead commercial sponsor behind Ubuntu, pegged the number of Ubuntu users at 8 million. It's a figure that could have increased by as much as 50 percent or more since then, insiders say. "We have no phone home or registration process, so it's always a guesstimate. But based on the same methodology that we came up with for the 2008 number, our present belief is that it's somewhere north of 12 million users at the moment," Chris Kenyon, vice president for OEM at Canonical, told InternetNews.com. Usage numbers aside, the upcoming Lucid release from Ubuntu is a big one for the Linux distribution as it is the first new Long-Term Supported (LTS) release in two years. Kenyon expect that users still running the 8.04 LTS will now make the jump to the 10.04 LTS when it becomes available.

http://www.linuxplanet.com/linuxplanet/reports/7032/1/

New Ubuntu look too destructive

ZDNet's Chris Duckett says take a good hard look at your screen and ask yourself if it is possible to accidentally close an application while reaching for the File menu. In most cases the answer is a clear no, but for users of Ubuntu, it has become a very real and dangerous use case. All the fuss began in March when the decision was taken to refresh Ubuntu's look and branding, which included a set of new default themes that moved the trio of minimise, maximise and close buttons from the PC standard right-hand side to the left side of the title bar. Suffice to say that despite the positives of the updated Ubuntu look, users overwhelmingly detested the movement of the window buttons — as shown by the over 630 comments, the vast majority of which are intensely negative, on this bug report. Mark Shuttleworth, Ubuntu's founder and patron, responded to the criticism by saying that moving the icons to the left opened up the space on the right of the title bar for experimentation further down the line, and thanking users for their feedback but reminding them that Ubuntu was not a democracy and the design team had made its decision. Since that posting the mob may have received some compromises from Shuttleworth, but Ubuntu has now taken a step which means everyone will lose something. Whether it be data, tabs, or that important email they were writing.

http://www.zdnet.com.au/new-ubuntu-look-too-destructive-339302224.htm

Beta 2 Arrives For Ubuntu 10.04 LTS "Lucid Lynx"

Michael Larabel of Phoronix reports that in just three weeks Ubuntu 10.04 LTS "Lucid Lynx" will be released, but before that happens there is a final beta and one release candidate that needs to make it out into the hands of Ubuntu testers. On April 8th the second beta was released and is ready for testing. Ubuntu 10.04 LTS Beta 2 really isn't anymore interesting than the first beta that came towards the middle of March, but there are bug-fixes and a few remaining updated packages (like for the GNOME 2.30.0 desktop). Being released along side Ubuntu 8.04 LTS Beta 2 proper is similar updates to Kubuntu, Edubuntu, Xubuntu, and the various other Ubuntu flavors like Ubuntu Server and Ubuntu Server for UEC/EC2 cloud computing platforms. The release announcement for Ubuntu 8.04 LTS Beta 2 can be read on the Ubuntu announcement list [1]. The final release of this Canonical Long-Term Support release is expected on the 29th of April.

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=ODEzNg

In The Blogosphere

Ubuntu: Canonical Focuses on Wall Street

Joe Panettieri of WorksWithU notes that Ubuntu will be at the HPC (High Performance Computing) Linux Financial Markets conference in New York. He mentions Equitec and Linux Box as already using Ubuntu, as well as Dell pushing the Enterprise Cloud as beginning points in their quest to gain a larger foothold. But this is just a beginning, and it remains to be seen how it will play out.

http://www.workswithu.com/2010/04/05/ubuntu-canonical-focuses-on-wall-street/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+WorksWithU+%28Works+With+U%29

Dell’s Ubuntu Linux Strategy Extends to China

Joe Panettieri of WorksWithU examines Dell's commitment to Ubuntu, and explains that Dell's move to Ubuntu was what prompted WorksWithU to come into existence. Although offerings of Dell computers with Ubuntu has fallen off in the United States, the possibilities with China have increased. In the U.S. the only offering is the Dell Mini 10. But in China, there are seven opportunities to get a Dell with Ubuntu installed on it. His reasoning and explanation for starting WorksWithU can be seen at the link.

http://www.workswithu.com/2010/04/07/dells-ubuntu-strategy-extends-to-china/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+WorksWithU+%28Works+With+U%29

Eye On Ubuntu 10.10

Christopher Tozzi, writing for WorksWithU, talks about what Mark Shuttleworth has said was the thrust of Maverick Meerkat, Ubuntu 10.10. He notes that it will be aimed at the netbook and mobility market, with a larger push toward connecting with social networks and the cloud. The big question is whether GNOME 3 will be ready in time to be included in Ubuntu 10.10

http://www.workswithu.com/2010/04/08/eye-on-ubuntu-10-10/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+WorksWithU+%28Works+With+U%29

Lubuntu not joining the ubuntu family until 10.10

OMG!UBUNTU! notes that the LXDE based Lubuntu won't become an official Ubuntu distribution until at least 10.10. The reason is that many packages needed for it are still missing from the repositories. Amongst them are the all important packages for the default file manager, which is still in Alpha. It's hoped that all the necessary packages will be available by October for the 10.10 release.

http://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2010/04/lubuntu-not-joining-ubuntu-family-until.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+d0od+%28Omg!+Ubuntu!%29

Ubuntu 10.04 drops Yahoo! will use Google as search engine

OMG!UBUNTU! list the Ubuntu Desktop Team's Rick Spencer's reasons for leaving Google as the default search engine. Spencer states that it's based on “user experience, user preferences, and costs and benefits for Ubuntu and the browsers and other projects that make up Ubuntu.” OMG!UBUNTU! suggests that it might be because users were just switching back, anyway.

http://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2010/04/ubuntu-1004-drops-yahoo-will-use-google.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+d0od+%28Omg!+Ubuntu!%29

What's coming in the new Ubuntu Linux desktop?

Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols, the Cyber Cynic on ComputerWorld Blogs, feels that "you can . . . expect to see a lot of PCs and devices with Ubuntu already pre-installed on them--in one form or another--within the next few months." Some of his reasons are expressed by Gerry Carr, head of platform marketing: "New theme; Social from the start; Ubuntu One Music Store; Boot Speed and "Long Term Support (not new but new to many users)." The biggest thrust, though, is the continued interest in engaging more outside developers, like Chrome, and manufacturers, like Dell, in making use of Ubuntu or the various packages tweaked by Ubuntu in their products.

http://blogs.computerworld.com/15889/whats_coming_in_the_new_ubuntu_linux_desktop

In Other News

Canonical, Upgrading GNOME Bugzilla, and Commercial Sponsorship

Sumana Harihareswara, GNOME Journal, writes about how Canonical recently spent "tens of thousands of USD" to upgrade the GNOME Bugzilla instance from 2.20 to 3.5. It seems all of this upgrading is centered around Launchpad. Sumana notes that, "Max Kanat-Alexander of consulting firm Everything Solved explains, “the most popular bug-tracker that Launchpad projects were interfacing without outside of Launchpad itself were Bugzilla installations.”" Sumana also quotes Canonical's Christian Robottoma Reis, "I know how cool a tool it is. We know organizations are invested in the tools they’ve chosen; we don’t expect them to come across to Launchpad for our primary benefit. So we’ve put work into making sure Launchpad plugs well into their infrastructure. All the work around bug watches, branch synchronization and translations emphasizes our coexistence with other tools.” This upgrade may also help with the reducing bug duplication across multiple Linux distributions. This article points why GNOME Bugzilla is important to Launchpad via the Ubuntu project. Sumana also shows how collaborative efforts of Canonical, GNOME, Everything Solved find creative commercial sponsorship solutions to address infrastructure issues. She goes on to note how Canonical, Google, Collabora, and Nokia all donated to help hire a full-time GNOME sysadmin, this continues the ongoing corporate/community partnerships.

http://www.gnomejournal.org/article/96/canonical-upgrading-gnome-bugzilla-and-commercial-sponsorship

Canonical Voices: Ubuntu's News Web Office Integration

By Jamie Bannett

Why Online?

Desktop Integration with the cloud is hot news. Ubuntu One is a great example of this. Currently Ubuntu One integrates file storage, contacts and notes sync, and now you can even buy music from the online store, delivered straight to the Rythmbox media player. But for some devices, integration with the cloud isn't just a nice feature, it completely changes the user experience (UX). Take for instance a low powered, possibly mobile/embedded system with limited processing power and memory. A cloud based service for these devices could allow resource intensive tasks to be offloaded to an online server somewhere, greatly improving the UX. One set of tasks that are used often but can put a strain on resources are related to office document editing.

Ubuntu's Current Offerings

The standard Ubuntu image currently contains the Open Office suite. Open Office also has around 9 million lines of code spread over 30 thousand files, in short, its a large project. Running this on a device with limited resources is a recipe for disaster. Of course there are alternatives, Abiword and Gnumeric are examples of two applications that replicate functionality found in Open Office's Writer and Calc respectively. There are also online services such as Google Docs and Zoho but neither of these are tightly integrated with the desktop, until now. Enter webservice-office-zoho. http://www.launchpad.net/webservice-office-zoho

Why Zoho?

First off, why Zoho and not, for instance, Google Docs. Both services offer great functionality and are very competitive but the ultimate decision came down to which suited our use case the most. What we wanted was for a user to double click on a document which would then seamlessly open ready for editing. From there the user would edit, read, and maybe even save it back to the local device. No fuss, no logging in, no other requirements, just open and get on with it. Similarly, when a user launches the application on its own, we wanted the correct type of service to open ready for the user to concentrate on their document. The service that allowed us to do this was Zoho. Zoho allows the user to do all of this without ever registering or logging in. Of course you get online storage with Zoho if you do register, but if you choose not to you can still get a full featured experience. Integrating Zoho with the Desktop

So what do you get with this new integration. Well as alluded to before you can:

  • Open, read, edit and save email document attachments.
  • Open, read, edit and save local documents.
  • Open, read, edit and save remote documents linked to with a url.
  • Launch the required application, Writer, Show or Sheet (Word Processor, Presentations, Spreadsheets) which will present the user with an empty document of that type ready to edit.
  • More functionality to come in Maverick Meerkat. http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/336

The Future

This functionality is currently only available as default on Ubuntu's ARM images, typically where limited hardware resources are more commonly found. But that's not to say webservice-office-zoho (http://www.launchpad.net/webservice-office-zoho) can't be used on any other Ubuntu install. As the package is in the main Ubuntu repository, a simple:

  • sudo apt-get install webservice-office-zoho

will install it on your Lucid based machine or if you are feeling brave, checkout the latest bazaar branch with:

  • bzr branch lp:webservice-office-zoho

There are lots of things planned for the future of webservice-office-zoho. If you have comments, idea's or just want to rant, come along to the web integration UDS session(https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UDS-M) this May, either in person or via online methods or just leave your thoughts at the link below.

http://www.linuxuk.org/2010/04/ubuntus-new-web-office-integration/

http://voices.canonical.com/

Portable Ubuntu Tres Runs 9.10 on Windows Desktops

Lifehacker was seriously impressed with Portable Ubuntu when we first saw it, running a Windows-aware Ubuntu from a thumb drive. Now a third version is out with an updated OS and apps, fewer bugs, and more improvements. Like its predecessor, Portable Ubuntu "Tres" can run from a thumb drive, if you've got about 3.7 GB free on a bigger thumb drive. Otherwise, you can unpack the 560 MB package somewhere on your Windows system and run Portable Ubuntu from there. It launches a taskbar right on your Windows desktop, opens windows that are framed to fit your theme, can write and read from Windows folders, and has a "persistent" storage space, so that settings you change and apps you install to Portable Ubuntu remain in place the next time you launch it. Particularly new to Tres is that it runs the latest stable version of Ubuntu, 9.10.

http://lifehacker.com/5509585/portable-ubuntu-tres-brings-910-to-windows-desktops-and-thumb-drives?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+lifehacker%2Ffull+%28Lifehacker%29

Upcoming Meetings and Events

Monday, April 12, 2010

Security Team Catch-up

  • Start: 17:00 UTC
  • End: 17:30 UTC
  • Location: IRC channel #ubuntu-meeting
  • Agenda: nothing formal, just a weekly catch-up.

Tuesday, April 13, 2010

Ubuntu Mobile Team Meeting

Developer Membership Board

  • Start: 14:00 UTC
  • End: 15:00 UTC
  • Location: IRC channel #ubuntu-meeting
  • Agenda: Not listed as of publication

Ubuntu Bugsquad Monthly Meeting

Desktop Team Meeting

Kernel Team Meeting

  • Start: 17:00 UTC
  • End: 18:00 UTC
  • Location: IRC channel #ubuntu-meeting
  • Agenda: Not listed as of publication

Website Localization Meeting

Wednesday, April 14, 2010

Server Team Meeting

Foundation Team Meeting

  • Start: 16:00 UTC
  • End: 17:00 UTC
  • Location: IRC channel #ubuntu-meeting
  • Agenda: Not listed as of publication

QA Team Meeting

Jono Bacon @ Home Videocast : Various Topics and Q+A

Edubuntu Meeting

Thursday, April 15, 2010

Ubuntu Java Meeting

  • Start: 14:00 UTC
  • End: 15:00 UTC
  • Location: IRC channel #ubuntu-meeting
  • Agenda: None listed as of publication

Friday, April 16, 2010

Lucid Weekly Release Meeting

Saturday, April 17, 2010

BugJam

  • Start: 20:00 UTC
  • End: 22:00 UTC
  • Location: IRC channel #ubuntu-us-dc and IRC channel #ubuntu-bugs
  • Agenda: None listed as of publication

DC Loco IRC meeting

  • Start: 22:00 UTC
  • End: 23:00 UTC
  • Location: IRC channel #ubuntu-us-dc
  • Agenda: None listed as of publication

Sunday, April 18, 2010

  • None listed as of publication

Updates and Security for 6.06, 8.04, 8.10, 9.04, 9.10, and 10.04

Security Updates

Ubuntu 6.06 Updates

Ubuntu 8.04 Updates

Ubuntu 8.10 Updates

Ubuntu 9.04 Updates

Ubuntu 9.10 Updates

Ubuntu 10.04 Updates

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Ubuntu - Get Involved

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This document is maintained by the Ubuntu Weekly News Team. If you have a story idea or suggestions for the Weekly Newsletter, join the Ubuntu News Team mailing list at https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/Ubuntu-news-team and submit it. Ideas can also be added to the wiki at https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UbuntuWeeklyNewsletter/Ideas. If you'd like to contribute to a future issue of the Ubuntu Weekly Newsletter, please feel free to edit the appropriate wiki page. If you have any technical support questions, please send them to ubuntu-users@lists.ubuntu.com.

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UbuntuWeeklyNewsletter/Issue188 (last edited 2010-04-11 21:03:22 by ip68-0-180-217)