Hi,

Two days ago, the entire world has celebrated the release of Ubuntu GNOME 14.04 LTS and the other official flavours of Ubuntu.

Ubuntu GNOME Team has received many Emails and Posts on our Social Media Channels about the very same question/issue.

“Why the system information is showing Ubuntu 13.10 instead of Ubuntu 14.04”?!

Same question is being asked daily even before the final release of Ubuntu GNOME 14.04.

Ubuntu GNOME Team is asking everyone to please read the release notes of Ubuntu GNOME 14.04 LTS before downloading or upgrading to Ubuntu GNOME 14.04 LTS.

This is actually a must-do step with any new release/version of any Operating System/Software in the world and to be more specific here, it is a must-do step every time Ubuntu and its official flavours announce a new release every 6 months.

Why reading the release notes is very important?
The answer is very simple: because the release notes will explain everything about the new release and above all, show the known issues for every new release that all users must be aware of before anything else.

Sorry for the inconvenience
Ubuntu GNOME Team would like to apologize if we caused any kind of confusion and/or headache to the users of Ubuntu GNOME. Our Developers are working on the known issues, specially this problem:

System Details shows Ubuntu 13.10 instead of 14.04

A Workaround
Meanwhile, you can check and verify which release/version of Ubuntu GNOME you’re using by following these steps:

How can I find the version of Ubuntu that is installed?

Thank you!
As always, thank you for choosing and using Ubuntu GNOME and thanks for reading this very important note. Please keep that in mind with each and every release, you do need to read the release notes. This will save your time and save the trouble for you and for everyone else.

Enjoy and have fun with Ubuntu GNOME 14.04 LTS

Ali/amjjawad
On behalf of Ubuntu GNOME Team

The Ubuntu GNOME Team is proud and happy to announce the release of Ubuntu GNOME 14.04 LTS.

Ubuntu GNOME is an official flavour of Ubuntu, featuring the GNOME desktop environment. Ubuntu GNOME is a mostly pure GNOME desktop experience built from the Ubuntu repositories. This is our very first Long Term Release (LTS) version.

Release Notes

Please read the Release Notes before Downloading Ubuntu GNOME 14.04 LTS:
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/TrustyTahr/ReleaseNotes/UbuntuGNOME

Get Ubuntu GNOME 14.04 LTS

There are important steps you need to be aware of before installing Ubuntu GNOME 14.04 LTS so please read carefully: Download Ubuntu GNOME 14.04 LTS

Ubuntu Announcement and Release Notes

Please see this link.

Contact Us

Please, see the full list of our communications channels

Thank you everyone

To each and everyone who participated, helped, supported and contributed to Ubuntu GNOME this cycle; big thanks to all of you.

Ubuntu GNOME Team has gone the extra miles by putting extraordinary efforts to the point, the team was ready to apply for the LTS Status. We have done all what we could to achieve that and indeed we have and therefore, we gained and deserved the LTS Status. Without a doubt, that is a huge achievement in our history.

Special thanks to our testers who did a unique great job to make Ubuntu GNOME better. As a result of all these efforts, we have a great LTS release to be proud of.

Thank you for choosing and using Ubuntu GNOME.

Ali/amjjawad
QA Lead of Ubuntu GNOME

Hi,

This is the final week of Trusty Tahr Cycle. We are now at the very last phase of this cycle. It is called The Final Freeze and Release Candidate.

The Final Freeze vs The Final Release
You need to understand the difference between The Final Release and The Final Freeze.

Final Freeze – April 10th

Final Release – April 17th

Adam Conrad from The Ubuntu Release Team has explained in details in his email and announced The Final Freeze of Trusty Tahr Cycle.

What does all this mean?
It means that Ubuntu GNOME Trusty Tahr Daily Builds are considered to be RC.

What does RC (Release Candidate) mean?

Release Candidate

“During the week leading up to the final release, the images produced are all considered release candidates.”

The Final Round of Testing Ubuntu GNOME Trusty Tahr
This is the final round and the last week to test Ubuntu GNOME Trusty Tahr.

Ubuntu GNOME QA Team is testing now Ubuntu GNOME Trusty Tahr Release Candidate.

As always, your help, support and testing are highly needed and greatly appreciated.

All about Testing Ubuntu GNOME.

Download and Test Ubuntu GNOME Trusty Tahr Release Candidate.

Feel free to Contact Us.

Thank you for choosing, testing and supporting Ubuntu GNOME. Without your great and amazing support, we would have never reached to this point.

Hi,

Ubuntu GNOME as an official flavour of Ubuntu, it has the same Release Schedule of Ubuntu and the same goes for all the other official flavours as well.

When it comes to Testing Ubuntu GNOME, we need to make sure everything is working as expected without any problem.

That said, we would like to invite you to help Ubuntu GNOME with Upgrade Testing.

How to help Ubuntu GNOME with Upgrade Testing?
The idea is very simple. We need to upgrade Ubuntu GNOME 13.10 to Ubuntu GNOME Trusty Tahr and test the upgrade process.

If you have Ubuntu GNOME 13.10 installed already, we would really appreciate your help in this regard.

If Ubuntu GNOME 13.10 is not installed, then kindly install it and do the upgrade. Installing Ubuntu GNOME from LiveUSB should not take more than 10 minutes.

How to do an upgrade from 13.10 to Trusty Tahr?
Before we get into this, kindly have a read at Upgrades Documentation.

Whether you’re helping Ubuntu GNOME Team with Testing or you’re a fan of running unstable releases on your machine, kindly make sure to backup your important files before anything else.

To upgrade Ubuntu GNOME 13.10 Stable to Ubuntu GNOME Trusty Tahr Development Release, kindly have a read at Upgrading to Development Releases.

Share your Testing Results
Please make sure to share your Testing Results with Ubuntu GNOME QA Team. The more feedback in this regard, the better.

Let’s make sure that our very first LTS Release of Ubuntu GNOME is solid as rock.

Thank you for helping, supporting and testing Ubuntu GNOME!

As always, for more information about testing, please see Ubuntu GNOME Testing Wiki Page.

Should you have any question, please don’t hesitate to Contact Us.

Happy Testing 🙂

Hi,

“No, unfortunately it’s not an April Fools joke.”

Said Jane Silber from Canonical.

Sad but true. Canonical is shutting down Ubuntu One file services.

“Today we are announcing plans to shut down the Ubuntu One file services. This is a tough decision, particularly when our users rely so heavily on the functionality that Ubuntu One provides. However, like any company, we want to focus our efforts on our most important strategic initiatives and ensure we are not spread too thin.”

However, the shutting down will not be over night but Ubuntu One will no longer be available on Ubuntu and its official variants.

“As of today, it will no longer be possible to purchase storage or music from the Ubuntu One store. The Ubuntu One file services will not be included in the upcoming Ubuntu 14.04 LTS release, and the Ubuntu One apps in older versions of Ubuntu and in the Ubuntu, Google, and Apple stores will be updated appropriately. The current services will be unavailable from 1 June 2014; user content will remain available for download until 31 July, at which time it will be deleted.”

This decision, as per Canonical, will not affect:

“The shutdown will not affect the Ubuntu One single sign on service, the Ubuntu One payment service, or the backend U1DB database service.”

For Full Details, please refer to this post.

Thank you!

Hi everyone,

While this post might be obvious for some of you, I feel it is not yet clear for some others and I thought it might be a good idea to clear some confusion and make life easier.

Introduction
My job within Ubuntu GNOME Team is not easy at all. One of the things that I like to do and I have to do (because of my commitments with Ubuntu GNOME) is being in touch with all the users of Ubuntu GNOME. This is alone is a huge burden if you ask me and I can assure you (from +3 years experience of doing that), it is very stressful and hard but I do like it. I’ve seen so many posts on our Social Media and Emails on our Mailing Lists. Most of those who would love to help Ubuntu GNOME to get better and better are confused and not sure what to do?
I don’t blame them simply because I do feel them. I’ve been there once and I know how frustrating it is when you want to do something you want badly but you can’t because of lack of information (for example) or lack of experience and/or lack of communications. There are really many reasons for that.

Today, I’d like to make life a lot easier for everyone and hopefully end that confusion with this post. I will give it a try. If I couldn’t make life easier then I didn’t fail, I just found 10,000 ways that didn’t work and will never give up nor surrender and will keep trying. Ubuntu GNOME as a team has many priorities, one of the most important among these are Our Users. However, to be logical here, we can’t please everyone as this is the key to failure. Not to mention, nothing is perfect.

So, are you ready?

How Can I help Ubuntu GNOME with Testing?

• Step 1: Please read the Testing Wiki Page. It is really very easy to find it. It is almost on all our channels, not to mention you can only bookmark our OneStopPage to have access to each and every Wiki and/or Document that Ubuntu GNOME Team has.
• Step 2: If the information on the Testing Wiki Page wasn’t enough, there is a link at the very bottom of the Testing Wiki Page called See Also. Click See Also and you will get more details about Testing.
• Step 3: If and only if you did read the Testing Wiki Page and the Activities Wiki Page and got stuck somewhere or have any Question, please don’t hesitate to Contact Us . If we will be late in response to your email or post, that means real life got into our way. Otherwise, we shall get back to you ASAP.
• Step 4: Done.

Yes indeed. That is all what you need to know.
Our Wiki Pages are organized and documented in a way that could help you at any time without the need to ask anything. But, just in case, we shall be always there waiting for you if you have any question in mind.

Summary
Now, you do have the first resource of information regarding testing, that is: Ubuntu GNOME Testing Wiki Page.

Also, your second resource of information which is actually a support resource more than just informational: Ubuntu GNOME Team – Just Contact Us.

I hope this is crystal clear now 🙂

As always, thank you for choosing, helping, supporting and testing Ubuntu GNOME!

The real power behind any Linux Distribution is not the Developers but the Testers. Without Testing, we would never know whether our system is rock solid or a buggy system.

Happy Testing!

Ali/amjjawad
Lead of Ubuntu GNOME QA Team

Hi,

Ubuntu GNOME Team is happy to announce the release of Ubuntu GNOME Trusty Tahr Final Beta.

Please see the release notes.

We’re preparing Ubuntu GNOME 14.04 LTS, the Trusty Tahr, for distribution in 17th of April 2014. With this Beta 2 release, you can see what we are trying out in preparation for our next stable version. We have some interesting things happening, so read on for highlights and information.

NOTE:
This is a Beta 2 Release. Ubuntu GNOME Beta Releases are NOT recommended for:

• Regular users who are not aware of pre-release issues
• Anyone who needs a stable system
• Anyone uncomfortable running a possibly frequently broken system
• Anyone in a production environment with data or workflows that need to be reliable

Ubuntu GNOME Beta Releases are recommended for:

• Regular users who want to help us test by finding, reporting, and/or fixing bugs
• Ubuntu GNOME developers

To help with testing Ubuntu GNOME:
Please see Testing Ubuntu GNOME Wiki Page.

To contact Ubuntu GNOME:
Please see our full list of contact channels.

Thank you for choosing and testing Ubuntu GNOME!

Hi,

Many users, for the last 5 months since the Trusty Tahr Cycle has started until now, are asking Ubuntu GNOME Team the same question over and over again. We thought to give our final, direct and clear answer for everyone.

Q: Why Ubuntu GNOME 14.04 LTS will not be shipped with GNOME 3.12?

A: Simply, because Ubuntu GNOME 14.04 LTS will be released in 17th of April, 2014 and GNOME 3.12 has been just released today. Please see the announcement of GNOME 3.12 release.

Q: So what? there is still time to introduce GNOME 3.12 into Ubuntu GNOME 14.04 LTS, right?

A: No. Because in the 20th of February, 2014 Trusty Tahr Cycle has reached to Feature Freeze:

“At this point we stop introducing new features, packages, and APIs, and concentrate on fixing bugs in the development release.”

That said, there is no time to introduce any new feature and at that time, GNOME 3.12 wasn’t yet released.

Q: But I like Ubuntu GNOME and I’d like to use it with the latest GNOME version?

A: Sure, no problem. That is why we do have our PPA.

Q: Hm, so with your PPA, can I run GNOME 3.12 with Ubuntu GNOME Trusty Tahr right now?

A: Please note that Ubuntu GNOME Trusty Tahr is ‘still’ under heavy development and testing and the main focus now is to work hard on our very first LTS release. That said, once our PPA is ready for GNOME 3.12 which has been just released today, we shall update everyone with new post on our website and all our other channels (Social Media + Mailing List). Stay tuned 🙂

Hope our answers will clear any confusion.

If you’re still in doubt, please Contact Us.

Thank you for choosing and using Ubuntu GNOME!

Hi,

Can you believe it? few more days, and Ubuntu GNOME Trusty Tahr Final Beta/Beta 2 will be released.

As always, it is time for some heavy testing and help Ubuntu GNOME Team to decide which image (daily build) could be the final beta (beta 2) for Trusty Tahr.

With the very latest great news – Ubuntu GNOME 14.04 will be an LTS release supported for 3 years – and with the great commitment of Ubuntu GNOME Team and the high quality that everyone showed for the last 5 months, we do need to carry on and keep up the great work. We have achieved a lot and less than a month to go to the final release and the very first LTS version of Ubuntu GNOME. The hard work has just started. Beta 2 or the final beta means this is what Ubuntu GNOME 14.04 LTS final release will look like, at least 90% or even more.

If you take a look at the Release Schedule Wiki Page, you will notice that there will be no more new features or any kind of changes to be done. At this stage/phase, it is mainly heavy testing and bugs fixing.

From today until 17th of April, 2014 (the date of the final release), we do need to make sure that Ubuntu GNOME 14.04 LTS will be solid and stable as a rock. Thus, we do need your help and support.

Final Beta or Beta 2 is not yet released. It will be released in 27th of March, 2014 but we must start testing from now and be ready.

What exactly do I need to test?
Ubuntu GNOME Trusty Tahr Daily Build

Okay, I’m new to this so how can I get started?
HOWTO Test Ubuntu GNOME

How can I get in touch with the Testing Team?
HOWTO Contact Ubuntu GNOME QA/Testing Team

Where else I could ask for some help?
Beside the mailing list of Ubuntu GNOME QA Team and Ubuntu GNOME IRC Channel, you can always post on Ubuntu Forums. There is a dedicated section for testing. However, please pay attention to:

This forum is for the discussion of the development of the next version of Ubuntu. Please Note: Ubuntu Developers do not usually read the forums, If you run into what you think is a bug, please use Launchpad to report it.

For anything else, please feel free to contact us.

Thank you for testing Ubuntu GNOME and helping us. We highly appreciate and respect that.

Ali/amjjawad
Ubuntu GNOME QA Lead

Hi everyone,

Ubuntu GNOME Team is pleased to officially announce that Ubuntu GNOME 14.04 (Trusty Tahr) is going to be our first Long Term Support (LTS) Release. YES! You did read that correctly 😀

[AGREED] Ubuntu GNOME is a 3 year LTS

Please see the log from the Technical Board Meeting on 17th of March, 2014.

What happened is, we have applied and sent this proposal. Ubuntu Technical Board asked Ubuntu GNOME Team to show more commitment and extend the support period for a very valid reason:

Steve Langasek said:

“I am very concerned about this proposed support timeline. 2 years and 3
months means that the support period would end the same month that 16.04.1 is likely to be released. Given that our policy has been to not recommend (or advertise in the UI) LTS upgrades until the first point release, this effectively gives users zero margin between the dropping of security support for Ubuntu-GNOME 14.04, and the first upgrades to Ubuntu-GNOME 16.04.

I would not be comfortable endorsing an LTS status for a release that is not going to provide a reasonable overlap between the LTS support periods. I think we should regard 3 years of support as the minimum for LTS status.”

So, Ubuntu GNOME team has responded to the request and Tim (Ubuntu GNOME head of developers) has agreed to extend the support to 3 years instead of 2 years and 3 months.

Without a doubt and without a question, this is by far, the biggest and the best achievement for Ubuntu GNOME Community. We’re not only an official flavour of Ubuntu but also got the LTS Status.

Ubuntu GNOME and Lubuntu are going to have their very first LTS Release at the same time. This is a great achievement for both Communities 🙂

This is the result of very hard and great work that has been putting into Ubuntu GNOME for the last few months. We’re getting better in everything. Yes, we are not perfect (no such thing as perfect system) and we do have mistakes but we’re learning from our mistakes and we’re interested not to do the same mistakes, yet again. We’re growing fast in quality and quantity. This is the result of not giving up and for going the extra miles.

Congratulation for Ubuntu GNOME Community (Team Members and Users) for this huge achievement and huge thank to Ubuntu Technical Board for their trust and endless support. Of course, we’d like to thank each and every volunteer who has helped Ubuntu GNOME and still helping. All of you are the best people. Those who dedicate their time and effort to help other people just to draw a smile on their faces are indeed unique, special and great people who deserve our full respect. Everyone involved with Ubuntu GNOME is great and so kind because he/she helped and supported us.

A new era for Ubuntu GNOME and a new glory is on the way. We must be prepared and ready. It is not the end, this is just the beginning.

Now, this calls for more recruitment and more commitment. Ubuntu Board put their trust in us. We must be trust worthy. We must prove ourselves as the best when it comes to commitment and support.

If you like Ubuntu GNOME, if Ubuntu GNOME managed to change your life or the way you’re using the Computer with and/or if you want to do something for Ubuntu GNOME to show your appreciation … it is very very simple – just get involved and write your name with the great people who have done all what they could and even more to reach to this point.

We’re looking forward for more volunteers.

You can always contact us if you need anything.

And last but not least, it is time to spread the word and let the whole world know that Ubuntu GNOME 14.04 is going to be supported for 3 years as an LTS release.
Please, spread/share this with everyone 🙂

Thank you for choosing, using and supporting Ubuntu GNOME!

On behalf of Ubuntu GNOME Community
Ali/amjjawad
Ubuntu GNOME Leader