Exactly three months after the first alpha version of Ubuntu Linux 12.04 “Pangolin States” from his debut published the project developers on Thursday the first beta version of the operating system.
ubuntu As a Long Term Support version of Ubuntu 12.04 is a particularly important iteration of a Linux distribution from Canonical. Only a beta version of the software is free and open source made available – with a date of 29 March – before the start of the final version on 26 April.
“The team worked hard during this cycle, the introduction of new features and fixing bugs,” said Kate Stewart, Canonical Ubuntu release manager, in a statement on Thursday.
Among the changes included in this first beta is a function that significant energy savings and a new image format allows CD 703MB “to every bit of goodness that we can squeeze grab the pictures on the installation CD,” added Stewart.
For test purposes can be downloaded Ubuntu 12.04 beta 1 of the project site. Here is a brief summary of some highlights from the press release.
First A Taste of HUD
As the founder of Canonical, Mark Shuttleworth in late January, the new Ubuntu “head-up display” interface or ‘HUD’ debuts in this beta version mentioned. Dubbed as “a new way to browse quickly and access to the desktop application and the menu of the indicator,” HUD by pressing the Alt key and type in a description of what you want to be accessed. The software is then a set of matching entries, including some fuzzy matching, the project team, she says. Over time you learn from your previous choices to make your search more precisely, they note.
Second Unity tweaks
Ubuntu Unity interface has been nothing if not controversial, but easier in this new version, configure the panel “appearance” in the system settings of the software to some features of the unit. For users, bookmarks, the launcher now includes support for Unity QuickList Nautilus.
Ubuntu includes support for 12.04 hours ClickPads or trackpad, built on the physical button on the trackpad surface. Most ClickPads Synaptics are out of the box in this new version, and the MacBook trackpad recognized by Apple. Coming in the next version of Ubuntu is the support for Apple devices, and more magical Synaptics trackpads its brand, says the Ubuntu team.
4th Save Energy
For energy savings mentioned above, RC6 – get technology that enables the GPU to be in a state of very low power consumption when the GPU is idle – is now standard for Sandy Bridge-enabled systems. The result is between 40 and 60 percent improvement in the energy consumption in the presence of loads of inactivity, say the developers.
5th LibreOffice 3.5 and Rhythmbox
Among the applications by default in Ubuntu 12.04 is updated only LibreOffice 3.5 and Rhythmbox as the default music player.
6th Better language support
When users install the new software from the Ubuntu Software Center, the appropriate packages of support, including translation and spell-checking modules – are now installed automatically, eliminating the need, the “Language Support” open after installing new software.
7th A new kernel
Finally, the update of the second alpha version of Pangolin States, this new beta 3.2.0-17.27 Ubuntu kernel, which is based on version 3.2.6 of the stable Linux kernel upstream.
