Ubuntu Weekly Newsletter #73
Welcome to the Ubuntu Weekly Newsletter, Issue 73 for the week January 6th - January 12th, 2008. In this issue: Hardy Alpha 3 released, Ubuntu 7.10 Desktop Course, KDE 4.0, a new member and MOTUs, MOTU Council election, an upcoming Hug Day, Forums tutorial of the week, and much, much more!!
In This Issue- Hardy Alpha 3 Released
- Ubuntu 7.10 Desktop Course
- Be Free with KDE 4.0
- New Member and MOTUs
- MOTU Council Election
- Hug Day - 16 January 2008
- Launchpad News
- Ubuntu Forums News & Interviews
- Tutorial of the Week
- In The Blogosphere
- In Other News
- Meetings & Events
- Updates & Security
- Bug & Translations
General Community News
Hardy Alpha 3 Released
Alpha 3 is the third in a series of milestone CD images that has been released during the Hardy development cycle. Alpha 3 includes several new features that are ready for large-scale testing. Please refer to http://www.ubuntu.com/testing/hardy/alpha3 for information on changes in Ubuntu and https://wiki.kubuntu.org/HardyHeron/Alpha3/Kubuntu for changes in Kubuntu. See: https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ub...ry/000367.html
Pre-releases of Hardy are *not* encouraged for anyone needing a stable system or anyone who is not comfortable running into occasional, even frequent breakage.
Ubuntu 7.10 Desktop Course - IT's HERE!!
OK folks the long awaited Ubuntu 7.10 Desktop Course is ready, waiting
and all yours for the taking! Thanks to all the community members who slogged over writing, reviewing, editing, proof reading and fixing the layout. This is just the beginning of the project which we hope will live and evolve with each new Ubuntu release. Yours to develop, enhance and branch off to your heart's content! There are 10 lessons in total. The course is modular - 2 days if all lessons are covered, however, topics and lessons can be selected as required. There are 2 versions of the course: an Instructor Guide, and a student guide. https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ub...er/000077.html
Be Free with KDE 4.0
The KDE 4 series has begun with the release of 4.0. It is the start of something amazing. Packages are available for 7.10 and the development Hardy version. KDE4 installs to /usr/lib/kde4 and can be installed alongside your existing KDE 3, see http://kubuntu.org/announcements/kde-4.0.php. If you want to test KDE 4 without installing packages, try the Live CD: http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/kubuntu/releases/gutsy/kde4/.
New Member
Jussi Schultink is a contributor of packages to Ubuntu Universe, a Launchpad Beta tester, and a member of the Ubuntu IRC operator team. He is also active in the Ubuntu Studio Project, and Cinelerra, a audio/video authoring tool. https://launchpad.net/~jussi01
New MOTUs
After rocking work in the MOTU team, with a particular preference for GNOME- and gstreamer-related packages, Emilio Pozuelo Monfort was deemed a great addition to the MOTU team. Warm welcome to the team! https://launchpad.net/~pochu
We have another Italian MOTU to announce. Michele Angrisano put a lot of work into merges and Universe fixes and just joined the team! https://launchpad.net/~micheleangrisano
Stephan Hermann put a lot of work into his MOTU comeback. After lots of Security work and other Universe uploads he is back in the team. http://launchpad.net/~shermann
MOTU Council Election
At the recent Community Council meeting, the new process for the election of Team Council members was agreed on. It's documented at https://wiki.ubuntu.com/CommunityCouncil/Delegation. Andrew Mitchell and Daniel T. Chen both have left the MOTU Council, both had been on the council from the very beginning and their work and experience shaped the MOTU Council of today. The Council is looking for two new members. MOTU Council members will be expected to:- approve new MOTU members
- resolve conflict in the team
- help to shape new and better ways of working together
- help to keep a friendly and productive atmosphere in the team
If you are a MOTU and you think you have what it takes to do the above, mail a member of the MOTU Council at https://launchpad.net/~motu-council/+members and let them know. https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ub...ry/024927.html
Hug Day - 16 January 2008
The second Hug Day of the new year, on Wednesday, January 16th, will be targeting OpenOffice.org. There are currently 300 new bug reports regarding OpenOffice.org and Hug Day will be focusing on reducing that number.
We'll do this by following up with reporters, documenting test cases, confirming bug reports and tagging bugs based on their sub-component. The list of targeted bugs and tasks is posted at: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UbuntuBugDay/20080116. Our goal is to deal with all of the bugs on that list. So on 16 January 2008, in all timezones, we'll be meeting in #ubuntu-bugs on irc.freenode.net for another Ubuntu Hug Day.
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ub...ry/134271.html
Launchpad News
Help Design the New Launchpad Logo!
The Launchpad Logo Community Design Contest.Using Launchpad Feeds in Wordpress
Matthew Revell gives us an in depth how-to on adding Launchpad feeds to your WordPress Blog. Visit the link below to find out how to add this great feature to your blog and help keep the world informed of all the great Launchpad News. https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/la...ry/002971.html
Ubuntu Forums News & Interviews
Ubuntu Forums Interview
Popch is a Swiss government IT department head with more than 30 years of programming and computer experience. Being a volunteer for a local housing cooperative, Popch is also a valuable, helpful and knowledgeable community member. Read more here: http://kmandla.wordpress.com/2008/01...ew-with-popch/
Tutorial of the Week
The tutorial of the week for Jan. 7, 2008 is PmDematagoda's explanation of the Magic SysRq keys -- and how to use them to recover your system, if it becomes unresponsive. Learn about the key sequences, and how to safely use them, in the tutorial. http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=617349
In The Blogosphere- Two Years of Ubuntu - Koplowicz.com is amazed at how polished and user-friendly Ubuntu is. It doesn’t come out of the box with a lot of the software, but it’s super easy to install whatever is wanted. It even passed the Mother Test - his mother used his Kubuntu laptop for a month while her desktop was broken, and she was fine with it. A few months ago he changed from Ubuntu to Kubuntu because he preferred KDE. He's been really happy with the Ubuntu community so he stuck with Kubuntu through Edgy Eft, Feisty Fawn, and Gutsy Gibbon. Kubuntu isn’t the most popular distribution, but Ubuntu is, and it’s nice being part of the popular crowd. http://koplowicz.com/?p=462
- KDE4 with Ubuntu Gutsy (first impressions) - Nethazard writes that his first impressions of the released KDE4 were positive. Taking into account that he has tried all the release candidates in Live CD mode, the quality of this released version is actually usable and comfortable. The libraries might be of stable release quality, but the applications are still a bit rough on the edges. While kmenu feels very Vista-ish, the user gets used to it very easily. The search is fast and the navigation is not as cumbersome as the Vista menu. He recommends you set Dolphin as your default file manager. On this release, the panel is still not that customizable, but at least it correctly displays the system tray, clock and virtual desktops. While there are some missing features, there are lots of features he hasn't discovered yet and there’s still a lot of polishing to do on it, its beautiful, fun and safe to use. http://blog.nethazard.net/2008/01/11...t-impressions/
In Other News- Driver-Free Car Runs Ubuntu Linux - At CES, Michael Larabel has spotted a very interesting car: the driver-less Carnegie Mellon vehicle. And it runs Ubuntu!! Sponsors include Google, NetApp, and Intel, and this car won this year's DARPA challenge. "This automated vehicle uses a dozen Intel Core 2 processors, but at the bottom of the software stack is Ubuntu 6.06 "Dapper Drake" Linux. Ubuntu 6.06 was chosen for being an LTS (Long Term Support) release. Perhaps next year's vehicle will be running Ubuntu 8.04?" http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?pag...item&px=NjI3NA
Meetings and Events
Wednesday, January 16, 2008
==== Edubuntu meeting ====- Start: 12:00 UTC
- End: 14:00 UTC
- Location: IRC channel #ubuntu-meeting
- Agenda: No agenda listed as of the publication
Thursday, January 17, 2008
==== Desktop Team Development Meeting ====- Start: 14:00 UTC
- End: 15:00 UTC
- Location: IRC channel #ubuntu-meeting
- Agenda: Beyond the normal reporting by each team member, additional agenda items will be listed on the Meeting wikipage.
Friday, January 18, 2008
==== MOTU Meeting ====Saturday, January 19, 2008
==== Chicago Ubuntu LoCo Meeting ====- Start: 13:00 US/Central
- End: 15:00 US/Central
- Location: 2nd floor, Institute of Design, 125 N, La'Salle St. Chicago, Illinois
- Agenda: The meeting is in conjunction with the Chicago GNU/Linux Users Group.
Updates and security for 6.06, 6.10, 7.04, and 7.10
Security UpdatesUbuntu 6.06 LTS UpdatesUbuntu 6.10 UpdatesUbuntu 7.04 UpdatesUbuntu 7.10 UpdatesBug Stats- Open (38966) +190 # over last week
- Critical (18) -1 # over last week
- Unconfirmed (19902) +82 # over last week
- Unassigned (29386) +267 # over last week
- All bugs ever reported (144859) +1410 # 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
1. Spanish (12476) -113 # over last week
2. French (37728) +/-0 # over last week
3. Swedish (49184) +/-0 # over last week
4. English-UK (26764) -783 # over last week
5. German (66656) +/-0 # over last week
Remaining string to translate in Ubuntu 7.10 "Gutsy Gibbon", see more at: https://translations.launchpad.net/ubuntu/gutsy/
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Additional Ubuntu News
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Conclusion
Thank you for reading the Ubuntu Weekly Newsletter.
See you next week!
Credits
The Ubuntu Weekly Newsletter is brought to you by:- Nick Ali
- Isabelle Duchatelle
- Craig A. Eddy
- John Crawford
- And many others
Glossary of Terms- CES - Consumer Electronics Show
Feedback
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