Issue427
WORK IN PROGRESS
Welcome to the Ubuntu Weekly Newsletter, Issue 426 for the week July 20 - 26, 2015.
In This Issue
General Community News
Ubuntu 14.10 (Utopic Unicorn) End of Life reached on July 23, 2015
Adam Conrad issues a follow up warning that as of July 23, 2015 Ubuntu 14.10 reached End-of-Life, thus no longer receives updates. He says that it will be archived to old-releases.ubuntu.com in coming weeks, having been supported for nine-months.
https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-announce/2015-July/000198.html
Welcome New Members and Developers
Ubuntu Stats
Bug Stats
- Open (#) +/- # over last week
- Critical (#) +/- # over last week
- Unconfirmed (#) +/- # over last week
As always, the Bug Squad needs more help. If you want to get started, please see https://wiki.ubuntu.com/BugSquad
Ask Ubuntu Top 5 Questions this week
Ask (and answer!) questions at http://askubuntu.com
LoCo News
Really getting there
Miles Sharpe writes that 15 of 18 countries in Africa have joined the Ubuntu Africa team. The first brainstorming meeting will be on the 29th of July at 20:30 Africa time (UTC+2) and makes clear that all are welcome to attend. The wiki page has been improved thanks to a helper from Tunisia.
http://kilosubuntu.blogspot.com/2015/07/really-getting-there.html
How UbuConLA 2015 evolved in the past months
José Antonio Rey writes that he is impressed and excited with how the upcoming UbuConLA (Latin America) is shaping up. Name badges and banners have arrived. The online Registration form however has been closed, as pre-registrations exceeded the size of the auditorium. He writes that the registration is just first-come, first-serve so to keep an eye out for more information on social media. José concludes by saying: “Hope to see you in August, can’t wait for UbuConLA to happen!”
https://joseeantonior.wordpress.com/2015/07/24/how-ubuconla-2015-evolved-in-the-past-months/
LoCo Events
Want to learn whether there is an event upcoming in your area? Visit the LoCo Team Portal to browse upcoming events around the world:
http://loco.ubuntu.com/events/
The Planet
Zygmunt Krynicki: Using Snappy Ubuntu Core to test-boot anything
Zygmunt Krynicki shares that Inception OS is a small Ubuntu Snappy Core based system with programmable boot-process control. It allows any x86/amd64 to be converted into a remotely controlled web API. This allows anyone to reflash the OS and reboot a fresh image (once). Details of installing and using Inception OS are provided, and it will boot non-Linux code.
http://www.zygoon.pl/2015/07/using-snappy-ubuntu-core-to-test-boot.html
Didier Roche: Arduino support and various fixes in Ubuntu Make 0.9
Didier Roche informs us that the Ubuntu Make team have continued to make improvements, and outlines some of what is new in the latest release. He says that Arduino support has been added, the Dart Editor has been replaced by the Dart SDK, and that the 32-bit Visual Studio Code page has been fixed.
http://blog.didrocks.fr/post/Arduino-support-and-various-fix-in-Ubuntu-Make-0.9
Elizabeth K. Joseph: Community Leadership Summit 2015
Elizabeth K. Joseph shares details from the Community Leadership Summit (CLS) July 18th-19th where she met with other Ubuntu Community Council and team members to discuss some of the current concerns in the Ubuntu community. In a series of four sessions, the group discussed the following with other CLS attendees: Lack of new generation of leaders, making lasting friendships that are bigger than the project, declining Community Participation and barriers related to single-vendor control and development of a project. She shares feedback from each session in the form of feedback and recommendations.
http://princessleia.com/journal/?p=10442
In a follow up post, Elizabeth also talks about her participation at OSCON, including details about Jono Bacon’s Community leadership workshop: http://princessleia.com/journal/?p=10451
Benjamin Kerensa: Ubuntu Trends: Part 1
Benjamin Kerensa provides graphs of “Ubuntu LoCo’s Trend” (by region over years), and “Ubuntu Membership Trends” (by year). He notes that statistics should not be considered to reflect to Ubuntu overall losing popularity, as data from Google Trends shows an overall downtrend for other desktop OS’s likely correlating to end-users spending more time on mobiles. Benjamin also warns that whilst 2015 is included; its data is obviously incomplete.
http://benjaminkerensa.com/2015/07/21/ubuntu-trends
Ubuntu App Developer Blog: Announcing UbuContest 2015
Daniel Holbach writes that Canonical, the Ubucon Germany 2015 team, and UbuContest 2015 team have announced the first UbuContest. You have until September 18, 2015 to build and publish apps and scopes using Ubuntu SDK (for Ubuntu). You don’t have to create a new project, just submit what you have and improve it over the next two months. You can also submit other community members, in the five categories: Best Team Entry, Best Individual Entry, Outstanding Technical Contribution, Outstanding Non-Technical Contribution, and Convergence Hero.
http://developer.ubuntu.com/en/blog/2015/07/23/announcing-the-ubucontest-2015/
Aaron Honeycutt: Akademy Day 1 & 2
Aaron Honeycutt writes a pair of posts covering sessions attended, photos and work done at Akademy, the annual KDE conference. He covers work the Kubuntu team has been doing and shares excitement and gratitude at being among the contributors who are able to attend from Kubuntu.
http://usefoss.com/index.php/2015/07/26/akademy-day-1/
http://usefoss.com/index.php/2015/07/26/akademy-day-2/
Other Community News
Ubuntu Cloud News
Introducing Kubernetes version 1.0! - http://insights.ubuntu.com/2015/07/21/introducing-kubernetes-version-1-0/
Launch the newly released kubernetes 1.0.0 with juju - http://blog.dasroot.net/2015-launch-kubernetes-with-juju.html
Kubernetes v1.0 is released! - http://bruzer.net/2015/07/21/kubernetes-v1-0-is-released/
Vedams joins the Charm Partner Programme - http://insights.ubuntu.com/2015/07/21/vedams-joins-the-charm-partner-programme/
Deploy a Kubernetes development cluster with Juju! - http://insights.ubuntu.com/2015/07/23/deploy-a-kubernetes-development-cluster-with-juju-2/
Juju for Telcos and Service Providers Pt. 2 - http://insights.ubuntu.com/2015/07/23/juju-for-telcos-and-service-providers-pt-2/
More Juju, Big Data and Snappy Beauty from Dataart - http://insights.ubuntu.com/2015/07/23/more-juju-big-data-and-snappy-beauty-from-dataart/
Azul Systems joins Canonical’s Charm Partner Programme - http://insights.ubuntu.com/2015/07/23/azul-systems-joins-canonicals-charm-partner-programme/
Canonical Cloud Chatter: July 2015 Newsletter - http://insights.ubuntu.com/2015/07/24/canonical-cloud-chatter-july-2015-newsletter/
Ubuntu Phone News
Wireless File Transfer on Ubuntu phones
Ronnie Tucker of Full Circle Magazine shows us a short video of his Ubuntu phone connecting to his PC using the “wifitransfer” app which is available in the Ubuntu App Store.
http://fullcirclemagazine.org/2015/07/20/wireless-file-transfer-on-ubuntu-phones/
Meizu MX4 Ubuntu Edition now available for direct purchase
Canonical announces that after a successful launch period where thousands interacted with a digital origami wall, the Meizu MX4 Ubuntu Edition phone is now available directly from Meizu’s online store for those based in the EU.
http://insights.ubuntu.com/2015/07/20/meizu-mx4-ubuntu-edition-now-available-for-direct-purchase-2/
Meizu MX4 is awesome after OTA-5
Riccardo Padovani thinks that with OTA-5, the Meizu MX4 is working as it always should have and that some bad reviews have probably been published which highlight problems that have now been fixed. Riccardo describes improvements to battery life, the introduction of shell rotation, and some new icons which he says look much clearer.
http://rpadovani.com/arale-ota5
Let's test Ubuntu Phone's Wi-Fi Hotspots (internet tethering) feature
Carla Sella shows us, with the aid of some screenshots, how to test the Wi-Fi hotspots (internet tethering) feature that will land in the next Ubuntu phone update, OTA-6. She says that Ubuntu 15.04 or 15.10 based phone images are required and that Developer Mode needs to be set on the phone.
http://carla-sella.blogspot.com/2015/07/lets-test-ubuntu-phones-wi-fi-hotspots.html
Driving with my Ubuntu Phone [video]
Marcos Costales writes that uNAV is a turn-by-turn GPS navigation app for the Ubuntu Phone, 100% GPL powered by OpenStreetMap and OSRM. He embeds a short video in his post of a short route being driven that shows uNav in operation.
http://thinkonbytes.blogspot.com/2015/07/driving-with-my-ubuntu-phone-video.html
[Kubuntu] Plasma Mobile Launched
Marco Parillo, on behalf of the Kubuntu and KDE teams, invites us to watch a video demonstration of Plasma Mobile.
http://wire.kubuntu.org/?p=358
The following items expand on the news of the release:
Embracing Mobile - http://vizzzion.org/blog/2015/07/embracing-mobile/
Kubuntu Team Launches Plasma Mobile References Images - http://www.kubuntu.org/news/kubuntu-team-launches-plasma-mobile-references-images
Canonical News
Converting old guidelines to vanilla
Richard McCartney writes that ‘Guidelines’ is a framework with an array of tools to create (consistent) Ubuntu themed sites. ‘Guidelines’ however had many shortcomings (no build system for one), hence the Vanilla project. The main goal of Vanilla is to make generic extendable and easy changes possible. Sass provides mixins which Vanilla utilizes simplifying (consistent) development and maintenance. An example is the Ubuntu vanilla theme (theme.scss) available from github.
http://design.canonical.com/2015/07/converting-old-guidelines-to-vanilla/
In The Press
I used this crazy alternative 'Ubuntu' phone for a month and ended up liking it more than Android
Alastair Stevenson of Business Insider reviews the Meizu MX4 Ubuntu Edition phone finding it to be the most unique and alien mobile operating system that he’d ever experienced. He describes the operation of the phone saying that he found himself looking for dedicated apps rather than scopes but the he eventually adjusted to the Ubuntu way of doing things. Alastair says that his biggest criticism of the phone is that it is not yet smart enough, many key services are missing but that he would definitely urge “tech savvy buyers or developers interested in trying something new” by buying an Ubuntu phone.
http://www.businessinsider.com/meizu-mx4-ubuntu-edition-review-2015-7
In The Blogosphere
GCC 5 Is One Week Away From Landing In Ubuntu 15.10
Michael Larabel of Phoronix writes that both Debian Unstable and Ubuntu 15.10 are switching to GCC 5. He relays the news that an update issued by Matthias Klose says that more than 3,000 packages are having to be rebuilt.
http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=GCC-5-Ubuntu-15.10-Step-2
HP ProBook 455 Ubuntu review
James Archer, writing for V3, reviews the HP ProBook 455 Ubuntu which is one of a series of low-budget laptops produced by HP who joined forces with Canonical and eBuyer. With the aid of some photographs, James looks at the display, the design, the performance and the battery of the machines. Despite some good features he says in his conclusion: “We believe that Ubuntu, with its frequent updates and top-notch security, has the potential to break into the business laptop space in spite of Windows' dominance. But it needs the right machine, and this, sadly, just isn't it.”
http://www.v3.co.uk/v3-uk/review/2418077/hp-probook-455-ubuntu-review
Other Articles of Interest
The only remaining barrier to entry for Linux - http://www.techrepublic.com/article/the-only-remaining-barrier-to-entry-for-linux/
Featured Audio and Video
Ubuntu Community Q&A - 21st July 2015
Alan Pope is joined by Daniel Holbach for another regular Q&A session in which they answer viewers’ questions put to them on IRC. This week the guests are Sujeevan Vijayakumaran, Richard Gaskin and José Antonio Rey who talk about upcoming UbuCon events.
Ubuntu Podcast from the UK LoCo: S08E20 – Who’s Your Caddy? - Ubuntu Podcast
It’s Episode Twenty of Season Eight of the Ubuntu Podcast! Mark Johnson, Laura Cowen, and Martin Wimpress are together with guest presenter Joe Ressington and speaking to your brain.
In this week’s show:
- We discuss Google Cardboard.
- We go over your feedback.
We have a GUI love, LauncherFolders sent in by Rich. T.
We chat about all the podcasts Joe presents on: Linux Luddites, mintCast, and JoeRess podcast.
- We also chat about Windows 8.1, Garmin 220 sports watch, and the MATE 1.10 release.
That’s all for this week, please send your comments and suggestions to: show@ubuntupodcast.org
http://ubuntupodcast.org/2015/07/23/s08e20-whos-your-caddy/
Weekly Ubuntu Development Team Meetings
Kernel Team - July 21, 2015 - https://wiki.ubuntu.com/KernelTeam/Meeting/2015-07-21
Security Team - July 20, 2015 - https://wiki.ubuntu.com/MeetingLogs/Security/20150720
Server Team - July 21, 2015 - https://wiki.ubuntu.com/MeetingLogs/Server/20150721
Monthly Team Reports: June 2015
See here for the team report for June 2015: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/TeamReports/June2015
If your team is not producing monthly reports, see this page to get your team started: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/BuildingCommunity/TeamReporting
Upcoming Meetings and Events
For upcoming meetings and events please visit the calendars at fridge.ubuntu.com: http://fridge.ubuntu.com/calendars/
Updates and Security for 12.04, 14.04, 14.10 and 15.04
Security Updates
Ubuntu 12.04 Updates
Ubuntu 14.04 Updates
Ubuntu 14.10 Updates
Ubuntu 15.04 Updates
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Conclusion
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Credits
The Ubuntu Weekly Newsletter is brought to you by:
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- Elizabeth K. Joseph
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Glossary of Terms
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