Beta release of Ubuntu 24.04

The beta release of Ubuntu 24.04 "Noble Numbat" has been presented. After the formation of this version, the package base has been completely frozen, and developers have moved on to final testing and bug fixing. The release is scheduled for April 25. The 24.04 branch is classified as a long-term support (LTS) release, with updates provided for 12 years (5 years of public support plus an additional 7 years for users of the Ubuntu Pro service). Ready test images have been created for Ubuntu, Ubuntu Server, Lubuntu, Kubuntu, Ubuntu Mate, Ubuntu Budgie, Ubuntu Studio, Xubuntu, Ubuntu Kylin (the edition for China), Ubuntu Unity, Edubuntu, and Ubuntu Cinnamon.

Key Changes:

• The desktop has been updated to GNOME 46, featuring a global search function, improved performance for the file manager and terminal emulators, experimental support for VRR (Variable Refresh Rate), enhanced output quality with fractional scaling, expanded connectivity options to external services, an updated configurator, and improved notification system. A new rendering engine based on the Vulkan API has been implemented in GTK. The Cheese camera application has been replaced with GNOME Snapshot.
• The Linux kernel has been updated to version 6.8.
• Similar to the changes in Arch Linux and Fedora Linux, the sysctl param vm.max_map_count, which defines the maximum number of memory mapping areas available to a process, has been increased by default from 65530 to 1048576. This change has improved compatibility with Windows games run through Wine (for instance, with the old value, games like DayZ, Hogwarts Legacy, Counter Strike 2, Star Citizen, and THE FINALS could not be launched) and resolved some performance issues with memory-intensive applications.
• Updated versions include GCC 14-pre, LLVM 18, Python 3.12, OpenJDK 21 (with optional OpenJDK 8, 11, and 17), Rust 1.76, Go 1.22, .NET 8, PHP 8.3.3, and Ruby 3.2.3.
• User applications have been updated: Firefox 124 (built with Wayland support), LibreOffice 24.2, Thunderbird 115, Ardour 8.4.0, OBS Studio 30.0.2, Audacity 3.4.2, Transmission 4.0, digiKam 8.2.0, Kdenlive 23.08.5, and Krita 5.2.2.
• Subsystems have been updated: Mesa 24.0.3, systemd 253.5, BlueZ 5.72, Cairo 1.18, NetworkManager 1.46, Pipewire 1.0.4, Poppler 24.02, and xdg-desktop-portal 1.18.
• Server packages have been updated: Nginx 1.24, Apache httpd 2.4.58, Samba 4.19, Exim 4.97, Clamav 1.0.0, Chrony 4.5, containerd 1.7.12, Django 4.2.11, Docker 24.0.7, Dovecot 2.3.21, GlusterFS 11.1, HAProxy 2.8.5, Kea DHCP 2.4.1, libvirt 10.0.0, NetSNMP 5.9.4, OpenLDAP 2.6.7, open-vm-tools 12.3.5, PostgreSQL 16.2, Runc 1.1.12, QEMU 8.2.1, SpamAssassin 4.0.0, Squid 6.6, SSSD 2.9.4, Pacemaker 2.1.6, OpenStack 2024.1, Ceph 19.2.0, Openvswitch 3.3.0, and Open Virtual Network 24.03.
• The Thunderbird email client is now only available in snap format. The DEB package for Thunderbird contains a placeholder for installing the snap package.
• For applications using gnutls, support for TLS 1.0, TLS 1.1, and DTLS 1.0 protocols has been forcibly disabled, which were officially deprecated three years ago by the IETF (Internet Engineering Task Force). A similar change has been implemented for OpenSSL in Ubuntu 20.04.
• In AppArmor, access to configuration files of GnuTLS and OpenSSL libraries is granted to any applications by default. The previously used selective access led to issues that were difficult to diagnose due to the lack of error output when access to configuration files was denied.
• The pptpd and bcrelay packages have been removed due to potential security issues and the cessation of maintenance for their core codebases. The PAM module pam_lastlog.so has also been removed, as the issue from 2038 has not been resolved.
• When building packages, compiler options are enabled by default to complicate the exploitation of vulnerabilities. In gcc and dpkg, the mode "-D_FORTIFY_SOURCE=3" is enabled by default, identifying possible buffer overflows during string functions defined in the header file string.h. The difference from the previously used mode "_FORTIFY_SOURCE=2" comes down to additional checks. Theoretically, these additional checks may lead to a decrease in performance, but in practice, SPEC2000 and SPEC2017 tests showed no differences, and there have been no user complaints about performance degradation during testing.
• In dpkg, the flag "-mbranch-protection=standard" has been added to enable execution protection of instruction sets that should not be branched to on ARM64 systems (ARMv8.5-BTI — Branch Target Indicator). Blocking transitions to arbitrary code segments has been implemented to counter the creation of gadgets in exploits using return-oriented programming techniques (ROP — Return-Oriented Programming).
• In the APT package manager, the priority for the "proposed pocket" repository has been changed. This repository is used for the preliminary testing of new package versions before they are placed in the main repositories for the public. The change aims to reduce the likelihood of automated installation of unstable updates when the "proposed pocket" repository is enabled, which may lead to system malfunctions. Now, after enabling the "proposed pocket," not all updates will be transferred from it, but users will be able to selectively install updates for necessary packages using the command "apt install / -proposed."
• The default service irqbalance, which distributes the handling of hardware interrupts across different CPU cores, has been discontinued. Currently, in most situations, the built-in mechanisms for distributing handlers provided by the Linux kernel are sufficient. The use of irqbalance may be justified in specific situations, but only with proper configuration by an administrator. Additionally, irqbalance can cause issues in certain configurations, such as when used in virtualization systems, and can interfere with manual adjustments of parameters affecting power consumption and latency.
• The network setup uses the release of the Netplan 1.0 toolkit, which allows configuration settings to be stored in YAML format and provides backends that abstract access to configuration for NetworkManager and systemd-networkd. The new version introduces the ability to simultaneously use WPA2 and WPA3, adds support for Mellanox VF-LAG network devices with SR-IOV (Single-Root I/O Virtualization), and implements the command "netplan status --diff" for a visual assessment of differences between the actual state of settings and configuration files. In Ubuntu Desktop, NetworkManager is enabled as the default backend for configuration.
• The ubuntu-desktop-installer has been updated and is now part of a larger project called ubuntu-desktop-provision, renamed to ubuntu-desktop-bootstrap. The essence of the new project lies in separating the installer into stages carried out before installation (disk partitioning and package copying) and during the first system boot (initial system setup). Notable changes include an improved installer interface, the addition of a page to specify the URL for downloading the autoinstall.yaml automated installation script, and the ability to modify default behavior and styling through a configuration file. Support for updating the installer itself has been added—if a new version exists at the early stage of installation, a prompt for updating the installer will now appear.

  The installer also features capabilities introduced in the previous Ubuntu 23.10 release, such as support for the ZFS file system and disk encryption that does not require entering a disk unlock password at boot, thanks to storing decryption key information in TPM (Trusted Platform Module).
• The Active Directory Certificate Auto Enrollment (ADSys) mechanism has been enabled, allowing automatic retrieval of certificates from Active Directory services when group policies are enabled. Automatic certificate retrieval through Active Directory is also applied when connecting to corporate wireless networks. VPN.
• The new Ubuntu App Center application manager has been enhanced, written in Dart using the Flutter framework with adaptive layout methods for proper functioning on screens of any size. The Ubuntu Store implements a combined interface for managing packages in both DEB and Snap formats (if a program is available in both deb and snap packages, snap is selected by default), allowing for searching and navigating the catalog of snapcraft.io packages and connected DEB repositories, enabling the management of application installation, uninstallation, and updates, as well as the installation of individual deb packages from local files. The application includes a rating system, where the five-point scale has been replaced with a like/dislike voting format (+1/-1), which generates a virtual five-star rating.

  The Ubuntu App Center has replaced the old Snap Store interface. Compared to Ubuntu 23.10, a new application category has been added — Games (while GNOME games have been removed from the distribution). A separate interface for updating firmware — Firmware Updater, available for amd64 and arm64 architecture-based systems, allows for firmware updates without launching a full application manager in the background.

• Packages for the 32-bit Armhf architecture have been transitioned to using the 64-bit time_t type. This change affected over a thousand packages. The previously used 32-bit time_t type cannot handle time past January 19, 2038, due to the overflow of the seconds counter since January 1, 1970.
• Updated builds for Raspberry Pi 5 (server and user) and StarFive VisionFive 2 (RISC-V).
• In Ubuntu Cinnamon, the Cinnamon 6.0 desktop environment has been implemented with initial support for Wayland.
• Xubuntu continues to ship with the Xfce 4.18 environment.
• Ubuntu Mate features the MATE 1.28 desktop environment, which has not yet been officially announced.
• Ubuntu Budgie includes the Budgie 10.9 desktop environment.
• Kubuntu continues to ship with KDE Plasma 5.27 by default. KDE 6 will be offered in the fall release of Kubuntu 24.10. The logo and color scheme have been updated.
• In Lubuntu, the installer based on the Calamares framework has been improved. A page has been added for setting installation parameters, such as installing available updates, codecs and proprietary drivers, and additional programs. Modes for minimal, full, and normal installations have been introduced. A first boot screen allows users to configure the language and connect to a wireless network, as well as choose between starting the installer or entering Live mode. A Bluetooth Manager and settings editor for the SDDM display manager have been added. The desktop environment has been updated to LXQt 1.4.
• Ubuntu Studio has introduced the Ubuntu Studio Audio Configuration utility for setting PipeWire parameters.

Source: opennet.ru