Jean Baptiste Lallement, the Director of Engineering at Canonical, published plans for enhancing the functionality of the desktop environment, intended for the fall release of Ubuntu 26.10. Four key areas of focus are highlighted:
- Development of the GNOME-based environment.
- Updating the desktop environment to the GNOME 51 release, scheduled for September 16.
- Transitioning from dbus-daemon to dbus-broker as the default D-Bus implementation. D-Bus Broker is implemented in user space but utilizes kernel subsystems for acceleration, maintains compatibility with the reference implementation of D-Bus, and can be used for transparent replacement of dbus-daemon. D-Bus Broker considers user-bound resources and includes optimizations to enhance performance and reliability (for example, messages cannot be lost without error handling). The Fedora project transitioned to dbus-broker by default in 2019.
- Providing a complete desktop build for RISC-V CPU boards supporting the RVA23 (RISC-V Application) profile, which includes extensions for vector operations and hypervisors.
- Implementing tools for persons with disabilities as defined in the WCAG 2.2 standard. Addressing shortcomings identified during the audit.
- Updating the GStreamer multimedia framework to the next 1.30 branch and engaging plugins for GStreamer written in Rust. Simplifying the search and installation of additional proprietary codecs.
- Combining ease of execution for standard tasks for newcomers with the flexibility and capability of utilizing extended functionality for experienced users.
- Delivering a universal application management interface (App Center) that supports packages in various formats (deb, snap) and simplifies the search for necessary programs based on categories and ratings.
- Improving the interface for searching and selecting additional drivers, with the capability to assess their readiness for everyday use.
- Developing a new simplified installation interface for the distribution, significantly reducing the complexity of partitioning and repository configuration.
- Development of a new initial setup wizard that takes basic system configuration operations and user-specific parameter settings out of the installer and into the first launch phase. The possibility of automating the initial setup during mass installation of Ubuntu.
- Implementation of AI-based capabilities that understand context and anticipate user intentions.
- Addition of context-aware tools during desktop work that assist users in completing their tasks by providing information that combines data from applications, services, and the desktop.
- Integration of a speech recognition system to facilitate voice input and natural language command recognition.
- Building a trusted platform.
- Continued development of the authd package for centralized authentication configuration through cloud identity providers. Adding the ability to connect using accounts from Microsoft services and multi-factor authentication (MFA) based on the Microsoft Authenticator app. Support for transmitting user ID information through attributes set by external identity providers to assign unified UIDs and GIDs across different computers. Providing administrators with the option to disable local password-based authentication for users with centralized accounts.
- Adding authentication capabilities in NetworkManager when connecting to VPN, using PKCS#11 certificates and smart cards.
- Integration of hardware certification information (Ubuntu Certified Hardware) into the configurator (GNOME Settings).
- Introduction of a new wiki site with documentation and guides that consolidates information from the Ubuntu wiki and the Canonical wiki.
- Optimizing performance and reducing build size for the WSL (Windows Subsystem for Linux) Windows subsystem.
Source: opennet.ru
