The Ubuntu 21.10 "Impish Indri" distribution release is available, which is classified as an interim release, updates for which are formed within 9 months (support will be provided until July 2022). Install images are created for Ubuntu, Ubuntu Server, Lubuntu, Kubuntu, Ubuntu Mate, Ubuntu Budgie, Ubuntu Studio, Xubuntu, and UbuntuKylin (China edition).
Major changes:
- The transition to the use of GTK4 and the GNOME 40 desktop has been made, in which the interface has been significantly modernized. Virtual desktops in the Activities Overview mode have been moved to landscape orientation and are displayed as a continuous scrolling chain from left to right. Each desktop shown in overview mode provides a visual representation of the available windows that are dynamically panned and zoomed as the user interacts. A seamless transition between the list of programs and virtual desktops is provided. Improved organization of work in the presence of multiple monitors. GNOME Shell provides the use of the GPU for rendering shaders.
- By default, a completely light version of the Yaru theme is offered.
A completely dark option is also available as an option (dark headers, dark background and dark controls). Support for the old combo theme (dark titles, light background and light controls) has been deprecated due to GTK4's lack of ability to define different colors for title and main window content, which prevents all GTK applications from being guaranteed to work correctly when using the combo theme.
- Provided the ability to use a desktop session based on the Wayland protocol in environments with proprietary NVIDIA drivers.
- Bluetooth support has been significantly expanded in PulseAudio: LDAC and AptX A2DP codecs have been added, support for the HFP (Hands-Free Profile) profile has been built in, which has improved sound quality.
- Changed to using the zstd algorithm for compressing deb packages, which will almost double the speed of installing packages, at the cost of a slight increase in their size (~ 6%). Support for using zstd has been present in apt and dpkg since Ubuntu 18.04, but has not been used for package compression.
- A new installer for Ubuntu Desktop is proposed, implemented as an add-on to the low-level curtin installer already used by the default Subiquity installer in Ubuntu Server. The new installer for Ubuntu Desktop is written in Dart and uses the Flutter framework to build the user interface. The design of the new installer is designed with the modern style of the Ubuntu desktop in mind and is designed to provide a consistent installation experience for the entire Ubuntu product line. Three modes are offered: "Repair Installation" to reinstall all packages available in the system without changing the settings, "Try Ubuntu" to get acquainted with the distribution in Live mode, and "Install Ubuntu" to install the distribution on disk.
- By default, the nftables packet filter is enabled. To preserve backward compatibility, the iptables-nft package is available, which provides utilities with the same command line syntax as in iptables, but translates the resulting rules into nf_tables bytecode.
- Linux kernel release 5.13 is involved. Updated software versions, including GCC 11.2.0, binutils 2.37, glibc 2.34. LLVM 13, Go 1.17, Rust 1.51, OpenJDK 18, PHP 8.0.8, PulseAudio 15.0, BlueZ 5.60, NetworkManager 1.32.12, LibreOffice 7.2.1, Firefox 93 and Thunderbird 91.2.0, OpenLDAP 2.5.6, QEMU 6.0, Libvirt 7.6, BIND 9.16.15, Containerd 1.5.5.
- The Firefox browser has been switched by default to be delivered as a snap-package, accompanied by Mozilla employees (the ability to install the deb-package has been preserved, but is now an option).
- systemd uses a single unified cgroup hierarchy (cgroup v2) by default. Cgroups v2 can be used, for example, to limit memory, CPU, and I/O consumption. The key difference between cgroups v2 and v1 is the use of a common cgroups hierarchy for all resource types, instead of separate hierarchies for CPU allocation, memory management, and I/O. Separate hierarchies led to difficulties in organizing interaction between handlers and to additional costs of kernel resources when applying rules for a process mentioned in different hierarchies.
- Added support for the Raspberry Pi Sense HAT module used in the Astro Pi mission. The necessary libraries and utilities are packaged as a sense-hat package; an additional sense-emu-tools package with a board emulator is supplied.
- Xubuntu continues to ship the Xfce 4.16 desktop. Integrated Pipewire media server used in conjunction with PulseAudio. The GNOME Disk Analyzer and Disk Utility applications are included to monitor disk status and simplify disk partition management. Rhythmbox is used to play music with an alternative toolbar. The messaging application Pidgin has been removed from the base distribution.
- Ubuntu Budgie features the new Budgie 10.5.3 desktop release and redesigned the dark theme. A new version of the assembly for Raspberry Pi 4 has been proposed. The capabilities of Shuffler, an interface for quick navigation through open windows and grouping windows on a grid, have been expanded, in which an applet has appeared for automatically moving and rearranging windows in accordance with the selected layout of elements on the screen, the ability to bind the launch of the application has been implemented to a specific virtual desktop or screen location. Added new applet to show CPU temperature.
- In Ubuntu MATE, the MATE desktop has been updated to version 1.26.
- Kubuntu: KDE Plasma 5.22 desktop and KDE Gear 21.08 are available. Updated versions of Latte-dock 0.10 and Krita 4.4.8 graphics editor. Available, but not enabled by default, is a Wayland-based session (select "Plasma (Wayland)" on the login screen to activate).
Additionally, two unofficial editions of Ubuntu 21.10 have been released - Ubuntu Cinnamon Remix 21.10 with the Cinnamon desktop and Ubuntu Unity 21.10 with the Unity7 desktop.
Source: opennet.ru