Ubuntu 24.04 Takes Cheese Off the Menu
Ubuntu is switching its default webcam app from Cheese to Snapshot, which debuted as part of the GNOME Core app lineup in GNOME 45. Snapshot Cheese has been part of Ubuntu’s default software set since 2010, first added in Ubuntu 9.10 Netbook Remix fuelled by rise of netbooks and their dim n’ dire 0.3MP webcams. Once upon a time people (hi 👋) made heavy use of Cheese for instant messaging profile pics, and the app included integrated plugins to upload photos to sites like Flickr. While Cheese remains a fun tool the webcam “novelty” factor has long-since worn off. When 
#News #Cheese #PhotographyTools #Snapshot #Ubuntu24_04Lts
https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2024/03/ubuntu-24-04-swaps-cheese-snapshot-webcam-app
Canonical Extends LTS Support to 12 Years
Ubuntu’s long-term support releases just got even longer, with Canonical today announcing they are eligible for up to 12 years of security coverage from initial release. As you know, every Ubuntu LTS release receives 5 years of standard security (and select application) updates for packages in the ‘main’ Ubuntu repo, while subscribing to Ubuntu Pro adds a further 5 years of security coverage for packages in the ‘main’ and ‘universe’ repos. But now there’s Legacy Support, a purchasable add-on for Ubuntu Pro customers. This offers an additional 2 years of coverage, bringing the total LTS support window up to 12
#News #Canonical #UbuntuPro
https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2024/03/ubuntu-lts-12-years-legacy-support
Ubuntu 24.04 Makes Tiny Tweak to Improve Gaming
Gamers can look forward to more epic top-tier titles working in Ubuntu 24.04 LTS. Following a user suggestion, Ubuntu developers have decided to increase the distro’s virtual memory mapping limit. The change will mean games previously reported to crash or exhibit performance issues when run on Ubuntu due to the vm_max_map_count value being low now run better. Games such as Hogwarts Legacy, Payday 2, Counter-Strike 2, DayZ, and Star Citizen are among those which benefit from the value bump — a few of this reportedly refuse to run at all in current versions of Ubuntu. In fact, any game or
#News #Gaming #Steam #Ubuntu24_04Lts
Ubuntu 24.04 Gives ‘App Center’ a Brand New Icon
App Center, Ubuntu’s Flutter-based replacement for the Ubuntu Software app, has a new icon. This isn’t the first icon change to App Center, which is a pre-installed snap package (snap-store) in Ubuntu 23.10 and 24.04 in recent months. A few months back an update to the software installation frontend rolled out and unintentionally swapped the full-colour, 3D Yaru icon for a flat, 2D, solid orange icon with transparent elements. A subsequent update resolved the issue. Now the App Center icon has changed again, although this time the swap is intentional. The new icon is taller, and the right-hand leg of
#News
https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2024/03/ubuntu-app-center-new-icon-noble
How to Bring Back Ubuntu’s Iconic Login Sound
If you only started using Ubuntu sometime after 2012 then you have my apologies: this article won’t make a whole lot of sense. But if your roots with the distro reach back farther then the following curio might appeal (though that ‘might’ is, I accept, doing a lot of lifting). When I reported on the new IRC-based chat app Linux Mint is building a commenter amusingly referred to IRC adherents as “nostalgia connoisseurs”. In some ways, that label applies to me for writing this post. I am a nostalgic dweeb — sorry/not sorry! 💁🏻♂️ — and the “golden era” of
#HowTo #Customization
https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2024/03/enable-old-ubuntu-login-sound
Extension Manager App Gets Update
A big update to Extension Manager, a popular 3rd-party tool to browse, install, and manage GNOME Shell extensions without the need for a web browser, has been released. If you’re into customising Ubuntu, be it changing the look and layout, adding animated effects, patching in new features and capabilities, or modifying underlying behaviour, you’ll know that GNOME Shell extensions are essential — as is this terrific, user-friendly tool. Extension Manager 0.5 is described as a “Performance & Polish” release by its developer Matt Wakeman, and with an update to libadwaita 1.5, smarter adaptive behaviour, (much needed) search fixes, and other
#News #AppUpdates #GnomeExtensions
https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2024/03/gnome-shell-extension-manager-app-updated
GNOME 46 Officially Released
The GNOME project today formally announced the release of GNOME 46 “Kathmandu”, the latest update to its hugely popular open-source desktop environment. And what an update it is. I ran through the best GNOME 46 features earlier this week. Suffice to say there’s a lot of improvement across all areas of the user experience. “This six-month effort wouldn’t have been possible without the whole GNOME community, made of contributors and friends from all around the world,” GNOME says of this release. “Developers, designers, documentation writers, usability and accessibility specialists, translators, maintainers, students, system administrators, companies, artists, testers, the local GNOME Asia team
#News #DesktopEnvironments #Gnome #Gnome46
https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2024/03/gnome-46-officially-released
Plattenalbum is a Modern-Looking MPD Client for Linux
This week I heard about Plattenalbum, a modern GTK4/libadwaita Music Player Daemon (MPD) client and it looks good so figured I’d give it a shoutout! Y’know, cheesy 1980s DJ style 🧀. MPD remains a popular way to access music that’s stored on a server, another computer, or even locally, and a user-friendly desktop MPD client is crucial to being able to enjoy it. Plattenalbum looks to be preciously that. This isn’t a “why you should use MPD” article nor a guide about installing MPD in Ubuntu. If MPD sounds like a faff — in some ways it is! — that’s fine,
#Apps #News #Mpd #MusicPlayer
Ubuntu 24.04 LTS Official Wallpaper Revealed (In All Its Crowning Glory)
Esteemed adherents of the arts rejoice, as the official Ubuntu 24.04 wallpaper has finally been unveiled! As you no-doubt know, every new Ubuntu release comes with its own unique desktop background and the upcoming release of Ubuntu 24.04 LTS “Noble Numbat” doesn’t abdicate the responsibility. Indeed, the Ubuntu 24.04 default wallpaper tacks firmly traditional, heeding the formula established in 2017: rich purple gradient, elegant geometric/polygonal edge detailing, and the official mascot image royally positioned in the center: As well as the the “colour” default you see pictured above a darker variant is included for those who prefer nocturnal vibes (i.e.,
#News #DefaultWallpaper #Ubuntu24_04Lts
Firefox 124 Released, Supports Screen Wake Lock API
Mozilla Firefox 124 is now officially available to download. The latest update to the open-source web browser includes a small clutch of improvements including, notably, support for the Screen Wake Lock web API. The Screen Wake Lock API is used by web developers to prevent device screens from dimming or locking when their web-based app/site is running/being used. Firefox is late to adoption as this API has been support by Chromium-based browsers and Apple’s Safari for several years. Firefox View is able to sort of open tabs by recent activity (default) or tab order, making it a touch faster to
#News #AppUpdates #Firefox
https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2024/03/mozilla-firefox-124-released
GNOME 46: The Best New Features
GNOME 46 is released on March 20 and the update will be at the heart of next month’s Ubuntu 24.04 LTS release — wondering what kind of improvements is brings? Well, I gotcha’ covered, innit. In this post I run-through the best GNOME 46 features, changes, and usability enhancements. And there’s a fair bit, including super-charged search features in the Nautilus file manager, streamlining to the Settings app, support for remote login over RDP, and some small but sensible buffs to GNOME Shell notifications. Ubuntu 24.04 LTS will ship with GNOME 46 by default, so if after reading this round-up
#News #Gnome #Gnome46
Mozilla Drops Axe on its Privacy-Friendly Location Service
Mozilla has announced it is retiring its Mozilla Location Service (MLS), which provides accurate and privacy-respecting geolocation data. Developers and third-party projects currently use MLS to provide location data, such as FreeDesktop location framework GeoClue, leveraged by apps like GNOME’s Maps and Weather, have only a few months left to use it. We knew cuts were coming from the new CEO but the axe has fallen ruthlessly quick on this! New API access keys will not be granted going forward (and pending requests deleted), Mozilla say. In late March, POST data submissions will return 403 responses. Finally, on June 12,
#News #Development #Geoclue #Mozilla
https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2024/03/mozilla-location-services-axed
KDE Plasma 6.0.2 Update Delivers More Fixes
The second bug-fix update to KDE Plasma 6 is now available, arriving just over a week after the first one rolled out. KDE Plasma 6.0.2 brings a bunch of band-aids to resolves crashes, quirks, and other odd-ball behaviours reported by users since the KDE Plasma 6.0 stable release landed at the end of February. Among the more notable (read: things that sound annoying to me) issues addressed through this KDE Plasma 6.0.2 update are the following: Check the official change-log for a comprehensive overview of everything altered between v6.0.1 and this v6.0.2 release. Users of Ubuntu-based KDE neon — the
#News #Kde #KdeNeon #KdePlasma6
https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2024/03/kde-plasma-6-0-2-update-delivers-more-fixes
Proton Mail’s New Desktop App is Available for Linux
Proton Mail has released a brand new desktop app for Windows, Mac, and Linux. The app means subscribers to the privacy-focused mail service no longer need to use a web browser to read, send, and manage their mail. For privacy-conscious folks, Proton needs little introduction. Formed by a group of scientists and engineers who met working at CERN in 2014, the company has grown to provide a wide range of secure, privacy-focused online services, including encrypted email, VPN, and cloud storage. On the Proton blog the company explains the rationale behind freeing their webmail service from the confines of a web
#News #EmailClient #PrivacyTools #Proton #Protonmail
https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2024/03/proton-mail-desktop-app-linux
VLC Passes 5 Billion Downloads, Teases Big Changes in Next Release
VLC media player has now been downloaded over 5 billion times across desktop and mobile devices, with the most recent release clocking up an impressive 335 million downloads alone! Jean-Baptiste Kempf, president of VideoLAN, the non-profit company who develop VLC, shared this monumental milestone in a natter with Lowpass newsletter editor Janko Roettgers. Kempf also shared some tantalising teases on what we should expect to find in VLC 4.0, when it finally ships. Also, if you’re interested, you can see VLC download statistics on the video player’s official website. The app passed 3 billion downloads in 2019. VLC was first
#News #Vlc
https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2024/03/vlc-hits-5-billion-downloads
Linux Kernel 6.8 Released, This is What’s New
After a solid couple of months of development the Linux 6.8 kernel has been officially released. This kernel is of particular note to Ubuntu users as it’s the version selected to ship in Ubuntu 24.04 LTS – the GA kernel and thereby supported for the duration of the release. Announcing the release of the latest Linux kernel on the official Linux Kernel Mailing List (LKML) Linux founder Linus Torvalds says: “This is not the historically big release that 6.7 was – we seem to be back to a fairly average release size for the last few year,” he writes. “You
#News #LinuxKernel
https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2024/03/linux-kernel-6-8-new-features
How to Run Any App in Picture in Picture Mode in Ubuntu
A new GNOME Shell extension lets you turn any app in to a picture-in-picture window on Ubuntu. You’re probably already familiar with picture-in-picture mode (PiP) through your web browser. The likes of Mozilla Firefox and Chrome let you to “pop-out” video playing on web pages to view as a thumbnail-size window that floats over other apps, and resize and reposition the PiP window. PiP in browsers only works for online video, which is useful if want to watch a video on YouTube or another supported site while you work in a different tab or app (I use the feature to
#HowTo #GnomeExtensions
https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2024/03/how-to-run-any-app-in-picture-in-picture-mode-in-ubuntu
Zorin OS 17.1 Released, Debuts New Education Edition
A new version of Zorin OS is available for download. Zorin OS 17.1, which is based on Ubuntu 22.04.4 LTS, brings a wealth of improvements to its (nifty) Windows app support, as well as a new Education Edition that “pairs the latest improvements to Zorin OS with educational software that makes learning better and more impactful”. The new Wine 9.0 release comes paired with the Bottles utility in Zorin OS 17.1 in an effort to makes its already user-friendly Windows app support even more powerful. “We’ve expanded our built-in database to detect installer files for popular Windows apps and games.
#News #DistroRelease #ZorinOs
https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2024/03/zorin-os-17-1-released-debuts-new-education-edition
Linux Mint is Building a New Desktop Chat App
A new IRC client (but don’t call it an IRC client) is being developed by Linux Mint. The Ubuntu-based distro currently includes Hexchat in its default software selection. IRC isn’t as trendy as Discord or Telegram but it a free, open standard that no one-entity controls, is relatively low-bandwidth, interoperable, and efficient. But as I reported in February: Hexchat is no more. However, Hexchat ‘quitting the chat’ leaves —I so badly want to say leafs— Linux Mint with a dilemma and an opportunity. The dilemma being: “should we continue shipping an IRC client?” and the opportunity being: “could we replace
#News #Irc #LinuxMint
https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2024/03/linux-mint-new-jargonaut-irc-chat-app
Classic Google Chrome Theme for Mozilla Firefox ESR
A new open-source nostalgia project lets you turn back time in web browser aesthetics. Silverfox is a custom theme for Mozilla Firefox ESR that recreates the look of Google Chrome in its early days. We’re talking trapezoid tabs, parallelogram new tab button, pared back speed dial, and a custom-made hamburger menu (with option to use classic wrench icon). “Browsers age, good design doesn’t”, say the developers of the theme. This theme is real labour of love and, speaking as someone who blogged obsessively about those early days of Google Chrome/ium on Linux, trying this out took me on a real
#News #EyeCandy #Firefox #GoogleChrome
https://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2024/03/silverfox-classic-google-chrome-firefox-theme
