It’s official: a pure GNOME edition of Ubuntu is to be released later this year.
‘Gnomebuntu’, to be based on Ubuntu 12.10, will be released on October 18th – the same day that Ubuntu, Kubuntu and Xubuntu all release their latest versions.
Gnomebuntu: What is it?
Gnomebuntu aims to provide as much of a “vanilla” GNOME experience as possible whilst also keeping various elements from Ubuntu. After all it is an Ubuntu-based spin.
What it will (and won’t) include
GNOME-Shell is provided as the default desktop, and GDM – which sports new fancy pants animations in 3.6 – is to be used for the lock and login screens.
File-manager wise the spin will use the same version of Nautilus as Ubuntu. So, with Ubuntu haven taken the decision to stick with the slightly older, but more featured, 3.4, this is the version that GNOMEbuntu will also be using.
Other changes currently suggested/mooted include:
- Epiphany (aka ‘Web’) will be the default web-browser
- Abiword will be included in place of LibreOffice
- No Ubuntu One by default
- GNOME Classic session included (complete with Ubuntu’s indicators)
- Rhythmbox (and its various music store plugins) will remain
- Ubuntu’s Software Center & Updater may not be included
- GNOME App “Documents” will not be included as it depends on LibreOffice.
Necessary?
It is perfectly possibly to create a “vanilla GNOME experience” in Ubuntu is around 20 minutes, according to some users. It requires a few PPAs, a bit of manually tidying up, and a willingness to lose some useful Ubuntu apps/features in the process. But it’s not difficult.
This approach isn’t ideal, and so a GNOME-flavoured Ubuntu (it feels rather strange to be writing that) will cut out the learning curve needed to enjoy a pure GNOME experience on Ubuntu.
Further information on the spin can be found on the Ubuntu Forums @ ubuntuforums.org/
Thanks to Stinger