11 Apr

Lubuntu Noble Beta Released!

We are happy to announce the Beta release for Lubuntu Noble (what will become 24.04 LTS)!

What makes this cycle unique?

Lubuntu is a lightweight flavor of Ubuntu, based on LXQt and built for you. As an official flavor, we benefit from Canonical’s infrastructure and assistance, in addition to the support and enthusiasm from the wider Ubuntu community. We are thankful for the opportunity to call ourselves an Ubuntu flavor; when there are common struggles, we step up to help. When discussions arise that affect the entire ecosystem, we lend a voice. This cycle was no different in that respect, but different in many others.

This started with the normal transitions that occur during the beginning of every cycle, a list of which can be found on the release schedule for Noble. These transitions take time; we (as Ubuntu) perform rigorous testing to ensure these packages are ready before publishing them for general availability. Several feature uploads became stuck, but we were looking forward to the opportunity to test after Feature Freeze.

We then faced two major transitions following Feature Freeze, the first of which was time_t. This allows for 32-bit devices to work past 2038. To learn more about the 2038 problem, visit this site. Immediately following this transition, the xz-utils backdoor was found. We would like to thank the Canonical and community developers involved in these transitions for their work around the clock to get everyone in the ecosystem to a releaseable state.

What does this mean for Lubuntu?

We need extra help from our community to test this release. If you have a few spare hours (or even minutes), please do help us test. If something is not working, please feel free to check the Beta tracking document, and file a bug if it is not otherwise reported.

If you are unsure how to file a bug report but just want to make the issue known, that is okay, please either make a post on our Discourse instance or join our Development channel on Matrix. Any help is appreciated, and your one post or message will make a difference for many users.

What new features made it?

For much more information, please see the Alpha status post.

Since then, we have made the tough decision to not include the following in the final release:

  • Power management UX.
  • Active Directory support in Calamares before release; that pull request has been submitted upstream.

That being said, a redesigned Customize menu has made it, in addition to other bugfixes and features listed in the Alpha announcement.

Our final release announcement will have many more details, stay tuned!

Where do I download it?

From our downloads page, here.

30 Mar

Lubuntu 23.04 Beta Released!

Thanks to all the hard work from our contributors, Lubuntu 23.04 Beta has been released. With the codename Lunar Lobster, Lubuntu 23.04 will be the 24th release of Lubuntu, the tenth release of Lubuntu with LXQt as the default desktop environment.

Support lifespan

With 23.04 being an interim release, it will follow the standard non-LTS support period of nine months, which means 23.04 will be supported until January 2024. Please note that 23.04 is still in Beta, and is not officially supported until its scheduled release on April 20, 2023.

You can download 23.04 Beta here. If you would like to upgrade your existing 22.04 LTS or 22.10 installation, please visit our manual page describing the process. Common Ubuntu instructions can be found here.

Known Issues and Notable Changes

LXQt

LXQt 1.2 is now shipped by default. More information on its initial and point releases can be found here: 1.2.0 | 1.2.1

System Installer and Potential Instability

Lubuntu uses the Calamares system installer in place of the Ubiquity installer that most other flavors use. While we are ensuring 22.04 LTS’ Calamares follows the upstream LTS cycle, we decided to get ahead of the curve by shipping Calamares 3.3 Alpha 2 in 23.04.

Here are the factors that went into this decision:

Additionally, you may notice that the main Ubuntu Desktop does not ship with Ubiquity this cycle. Instead, it ships with a new snap-based Ubuntu Desktop Installer. While flavors are free to switch to the new installer, Lubuntu is still evaluating this decision (preliminary performance, usability, and design assessments continue to show Calamares as the clear leader between the two choices).

Firefox, and the move to snap

An ongoing concern within the Ubuntu and Lubuntu communities has been the increased startup times for the Firefox web browser due to using the Snap package format instead of the traditional Debian-based package format used for the rest of the system. After careful consideration, taking into account the fast-paced technical improvements in modern web technology, the work required to keep Lubuntu users secure after the release, and Canonical’s commitment to Firefox as the default web browser for Ubuntu, we made the decision to keep this as-is.

That being said, the existing issues to watch out for include:

  • Snaps ship with confinement enabled by default, in order to properly isolate the application from the rest of the system. While this eases the update process, if you need to pass through a device to Firefox (such as a smartcard), some manual work will be required.

We recommend consulting the Snapcraft Forums with any issues related to Snaps in general. More information on the Firefox snap specifically can be found here.

Common Release Notes

Please also check the Ubuntu Release Notes for more common issues and bugs affecting all Ubuntu flavors.

What is Lubuntu?

Lubuntu is an official Ubuntu flavor which uses the Lightweight Qt Desktop Environment (LXQt). The project’s goal is to provide a lightweight yet functional Linux distribution based on a rock-solid Ubuntu base. Lubuntu provides a simple but modern and powerful graphical user interface, and comes with a wide variety of applications so you can browse, email, chat, play, and be productive. You can find the following major applications and toolkits installed by default in this release:

You can find a variety of other applications installed which aim to enhance your experience while staying out of the way of your normal workflow. New features and bugfixes in core Ubuntu components can be found here.

Lubuntu Manual

The Lubuntu Team has been hard at work in polishing the Lubuntu Manual to make it easy for new and experienced users alike to use their system more productively. The manual can be found at manual.lubuntu.me. We want to thank Lyn Perrine for all the hard work she has put into the Lubuntu Manual. Thank you!

Versions of the Lubuntu Manual:

While the documentation for previous releases will be kept in the Git repository, they will not be published anywhere.

Want an easy way to access the manual? Don’t worry, it’s now an (opt-out) desktop icon.

Lubuntu Project

How can I help?

We can always use more help! No matter your skill level or your technical experience, there’s something you can help with that can make a huge difference in Lubuntu. Join us on our chat (which is bridged three ways to Matrix, Telegram, and IRC) and talk to us there. Whether you know another language, have some spare time to help us test Lubuntu, are good at writing documentation, or just want to stay “in the know,” that is the place to be. More information about contributing can be found here. If you want to contribute to Lubuntu but do not feel you have the time or skills, consider buying a t-shirt or donating to Lubuntu. Another great method to get involved is bug reporting. If you notice an issue, please file a bug using the instructions on the Lubuntu Wiki. Don’t want to file a bug? Let us know what the problem is (in detail, enough that we can reproduce it) and we can assist you in filing one or do it ourselves.

Contributors

We would like to thank the following contributors for dedicating their time to Lubuntu this cycle. Thank you!

In addition, we would also like to recognize some very active contributors on our Discourse forum.

We also wanted to give a special mention to Julien Lavergne, our Project Lead Emeritus and Founder. Without you, the Lubuntu project would not exist today. Thank you.

Global Team

The Lubuntu Global Team has been created to foster communities in non-English languages and locales. An up-to-date list of our communities can be found on our Links page, but the existing groups include: Spanish, Portuguese, Russian, Italian, Chinese, German, Japanese, Arabic, and French. If you would like to start a language group, join our development channel and talk with the Global Team. At minimum, you should have a few interested drivers of the community, and at least one administrator that speaks English. We now have multiple languages available in the support section of our Discourse forum.

01 Apr

Lubuntu 21.04 (Hirsute Hippo) BETA testing

We are pleased to announce that the beta images for Lubuntu 21.04 have been released!

While we have reached the bugfix-only stage of our development cycle, these images are not meant to be used in a production system. We highly recommend joining our development group or our forum to let us know about any issues.

Ubuntu Testing Week

Ubuntu, and flavors such as Lubuntu, are having a testing session (hashtag #UbuntuTestingWeek, #UTW) during the first week of April, to encourage as many people as possible to help test our new beta, and help make it the best release yet of Lubuntu.

You can read more about testing week and ways to test on our Discourse Post

Getting the download

You can download the Hirsute Hippo daily build here.

Thanks!

Thanks in advance to those of you who can help, and please reply on discourse with any issues, concerns, or questions!

01 Oct

Lubuntu 20.10 (Groovy Gorilla) BETA testing

We are pleased to announce that the beta images for Lubuntu 20.10 have been released!

While we have reached the bugfix-only stage of our development cycle, these images are not meant to be used in a production system. We highly recommend joining our development group or our forum to let us know about any issues.

Getting the download

You can download the Groovy Gorilla daily build here.

Recording the results

To record your testing, you’ll need a Launchpad/Ubuntu One login. Go here to create one if you haven’t already got one.

Take a look at the testsuites, though most of our testcases can be found here.

Our current behavior when we run a QA-test install is to use the “Install using Calamares (entire disk)” testcase, where in the Comments section we use the first line to briefly list hardware used, the second line has an entry like

Lenovo V14 IIL,Intel Core i3-1005G1,8GB,256GB SSD
Testcase:BIOS,no encryption,full disk,Internet

which highlights it was a BIOS install, no encyption, full disk with internet connected; all of which matches an testcase found on our checklist.

How you describe your hardware is up to you, I get details from sudo lshw roughly in format “Make model (cpu, ram, gpu)” so my x201 will show as
lenovo thinkpad x201 (i5-m520, 4gb, i915)
but in my testcase example I’ve copied the first two lines from a real QA-test install performed by our most recent Lubuntu member Leó Kolbeinsson.

Reporting bugs

Follow the directions in the testsuite. If it does all of those things, great! If it doesn’t, we do need your help. Please file a bug on your testing box, and record the bug ID in the Bug (or Critical Bug) section in the iso.qa.ubuntu.com page when complete.

Follow the directions in the bug report, and be as specific as you can. This is a key step – an unreported bug will be an unfixed bug. For details on reporting bugs please refer to our wiki page and don’t forget to include the bug report number in the iso.qa.ubuntu.com test report.

Questions?

If you have any questions, appropriate places to ask are of course, our discourse site or for faster responses please ask on IRC #lubuntu-devel or via our telegram channel

Please note tests that complete okay with only minor issues should still be PASSED, but the bug ID reported in the “Bugs” section. If you consider it a show-stopper bug, record it in the “Critical bugs” section (failing the test if you believe absolutely necessary).

Thanks!

Thanks in advance to those of you who can help, and please reply on discourse with any issues, concerns, or questions!

05 Apr

Lubuntu 20.04 LTS Beta Released!

Your Lubuntu team has been hard at work, and has now released the beta version of Lubuntu 20.04 LTS. This will be our 18th release of Lubuntu, our fourth LTS release, but is our first LTS with the new LXQt desktop.

Between April 2nd and April 23rd, all efforts will be focused on testing our product before its final release; finding any missed bugs and getting those squashed. These beta images are not intended to be used on a production system. We strongly encourage anyone willing to test the new images to join our development group, our forum, or the new Ubuntu community group that is coordinating testing for all the flavors on IRC or Telegram. For more information on testing Lubuntu please visit our wiki page. We’ll love all the spare time anyone can provide, to help test our upcoming Lubuntu 20.04 LTS release, and make this the best Lubuntu release ever.

Where can I download it?

You can download the Beta images off of our downloads page.

A note about the Lubuntu Wallpaper Contest

For this release we once again asked the community to get involved in creating the wallpaper for the desktop. The submissions were fantastic and the decision was difficult for the committee to decide. The committee scored the choices and narrowed the selection down. The Lubuntu Members then voted for the winning wallpaper. While the wallpapers didn’t make it into this Beta release, we are packaging them up and you can expect to see them in time for the final release.

Thanks to our Contributors!

This release would not be possible without significant contributions. Thank you for taking the time to develop, support, test and promote Lubuntu. We also want to thank those that choose to donate!

27 Sep

Lubuntu 19.10 Beta Released!

We are pleased to announce that the beta images for Lubuntu 19.10 have been released!

While we have reached the bugfix-only stage of our development cycle, these images are not meant to be used in a production system. We highly recommend joining our development group or our forum to let us know about any issues.

Where can I download it?

You can download the Beta images off of our Downloads page.

Results of the Lubuntu Wallpaper Contest

For this release we asked the community to get involved in creating the wallpaper for the desktop. The submissions were fantastic and the decision was difficult for the committee to decide. The committee scored the choices and narrowed the selection down. The Lubuntu Members then voted for the winning wallpaper:

The author provided some context around their creation:

Hello, how are you? Very happy to participate in the contest and to have been selected to be part of the desktop of the next version of Lubuntu.
I send you the final version of the desktop wallpaper that I created for the attached contest like LubuntuFINAL.svg, created in Inkscape and also a .zip file with different design variants, including the original blue background version. I have modified the images so that they have the corresponding license.
The image story comes like this. I am a man who likes to investigate and learn repairing old computers, as a computer fan, without much knowledge, I am trying different Linux distributions, at the moment I learn how to use the terminal, the commands and the dynamics of the hardware. For what they have given me an old cpu that tried to make work for what I found a while ago with Lubuntu as a very good option for that team since with this operating system it works smoothly and made the team functional, since that team It would be used by the family for general uses. Since I am very satisfied with Lubuntu as a system, I looked for a way to get involved in some way, so I arrived at the Lubuntu forum, it is there where I learned about the contest and where it seemed a good idea to create a desktop background. I have been using open-source programs for some time, as you may have noticed, I am self-taught, I am not a professional graphic designer; so I also ran into Inkscape. As one of my hobbies, I design cartoons, logos, etc.
I thought it was a good idea about the contest but I wasn’t sure…
So I decided to first post it on reddit and see what opinion the users of my desktop background had. That’s where I was encouraged to enter the contest and where I decided to sign up. Well I think I extended too much, I thank you for taking into account for this contest, for being able to participate together with other users who also had very good jobs and for being able to get involved in the next launch of Lubuntu. I hope that users enjoy both the wallpaper, as I enjoy creating it for all of you…
A Big hug!

Marcelo D. Moreira from Argentina.

While the wallpapers didn’t make it into this Beta release, you can expect to see them in time for the final release, and on your computer (please keep your system updated!).

Known Issues

Keyboard Shortcuts

Many keyboard shortcuts have been updated in this release. We have moved many of the keyboard shortcuts from Openbox to the native LXQt shortcut manager, and have spent time polishing the existing shortcuts.
You can find a list of all the updated shortcuts here.
Unfortunately, they won’t be updated automatically when upgrading from Lubuntu 19.04 to Lubuntu 19.10.
Here are the steps to update them manually:

  1. Delete the following files:
    • ~/.config/lxqt/globalkeyshortcuts.conf
    • ~/.config/lxqt/lxqt-runner.conf
    • ~/.config/openbox/lxqt-rc.xml
  2. Reboot

Follow the same procedure for all users if there are more than one present.
This will reset all the shortcuts to new defaults as listed in the manual. (Editor’s note: Add link to man page.)

Note: This will clear any non default shortcuts you might have configured by yourself (e.g: Super+T for qterminal). You will have to assign them again using shortcuts settings from LXQt Configuration Center.

Thanks!

This release could not have happened without the help from our contributors. Thank you to the following people that make Lubuntu happen:

If you find Lubuntu useful, please consider donating to the project or contributing your time.