Hardy Heron fixes existing features rather than adding new ones to Ubuntu 8.04

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Want a sneaky peek at Ubuntu 8.04? Then you are in luck as the Hardy Heron Tribe 1 Alpha pre-release has just been made . This will, in time, morph into 8.04 and is the first in a series of milestone CD images that is slated for distribution throughout the Hardy development cycle.

According to Ubuntu developer Steve Langasek, posting at lists.ubuntu.com the Hardy Heron Tribe 1 images are “known to be reasonably free of showstopper CD build or installer bugs, while representing a very recent snapshot of Hardy.”

So what has changed since the Ubuntu 7 ‘Gutsy Gibbon’ release? Well there is the inclusion of Xorg 7.3 with a vastly improved automatic graphics config support, various packages that have been merged in from Debian, and installation images that are available for x86 and AMD 64 servers, SPARC, Kubuntu, Edubuntu, Xubuntu and Gobuntu.

Most importantly though, the entire Hardy development cycle is focusing on ensuring that existing features are as robust as possible instead of dumping tons of new functionality into the mix as happened with Gutsy Gibbon. Being a long-term support release this is, perhaps, just as well. Especially as Linux is starting to become a more attractive option to hardware vendors such as Dell.

A full list of the bugs uncovered so far can be found here.

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As pointed out, the Hardy Heron alphas are deliberately conservative: because 8.04 is a Long-Term Support (LTS) release the developers concentrated on hardening and fixing the desktop and server stacks instead of piling on new features. LTS releases carry extended maintenance windows (desktop and server policies differ), so that tradeoff is intentional and documented. Hardy Heron documentation. (help.ubuntu.com)

Key components to test that will affect day-to-day use: Xorg 7.3 (improved auto-configuration), GNOME 2.22 (GVFS/PolicyKit changes), PulseAudio becoming the default sound stack, and the Wubi Windows installer for easier trials. Those pieces can change how hardware, permissions dialogs, and audio behave even in a stabilization-focused cycle. Read coverage and the desktop notes for practical details. Wired beta coverage — Ars Technica summary of 8.04 features and LTS focus. (wired.com)

Practical testing checklist (use a VM or spare machine; avoid production hardware). Collect reproducible logs before filing bugs: run the commands below and include the outputs plus /var/log/Xorg.0.log and /var/log/syslog in your report.

lsb_release -a
uname -a
dpkg -l | egrep 'xserver|xorg|gnome|pulse|compiz'
dmesg | tail -n 200
sudo tail -n 200 /var/log/syslog
sudo tail -n 200 /var/log/Xorg.0.log

When you find a bug, report it to Launchpad and attach the logs and command outputs; the Hardy milestone pages and release notes explain known issues and the preferred reporting channels. Launchpad bug tracker. (wiki.ubuntu.com)

Do not install alpha media on a production system. If you plan to upgrade from 7.10, follow the documented upgrade path (for alphas the usual advice is update-manager -d) and expect the final stable LTS to land in April 2008. (wiki.ubuntu.com)

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