The Ubuntu Studio team is pleased to announce the release of Ubuntu Studio 22.04, code-named “Jammy Jellyfish”. This marks Ubuntu Studio’s 31st release. This release is a Long-Term Support release and as such, it is supported for 3 years (until April 2025).
Since it’s just out, you may experience some issues, so you might want to wait a bit before upgrading. Please see the release notes for a complete list of changes and known issues.
You can download Ubuntu Studio 22.04 LTS from our download page.
Upgrading
Since it’s just out, you may experience some issues, so you might want to wait a bit before upgrading.
Due to the change in desktop environment that started after the release of 20.04 LTS, direct upgrades from 20.04 LTS are not supported and may only be attempted at-your-own-risk. As with any system-critical operation, back-up your data before attempting any upgrade. The safest upgrade path is a backup of your /home directory and a clean install.
We have had anecdotal reports of successful upgrades from 20.04 LTS (Xfce desktop) to later releases (Plasma desktop), but this will remain at your own risk, and it is highly recommended to wait until 22.04.1 is released in August before attempting such an upgrade.
Instructions for upgrading are included in the release notes.
New This Release
Most of this release is evolutionary on top of 21.10 rather than revolutionary. As such, most of the applications contained are simply upgraded versions. Details on key packages can be found in the release notes.
Dark Theme By Default
For this release, we have a neutral-toned dark theme by default. While we could have gone with the Breeze Dark color scheme since we dropped the Materia KDE widget and window theme (it was difficult to maintain and work with new Plasma features), we decided to develop our own based on GNOME’s Adwaita Dark theme with a corresponding Light theme. This was to help with photography since a neutral tone is necessary as Breeze Dark has a more blueish hue, which can trick the eye into seeing photos as appearing warmer than they actually are.
However, switching from the dark theme to the light theme is a breeze (pun somewhat intended). When opening the System Settings, one only has to look at the home screen to see how to do that.
Support for rEFInd
rEFInd is a bootloader for UEFI-based systems. Our settings which help to support the lowlatency kernel help to create a menu entry to help apply those settings and keep the lowlatency kernel as the default kernel detected by rEFInd. To keep it current, simply enter sudo dpkg-reconfigure ubuntustudio-lowlatency-settings in the command line after a kernel update.
For a more complete list of changes, please see the release notes.
Backports PPA
There are a few items planned for the Backports PPA once the next release cycle opens. One of those is folder icons that match the accent color set in the System Settings.
We plan on keeping the backports PPA up-to-date for the next two years until the release of 24.04 LTS, at which point you will be encouraged to update.
Instructions for enabling the Ubuntu Studio Backports PPA
- Automatic method:
- Open Ubuntu Studio Installer
- Click “Enable Backports”
- Manual method:
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ubuntustudio-ppa/backportssudo apt upgrade
Note that at release time, there’s nothing in there yet, so if you add it now (at the time of this writing) you’ll get a 404 (file not found) error.
On a related note, at this time, the Backports PPA is frozen for 21.10 and 20.04 LTS. To receive newer versions of software, you must upgrade.
Plasma Backports
Since we share the Desktop Environment with Kubuntu, simply adding the Kubuntu Backports will help you with keeping the desktop environment and its components up-to-date with the latest versions:
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:kubuntu-ppa/backportssudo apt upgrade
More Updates
There are many more updates not covered here but are mentioned in the Release Notes. We highly recommend reading those release notes so you know what has been updated and know any known issues that you may encounter.
Get Involved!
A great way to contribute is to get involved with the project directly! We’re always looking for new volunteers to help with packaging, documentation, tutorials, user support, and MORE! Check out all the ways you can contribute!
Special Thanks
Huge special thanks for this release go to:
- Len Ovens: Studio Controls, Ubuntu Studio Installer, Coding
- Thomas Ward: Packaging, Ubuntu Core Developer for Ubuntu Studio
- Eylul Dogruel: Artwork, Graphics Design, Website Lead
- Ross Gammon: Upstream Debian Developer, Guidance, Testing
- Sebastien Ramacher: Upstream Debian Developer
- Dennis Braun: Debian Package Maintainer
- Rik Mills: Kubuntu Council Member, help with Plasma desktop
- Mauro Gaspari: Tutorials, Promotion, and Documentation, Testing
- Brian Hechinger: Testing and bug reporting
- Chris Erswell: Testing and bug reporting
- Robert Van Den Berg: Testing and bug reporting, IRC Support
- Krytarik Raido: IRC Moderator, Mailing List Moderator
- Erich Eickmeyer: Project Leader, Packaging, Direction, Treasurer
