Category: Planet Ubuntu

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Ubuntu Studio 23.04 Released

in Known Issues, News, Planet Ubuntu, Release Notes
Apr
20
2023

The Ubuntu Studio team is pleased to announce the release of Ubuntu Studio 23.04, code-named “Lunar Lobster”. This marks Ubuntu Studio’s 33rd release. This release is a regular release and as such, it is supported for 9 months (until January 2024).

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 23.04 from our download page.

Upgrading

Instructions for upgrading are included in the release notes.

New This Release

Plasma Desktop 5.27 LTS

This release includes the Long-Term Support release of KDE’s Plasma Desktop 5.27. This is a wonderful release and includes several stability and performance culminations of Plasma Desktop 5.

PipeWire Audio by Default

Pipewire logo.svg

Beginning in this release we have switched to utilized PipeWire by default with the JACK and PulseAudio plugins. This means that, without configuration, all JACK and PulseAudio applications will simply work without much configuration.

For advanced routing, Patchance is a new addition and is fully JACK compatible and works with PipeWire to route audio applications between each other and between outputs and inputs.

While PipeWire is convenient and recommended for most users, we do not recommend it for professional or prosumer audio work at this time. Click here for more information.

Rewritten Ubuntu Studio Installer

Ubuntu Studio Installer has been completely rewritten from the ground-up and works better on high-DPI displays. It utilizes the Zenity GTK interface to give users a choice of package selection and is even capable of uninstalling entire groups of packages.

Ubuntu Studio Installer can still be used to add or remove the Ubuntu Studio Backports PPA as well as switch between the new PipeWire configuration or the traditional PulseAudio/JACK configuration of past releases (which also installs Studio Controls).

Wayland Available (but not default)

Wayland is available and installed by default to select upon login and test but is still unsupported. We have done this at the request of KDE so that it can gain more testing and bug reports. We have done our best to configure it with the default theming and to make sure it picks up your settings, but it is possible some things will be missed and not work quite right. However, it has undergone extensive real-world testing and works well on non-Nvidia systems.

Return of the Materia Theme

We have returned our theming back to being based on the Materia theme while keeping the Papirus icons, but using the Dark theme that we introduced back in Ubuntu Studio 22.04. This further differentiates our KDE Plasma Desktop from the default Breeze theme used in Kubuntu.

We have gone even further with this and introduced a new Login Screen and Lock Screen based on the Materia theme. This is to keep our theming consistent and to give our system a more unique look.

Login Screen / Lock Screen

Backports PPA

There are a few items planned for the Backports PPA once the next release cycle opens. We plan to keep the backports PPA up to date for the next six months until the release of 23.10, at which point you will be encouraged to upgrade.

Instructions for enabling the Ubuntu Studio Backports PPA

  • Automatic method:
    • Open Ubuntu Studio Installer
    • Click the checkbox next to “PPA-Ubuntu_Studio_Backports”
  • Manual method:
    • sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ubuntustudio-ppa/backports
    • sudo apt upgrade

Please note, however, this is the last regular release in which we will be supporting the backports PPA. In the future, we plan to utilize the official Ubuntu Backports Repository and backporting newer package versions there, except for Ardour Backports when new whole versions are released. The Ubuntu Backports Repository only supports LTS releases.

Plasma Desktop 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/backports
  • sudo 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 wonderful 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
  • Simon Quigley: Packaging, Ubuntu Core Developer
  • Eylul Dogruel: Artwork, Graphics Design
  • Ross Gammon: Upstream Debian Developer, Testing, Email Support
  • 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
  • Aaron Rainbolt: Testing and bug reporting, IRC Support
  • Krytarik Raido: IRC Moderator, Mailing List Moderator
  • Erich Eickmeyer: Project Leader, Packaging, Direction, Treasurer

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: Does Ubuntu Studio contain snaps?
A: Yes. Mozilla’s distribution agreement with Canonical changed, and Ubuntu was forced to no longer distribute Firefox in a native .deb package. We have found that, after numerous improvements, Firefox now performs just as well as the native .deb package did.

Additionally, FreeShow is an Electron-based application. Electron-based applications cannot be packaged in the Ubuntu repositories in that they cannot be packaged in a traditional Debian source package. While such apps do have a build system to create a .deb binary package, it circumvents the source package build system which is required when packaging for Ubuntu. However, Electron apps also have a facility for creating snaps, which can be uploaded to the snap store. Therefore, for FreeShow to be included in Ubuntu Studio, it had to be packaged as a snap.

Q: Will you ever make an ISO image with {my favorite desktop environment}?
A: To do so would require creating an entirely new flavor of Ubuntu, which would require going through the Official Ubuntu Flavor application process. Since we’re completely volunteer-run, we don’t have the time or resources to do this. Instead, we recommend you download the official flavor for the desktop environment of your choice and use Ubuntu Studio Installer to get Ubuntu Studio. Please note that this process does not convert that flavor to Ubuntu Studio but adds its tools, features, and benefits to the existing flavor installation.

Q: What if I don’t want all these packages installed on my machine?
A: Simply use the newly rewritten Ubuntu Studio Installer to remove the features of Ubuntu Studio you don’t want or need by unchecking the boxes!

Ubuntu Studio 20.04 LTS reaching End-Of-Life on April 28th 2023

in News, Planet Ubuntu, Security
Apr
13
2023

In a few short weeks, Ubuntu Studio 20.04 LTS will reach the end of its three years of supported life provided by the Ubuntu Studio team. All users are urged to upgrade to 22.04 LTS at this time.

This means that the Xfce, audio, video, graphics, photography, and publishing components of your system will no longer receive updates, plus we at Ubuntu Studio won’t support it after 28-April-2023, though your base packages from Ubuntu will continue to receive security updates from Ubuntu until 2025 since Ubuntu Desktop, Ubuntu Server, Ubuntu Cloud and Ubuntu Core continue to receive updates.

Unfortunately, due to the change in desktop environment from Xfce to KDE’s Plasma Desktop, there is no supported in-place upgrade path. The only supported upgrade path is to back-up your /home/{user} folder and reinstall the operating system.

No single release of any operating system can be supported indefinitely, and Ubuntu Studio has no exception to this rule.

Long-Term Support releases are identified by an even numbered year-of-release and a month-of-release of April (04). Hence, the most recent Long-Term Support release is 22.04 (YY.MM = 2022.April), and the next Long-Term Support release will be 24.04 (2024.April). LTS releases for official Ubuntu flavors (not Desktop or Server which are supported for five years) are three years, meaning LTS users are expected to upgrade after every LTS release with a one year buffer.

Ubuntu Studio 23.04 Beta Released

in Development, Known Issues, News, Planet Ubuntu, Release Notes, Testing
Mar
31
2023

The Ubuntu Studio team is pleased to announce the beta release of Ubuntu Studio 23.10, codenamed “Lunar Lobster”.

While this beta is reasonably free of any showstopper installer bugs, you may find some bugs within. This image is, however, mostly representative of what you will find when Ubuntu Studio 23.04 is released on April 20, 2023.

Special notes:

The Ubuntu Studio 22.10 disk image (ISO) exceeds 4 GB and cannot be downloaded to some file systems such as FAT32, and may not be readable when burned to a DVD. For this reason, we recommend downloading to a compatible file system. When creating a boot medium, we recommend creating a bootable USB stick with the ISO image, or burning to a Dual-Layer DVD.

Images can be obtained from this link: https://cdimage.ubuntu.com/ubuntustudio/releases/23.04/beta/

Full updated information, including Upgrade Instructions, are available in the Release Notes.

New Features This Release

  • PipeWire is now enabled with JACK support by default. More on that here.
  • Ubuntu Studio Installer has been completely rewritten from the ground-up and can be used to remove components you don’t want. Version 1.4
  • Patchance, a simple patchbay for JACK (works with Pipewire with JACK). version 1.0.0
  • We have changed back to the Materia theme first used in Ubuntu Studio 19.04, this time using the dark theme by default.
  • Entirely new Login Screen and Lock Screen Theme based on the Materia theme. This is to differentiate from the Breeze theme traditionally used in KDE Plasma and used mostly in Kubuntu, as to set our default setup apart and to not simply be “Kubuntu with a bunch of extra packages.”

Major Package Upgrades

  • Darktable version 4.2.1
  • Gimp version 2.10.34
  • Ardour version 7.3.0
  • OBS Studio version 29.0.2
  • Audacity version 3.2.4
  • digiKam version 8.0.0-beta1
  • Kdenlive version 22.12.3
  • Krita version 5.1.5

There are many other improvements, too numerous to list here. We encourage you to look around the freely-downloadable ISO image.

Known Issues

  • digiKam is a beta release of 8.0.0. As such, it may have undocumented bugs. We hope these bugs get ironed out by the time 8.0.0 stable comes out, and the digiKam developers have set a goal for April 2023 for a release. When the 8.0.0 stable release of digiKam becomes available, we hope to provide these to you as a Stable Release Update. If you would like a stable version of digiKam now, a snap of 7.8.0 is available.

Official Ubuntu Studio release notes can be found at https://ubuntustudio.org/ubuntu-studio-23-04-release-notes/

Further known issues, mostly pertaining to the desktop environment, can be found at https://wiki.ubuntu.com/LunarLobster/ReleaseNotes/Kubuntu (when available)

Additionally, the main Ubuntu release notes contain more generic issues: https://discourse.ubuntu.com/t/kinetic-kudu-release-notes/27976

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: Does KDE Plasma use more resources than your former desktop environment (Xfce)?
A: In our testing, the increase in resource usage is negligible, and our optimizations were never tied to the desktop environment.

Q: Does Ubuntu Studio contain snaps?
A: Yes. Mozilla’s distribution agreement with Canonical changed, and Ubuntu was forced to no longer distribute Firefox in a native .deb package. We have found that, after numerous improvements, Firefox now performs just as well as the native .deb package did.

Additionally, Freeshow is an Electron-based application. Electron-based applications cannot be packaged in the Ubuntu repositories in that they cannot be packaged in a traditional Debian source package. While such apps do have a build system to create a .deb binary package, it circumvents the source package build system in Launchpad, which is required when packaging for Ubuntu. However, Electron apps also have a facility for creating snaps, which can be uploaded included. Therefore, for Freeshow to be included in Ubuntu Studio, it had to be packaged as a snap.

Q: If I install this Beta release, will I have to reinstall when the final release comes out?
A: No. If you keep it updated, your installation will automatically become the final release. However, if Audacity returns to the Ubuntu repositories before final release, then you might end-up with a double-installation of Audacity. Removal instructions of one or the other will be made available in a future post.

Q: Will you make an ISO with {my favorite desktop environment}?
A: To do so would require creating an entirely new flavor of Ubuntu, which would require going through the Official Ubuntu Flavor application process. Since we’re completely volunteer-run, we don’t have the time or resources to do this. Instead, we recommend you download the official flavor for the desktop environment of your choice and use Ubuntu Studio Installer to get Ubuntu Studio.

Q: What if I don’t want all these packages installed on my machine?
A: Simply use the Ubuntu Studio Installer to remove the features of Ubuntu Studio you don’t want or need!

Please Test!

Ardour 7.1 Backports Available

in News, Planet Ubuntu
Nov
18
2022

Our friends at Ardour have released Version 7.1, and we would like to offer them huge congratulations! While the source code and their own builds were available on release day, many of you have been waiting for Ardour 7 to come to Ubuntu’s repositories.

That day has come. Ardour 7.1 will be landing in Ubuntu Lunar Lobster (future 23.04) and will be on Ubuntu Studio’s daily spins of Lunar Lobster very soon.

Unfortunately, it is not possible to backport Ardour 7.1 into Ubuntu 22.04 LTS or 22.10, nor would we want to. This is because if we do, we might disrupt the workflow of people who are currently working with projects in 6.9 that are relying on its functionality and sound. Ardour 7.1 projects are not backwards compatible with Ardour 6.9 projects; once a 6.9 project is opened in 7.1, it is converted to a 7.1 project and cannot be used in 6.9 again unless restored from a backup.

This is also the reason we will not be releasing Ardour 7.1 into Ubuntu Studio’s main Backports PPA. However, we are giving Ardour its own Backports PPA so that users may upgrade Ardour in their Ubuntu (Studio) 22.04 LTS or 22.10 installation whenever they are ready.

To upgrade Ardour to 7.1, open a terminal and type the following:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ubuntustudio-ppa/ardour-backports
sudo apt upgrade

If at any point you change your mind and want to revert to Ardour 6.9 (and hopefully haven’t converted any projects):

sudo apt install ppa-purge
sudo ppa-purge ppa:ubuntustudio-ppa/ardour-backports

Enjoy Ardour 7.1! If you find it useful, please consider downloading and paying for the official package from Ardour themselves. They more than deserve it!

Ubuntu Studio 22.10 Released

in News, Planet Ubuntu, Release Notes
Oct
20
2022

The Ubuntu Studio team is pleased to announce the release of Ubuntu Studio 22.10, code-named “Kinetic Kudu”. This marks Ubuntu Studio’s 32nd release. This release is a regular release and as such, it is supported for 9 months (until July 2023).

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 22.10 from our download page.

Upgrading

Instructions for upgrading are included in the release notes.

New This Release

Ubuntu Studio Feature Uninstaller

Previous releases of Ubuntu Studio had a way to choose the features you wanted when you installed. Unfortunately, this had to be removed from the installer several releases ago. An often-requested item is a way to uninstall some of these features after installation since they might not integrate into your workflow.

A new addition to the Ubuntu Studio Installer package is the Ubuntu Studio Feature Uninstaller which performs the reverse of the Ubuntu Studio Installer: removes groups of packages from the Ubuntu Studio installation as long as they aren’t required by another group of packages. For example, if you have ubuntustudio-photography installed and ubuntustudio-graphics installed but wish to uninstall ubuntustudio-photography, you will still have gimp installed since it’s part of the ubuntustudio-graphics metapackage. This method of uninstallation is safe and effective at making your digital studio yours.

Audacity 3.2

Included with this release is the brand-new Audacity 3.2. Prior to this release, Audacity had been still on the Audacity 2.4 release. This is the first Ubuntu release to carry Audacity 3.x and we couldn’t be prouder.

Just a word of caution: Audacity 3.2 isn’t compatible with all of the audio plugins we carry, so there may be some errors when scanning, so keep that in mind.

Software for Live Performances and Houses of Worship

A major group of people that could benefit from Ubuntu Studio and its software is those who do live performances and those in houses of worship, such as Churches and Synagogues. As such, we have included, in addition to our vast audio suite, such software to enable houses of worship to create effective services.

For lighting, we have included Q Light Controller Plus to serve the needs of controlling house and stage lighting across multiple universes of light fixtures. Whether you have simple stage lighting or moving programmable RGB lights, QLC+ can handle it.

FreeShow’s Interface

For projection, in addition to LibreOffice Impress, we now have FreeShow, a presentation program to easily show text on a big screen, with support for stage display, remote control, media, and many more advanced features. It is geared toward houses of worship but can be used for many live performance lyric presentation applications. If FreeShow is inadequate or not featureful enough, OpenLP is also included.

Backports PPA

There are a few items planned for the Backports PPA once the next release cycle opens. We plan to keep the backports PPA up-to-date for the next six months until the release of 23.04, at which point you will be encouraged to upgrade.

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/backports
    • sudo apt 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/backports
  • sudo 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 wonderful 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
  • Simon Quigley: Packaging, Ubuntu Core Developer
  • Eylul Dogruel: Artwork, Graphics Design
  • Ross Gammon: Upstream Debian Developer, Testing, Email Support
  • 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
  • Aaron Rainbolt: Testing and bug reporting, IRC Support
  • Krytarik Raido: IRC Moderator, Mailing List Moderator
  • Erich Eickmeyer: Project Leader, Packaging, Direction, Treasurer

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: Does Ubuntu Studio contain snaps?
A: Yes. Mozilla’s distribution agreement with Canonical changed, and Ubuntu was forced to no longer distribute Firefox in a native .deb package. We have found that, after numerous improvements, Firefox now performs just as well as the native .deb package did.

Additionally, FreeShow is an Electron-based application. Electron-based applications cannot be packaged in the Ubuntu repositories in that they cannot be packaged in a traditional Debian source package. While such apps do have a build system to create a .deb binary package, it circumvents the source package build system which is required when packaging for Ubuntu. However, Electron apps also have a facility for creating snaps, which can be uploaded to the snap store. Therefore, for FreeShow to be included in Ubuntu Studio, it had to be packaged as a snap.

Q: Is PipeWire the main sound server like Ubuntu Desktop 22.10?
A: One of our goals this release was to create some kind of switch between our traditional PulseAudio/JACK setup and PipeWire, but this did not come to fruition as we had quite a few other bugs to squash as a result of the transition to ffmpeg 5. Additionally, we had a lot of clean-up after the transition to Python 3.10 in 22.04 LTS among other bugs. Sadly, that’s where our attention went and PipeWire support had to be deprioritized for this release.

Additionally, PipeWire does not support any JACK backends other than ALSA, so users who need NetJACK, FFADO for FireWire, or other backends would not be able to use PipeWire alone. Therefore, we need to develop an easy way to switch between the more traditional PulseAudio/JACK setup and PipeWire.

Q: Will you ever make an ISO image with {my favorite desktop environment}?
A: To do so would require creating an entirely new flavor of Ubuntu, which would require going through the Official Ubuntu Flavor application process. Since we’re completely volunteer-run, we don’t have the time or resources to do this. Instead, we recommend you download the official flavor for the desktop environment of your choice and use Ubuntu Studio Installer to get Ubuntu Studio. Please note that this process does not convert that flavor to Ubuntu Studio but adds its tools, features, and benefits to the existing flavor installation.

Q: What if I don’t want all these packages installed on my machine?
A: Simply use the Ubuntu Studio Feature Uninstaller to remove the features of Ubuntu Studio you don’t want or need!

Ubuntu Studio 22.10 Beta Released

in Development, Known Issues, News, Planet Ubuntu, Release Notes, Testing
Sep
30
2022

The Ubuntu Studio team is pleased to announce the beta release of Ubuntu Studio 22.10, codenamed “Kinetic Kudu”.

While this beta is reasonably free of any showstopper installer bugs, you may find some bugs within. This image is, however, mostly representative of what you will find when Ubuntu Studio 22.10 is released on October 20, 2022.

Special notes:

The Ubuntu Studio 22.10 disk image (ISO) exceeds 4 GB and cannot be downloaded to some file systems such as FAT32, and may not be readable when burned to a DVD. For this reason, we recommend downloading to a compatible file system. When creating a boot medium, we recommend creating a bootable USB stick with the ISO image, or burning to a Dual-Layer DVD.

Images can be obtained from this link: https://cdimage.ubuntu.com/ubuntustudio/releases/22.10/beta/

Full updated information, including Upgrade Instructions, are available in the Release Notes.

Regarding Pipewire

One of our goals this release was to create some kind of switch between our traditional PulseAudio/JACK setup and Pipewire, but this did not come to fruition as we had quite a few other bugs to squash as a result of the transition to ffmpeg 5. Additionally, we had a lot of clean-up after the transition to Python 3.10 in 22.04 LTS among other bugs. Sadly, that’s where our attention went and Pipewire support had to be deprioritized for this release.

New Features This Release

  • Ubuntu Studio Installer now includes Ubuntu Studio Feature Uninstaller to remove features of Ubuntu Studio that you don’t need. This is a long-requested feature that will be detailed in the official release announcement when Ubuntu Studio 22.10 releases on October 20th.
  • Q Light Controller Plus version 4.12.5
  • Freeshow version 0.5.6
  • openLP version 2.9.5

Major Package Upgrades

  • Darktable version 4.0.0
  • OBS Studio version 28.0.1
  • Audacity version 3.1.3
  • digiKam version 8.0.0 development snapshot (pre-release, see notes below)
  • Kdenlive version 22.08.1
  • Krita version 5.1.1

There are many other improvements, too numerous to list here. We encourage you to take a look around the freely-downloadable ISO image.

Known Issues

  • digiKam is a development snapshot of 8.0.0. As such, it likely has undocumented bugs. We hope these bugs get ironed out by the time 8.0.0 beta comes out, but we are not sure when that will be as the digiKam developers have not released a timeline or release date. When the 8.0.0 beta or stable release of digiKam becomes available, we hope to provide these to you as Stable Release Updates. This came from the transition to ffmpeg 5 as prior versions of digiKam do not support ffmpeg 5. If you would like a stable version of digiKam now, a snap of 7.8.0 is available.

Official Ubuntu Studio release notes can be found at https://ubuntustudio.org/ubuntu-studio-22-10-release-notes/

Further known issues, mostly pertaining to the desktop environment, can be found at https://wiki.ubuntu.com/KineticKudu/ReleaseNotes/Kubuntu

Additionally, the main Ubuntu release notes contain more generic issues: https://discourse.ubuntu.com/t/kinetic-kudu-release-notes/27976

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: Does KDE Plasma use more resources than your former desktop environment (Xfce)?
A: In our testing, the increase in resource usage is negligible, and our optimizations were never tied to the desktop environment.

Q: Does Ubuntu Studio contain snaps?
A: Yes. Mozilla’s distribution agreement with Canonical changed, and Ubuntu was forced to no-longer distribute Firefox in a native .deb package. We have found that, after numerous improvements, Firefox now performs just as well as the native .deb package did.

Additionally, Audacity 2.4.2, due to incompatibilities with ffmpeg 5, had to be removed from the official Ubuntu repositories this cycle. For that reason, we worked hard with the snap packager to include it in Ubuntu Studio 22.10. Therefore, Audacity 3.1.3 is included as a snap. Watch this bug to track Audacity’s reintroduction into the Ubuntu repositories. Right now, it is on-pace to happen before the release of Ubuntu 22.10. When this happens, we fully intend to drop the snap and re-include the .deb package in Ubuntu Studio. Watch Ubuntu Studio News for updates.

Finally, Freeshow is an Electron-based application. Electron-based applications cannot be packaged in the Ubuntu repositories in that they cannot be packaged in a traditional Debian source package. While such apps do have a build system to create a .deb binary package, it circumvents the source package build system in Launchpad, which is required when packaging for Ubuntu. However, Electron apps also have a facility for creating snaps, which can be uploaded included. Therefore, for Freeshow to be included in Ubuntu Studio, it had to be packaged as a snap.

Q: If I install this Beta release, will I have to reinstall when the final release comes out?
A: No. If you keep it updated, your installation will automatically become the final release. However, if Audacity returns to the Ubuntu repositories before final release, then you might end-up with a double-installation of Audacity. Removal instructions of one or the other will be made available in a future post.

Q: Will you make an ISO with {my favorite desktop environment}?
A: To do so would require creating an entirely new flavor of Ubuntu, which would require going through the Official Ubuntu Flavor application process. Since we’re completely volunteer-run, we don’t have the time or resources to do this. Instead, we recommend you download the official flavor for the desktop environment of your choice and use Ubuntu Studio Installer to get Ubuntu Studio.

Q: What if I don’t want all of these packages installed on my machine?
A: Simply use the Ubuntu Studio Feature Uninstaller to remove the features of Ubuntu Studio you don’t want or need!

Please Test!

Ubuntu Studio 21.10 has reach End Of Life (EOL)

in News, Planet Ubuntu, Security
Jul
14
2022

As of July 14, 2022, all flavors of Ubuntu 21.10, including Ubuntu Studio 21.10, codenamed “Impish Indri”, have reached end-of-life (EOL). There will be no more updates of any kind, including security updates, for this release of Ubuntu.

If you have not already done so, please upgrade to Ubuntu Studio 22.04 LTS via the instructions provided here.

No single release of any operating system can be supported indefinitely, and Ubuntu Studio has no exception to this rule.

Regular Ubuntu releases, meaning those that are between the Long-Term Support releases, are supported for 9 months and users are expected to upgrade after every release with a 3-month buffer following each release.

Long-Term Support releases are identified by an even numbered year-of-release and a month-of-release of April (04). Hence, the most recent Long-Term Support release is 22.04 (YY.MM = 2022.April), and the next Long-Term Support release will be 24.04 (2024.April). LTS releases for official Ubuntu flavors (not Desktop or Server which are supported for five years) are three years, meaning LTS users are expected to upgrade after every LTS release with a one year buffer.

Ubuntu Studio 22.04 LTS Released

in Known Issues, News, Planet Ubuntu, Release Notes
Apr
21
2022

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

System Settings with Accent Colors (Folder Colors will follow if Backports PPA is added)

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/backports
    • sudo 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/backports
  • sudo 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

Ubuntu Studio 22.04 LTS Beta Released

in Development, Known Issues, News, Planet Ubuntu, Release Notes, Testing
Mar
31
2022

The Ubuntu Studio team is pleased to announce the beta release of Ubuntu Studio 22.04 LTS, codenamed “Jammy Jellyfish”.

While this beta is reasonably free of any showstopper DVD build or installer bugs, you may find some bugs within. This image is, however, reasonably representative of what you will find when Ubuntu Studio 22.04 LTS is released on April 21, 2022.

Ubuntu Studio 22.04 LTS will be Ubuntu Studio’s first Long-Term Support(LTS) release with the KDE Plasma Desktop Environment.

Special notes:

  • Due to the change in desktop environment, directly upgrading to Ubuntu Studio 22.04 LTS from 20.04 LTS is not supported and will not be supported.  However, upgrades from Ubuntu Studio 21.10 will be supported. See the Release Notes for more information. Anecdotally, some people have had success upgrading from 20.04 LTS to a later version, so your mileage may vary.
  • The Ubuntu Studio 22.04 LTS disk image (ISO) exceeds 4.0 GB and cannot be downloaded to some file systems such as FAT32, and may not be readable when burned to a DVD. For this reason, we recommend creating a bootable USB stick with the ISO image.

Images can be obtained from this link: https://cdimage.ubuntu.com/ubuntustudio/releases/22.04/beta/

Full updated information is available in the Release Notes.

New Features

Ubuntu Studio 22.04 LTS includes the new KDE Plasma 5.24 LTS desktop environment. This is a beautiful and functional upgrade to previous versions, and we believe you will like it.

Studio Controls is upgraded to 2.3.0 and includes numerous bug fixes.

OBS Studio is upgraded to version 27.2.3 and works with Wayland sessions. While Wayland is not currently the default, it is available as unsupported and experimental.

There are many other improvements, too numerous to list here. We encourage you to take a look around the freely-downloadable ISO image.

Known Issues

  • At this time, the installer (Calamares) will crash when attempting an installation on a manually-partitioned btrfs file system. (LP: #1966774)
  • MyPaint crashes upon launching (LP: #1967163), may be resolved after an update.
  • There are a few cosmetic issues that should be resolved before final release.

Official Ubuntu Studio release notes can be found at https://ubuntustudio.org/ubuntu-studio-22-04-lts-release-notes/

Further known issues, mostly pertaining to the desktop environment, can be found at https://wiki.ubuntu.com/JammyJellyfish/ReleaseNotes/Kubuntu

Additionally, the main Ubuntu release notes contain more generic issues: https://discourse.ubuntu.com/t/jammy-jellyfish-release-notes/24668

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: Does KDE Plasma use more resources than your former desktop environment (Xfce)?
A: In our testing, the increase in resource usage is negligible, and our optimizations were never tied to the desktop environment.

Q: Does Ubuntu Studio contain snaps?
A: Yes. Mozilla’s distribution agreement with Canonical changed, and Ubuntu was forced to no-longer distribute Firefox in a native .deb package. We have found that, after initial launch, Firefox performs just as well as the native .deb package did.

Q: If I install this Beta release, will I have to reinstall when the final release comes out?
A: No. If you keep it updated, your installation will automatically become the final release.

Q: Will you make an ISO with {my favorite desktop environment}?
A: To do so would require creating an entirely new flavor of Ubuntu, which would require going through the Official Ubuntu Flavor application process. Since we’re completely volunteer-run, we don’t have the time or resources to do this. Instead, we recommend you download the official flavor for the desktop environment of your choice and use Ubuntu Studio Installer to get Ubuntu Studio.

Please Test!

This release we are participating in Ubuntu Testing Week, which begins as soon as this beta is released. During this testing cycle we will work with the amazing folks at the Ubuntu Hideout Discord (https://discord.gg/ubuntu). They have created a #testing-cycles channel in Discord and had a very good response with users coming forward and helping with testing. They have expressed a desire to have the Ubuntu Hideout Discord community make an even greater impact during this release.

Whether or not you choose to participate on Discord is up to you. If you do find something that is a legitimate bug, please open a terminal and type “ubuntu-bug (package name)” to file the bug report since this collects valuable information we need when debugging. If you get a popup while something is running saying that something has crashed, don’t hesitate to click on the “send bug report” button.

A New Logo for Ubuntu Studio

in News, Planet Ubuntu
Mar
25
2022

Many of you may have seen Ubuntu’s post about their logo refresh. Since Ubuntu Studio is a part of Ubuntu, we decided to follow suit.

Beginning with the release of Ubuntu Studio 22.04 LTS, you will notice a new logo in the startup and splash screens, along with the website. These changes can be seen on the Ubuntu Studio Daily Builds and will be on the Ubuntu Studio 22.04 LTS Beta image.

You will see two variations of this logo. Here’s the inline variation, both old and new:

Here’s the stacked variation:

This will be the first update in over 12 years. We realize not everyone will like this update, but we hope it grows on you.

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