Ubuntu 15.04: Desktop, Phone and IoT; towards a converged future

• Ubuntu 15.04 desktop extends leadership of developer experience
• Snappy Ubuntu Core on general availability for the first time
• New developer tools allow immediate and constant access to latest updates

London – 21 April, 2015. Ubuntu 15.04, the latest release from Canonical, will be available for download this week with updates across the desktop, phone, cloud and IoT ecosystem. Ubuntu 15.04 is the advanced developers’ favourite platform today, and presents a fully converged platform spanning cloud, device and client.

Desktop

Ubuntu is the favourite environment for Linux developers, celebrated in products such as the Dell XPS 13 Developer Edition. This release introduces new tools for cloud and IoT development as well as making the desktop more productive with integrated menus and dashboard usability improvements.

Since 2008, Ubuntu desktop has been pre-installed on 40 million PCs worldwide and continues to grow in popularity as one of the world’s most easy-to-use and reliable operating systems available today. Ubuntu preloaded devices are growing in popularity in regions such as EMEA, India, South East Asia and Latin America, as well as being the high-end developer platform of choice in the West, with incredible machines such as the NVidia DevBox for advanced machine learning and visualization engineering.

One of the key highlights in this release is the way in which developers are afforded immediate access to the most exciting and innovative software for their development on cloud, mobile and web.

Ubuntu Developer Tools Centre has become Ubuntu Make, enabling developers of mobile apps, web applications and games, with support for 14 new platforms including:

•  Android NDK & Android Studio updated to the latest release
• Other new IDEs: IDEA (ultimate and community editions), pycharm (professional, educational and community editions), webstorm, rubymine, phpstorm and eclipse
• Firefox developer edition
• Stencyl game development platform

Ubuntu Make provides a fresh, well-isolated development environment for every application so developers don’t have to worry about messing up up their installation if they want to install pipy, npm, rubygem libraries. Ubuntu’s leadership in containers and containment enable fantastic developer experiences on modern workstations and laptops.

LibreOffice 4.4 brings increased business productivity, including the addition of improved change tracking to Writer, enhanced mail merge performance and improved shapes which can now have fully formatted content with tables. Support for digitally signed PDF exports is a new addition with 15.04, as is support for connecting to Sharepoint and OneDrive. Some other updates of note include:

• Addition of statistics functions in Calc and password protected documents in Impress
• Improved OpenGL
• Support for slide transitions in Impress and Draw

Ubuntu Kylin 15.04

For Ubuntu Kylin users, locally integrated menus and click-to-minimise are now incorporated alongside upgrades to features applications such as Ubuntu Kylin Software Center, Youker Assistant, Youker Weather to name a few.

Youker Assistant V2.0.2 features a new user interface, allows better management of personal applications and enables users to contribute directly to translation of package descriptions directly from the Ubuntu Software Centre.

Pinyin users can install vocabularies directly from the Sogou website.

Internet of Things: Snappy on Devices

‘Snappy’ Ubuntu Core is the smallest and most secure edition of Ubuntu. It is a super-lean, transactionally updated version of Ubuntu, perfect for inventors, technologists and the active and growing Ubuntu developer community, for cloud container hosts and smart, connected devices. It powers drones, robots, network switches, mobile base stations, industrial gateways, and IoT home hubs.

“This is an amazing platform for the new generation of cloud and device developers” said Dustin Kirkland, product manager for Ubuntu Core. “The combination of an open platform with an app store that works across a very wide range of devices, from tiny embedded boards to high end switches and routers, has stimulated a rush of creativity in the maker and entrepreneur communities.”

The first stable version of ‘Snappy’ Ubuntu Core is now available as part of 15.04.

This release supports 64-bit Intel-based architectures, as well as ARM HF, providing a crisp common platform for device development that support a very wide range of production hardware.

Ubuntu Phone

Ubuntu 15.04 is the base for the Ubuntu Phone currently shipping on the BQ Aquaris E4.5 and in due course on the Meizu MX4. The latest 15.04 updates will be delivered OTA (over-the-air) in coming weeks meeting Canonical’s commitment to the mobile as an extension of Ubuntu on the desktop and cloud: a secure platform that is always up-to-date.

Ubuntu 15.04 will be available to download from www.ubuntu.com/download from Thursday 23 April.