Ubuntu 8.10 Technical Overview

More information can be found in the Ubuntu wiki.

Totem BBC plugin

Ubuntu 8.10 Beta features a new plugin for the Totem movie player that fetches free digital content from the BBC. To enable it, start Totem (Applications -> Sound & Video -> Movie Player), enable the plugin (Edit -> Plugins -> BBC content viewer) and select "BBC" from the drop-down labelled "Playlist". The feed is fetched from a staging server at the moment so there may be a delay while it is downloaded.

Thanks to the BBC and Collabora for their work developing this feature.

Known Issues

There are several known bugs that users may run into with Ubuntu 8.10 Beta. We have documented them here for your convenience along with any known workarounds.

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A problem that could result in corruption of the firmware on Intel GigE ethernet hardware has led to the disabling of the e1000e driver in the Linux kernel included in Ubuntu 8.10 Beta. Ethernet devices that use this driver cannot be used with Ubuntu 8.10 Beta; support for this hardware will be re-enabled in daily builds immediately after Beta and this issue will be resolved for the Ubuntu 8.10 final release. https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/263555

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Clicking on links in GNOME programs, such as evolution, will not launch firefox automatically due to a bug in a wrapper script used by the firefox-3.0 package. As a workaround, users can launch firefox manually and copy and paste links into the location bar. https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/275410

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NetworkManager 0.7 as included in Ubuntu 8.10 Beta is not compatible with static network configuration in /etc/network/interfaces. New installations are not affected by this issue because NetworkManager will manage all interfaces by default. Users upgrading from previous Ubuntu releases can work around this issue by disabling NetworkManager at startup. https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/256054

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When using the Kubuntu LiveCD, the ubiquity installer hangs at the end of the installation instead of prompting you to reboot. Investigation of this issue is ongoing; as a workaround, you can safely reboot to the new system by hand. https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/270423

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Installing an LTSP server fails with Ubuntu 8.10 beta because the CD is not recognized as an apt source. This will be resolved for the final release. https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/276349

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The Live CD's detection of nVidia hardware incorrectly selects the 'nv' driver even for hardware not supported by that driver, preventing X from running on some systems. This issue will be fixed in daily builds immediately after Beta and will be resolved for the Ubuntu 8.10 final release. https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/261977

Reporting Bugs

Intrepid Ibex Beta has bugs! Your comments, bug reports, patches and suggestions will help fix bugs and improve future releases. After reading the bug-reporting guidelines, please report bugs through the Ubuntu bug tracking system.

If you want to help with bugs, the Bug Squad is always looking for help.

If you plan to do an installation of Intrepid Beta, be sure to head to the Testing page. With just a few minutes of your time, you can really help to improve Ubuntu. We have two different tests; one takes just a short time, and the other is more thorough.

Participate in Ubuntu

If you would like to help shape Ubuntu, take a look at the list of ways you can participate at

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http://www.ubuntu.com/community/participate/

Help Spread the Word About Ubuntu 8.10

A new banner is available that counts down the days until the Ubuntu 8.10 release:

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http://www.ubuntu.com/getubuntu/countdown

You can add the countdown banner to your website to help build excitement for the new release as the date approaches.

More Information

You can find out more about Ubuntu on our website and wiki.

To sign up for future Ubuntu development announcements, please subscribe to Ubuntu's development announcement list at:

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http://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-devel-announce