Ubuntu as project in Google Summer of Code 2010

By boredandblogging | Published: 2010-03-12

I’m very excited to announce that Ubuntu has applied as participating organisation in the Google Summer of Code 2010!

We submitted an organisational application, along with suggested ideas for potential projects for students. We also encourage students to come up with their own ideas.

If you’re a student interested in Open Source (or if you know students who are), now is the time to act to get involved in Google’s wonderful Summer of Code program.

Also, if you are thinking about becoming a student’s mentor please visit:

https://wiki.ubuntu.com/GoogleSoC2010

Make sure you read all the necessary information carefully and join the IRC channel and mailing list for more discussion.

The timeline is as follows:

  • The list of accepted Mentoring Organisations will be announced on March 18, 2010 at 12 noon PDT / 19:00 UTC and will be posted on the Google Summer of Code 2010 site.
  • The student application period begins March 29, 2010 at 12 noon PDT / 19:00 UTC and ends April 9, 2010 at 12:00 at 12 noon PDT / 19:00 UTC. Please see the Google Summer of Code 2010 timeline and FAQs for further information.

[Discuss Ubuntu and the Google Summer of Code 2010 on the Forum]

Originally sent to the ubuntu-devel-announce mailing list by Daniel Holbach on Fri Mar 12 09:59:16 GMT 2010

1st Annual Ubuntu Women Project "How I discovered Ubuntu." International Women's Day Competition Winners announced

By boredandblogging | Published: 2010-03-10

March 8, 2010 – 1st Annual Ubuntu Women Project "How I discovered Ubuntu." International Women’s Day Competition

The Competition which was announced back in January, asked women and girls who use Ubuntu to submit their "How I discovered Ubuntu" stories. We as a Project acknowledge that there is no one definite answer to "How do you get women to use Ubuntu?", but wanted a way to highlight some of the various ways that women become Ubuntu users, contributors, and developers and at the same time not only have those stories as examples but also as a growing gift of encouragement and inspiration to women.

In order for events/competitions to be successful it takes community participation, and a heart felt thank you to all those who participated by submitting their personal "How I discovered Ubuntu." stories, those who took the time to vote, those who helped promote, and those who supported this initiative as well as offer encouragement to those might not have submitted their stories otherwise. I am grateful for everyone involved in the Ubuntu Women Project and greater Ubuntu Community as a whole who are continually helping to provide both the platform and encouragement for women to contribute to Ubuntu.

The winners of an awesome prize pack are: Elvira Martinez and Karen Y. Perez with honorable mention going to Jen Phillips as well. CONGRATULATIONS!!!! Here are there stories:

***Elvira Martinez "tatica1" ***

Today my Honduran team mate Diego Turcios shared with me this link to Amber’s blog that excited me to finally write about how I met Ubuntu. I wanted to share this a while ago but I feel motivated about doing it through Ubuntu-women and not just for the sole interest in participating in the contest. I think it will be very interesting to hear how other women became interested in Ubuntu and others may be interested in my experience, specially considering that I am not the “computer girl” precisely.

After nearly 20 years after my high school graduation in Colombia Lycée Français Paul Valery, I found again one of my classmates through Facebook (I guess) Fabian Rodriguez known as MagicFab who after asking him what he was doing today, he mentioned Ubuntu as part of his activities. And I say activities, because Ubuntu is much more than an operating system.

I’ve always liked the world of computer science and unfortunately that was not what I studied, but I learned on my own how to manage, fix, clean my home machines. I could say that the world of computers is my passion and when Fabian told me about this, I knew it was no fluke.

I remember the first thing I said was: Ubuntu what?? How do you eat that?? And then after a brief speach about it and some information he sent to me to read on the subject, dropped his usual phrase, “If you want to install it, I can help you do it now”. Well, two days later, I was harrassing Fabian to help me install Ubuntu after a bunch of questions I had.

Some of my concerns were:

  1. If I would be able to use MSN and Skype with camera and audio included.
  2. My biggest question was if I could run iTunes on the computer (tool my daughters and my husband use).
  3. If Windows had to be removed to use Ubuntu.
  4. If I’ll have Office, PowerPoint or Excel with Ubuntu also and if so, would be so easy to use as those.
  5. If I was going to be able to install Ubuntu alone, long distance with Fabian’s instructions.

Well, the day I gave a YES myself to Ubuntu, began with a phone call from Fabian from Canada. After downloading into my own computer some files, we start by checking whether they were good and then install it. I remember Fabian told me, don’t install it yet first test it. Then after his explanations that I could partition the computer and leave Windows intact but also have Ubuntu too I said “Let’s do it and install it now”. And so it was, on the phone, with his help, that I installed for the first time in one of my computers Hardy 8.04 and some months later in another Ubuntu 8.10.

When he finally said, “Take a last click and you’re done, finished,” I could not believe it!! First, I had allowed to risk to install another operating system on my computer and two, that I had done through instructions by telephone. That meant that it could be do so easily! That’s how my story began with Ubuntu in June 2008 : D

Months later I bought an Acer Aspire One that came with Linpus and my next challenge was to install Ubuntu on it. It was a laptop (and not a desktop) and needed a version for netbooks so I tried first to fight with LPIA platform with which I ended up frustrated because after installing it did not work and gave me error. Then it was new to me to download an ISO file to my laptop and also install it throught a USB. I think it was two weeks without my computer, sweating and suffering, but with some help of several friends of the Honduran community I finally had Ubuntu on my Acer. I remember I installed 8.10 version which gave me enough slow problems on my laptop, but when I upgraded to 9.10, I was sooo happy;)

From Ubuntu, I further research, looking and learning how to move in the Ubuntu world. As part of that and then again by MagicFab’s suggestions I learned how to participate via IRC in different communities, to tell my experiences with applications in Ubuntu, I dared to start my own blog for the first time telling my experience with the Ubuntu Desktop Course (elearning), learned to use my blog as a tool through which I can inform others about Ubuntu, participating in lists of the communities I belong and learned how to handle wiki, blueprint and documentation pages to share information to others.

Today I am part of the community and am in several team where I hope to be able to support as I learn from everyone’s experiences too. I am a member in the communities of Ubuntu Honduras, Colombia, Women, Guatemala and El Salvador. Almost daily I am present in IRC channels of Honduras, Colombia and Women getting feedback and contributing wherever I can. I still can not work actively participate in all these media but try to do when I feel more confident about the subject. English is my third language, so I am kind of shy in the ubuntu-women channel.

Today I know that there is Free Software and Ubuntu exists there with all its benefits over other systems. I also know that although I did not study computers, I can handle and learn thousands of things about it and help knowing others that will benefit too.

Today I belong and work hand by hand with others in the Honduras Ubuntu community, promoting Ubuntu in the country, mostly in San Pedro Sula where I currently reside. With the support Fabian gave me, I revived the group that was practically abandoned and we are trying again today to show people of Honduras that Ubuntu is the best choice when it comes to choosing an operating system. Every day I try to learn more and see how I can support other Ubuntu users here and elsewhere. I am very excited to be part of this team and I love to learn and collaborate with this good cause;)

Since I started being part of this community, I had the opportunity to share with others from other distros like Fedora or Debian. There is little that I have experienced them, but for now I’m only interested in Ubuntu.

My name is Elvira Martinez or tatica1 as I I’m known in the community and my main challenge is to convince my daughters and my husband that Ubuntu is the best choice when we talk about operating systems.

***Karen Y. Perez***

When I was a little girl i saw my dad studying computer science to eventually working on projects. Like most little girls I admire my dad more than anyone in the world and I always tried to be just like him. I read many books like him, I begged for my own laptop and fell in love with space. Since then my passion for science, math and technology developed. There were moments where I loved chemistry more than physics and times where math was better than astronomy. But, my passion for computers never faded once. Each year I pleaded my dad to teach me how to program because his code was like a puzzle i need to understand. So, every so often he would teach me bits and pieces but only enough to keep my curiosity afloat and have me do my own research. One day I stumbled across one of my dad’s Unix books in his library. I didn’t really understand much at the time so I tried my very best to read it and eventually I did some research on-line. While doing my research I read about Linux and I saw what the open source revolution was all about. I taught myself as much as I could and I decided to convert my laptop to Linux for the first time in ‘09. Ubuntu has helped me with my studies in computer science and helped me stay open to new things of course including technologies. The last thing a geek needs is to not want to explore outside of the box. I guess you can say I’m a self pro-claimed fem-geek and I couldn’t imagine life any other way. Although, I am no professional yet I do try to talk to other girls and show them how great of an experience using Linux Ubuntu is as well as many other great “geeky” technologies. I hope to one day show young girls that there is more to life than fashion. That you can be as “fashionable” as Barbie and yet be an astronaut.

***Jen Phillips***

Learning to Fly

Some years ago, I used to travel everywhere by bus. The company that ran it was called Microsoft, and I used the Number 3.1. It generally got me where I needed to be, but it took a bit of an odd route to get there, and it would often stop at seemingly random points. If I fancied a change, I could take my walkman, or a book. It wasn’t the most comfortable ride, but it did ok, and I was used to it. After a while, the company decided to upgrade all their busses and change all the routes – and put the fares up. I went onto the Number 95, and everything looked nice and shiny, although I missed my stop a couple of times because I wasn’t used to the route. After a while I realised that although the route didn’t take the same detours, it took new ones, so I didn’t really get where I was going any faster. The busses all seemed to get a bit dingy after a while, too. Still, I had my CD walkman, and it became familiar again.

Eventually, I took the plunge, and got a car. I loved the freedom – I could go where I wanted to go, when I wanted to go. I wasn’t constrained by having to have the right money, and I didn’t have to stop for the sake of everyone else. It was a SuSE, and it was mine and I loved it. Except, any time anything went wrong I had to ask for help. When the radio stopped working, I had to get someone else to fix it. If i couldn’t find a particular stick or button, I had to get someone to show me where it was. It also wouldn’t play any of my old CDs. In short, it was frustrating. I tried a couple of other cars, but they weren’t any better. I took ages getting my Debian to even start, and somehow had a knack for stalling it before I got to the end of the street. Eventually, I gave up and went back to the bus – the XP route now had air conditioning and contoured seats, and I could cope with the delays (and occasional breakdowns) because it did tend to get me there in the end.

Then one day, something quite miraculous happened: someone gave me a pair of wings. In only a couple of lessons, I was flying! I no longer have to wait for the bus, and I don’t need a mechanic to come and rescue me any more. If I want different music, I can just pick up a media player and set it going. If I want to dye my wings a different colour, that’s easy too. I decide which route to take – I’m not even limited by roads any more. The best thing is that flying feels so natural – like walking only better. I call these wings “Ubuntu”.

These story submissions along with all the others are available on the Ubuntu Women Project wiki pages.

Without the efforts of Ubuntu Women Project team member, Melissa Draper, the competition may have never made it to the community, the time and talent she personally put into this competition by drafting the competition as well as writing the voting submission application was awesome! – Thanks Melissa!

It is also important to say thank you to the sponsors of this competition, Rikki Kite, Associate Publisher, Linux Pro and Ubuntu User Magazines, for donating Linux Pro or Ubuntu User Magazine subscriptions (choice of one per winner), to Canonical for donating the Ubuntu Backpacks, notebooks, pens, lanyards, pins and T-shirts, at last but not least to Jono Bacon for making the announcement of the winners as well as for copies of Art of Community.

Again, Congratulations to the winners of the prize packs as well as all those who submitted your person Ubuntu discovery stories. I can’t wait to read the submissions for the 2nd Annual Ubuntu Women Project “How I discovered Ubuntu.” International Women’s Day Competition, so mark your calendars and work on YOUR personal discovery of Ubuntu to help celebrate 100 years of International Women’s Day.

REMINDER: If you or someone you know would like to find out more information about the Ubuntu Women Project there are several ways to do so – website, mailing list, IRC channel(s), and Ubuntu Women Forums

[Discuss the International Women’s Day Competition Winners on the Forum]

Originally sent to the ubuntu-news-team mailing list by Amber Graner on Tue Mar 9 04:46:28 GMT 2010

Interview with Emma Jane Hogbin

By boredandblogging | Published: 2010-03-08

Amber Graner: Today we talk to Emma Jane Hogbin, Technical Author, HiCKTech creator, Drupal Guru, Ubuntu Member and the list goes on. Before I want to say thank you for taking the time to tell us about your journey into the Ubuntu Project. Emma can you tell us a little about when and how you got involved in FOSS? Also, How and when did you get involved with the Ubuntu Project?

Emma Jane Hogbin: When I first graduated from university I chatted with various companies to find out what kind of work I wanted to do. (My degree is in Environmental Science, but I took a job as a project manager for a Web design company that specialized in web sites for environmental groups.) One of the companies that I met with had an entire shelf of Adobe software boxes. I made a comment about warez sites, and the owner of the company responded by saying that carpenters don't steal their hammers. My father is a wood worker, so this hit home in exactly the right way for me. From that point on I started looking into free and open source tools.

I spent a year using only FOSS software on Windows before making the final switch to the Linux desktop (Debian). I immediately had problems with my laptop and had to patch and recompile my kernel. The Debian mailing list encouraged me to write up the steps I'd taken to fix my problem. Werner Heuser (tuxmobil.org) encouraged me to publish them with the Linux Documentation Project. From that point on I have been at least peripherally involved in the desktop communities for the distro that I use.

AG: Emma you are involved in so many wonderful projects; you took part in Ubuntu Open Week (https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UbuntuOpenWeek) with a session on "Writing a Book" (https://wiki.ubuntu.com/MeetingLogs/openweekKarmic/WriteBook). Can you tell us about your Drupal Book and other technical writings you have done.

EJH: Front End Drupal, my first book with a Real Publisher, has been a fantastic journey. I love teaching. It isn't so much about being the authority though. I love it when my students leap beyond what I've said and make their own predictions about how things work. Front End Drupal isn't your typical computer book. It has lots of little bits to keep the reader interested. From ponies, kittens, and ducks to pirates, orks and hobbits, Front End Drupal is actually a "readable" book.

I don't always inject my sense of humour into my technical writing though. When I'm contributing to a collected work (such as a documentation project) I tend to be more "straight" in my writing style. This makes it easier for other contributors, and also for the reader who may be jumping in and out of the documentation at various points. To date I've contributed documentation to a number of open source projects including Bazaar, Drupal, The Linux Documentation Project, and Ubuntu.

AG: Your HiCK Tech site is full of amazing classes? First what is HiCK Tech the conference? What is HiCK Tech the Company? How did you come up with the idea behind it? And What Classes are offered there.

EJH: HICK Tech the conference is a one-day rural technology forum that addresses How the Internet Connects Knowledge. The goal is to highlight the amazing achievements in rural technology (including bovine breeding, and linking remote hospitals to track disease); but also to share some of the innovative "high tech" things that happen in the big city. I live in a rural community and felt isolated from all of the conferences that were happening in big cities. Instead of being upset about what I didn't have, I decided to throw myself a conference that had all the elements that were important to me.

From the one-day conference an entire consulting company has emerged (HICK Tech the company). The things that I deal with as a small business in rural Canada are not unique. Open source software can solve nearly all of the problems that are presented to me by my clients. HICK Tech tries to figure out how to pool resources to make technology even more affordable. I've given several talks on my 100 Mile Client Roster and have started to collect this information at www.100mileclientroster.com in an attempt to help other small businesses earn a living in their communities.

The classes that HICK Tech offers all help small businesses get more from technology. The students are small business owners who need to learn specific skills to keep their own Web presence up-to-date. I've also had interest from designers who want to learn open source tools; and entrepreneurs who want to learn how to launch their own Web design business.

AG: The first time I spoke with you was in the Ubuntu Women IRC Channel on Freenode, so I know you are involved in this Project, can you tell us about your involvement with this Project and also are there any other teams/groups/projects that focus on Women in Open Source you are involved in or could recommend.

EJH: My initial involvements with the UW project were focused on moving beyond a gendered social space. While I think these spaces are incredibly important, we are at risk of never moving beyond them to participation in the broader community. Within the UW project I have mostly worked on community advocacy. I encourage other women to step up to their passions and take part in the larger FOSS community. I have actively encouraged women to present at conferences, and to apply for sponsorship to events. I help squash the "I'm not good enough" bug and empower women to feel confident about their abilities, and to ask questions when they need help.

Women should feel welcome in any community they want to be a part of. The reality is that not every community welcomes newcomers with grace. Every contributor to open source projects needs to be able to feel their time and opinions are going to matter. Sometimes it can take a couple of attempts to find someone in a project who will be a good mentor. I encourage everyone to be persistent when they are passionate; but to move on when the fit doesn't feel good.

AG: Are there any other FOSS projects, such as your documentation work, that you are involved in that you would like to take the time to share with everyone?

EJH: I'm really excited about all of the great work that's been happening in the world of documentation. This year I hosted what I believe is the first ever open source documentation conference. We had contributors from many different open source projects and participants from four different countries. Usability is getting a lot of attention these days, and I think it's only a matter of time before people realize how important user help and documentation are to the user experience. The conference will be running again in 2010. People who are passionate about user help and documentation are encouraged to create an account at www.writingopensource.com.

AG: When I read about how you released the pattern for you one of your knitting projects a bell went off for me anyway: GPL can be used for many things only one of which is Operation Systems and Code. I have seen first hand the brilliant and complex knitting projects you work on, and I have seen pictures of the now famous Drupal Socks you have knitted as well. Any plans for some Ubuntu socks, other items? Can you tell us about the GPL license you released the pattern for the socks under?

EJH: Not all community contributions have to be made in front of a computer. It's true, I did knit the Drupal socks. A friend of mine had given me countless hours of free tech support to help me with some Drupal problems I was having. As thanks, I knit him a pair of Drupal socks.

Druplicon, the mascot, is licensed under the GPL. I felt it was only fair to release my "code" back into the commons under the same license that made it legally possible for me to knit the socks. The pattern is available from http://www.emmajane.net/craft/drupal. It has been featured at many DrupalCon conferences as well as in CRAFTzine (http://craftzine.com/). I don't have any plans to knit other logo items, and if I did it would only have to be an open source image that I was replicating. Crafters who are interested in creating logoed items may find knitPro (http://www.microrevolt.org/knitPro/) useful. This software was definitely part of my toolkit when I first created the sock pattern.

Crazy things like socks are a great way to show people that it's not just the code that matters, the part that really matters is the passion to volunteering in whatever way suits you best. Knitting the socks has given the Drupal project far more exposure than if I'd contributed the same amount of time in code patches. We need to embrace all positive contributions—no matter how wacky they seem.

AG: Also can you tell folks about the award you created and the process in creating the award.

EJH: This fall I created a tech award at my local high school. It was remarkably easy. This year's recipient, Sadie Hewgill, is now enrolled in Systems Design Engineering at the University of Waterloo. She was granted the award for demonstrating creative use of technology. I created the award because I wanted a simple way to make one girl feel proud of her technology-related accomplishments. The only way to affect real change is when each person you reach out to feels personally connected to the change you are seeking.

The award I created isn't about having the best marks or winning buckets of cash. It's about being excited about technology; creating award winning technologists; and about having an entire gymnasium of people clap because you did something special. On my blog I wrote up the steps I took to create the award (www.emmajane.net/howto/create-award). I hope it will inspire others to find creative ways to encourage even more girls to stay interested in the skilled trades and IT.

AG: FOSS contributor, Author, Conference Planner, Mentor, Savvy Businesswoman, to Community Contributor both in your hometown and the FOSS communities, is there anything I have left off of forgotten to mention that you would like to tell people about?

EJH: I think you've covered everything. As always, you've asked great questions. Thanks, Amber!

AG: Emma thank you so much for taking the time to wear yet another hat in the roll of interviewee and spend some time sharing a little about you and your adventures in, and around the Ubuntu and FOSS Communities. I always walk away having learned something from every conversation we have. It is my hope that others will be inspired by the things that you do and are involved in, just as I continue to be. Thank you for all you do and thank you again for your time with this interview series.

[Discuss Emma Jane Hogbin’s Interview on the Forum]

Originally posted by Amber Graner in Full Circle Magazine Issue #32 on January 1, 2010

Ubuntu Weekly Newsletter #183

By boredandblogging | Published: 2010-03-07

Welcome to the Ubuntu Weekly Newsletter. This is Issue #183 for the week February 28th – March 6th, 2010 and is available here.

In this issue we cover:

* Mark Shuttleworth: “Light” the new look of Ubuntu
* Announcing the 10.10 Ubuntu Developer Summit
* UI Freeze in place for Lucid
* Developer Membership Board meeting
* International Women's Day Vote
* Ubuntu Stats
* Getting Patches Upstream
* The Grand App Writing Challenge Submissions!
* Server Bug Zapping results
* Ubuntu Classroom Team presents “ClassBot”
* In the Press & Blogosphere
* February 2010 Team Reports
* Upcoming Meetings & Events
* Updates & Security
* And much, much more!

This issue of The Ubuntu Weekly Newsletter is brought to you by:

* John Crawford
* Craig A. Eddy
* Dave Bush
* Amber Graner
* Liraz Siri
* Nathan Handler
* And many others

If you have a story idea for the Weekly News, join the Ubuntu News Team mailing list and submit it. Ideas can also be added to the wiki!

Except where otherwise noted, content in this issue is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License BY SA Creative Commons License

Refreshing the Ubuntu Brand

By boredandblogging | Published: 2010-03-03

Ubuntu has seen a tremendous amount of growth and change since it was conceived in 2004. Back then it was a small project with strong ambitions and a handful of developers passionate about delivering a world class Linux Operating System that can compete on every level with Microsoft and Apple. We adopted a style based on the tagline “Linux for Human Beings”, and called it “Human”. Six years on we have made incredible progress. Ubuntu is a global phenomenon: we have carved out a pervasive culture of quality and design, thoughtful usability and great technology all fused together in a project that maintains the same commitment to community and collaborative development that we embraced back in 2004.

In 2009, a small team lead by Mark Shuttleworth, conducted a review of our key brand values and identity. Based on that work, a set of visual treatments were produced, and shared with key members of the Ubuntu Art community, spanning the core distributions, derivatives, and aligned efforts like the Forums. Representatives from Ubuntu, Kubuntu, Edubuntu, Xubuntu, Mythbuntu, SpreadUbuntu and more came to London and worked with the Canonical design team to refine the designs and work together. The results of that work are presented here.

This collection of community representatives worked with the design team and created some great work. Some examples:

In addition to this we also worked with our key governance boards: the Community Council, Technical Board, Forums Council, LoCo Council and others around this work to ensure that our community can use it to it’s best advantage.

Brand Values

The key values we believe are reflected in the Ubuntu project are:

  • Precision. We ship high quality software, and we ship it exactly on schedule. Our Debian heritage means that the individual components of our platform are tightly defined and neatly arranged. There is no excess, no fat, and no waste in Ubuntu. We are a community that thrives on delivery.

  • Reliability. We are building Ubuntu for serious use. Whether it is being deployed on the desktop or in the cloud, we care that Ubuntu is secure, reliable and predictable. We deliver updates to Ubuntu that are rigorously tested. When we make a mistake, we learn from it and put in place good processes to ensure that it does not happen again.

  • Collaboration. Ubuntu is the result of collaborative work between thousands of people, and it is both the beneficiary and the public face of the collaborative work of tens of thousands of free software developers who build individual upstream components, or aggregate them in Debian. We go to great lengths to ensure that anybody, anywhere, who is passionate about Ubuntu and competent to participate, can do so. We enable virtual participation in our physical Ubuntu Developer Summits, we use mailing lists and IRC in preference to over-the-cubicle-wall communications, and we welcome contributions from both companies and individuals. Our governance bodies reflect the diversity of that participation, and leadership or permissions are based on proven merit, not corporate employment.

  • Freedom. We strive to deliver the very best free software platform. Our highest mission is to accelerate the adoption and spread of free software, to make it the de facto standard way that people build and consume software. We celebrate the work of other groups committed to collaborative content development, and open content licensing. While we are pragmatic about this (we ship proprietary drivers when we believe they are a requirement to get free software working well on PC’s) we expressly do not include any proprietary applications in the default installation of Ubuntu. We want people to love and appreciate free software, and even though we work to make sure that Ubuntu is compatible with, certified with and iteroperable with popular proprietary software, we do so to facilitate the adoption of free alternatives to proprietary solutions.

While the branding has changed, the freedoms and rights have not: our global community will still maintain access to the resources needed to construct logos that use the branding. We will be providing the new font, images, colour specs, and a set of recommendations for creating branding for websites, t-shirts and the other needs of our community. As before we will protect the integrity of the Ubuntu brand with the Ubuntu Trademark Policy.

Light: Ubuntu is Lightware

The new style in Ubuntu is inspired by the idea of “Light”.

We’re drawn to Light because it denotes both warmth and clarity, and intrigued by the idea that “light” is a good value in software. Good software is “light” in the sense that it uses your resources efficiently, runs quickly, and can easily be reshaped as needed. Ubuntu represents a break with the bloatware of proprietary operating systems and an opportunity to delight to those who use computers for work and play. More and more of our communications are powered by light, and in future, our processing power will depend on our ability to work with light, too.

Visually, light is beautiful, light is ethereal, light brings clarity and comfort.

Historical perspective: From 2004-2010, the theme in Ubuntu was “Human”. Our tagline was “Linux for Human Beings” and we used a palette reflective of the full range of humanity. Our focus as a project was bringing Linux from the data center into the lives of our friends and global family.

Go and see the full details of the brand refresh here, with more images.