Ubuntu 17.10 Artful Aardvark is now available for download
Ubuntu 17.10, codenamed ” Artful Aardvark “, is now available to the public. The new version brings great news for users, starting from the GNOME desktop environment that replaces the deceased Unity.
Canonical announced the official launch of Ubuntu 17.10, the latest version of its operating system with Linux kernels. Among the many innovations brought by this version, the abandonment of the Unity desktop and the return of GNOME are among the most notable.
Despite having chosen to switch to GNOME, Canonical has changed its user experience to make it more similar to that found in Unity. For this, he inserted, for example, a dock on the left side (still movable on the right and bottom sides) and brought the icons to the desktop via extensions that can be disabled by the user.
The kernel chosen is Linux 4.13, to which are added GNOME 3.26 and Wayland as the default graphical server (replaceable with X.org to the choice of session). Ubuntu 17.10 is the first edition not to support 32-bit computers, except by upgrading from previous versions. The swap partition is no longer needed, since Ubuntu will use a file in its place. In terms of user-level software, the default browser is Firefox, and LibreOffice 5.4.1 is pre-installed.
Among the other innovations brought by this version, it is possible to find a better support of the Bluetooth devices and the management of the captive portal (WiFi networks that require authentication to navigate). At the moment, it is unstable the use of multiple screens with the Wayland session; upgrading to GNOME 3.26.2 should bring improvement in this regard.
You can download a bootable image of Ubuntu 17.10 from the official website.
