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Ubuntu 17.04 Zesty Zapus

Ubuntu 17.04 has been released.

The new version brings updated applications and various under-the-hood improvements, along with bug fixes. As expected, Compiz and Unity have only received minor improvements and bug fixes.

On the other hand, Ubuntu 17.04 includes the GNOME 3.24 stack for the most part (GTK3 along with Totem, Disks, Calendar, and so on). There are some missing bits, but this is still pretty important, as Ubuntu didn't use the latest GNOME since around Ubuntu 11.10 / GNOME 3.2.


Unity and Compiz in Ubuntu 17.04



As you probably know, Ubuntu will switch to GNOME (Shell) by default starting with Ubuntu 18.04 (to be released in April, 2018).

However, even before this announcement, Unity 7 was in maintenance mode, with the focus being Unity 8. It did receive some features, like the option to move the launcher to the bottom in Ubuntu 16.04, but only bug fixes for the most part.

Ubuntu 17.04 (Zesty Zapus) is no different. Both Unity and Compiz only had some minor changes and bug fixes, such as:
  • keep the screen locked if autologin or nopasswdlogin is enabled;
  • if scale-factor is not set, find and set right scale for HiDPI displays;
  • dropped click scope from the default list of favourites;
  • fixed lock screen not covering the entire desktop on HiDPI display with draw-user-backgrounds unchecked;
  • fixed issue that made it impossible to exit screensaver if a menu or application grabs the screen;
  • fixed bug preventing switching to the copy / move dialog;
  • fixed bug that caused users to be asked to unlock the screen twice after closing the guest session;
  • Compiz Move plugin: add options for only showing the window shape (outline, rectangle);
  • Compiz: added option to disable blend in grid plugin.

Complete changelogs for Unity and Compiz.

I should also mention that while Mark Shuttleworth, the founder of Ubuntu and Canonical, has recently said that Canonical is ending their "investment in Unity8", Ubuntu 17.04 ships with an experimental Unity 8 session by default, just like Ubuntu 16.10.

Here's a Unity 8 screenshot I took under Ubuntu 17.04 (by the way, Unity 8 now works in VirtualBox):

Unity 8 Ubuntu 17.04


Defaults and other changes


Ubuntu Software 17.04

Ubuntu 17.04 Zesty Zapus ships with GTK 3.24 and GNOME 3.24 applications for the most part.

Not all the bits were updated to version 3.24 though. The exceptions are Nautilus (3.20), Terminal (3.20), Gedit (3.22), Software (3.22) and Evolution (3.22).

Besides the applications mentioned above, Ubuntu 17.04 ships with Firefox 52.0.1, Thunderbird 45.8.0, LibreOffice 5.3.1, Transmission 2.92, Shotwell 0.22+git, Rhythmbox 3.4.1, Totem 3.24.0, GNOME Disks 3.24.0, GNOME Calendar 3.24, GNOME System Monitor 3.24 and Evince 3.24, on top of Unity 7.5.0 (+17.04.20170407) and Compiz 0.9.13.1 (+17.04.20170109).

Under the hood, Ubuntu 17.04 (Zesty Zapus) ships with Xorg server 1.19.3, Mesa 17.0.3, Ubuntu Linux Kernel 4.10.0-19.21 based on the upstream 4.10 Linux Kernel, PulseAudio 10.0, and systemd 232.

Here's a quick list of changes in the Linux Kernel since the version used in the previous Ubuntu release (Linux 4.8 for Ubuntu 16.10):
  • Linux 4.9 (more information: Kernel Newbies | Phoronix):
    • AMDGPU virtual display support;
    • better AMDGPU GPU reset support;
    • shared data extents and copy-on-write support for XFS;
    • support for new ARM machines, including Raspberry Pi Zero and LG Nexus 5;
  • Linux 4.10 (more information: Kernel Newbies | Phoronix):
    • initial Intel Graphics Virtualization Technology support;
    • improved writeback management;
    • Nouveau Boost support, which allows new graphics cards to go up to their "boost" frequencies, and not just the highest standard frequency;
    • support for Intel Turbo Boost Max 3.0 and Intel Cache Allocation Technology.

Other changes in Ubuntu 17.04:
  • Ubuntu now includes support for printing without printer-specific drivers. Among the supported printers are IPP Everywhere and Apple AirPrint printers, but also some PDF, Postscript, and PCL printers;
  • the default DNS resolver is now systemd-resolved;
  • for new installs, a swap file will be used instead of a swap partition;
  • gconf is no longer installed by default;
  • this release does not include 32bit powerpc.


Download Ubuntu 17.04 (Zesty Zapus)


Download Ubuntu 17.04 | official release notes
(includes instructions for upgrading from older Ubuntu versions)

Important: all non-LTS Ubuntu versions are only supported for 9 months. Ubuntu 17.04 will be supported until January 2018.

Official release notes and download links for the Ubuntu 17.04 desktop flavors:

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