Gnome is Celebrating it’s 20th Birthday
More than 33 releases since the first release of Gnome.
Gnome was started by Miguel de Icaza and Federico Mena Quintero on August 15, 1997. The primary goal of the project was to create a fully open source alternative of KDE, which was based on Qt widget toolkit that used a non-free licence back then.
Since its initial release in 1999, there have been 33 stable releases of GNOME till date. While Linux caters to power users, developers and sysadmins who prefer CLI, Gnome focuses on ease of use. No wonder Ubuntu, a distribution that targeted PC users picked Gnome as the default desktop environment.
Gnome has made some significant progress in the Linux desktop space with the 3.x family. They have built a distro agnostic software center that allows users of any distro to not only install and update applications, but also update the distribution itself.
Gnome also brought the capability of accessing Google Drive from within Linux desktops, a feature that’s not officially supported by Google.
No wonder that even the creator of Linux, Linus Torvalds runs Gnome as his favorite desktop.
Gnome used to be the default desktop environment for Ubuntu, before Canonical introduced its own Unity shell. As a result of that decision, Gnome lost millions of users. But recently, Canonical decided to pull out of desktop space and focus on enterprise. They ditched Unity and went back to Gnome. That means Gnome will return to millions of Ubuntu desktop users.
Happy 20th Birthday, Gnome.
Issue 268/2023
Buy this issue as a PDF
Subscribe to our Linux Newsletters
Find Linux and Open Source Jobs
Subscribe to our ADMIN Newsletters
Find SysAdmin Jobs
News
-
SparkyLinux 6.6 Now Available for Installation
The Debian-based SparkyLinux has a new point release that retools the live USB desktop creator and other changes that give it shiny new-ness.
-
SparkyLinux 6.6 Now Available for Installation
The Debian-based SparkyLinux has a new point release that retools the live USB desktop creator and other changes that give it shiny new-ness.
-
Escuelas Linux 8.0 Now Available
Just in time for its 25th anniversary, the developers of Escuelas Linux have released the latest version.
-
LibreOffice 7.5 Loaded with New Features and Improvements
The favorite office suite of the Linux community has a new release that includes some visual refreshing and new features across all modules.
-
The Next Major Release of Elementary OS Has Arrived
It's been over a year since the developers of elementary OS released version 6.1 (Jólnir) but they've finally made their latest release (Horus) available with a renewed focus on the user.
-
KDE Plasma 5.27 Beta Is Ready for Testing
The latest beta iteration of the KDE Plasma desktop is now available and includes some important additions and fixes.
-
Netrunner OS 23 Is Now Available
The latest version of this Linux distribution is now based on Debian Bullseye and is ready for installation and finally hits the KDE 5.20 branch of the desktop.
-
New Linux Distribution Built for Gamers
With a Gnome desktop that offers different layouts and a custom kernel, PikaOS is a great option for gamers of all types.
-
System76 Beefs Up Popular Pangolin Laptop
The darling of open-source-powered laptops and desktops will soon drop a new AMD Ryzen 7-powered version of their popular Pangolin laptop.
-
Nobara Project Is a Modified Version of Fedora with User-Friendly Fixes
If you're looking for a version of Fedora that includes third-party and proprietary packages, look no further than the Nobara Project.