Ubuntu 'Stonking Stingray' beta swims out: Deeper Rust 'oxidization' plus LLM speech-to-text
GNOME 51 is here, and Ubuntu interim releases are getting interesting again
Ubuntu 26.10, also known as "Stonking Stingray," has entered beta testing, slightly delayed from its original schedule. Though many users will stick with the LTS version, there are some noteworthy features to explore. Some release notes have already been released, but they are not final, and there are still gaps to fill. Canonical highlights that the oxidation process - replacing core Unix tools written in C with Rust replacements - goes further in this edition. The stock OpenPGP encryption support is now provided by the Rust-based Sequoia-PGP.
One of the most daring new features is Canonical's promise to offer an LLM-powered Myna speech-to-text tool. However, this feature is not installed by default; users can choose to add it and select their preferred speech-recognition model. Unfortunately, we were unable to test this feature due to the age of our geriatric testbed.
An update to GNOME 51, known as "A Coruña," is included in both the Ubuntu beta and the default workstation edition of Fedora. However, GNOME 51 has some issues, such as persistent errors about missing themes. Although the OS offers to install missing themes automatically, this process failed intermittently. Despite these issues, the OS functions well overall, with some cosmetic problems related to GNOME themes.
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