BOSTON, Mass — March 31, 2010 — The GNOME Project is proud to
announce GNOME 2.30, the latest stable release of the popular Free
Software desktop environment and applications suite. GNOME 2.30
builds on previous GNOME releases and brings hundreds of
improvements for users and developers, including enhancements for
user management, Web browsing, support for Facebook chat, and new
productivity features.
GNOME contributors have added improvements across the board for
GNOME 2.30 in accessibility, productivity applications, Web
browsing, instant messaging, and games. This release includes
hundreds of new features, enhancements, and improvements over the
GNOME 2.28 release from September 2009.
“I’m really pleased with all of the updates in GNOME 2.30,” said
Stormy Peters, GNOME Executive Director. “I’m excited that I can
automatically sync my Tomboy notes between my desktop and laptop
computer, easily configure Facebook chat in Empathy instant
messenger, and do more with PDFs in Evince. GNOME 2.30 provides
everything I need for work and play.”
The GNOME Project thrives by consistently improving on previous
releases while retaining compatibility and delivering a
user-friendly desktop environment and applications twice a year.
GNOME combines a commitment to Free Software with a focus on
usability and working well with downstream projects to deliver a
high-quality suite of free software.
“GNOME’s commitment to usability, quality and predictable
delivery is a key contributor to Ubuntu’s success,” said Mark
Shuttleworth, founder of Canonical. “GNOME sets the standard for a
diverse and vibrant community that shares the goal of a Free
desktop that is both familiar to users from any computing
background, and also innovative. Congratulations to the project on
this significant release.”
The 2.30 release contains significant user-visible improvements,
adding numerous platform improvements for developers, and builds
towards the upcoming GNOME 3.0 release with a preview of the
revolutionary GNOME Shell. GNOME Shell, which will replace the
existing GNOME Panel, changes the way users will interact with the
desktop.
“I’d like to congratulate the GNOME project on a state of the
art GNOME 2.30 desktop release,” said Andreas Jaeger, program
manager of openSUSE for Novell. “I’m glad that we are able to
include it in our next release and also have it available for easy
installation on openSUSE 11.2. We’ll be providing packages via the
openSUSE Build Service to allow users to easily test drive the
upcoming GNOME 3.0 features like the GNOME Shell.”
GNOME 2.30 is immediately available via GNOME Live Media, and
will soon be available from the many vendors and projects that
support GNOME.
“The GNOME environment and platform have been a central part of
Fedora’s releases since our earliest days. Over that time, GNOME
has matured into a vital and healthy project that consistently
combines simple, beautiful, user-friendly features and a robust
platform for community-driven development,” said Paul Frields,
Fedora Project Leader. “It’s a point of great pride that Fedora
community members including Red Hat’s Desktop engineering team have
contributed significantly to GNOME. I’m excited that we’re already
involved in planning for the next generation of desktop
technologies, including GNOME, that will help us build the free
software desktop of the future.”
GNOME is also committed to delivering a Free desktop for all
users, and translations and Accessibility work is an important part
of the GNOME 2.30 release. This release includes a number of
improvements in GNOME’s Orca Screen Reader that improve performance
and use on netbooks, and platform improvements to ready GNOME’s
Accessibility interface for GNOME 3.0. The 2.30 release also
delivers comprehensive support for more than 50 languages, and
partial support for many others.
“I’m extremely excited with the number of different languages
currently supported by GNOME,” said Og Maciel, Foresight Linux
Community Manager. “If there is one single feat about GNOME 2.30
that I’m proud of is the great work done by the Asturian and
Shavian translation teams! We now have more than 50 different
languages with at least 80% of the user interface translated, which
means that more people will be able to enjoy their favorite desktop
environment in their native tongue!”
About GNOME and the GNOME Foundation
GNOME is a free-software project whose goal is to develop a
complete, accessible and easy to use desktop for Linux and
Unix-based operating systems. GNOME also includes a complete
development environment to create new applications. It is released
twice a year on a regular schedule.
The GNOME desktop is used by millions of people around the
world. GNOME is a standard part of all leading GNU/Linux and Unix
distributions, and is popular with both large existing corporate
deployments and millions of small business and home users
worldwide.
Composed of hundreds of volunteer developers and
industry-leading companies, the GNOME Foundation is an organization
committed to supporting the advancement of GNOME. The Foundation is
a member directed, non-profit organization that provides financial,
organizational and legal support to the GNOME project and helps
determine its vision and roadmap.
More information about GNOME and the GNOME Foundation can be
found at www.gnome.org and
foundation.gnome.org.
Media Enquiries
-
GNOME Foundation Executive Director
Stormy Peters
Email: gnome-press-contact@gnome.orgPhone: +1-617-206-3947