Ubuntu's Next Unity Begins to Take Shape

17.08.2011
With the possible exception of , few recent innovations in the Linux world have proven as controversial as the Unity desktop included in "

Canonical founder Mark Shuttleworth may have argued that Unity was designed to , but many users--particularly the experienced ones--didn't seem to see it that way. My own take is that Unity is a great desktop , who will surely see something familiar and reassuring in its smartphone-style interface.

Whatever your thoughts about the current Unity, however, be prepared to change them, because the Ubuntu team is now hard at work on the next version, which will appear in , this October.

In a Tuesday this week, Shuttleworth outlined some of the latest efforts and developments on the new Unity project so far, providing an exciting glimpse at what's to come this fall. In particular, he discussed how the Unity desktop's Dash interface is shaping up and provided a of its appearance so far.

Ready for a run-down of some of the key changes? Here we go.

1. Instead of 'Places,' 'Scopes' and 'Lenses'