GNOME 3.5.3 Bulks On Changes For GNOME 3.6

The latest GNOME 3.5 development release is now available with a lot of changes as the developers prepare to issue the final GNOME 3.6 desktop release in late September.

Some of the changes to be found in this latest GNOME 3.5/3.6 development release include:

- A new interface for Empathy.

- Baobab disk usage analyzer has experienced a near-complete re-write in Vala.

- Clutter has improvements in GridLayout, explicit animation API improvements, and improved touch event support.

- New GTK+ widgets (GtkSearchEntry and GtkMenuButton).

- A new API for the Evolution Data Server. The Evolution change-log for this release begins with "!!! MAJOR DESIGN CHANGES AND API BREAKS IN THIS RELEASE !!!"

- Initial WebKit2 support in the Epiphany web-browser. This WebKit2 support is still under development but by Epiphany 3.6 they hope to have it in a beta quality state. There's also user-interface improvements for the full-screen mode as well as HTML5 full-screen support. Epiphany 3.5.3 has also tacked on "Do Not Track" support.

- Microsoft Exchange is now enabled by default for GNOME Online Accounts as is Facebook.

- GNOME Shell 3.5.3 has seen a variety of improvements.

- The Mutter window manager now has a simplified plug-in system and other changes.

- The Nautilus file manager has seen various improvements.

The latest GNOME 3.5.3 components can be downloaded from the usual location. GNOME 3.6.0 is planned for release in late September (once again, during Oktoberfest). Some of the other GNOME 3.6 features are talked about on the GNOME.org Roadmap.