Future Plans For Ubuntu's Unity Still Being Discussed

Following word earlier this week that "Unity Next" is being written in Qt/QML and that this next-generation Unity desktop will run on the Mir Display Server and be a converged user-interface from phones and tablets to the Ubuntu desktop, more of Unity's future was talked about at the online UDS.

On Wednesday during the online Ubuntu Developer Summit, the Ubuntu user-interface converged for all form factors was one of the focuses for the hour-long session.

Among the takeaways from the session for general users are:

- By Ubuntu 13.05, which would mean availability in May, they hope to have the next-generation Unity tested and running on Mir. As part of this, likely all of the core user-interface will be running via QML.

- Already written in QML is the Unity launcher, HUD, Dash, and Unity Panel.

- Among the TODO items is adding in/back support for theming, orientation support (dynamic portrait/landscape handling), internationalization support, and testing. Porting to QML for doing in the future also includes the switcher and spread components.

- Having the desktop form-factory ready for Unity Next isn't part of the plans until the Phone/Tablet Unity is ready. The estimate is the desktop version of the new Unity will be ready around October. The clear focus by Canonical right now is on the phone/tablet interface.

- Daily packages of Unity Next are still being planned.

The video of the session is embedded below.