Hello Linux Geeksters. As a reminder, Mark Shuttleworth’s dream is to make Ubuntu Touch a stable and important mobile operating system, in order to reach a full desktop-mobile convergence with the next Ubuntu versions.
Because the Canonical developers are not able to test all the application updates available in the software center, they forbid the apps to access the user’s private data, for security and privacy reasons. So, the users will be able to see the requirements of the applications, just like on Android, but they will also have the possibility to deny some of the requirements and still use the app, thing which is not possible on Google’s mobile OS.
Ubuntu’s way of protecting the user’s privacy will set a new standard that everyone will have to follow.
Canonical has been working a lot at Ubuntu Touch in the last couple of months. Lately, they have fixed some hud crashes, have patched Mir to be compatible with Nexus 10′s hardware architecture, fixed some Network Manager issues, added support for Unknown calls and SMS messages, fixed the 12h/24h time bug and many others. A while ago, Mark Shuttleworth has announced that Canonical has signed with their first mobile phone manufacturer, and that they are in strong talks with 4 others.
For those who don’t know, Ubuntu Touch is officially supported only on the Google Nexus smartphones and tablets, despite the fact that it has been experimenally ported on OPPO Find 5, Pantech Vega Iron, Xperia Tablet Z and many other phones/tablets. The first stable version of Ubuntu Touch, based on Ubuntu 13.10, has been officially optimized to work on LG Nexus 4, but it is not mature enough to compete with Android yet. After the latest Mir updates, Ubuntu Touch can be successfully installed on all the existing Google Nexus devices: LG Nexus 4, Samsung Galaxy Nexus, Nexus 7 and Nexus 10, except Nexus 5.