14 DAY TRIAL // The Ubuntu flavors have each announced the period of time for which they are willing to support the new Ubuntu LTS release, but it seems that the support period of the the GNOME flavor was a little too short for Canonical's liking.
Ubuntu GNOME developers announced just a few weeks ago that they intended to support the new Ubuntu 14.04 LTS for a period of two years and three months, which is just the time it takes Canonical to push the new 16.04 LTS out the door.
This decision didn't sit too well with Canonical, and Ubuntu developer Steve Langasek explained that the minimum support period must be three years.
“I am very concerned about this proposed support timeline. 2 years and 3 months means that the support period would end the same month that 16.04.1 is likely to be released. Given that our policy has been to not recommend (or advertise in the UI) LTS upgrades until the first point release, this effectively gives users zero margin between the dropping of security support for Ubuntu-GNOME 14.04, and the first upgrades to Ubuntu-GNOME 16.04,” said Steve Langasek in the mailing list.
Ubuntu developers have agreed and they said that they will do their best to extend the support period to three years, which is also the same period used by the other flavors.