14 DAY TRIAL // The Ubuntu Touch RTM branch has been updated and a new stable image has been released. The system is definitely getting more stable with each version and the devs are pretty much finished with the upcoming features.
Canonical has been working very hard on Ubuntu Touch, and the RTM branch has been improved tremendously in the last couple of months. The system has got faster and more precise, and some of the already implemented features have been refined. Also, it appears that the devs now have an easier time promoting new images, which means that they are homing in on the bugs that are still left.
The Ubuntu devs are now focusing exclusively on bug fixes, for the most part, and a proper RTM version that is actually finished and needs no updates is probably closer than we think. Until then, users should still install the latest updates and they have to continue to hope that an Ubuntu-powered phone might arrive in stores before year's end.
Ubuntu Touch RTM update 7 is mostly about fixes
Unlike previous updates that provided a changelog in readable form, at least for non-technical people, the current one only mentions what system packages have been updated. There are no specific details about what has been changed, but this is no reason not to update as soon as possible.
"Even though QA only finished the regression testing to 60% we decided to actually let it out into the wild since it did so well in manual testing over the last days (everyone running the above channel should have gotten an upgrade notification by now and hopefully be running the new and shiny image). Lots of silos were stuffed with fixes today (and many already made it through the landing process into the rtm archive), if you are working on a TOP blocker, do not forget you have about another 11h before we lock down the gates."
"We will stop the image auto-builds and hope to produce a candidate image by end of tomorrows EU workday. If everything goes well we will have another RTM promotion by Friday or latest by Monday," says Canonical's Oliver Grawert.
Users can install Ubuntu Touch on Nexus 4 and 7 devices. It's a simple procedure and it's described at length in the official wiki. It's even possible to dual-boot with your Android system, if you don't want to lose it.
