14 DAY TRIAL // System76 is getting ready to unleash the first Beta release of their upcoming Pop!_OS Linux distribution, which should be available to download next week based on the Ubuntu 17.10 Final Beta.
It appears that System76's development team recently dropped focus on the Pop!_OS Installer, which they develop in collaboration with the elementary OS team, to concentrate on fixing critical bugs and add the final touches to the Beta release. They still need to add some patches to fix backlight brightness issues on Nvidia GPUs.
"We’re currently working with NVIDIA to correct backlight brightness issues related to their 9- and 10-series cards. We have a patch to our driver and anticipate them providing a fix upstream," said System76 in their latest weekly report. "There are also a few HiDPI bugs with X that we previously fixed for Ubiquity that now need to be fixed for Pop!_OS."
System76 working with Ubuntu Desktop team to fix critical bug
During testing of the upcoming Pop!_OS Beta release, System76's development team discovered a bug that would break the GNOME Tweak tool and created numerous other issues, so they've also been working lately with the Ubuntu Desktop team to fix this critical bug, which improves desktop icons, font selection, and top bar clock settings.
The first Beta of Pop!_OS Linux is expected to land sometime next, probably at the same time with Canonical's Ubuntu 17.10 Final Beta milestone, which is hitting the streets on September 28, 2017. Only then, we will be able to take a first look at Pop!_OS and see what System76 had prepared for the first release of their GNU/Linux distro.
For example, Ubuntu 17.10 will be shipping with the latest Linux 4.13 kernel series and a bunch of other recent GNU/Linux technologies and Open Source apps, so we'd like to see the same level of freshness in System76's Pop!_OS Linux, too. Stay tuned!