#system76

Now that those bunny eggs have been painted and the afikomen has been found, it’s time to upgrade Pop!_OS! Here’s what’s new in Pop!_OS 22.04 LTS:

Automatic Updates

Update and upgrade Pop!_OS automatically from the OS Upgrade & Recovery panel in Settings! Minimize interruption by scheduling what day & time that you want your computer to perform the updates. Scheduled automatic updates include support for Debian, Flatpak, and Nix packages.

To reduce distractions, notifications for available updates are set to show weekly by default. The frequency can also be set to daily or monthly notifications. Notifications won’t show if you have automatic updates enabled. Automatic updates are turned off by default.

Troubleshoot from the New Support Panel

At the bottom of the Settings menu, you’ll find the new Support panel. Here, you’ll have quick access to troubleshooting resources such as:

Documentation articles for both Pop!_OS and System76 hardware on the Support Page

The community support chat, where you can get help from veteran users and report bugs directly to System76 software engineers

Professional support, where System76 hardware users can submit a support ticket to System76 Happiness Technicians (only visible on System76 hardware)

Generating log files, enabling Happiness Technicians to troubleshoot your issue more quickly and effectively

Dark vs Light Backgrounds

You can now set one Dark Mode background and one Light Mode background from the Background panel in the Desktop settings. Search for Desktop, Background, Appearance, Dock, and Workspaces directly from the Launcher for the fastest way to navigate those settings options.

Enhanced Performance with the System76 Scheduler

The System76 Scheduler optimizes performance by directing resources to the window in focus. So if you’re doing something intensive like gaming in full screen, you’ll get a much smoother experience.

A New and Improved Pop!_Shop

After some significant renovations, the Pop!_Shop is once again open for business! The updated storefront includes:

Backend code improvements for more responsive operations

Improved reliability for package operations (update, install, etc.)

UI Improvements to aid in allowing small window sizes for tiling

Update and Install buttons now also function as a progress bar

New "Recently Updated" homepage section highlighting newly added/updated apps

The result is a consistently smooth overall experience that we know you’ll love.

Switch to PipeWire for Audio Processing

To take advantage of the capabilities of modern sound hardware, Pop!_OS will now use PipeWire by default for audio processing. Software built to use PulseAudio will still be compatible with PipeWire, and this change will open up the door for better audio quality, control, and customization going forward.

Nuts and Bolts Improvements

The workspaces view has received a sizable tune-up, which includes:

Better multi-monitor support

Fixed layout on HiDPI displays

Increased performance

Additional improvements:

Installed NVIDIA drivers are now visible in Pop!_Shop, and will no longer include an “Install” button. Older drivers are also available to install, though the most recent available NVIDIA driver is recommended for most NVIDIA GPUs.

Better performance with improvements to the CPU scaling governor, which keeps your CPU running at the optimal frequency for your system.

The Pop!_OS upgrade service will now only activate when checking for or performing release upgrades. (Previously it was active 24/7.)

If your upgrade gets interrupted, debian packages are now resumable—meaning you can pick up the upgrade from where you left off.

File type for icons has been changed to .svg

Max disk capacity for journald logs is now limited to 1GB.

Added support for laptop privacy screens

RDP by default for remote desktop use

Better performance, scaling, and reliability in Pop!_Shop

Added this funky new user icon

Foundational Upkeep

Based on Ubuntu 22.04

Linux kernel 5.16.19 at release (regularly updated)

Mesa 22

Updated to the GNOME 42 base with System76 COSMIC UX

What about COSMIC DE?

It’s in progress! Our UX Team has been testing new designs, and the Engineering Team has begun packaging various elements in the new Rust code base. An alpha release for the COSMIC desktop environment could be available as early as this summer!

Note: Back up your system to a storage drive before upgrading, reinstalling, or refreshing your OS. Creating frequent backups is guaranteed to save users from the extremely rare chance of data loss and ensuing heartbreak.

How to Upgrade

IN SETTINGS

Before diving into the upgrade, open up Pop!_Shop to the Installed view and perform any outstanding updates. This will ensure a faster and more reliable upgrade.

Open the Settings application to the OS Upgrade & Recovery menu, then click the Download button at the top to download the upgrade. To apply the upgrade, click Upgrade once the download is complete.

IN TERMINAL

Open Terminal from your desktop or with Super + T. To make sure you’re fully updated before upgrading, use the commands below one at a time, pressing Enter after each.

sudo apt update

sudo apt full-upgrade

You’ll be prompted to enter your password, which will be cloaked in invisible ink as you type. This is normal. Once the process is finished, run the following command:

pop-upgrade release upgrade

As your system upgrades, you may be prompted to answer a few yes or no questions. Press Y and then Enter to continue. After a reboot and about 15 minutes, bam! Upgrade complete.

FRESH INSTALL

Back up your files. Then, head to this web page. Click the Download button at the top, then select Download 22.04 LTS. If you have or plan to have an NVIDIA GPU in your system, select the NVIDIA download instead. Once Pop!_OS is installed, you’ll encounter a series of prompts for setting up your operating system. Check out this article if you need guidance.

KDE, Day 1

Scrapped GNOME (”pop shell”) for Plasma, because reasons.

Buying a computer, a smartphone, or tablet in 2019 is different than it has been in years past. Usually, I'm lurking in anticipation of my "next", and have a lot of ready recommendations for friends and family. That isn't to say there aren't a lot of great options, they just seem to be more arcane.

My current technology arc consists of incrementally shedding Apple, Google, Microsoft, and any hardware, or digital service, that doesn't provide me with a great deal of value. Also, I'm looking for those services and products that have a community around them, and with whom one can have some kind of relationship.

I look at everyone; Apple, Asus, Dell, Google, HP, Huawei, LG, Microsoft, MSI, Samsung, Vaio, before I make a purchase. I look at their products, support documentation, warranty, social media presence, how transparent they are with consumers, and whether or not they understand how to engage in basic marketing and commerce.

So, what's good? The plucky upstarts and potential market disruptors first.

Now that the first snowflake has descended gracefully upon our Denver headquarters, it’s time to upgrade to the newest version of Pop!_OS. Here’s what’s new in Pop!_OS 21.10:

New Application Library

Previously when navigating to Applications, a full screen Application Wall would appear. In Pop!_OS 21.10, the Application Library opens in a small, searchable window over your current workspace. Like the former view, the Application Library can be opened from the top bar, a 4-finger swipe right on the trackpad, or by using Super + A on your keyboard. What this means for you:

Better multi-monitor experience: The Application Library will launch on the display that has your mouse focus. This way, you can keep your eyes on your current workspace and launch the application on the display you intended.

Easy scanning: Alphabetical listing makes it easier to scan and find the application or folder you want.

Simple app organization: Drag and drop applications into custom folders. The new folders are always visible, and act like tabs to move between your personally organized applications.

Search: Quickly filters your installed applications as well as apps available to install from the Pop!_Shop.

Just the right size: Achieves the same information density while using much less space. The Application Library provides the optimal experience, especially on ultra-wide monitors.

Pop!_Pi Tech-Preview for Raspberry 4

Tinkerers, this one’s for you! A tech preview of Pop!_OS 21.10 is now available on the Raspberry Pi, a mini computer for STEM learning and experimentation. We built Pop!_Pi for the Raspberry Pi 4 to gain experience building for ARM platforms. The Raspberry Pi 4 performed much better than we anticipated, so we decided to release it to the public.

It's a Tech-Preview because it doesn't receive as much Quality Assurance focus as Pop!_OS for the desktop, but is nonetheless an excellent option for users. We plan to continue releasing Pop!_Pi with future Pop!_OS releases.

Latest Hardware Support

Pop!_OS 21.10 features the 5.15.5 kernel and latest NVIDIA driver. Pop!_OS has a new kernel policy whereby the latest kernels will be released once they've passed extensive quality assurance tests. This is the same release policy we've used for NVIDIA drivers.

The System76 hardware lab contains a broad spectrum of chipsets, processors, and components to test for regressions prior to release so customers and users can be confident that new kernel releases will only improve their hardware performance and support.

New, More Intuitive Refresh OS Feature

Your system will now recognize when Pop!_OS is installed from the recovery partition and offer the Refresh OS option prior to unlocking an encrypted drive. This makes it easier to see when the Refresh OS option is available.

The Refresh OS feature reinstalls your operating system without deleting the files in your Home folder. This allows you to “refresh” your operating system without losing your data, which can come in handy if you accidentally break functionality while tinkering. It’s all part of the learning process!

System76-Hosted Packages and New CI

To ensure Pop!_OS continues to keep up to date on new software versions, we now host Pop!_OS custom software repositories from our own infrastructure. This helps us maintain a stable experience for users.

Meanwhile, our new CI (continuous integration) infrastructure increases the speed of building and releasing packages, which allows our engineering and QA teams to more rapidly prepare updates.

Hardened Upgrades

We improved the OS upgrade feature.

The restore partition is now updated prior to upgrading the OS. This ensures that, in the unlikely case something goes wrong during an upgrade, the Refresh OS option in the recovery partition can install to the latest release.

Improved handling of custom changes to the fstab file

We now disable user-added PPAs, as they often cause upgrade issues for users.

GNOME Updates

Pop!_OS 21.10 includes GNOME updates and improvements. Simply put, GNOME is the foundation upon which the visible front-end pieces of Pop!_OS are currently built. We’ve integrated some of the GNOME Project’s latest updates into Pop!_OS, including:

Wifi Sorting in Settings: Wi-Fi connections will now be sorted by your current connection, previous connections, and strength of signal, making your desired network easier to find.

Auto-completion in Files: Searching in Files will turn up a list of search results as you type.

Note: Back up your system to a storage drive before refreshing, reinstalling, or upgrading your OS. Creating frequent backups is guaranteed to save users from the extremely rare chance of data loss and ensuing heartbreak.

NEAT! SO HOW DO I UPGRADE?

Fear not, citizen! There are a few ways to upgrade:

In Settings

Before diving into the upgrade, open up Pop!_Shop to the Installed view and perform any outstanding updates. This will ensure a faster and more reliable upgrade.

Open the Settings application to the OS Upgrade & Recovery menu, then click the Download button at the top to download the upgrade. To apply the upgrade, click Upgrade once the download is complete.

In Terminal

Open Terminal from your desktop or with Super + T. To make sure you’re fully updated before upgrading, use the commands below one at a time, pressing Enter after each.

sudo apt update

sudo apt full-upgrade

You’ll be prompted to enter your password, which will be cloaked in invisible ink as you type. This is normal. Once the process is finished, run the following command:

pop-upgrade release upgrade

As your system upgrades, you may be prompted to answer a few yes or no questions. Press Y and then Enter to continue. After a reboot and about 15 minutes, bam! Upgrade complete.

Fresh Install

Back up your files. Then, head to this web page. Click the Download button at the top, then select Download 21.10. If you have or plan to have an NVIDIA GPU in your system, select the NVIDIA download instead. Once Pop!_OS is installed, you’ll encounter a series of prompts for setting up your operating system. Check out this article if you need guidance.

The Unleash Your Potential Program provides a System76 computer to six winners for accelerating the completion of their next project. This week, we interviewed Marquita Wiggins, who is in the early stages of developing her open source Canva alternative, Designy.

What prompted you to want to create Designy?

I like Canva, but because it’s owned by a company that keeps the software closed down, there’s no ability for people who know how to code to be like, “Oh, I want this. Let’s add it and make Canva even better.” To my knowledge, there aren’t any free tools out there that give the Canva Pro treatment. So I’d like to make a tool that’s better, and also free.

You mentioned you had heavy experience using Canva. What’s your background with it?

I work in marketing for WBEZ, a public radio station. I’ve been doing that for about three years. A good portion of my work involves designing, so I’m always in either Canva or Illustrator.

I like the ease of Canva because I can work on designs from my work laptop, or I can use someone else’s laptop and log in if I’m somewhere else. And then with Illustrator, you can expand artboards as much as you want.

What sorts of improvements are you implementing in your open source alternative?

When you’re working on a design in Canva, it’s very linear. Let’s say I am working on a poster, and I just started it, and I just want to keep iterating on small changes. In order to do that, you have to locate the artboard that you’re working on, and you can’t view them all on the board at the same time. The reason I like Illustrator is I like to have eight different artboards up at the same time, and I can zoom out and see all my iterations at the same time, and then zoom into the one I want to make changes on. That is my number one feature that I love about Illustrator, and that’s what I want to bring to Designy.

I’d also give Designy the ability to create templates and share them with other people on the same software. If you create a template, you can then put it on the template board for other people to use. In Canva, you can’t just put templates up in the marketplace. Canva creates your templates, and those are the only ones you’re able to see unless you know somebody who also uses Canva, and they send you the template to use.

Do you have a background in coding?

Not really. In my last job I sent out all the emails for the organization, and I also managed the website, so I did use HTML and CSS for that, but I was never an expert in it. That said, I was an expert Googler. I was able to make massive changes to the website by Googling what I needed to do and then figuring out the code for it.

I’ve been interested in the computer programming space for a while, and I’ve always dabbled in it and learned more about HTML and CSS. When I saw this program pop up, I felt that this was my opportunity to learn a lot more, and also be able to create something that would be useful to myself.

What software are you using to develop it?

I’m going to be using Javascript for the front end, Java for the back end, and likely MonoDB for the database. I’m almost done learning Javascript now, and it’s a lot! So after that, I’ll start building the front end of the site, and then learn Java, connect it to the back end, and then MonoDB for the database.

This was the perfect opportunity to get the momentum going on learning how to do this, because now I can’t stop until it’s done!

Why did you choose Javascript?

When Canva was created, they created it using Javascript, so I figured why not use the same software that they originally used? I think right now they’ve moved on to something else, but when they originally started they used Javascript.

What are your initial thoughts on Pop!_OS?

I never used Linux until I got this laptop, so it was a bit of a learning curve to figure out how to do certain things. I haven’t really downloaded that much—I only really use Visual Studio Code and Firefox, and I also downloaded the Brave browser on it—but I like the navigation. I like that I can open up Visual Studio Code and then open up Firefox and the auto-tiling will automatically arrange the windows. I wish more companies would develop that feature.

How has your experience been with the Oryx Pro so far?

It’s great! It has a huge screen, so I don’t even have to use an external monitor. I have it on a riser with an external keyboard. I haven’t had any issues so far.

Did you encounter any challenges in setting up your system out of the box?

It was super smooth. I don’t even know if it took 15 minutes from unboxing it to actually being able to use it. I also like that I’m able to secure my data with encryption before I log into my account.

You mentioned Designy will have a beta. What’s the plan for that currently?

I’m thinking the beta phase will start in March when it’s all done, where I’m sharing it with other people, getting feedback, and making changes. I’ll be using Reddit a lot to get folks to try it out and let me know what they think. It’ll also be up on GitHub, so people will be able to push updates if they have a change they want me to make.

I’m going to finish the front end of the site in November and the back end of the site will be done in January. The database connection will be done in February. I know there may be a lot of weird bugs and whatnot that other people will find, so the beta helps me work all that out. The goal is to put this out to the public and then iterate on it, so maybe down the line it’ll transition from Javascript to something else.

Is there anything we didn’t ask about that you wanted to share?

A random fact is I have a dog named Mr. President. People seem to get a kick out of that.

The computer and operating system are the most powerful tools in existence. The Launch into Learning season encourages STEM and creative professionals like you to hone their craft, learn a new skill, or make something they’re proud to share.

This year, we’re empowering one lucky user with a $10,000 Thelio Major workstation. The complete package includes a Launch keyboard, an MX Master 3 wireless mouse, a 27” 1440p IPS display, and a decked-out Thelio Major.

To enter the giveaway, retweet our contest tweet and read our terms and conditions.

The Launch Keyboard

The Launch configurable keyboard is fully customizable and engineered for comfort and efficiency. Remap your layout in the Keyboard Configurator, swap keycaps and accent colors, use up to four layers, and transfer data at high speeds through the USB hub. By personalizing your workflow, Launch propels users forward at max velocity. That’s max for Maximillion, a measurement equal to one million maximums.

Thelio Major

Thelio Major is a high-end desktop (HEDT) that’s thermally engineered to ensure components perform to their fullest potential. For the Launch into Learning giveaway, one randomly selected winner will receive a system with an AMD Threadripper 3970X processor, 64GB of RAM, 2TB of fast PCIe 4.0 storage, and an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 GPU. Thelio Major does not skimp on power. Or beauty.