What’s New In Ubuntu 19.04 “Disco Dingo”

After 6 months of development, Ubuntu 19.04 is released. As always it was exciting to wait for the new Ubuntu release with new features. In this article, I am going to walk you through what’s new in Ubuntu 19.04 codenamed, “Disco Dingo”. So keep reading!

Ubuntu 19.04 “Disco Dingo” Focuses On Performance Improvement

Honestly speaking, this release does not ship with a huge list of new features. Actually, there are a few new things that you won’t even notice easily without reading a review. So you must be thinking that it’s not even worth reading a review then. Well, not really. Ubuntu 19.04 might not ship with so much cool stuff for your eyes, but it does make Ubuntu better by improving its performance to a great level. You will quickly notice improved performance on the very first boot.

And that’s what we have been noticing for the past few Ubuntu releases. It is more focusing on performance rather than pre-loading your system with new features. But don’t worry the new features are also worth checking out.

​So here it goes.

What’s New In Ubuntu 19.04 “Disco Dingo”

Gnome 3.32 makes system faster & more responsive

Ubuntu 19.04 ships with the latest Gnome 3.32. Gnome 3.32 is much faster and includes desktop bug fixes. So you’ll find it pretty smooth while you are using your lovely Linux distro.

System search improvement

Disco Dingo comes preinstalled with Tracker. Tracker is a package that finds and save files information and saves metadata in a database. This lets you search files faster from system search. You can learn more about Tracker on Tracker wiki page.

More refined Yaru theme and Icon pack

Yaru theme and icons pack has been refined. Yaru theme now supports a few more applications and icon pack has also changed a few icons such as settings icon.

Safe Graphics Mode

There is also an option in the grub menu to boot your system into Safe Graphics mode. This option boots your system with ‘NOMODESET’ on to help you resolve graphics card related issues easily.

Updated Software

Other than a few new features, the system comes with all the latest applications such as Firefox, Mozilla Thunderbird, and LibreOffice, etc.

Application Permission Controls

Now you can control various permissions for each application installed on your system. For example, you can turn on/off notifications for a specific application.

Night Light Improvements

Night light application is one of my favorite applications. It can make me work longer on my computer. In the new update, you can manage color Temperature. You can make choosing a color temperature between less warm to warmer.

Linux Kernel 5.0

Ubuntu 19.04 runs on Linux kernel 5.0. Last month Linux kernel 5.0 came out with some important features such as full support for Raspberry Pi 3B and Raspberry Pi 3B+, Qualcomm Snapdragon 845, USB 3.2 and Type-C improvements, etc.​

Mesa 19.0

Mesa 19.0 is the latest release of open-source graphics driver. It will improve system performance if you’re using a compatible graphics card. Though you can switch between a proprietary driver from ‘Sofware & Updates’ if you have Nvidia graphics card.

Improved Sound controls

I really like the revamped interface of sound controls. Each setting type is stacked vertically instead of horizontally in tabs format.

Livepatch included but only supports LTS releases

Livepatch is really a cool feature. It lets you install Linux kernel updates without restarting the system. Though the feature is only supported in long term support release. So you’ll get this in Ubuntu 19.04 –

New wallpapers

With the new release there comes new wallpapers. 🙂  

Disco Dingo Wallpaper

Download Ubuntu 19.04 “Disco Dingo”

Download

Conclusion – Should you upgrade it or not?

So these were the important features in your new Ubuntu 19.04. After reading all the features, it should be pretty easy to decide if the release worth upgrading to or not. Well, my point of view is if you are using Ubuntu 18.10 then you should definitely upgrade as it will improve system performance. For long term support users, I don’t think upgrading to a short term release is a good idea. If you are curious to test Ubuntu 19.04 then you can install it in Virtualbox.​Do let me know if you are going to upgrade or not by taking a poll below.