Welcome to the Raring Ringtail Beta 1 release, which will in time become the 13.04 release.

This alpha features images for Edubuntu, Kubuntu, Lubuntu, UbuntuKylin, Ubuntu Cloud, Ubuntu Studio and Xubuntu.

At the end of the 12.10 development cycle, the Ubuntu desktop and server flavours decided that they would reduce the number of milestone images going forward and the focus would concentrate on daily quality and fortnightly testing rounds known as cadence testing. Based on that change, the Ubuntu products themselves will not have a Beta 1 release. Its first milestone release will be the FinalBetaRelease on the 28th of March 2013. Other Ubuntu flavours have the option to release using the usual milestone schedule.

Pre-releases of Raring Ringtail are *not* encouraged for anyone needing a stable system or anyone who is not comfortable running into occasional, even frequent breakage. They are, however, recommended for Ubuntu developers and those who want to help in testing, reporting, and fixing bugs as we work towards getting this release ready.

Beta 1 is the third in a series of milestone images that will be released throughout the Raring development cycle, in addition to our daily development images. The Beta images are known to be reasonably free of showstopper CD build or installer bugs, while representing a very recent snapshot of Raring. You can download
them here:

• Edubuntu Announcement: http://www.edubuntu.org/news/13.04-beta1, Download: http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/edubuntu/releases/raring/beta-1/
• Kubuntu Announcement: https://wiki.kubuntu.org/RaringRingtail/Beta1/Kubuntu, Download: http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/kubuntu/releases/raring/beta-1/
• Lubuntu Announcement: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/RaringRingtail/ReleaseNotes/Beta1/Lubuntu, Download: http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/lubuntu/releases/raring/beta-1/
• UbuntuKylin Announcement: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UbuntuKylin/1304-beta-1-ReleaseNote, Download: http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/ubuntukylin/releases/raring/beta-1
• Ubuntu Server Cloud Announcement: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/RaringRingtail/Beta1/UbuntuCloudImages
  Download: http://cloud-images.ubuntu.com/releases/raring/beta-1/
• Ubuntu Studio Announcement: http://ubuntustudio.org/2013/03/ubuntu-studio-13-04-beta-1-released/, Notes: https://wiki.ubuntu.com/RaringRingtail/Beta1/UbuntuStudio, Download: http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/ubuntustudio/releases/raring/beta-1/
• Xubuntu Announcement: http://xubuntu.org/news/raring-beta1, Download: http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/xubuntu/releases/raring/beta-1/

Beta 1 includes a number of software updates that are ready for wider testing. This is an early set of images, so you should expect some bugs. For a more detailed description of the changes in the Beta 1 release and the known bugs (which can save you the effort of reporting a duplicate bug, or help you find proven workarounds), please see:

http://www.ubuntu.com/testing/

If you’re interested in following the changes as we further develop Raring, we suggest that you subscribe initially to the ubuntu-devel-announce list. This is a low-traffic list (a few posts a week) carrying announcements of approved specifications, policy changes, alpha releases, and other interesting events.

http://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-devel-announce

Originally posted to the ubuntu-devel-announce mailing list on Thu Mar 14 20:40:34 UTC 2013 by Stéphane Graber, on behalf of the release team