It seems that the growing "ecosystem" of official Ubuntu projects is about to expand by another member. Initially named "GNOMEbuntu", the new Ubuntu flavour will come with a vanilla GNOME 3 desktop and GNOME Shell, rather than Unity. OMG! Ubuntu!'s Joey Sneddon writes in "GNOME-flavoured Ubuntu Spin Coming October 18th": "'GNOMEbuntu', to be based on Ubuntu 12.10, will be released on October 18th - the same day that Ubuntu, Kubuntu and Xubuntu all release their latest versions. GNOMEbuntu aims to provide as much of a 'vanilla' GNOME experience as possible whilst also keeping various elements from Ubuntu. After all it is an Ubuntu-based spin. GNOME Shell is provided as the default desktop, and GDM -- which sports new fancy pants animations in 3.6 -- is to be used for the lock and login screens. File-manager wise the spin will use the same version of Nautilus as Ubuntu. Other changes currently suggested/mooted include: Epiphany will be the default web-browser; AbiWord will be included in place of LibreOffice; no Ubuntu One by default; GNOME Classic session included (complete with Ubuntu's indicators); Rhythmbox (and its various music store plugins) will remain." An initial developer-only release called "Ubuntu GNOME Remix" is now available for download.
Source: http://distrowatch.com/weekly.php?issue=20120903#news
