Gnome 45-Rīga arrives with new applications and great improvements
The new version of Gnome 45 with codename "Riga" in recognition of the work done by the organizers of the GUADEC conference in Riga, Latvia, the capital of this country.
This new version of Gnome 45 is one of the versions that already accompanies the beta versions of Ubuntu 23.10 "Mantic Minotaur" and Fedora 39 (which were recently announced and are available for testing) and with which you can try the experience of this new version of the desktop environment.
Main new features of Gnome 45
In this new version of Gnome 45 be consistent with porting apps to use GTK 4 and the Libadwaita library and it is that now the program for scanning documents has been ported to GTK 4, while the Console, Text Editor, Disk Usage Analyzer, Fonts, Tour, and Web applications feature a new title bar style that visually separates the title from the content with a shadow.
It is also highlighted that Updated the layout style of the Calendar, Maps, Files, and Calculator apps and the display style of the side panels has been changed; They now take up the entire width of the window and automatically adjust to the new size when the window width changes.
In Gnome 45, we can find that a change is shown from the first launch, Because instead of the inscription Activities, an indicator is now displayed that shows which desktop is open and other dots indicate other desktops. By keeping the mouse pointer over this element we can move to change desktops, which is quite convenient. Additionally, to free up space on the panel for new design elements, the application menu that displays the name of the active program has been removed.
Added a button to control the keyboard backlight to the menu Quick change for the most frequently used settings. To quickly open and close the menu to quickly change settings, the keyboard shortcut “Super/Windows + S” is proposed.
Gnome 45 presents a new default image viewer app, which is much faster and when moving from one image to the next the movement is fluid. New image viewer is fully responsive and supports mobile form factors
In addition to the new image viewer, Gnome 45 also includes a new camera app with all controls superimposed over the display area. Like the new image viewer, the new camera app works great on both mobile and desktop devices.
A new light system interface style that can be used instead of dark style predetermined. The new style is enabled with the command “gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.interface color-scheme prefer-light” (the setting to enable it is not yet integrated into the configurator).
The Wayland-based session includes support for the Input Leap software's KVM switch, allowing you to use a single keyboard and mouse to control multiple computers.
On the other hand, it is highlighted that they have added new keyboard shortcuts to the scheduler calendar: F5 to sync calendars, F8 to open the calendar menu and Ctrl+Alt+M to manage calendars. The date range covered by the event search has been expanded. Performance optimization has been carried out.
Of the other changes that stand out:
- The Gnome Builder integrated development environment provides the ability to use JavaScript to develop plugins. The color scheme has been adapted to the modern GNOME style.
- The Calculator app now supports more currencies and the Connections app can now copy and paste text, images, and files over RDP connections.
- Nautilus has received a minor UI tweak, where a new hamburger menu in the left sidebar now makes the sidebar look more distinct than before.
- The hardware acceleration tools available now are used to improve video playback and screen casting performance.
- Connections now allows you to copy text, images, and files to and from remote computers when using RDP connections.
Console, the GNOME terminal application, has a new preferences window, with options to set a custom font and disable the system bell. - Updated the design of the cursor images. Improved smoothness of pointer movement, even under high system load.
Finally If you are interested in knowing more about it, you can check the details in the following link