Today April 22 was an important day in the Linux world because Canonical had to introduce us to a new family. Specifically, it had to launch and has already launched the new version of its operating systems, which in April 2021 have the code name of Hirsute Hippo, also known as the hairy hippo. After talking about Ubuntu 21.04, now it is the turn of Kubuntu 21.04, a somewhat more important update than the main version because it does include a new graphical environment.
And no, it's not that Kubuntu 21.04 is going to change the KDE / Plasma desktop for another. Is that the October 2020 edition arrived with Plasma 5.19.5, and one of the most outstanding novelties of Kubuntu Hirsute Hippo is that it will arrive with plasma 5.21. A couple of jumps on the desktop is something that users of the K flavor of Ubuntu will be used to, but it is not something that normal that of having to wait 6 months to receive some news for users who added the Backports PPA.
Kubuntu 21.04 Highlights
- Supported for 9 months, until January 2022.
- Linux 5.11.
- plasma 5.21.4.
- KDE Applications 20.12.3, the December issue with its three maintenance updates.
- Qt 5.15.2.
- Updated packages, including Firefox 87 and LibreOffice 7.2. Firefox 88 was launched last Tuesday, so it will be one of the first packages to be updated.
- Plasma Wayland installed, but will not be used by default.
Although the list of changes is short, the Most of the news will come from the hand of the kernel and the desktop, that is to say, from Plasma 5.21, Applications 20.12.3, Qt 5.15.2 and Linux 5.11.
Kubuntu 21.04 Hirsute Hippo has already been released, which means that it can be downloaded from cdimage.ubuntu.com, Since the Kubuntu official page or from the same operating system if we use the command sudo do-release-upgrade. Although nothing usually happens, it is recommended to back up all important files before starting the process.