See ReleaseNotes.

* Possible one sentence summary, for the press release, in addition to the regular text about bug-fixing, integration, just-works, localization, etc: "This time GNOME also includes a video player and a an audio-CD extraction utility".

For GNOME 2.10, we know about these major visible changes so far:

Done (written up properly)

• New applications:
  • sound-juicer
  • totem
• Panel:

  • Better icon theme support & svg support for panel objects. (sounds like general bugfixing)

  • "Run application" dialog completion should be faster (There is talk of removing this soon, so best not to mention it)
  • New menu layout (If there's still no menu editor, then this is techy detail)
  • Lots of bugfixes, better HIG compliance, etc.
• Panel Applets:
  • new menu system
    • Panel menus now use the fd.o specification
    • Addition of Places and Desktop menus
    • removal of Actions menu
  • Applet transparency
  • New modem applet
    • replaces modem lights, from GNOME 1.
    • integrates with GNOME-System-Tools
  • New trash applet
  • Revamped drive mount applet
    • Gets volumes from GNOME-VFS
    • Now works with no user configuration
  • Day/Night in weather applet
  • New mixer
    • Simpler
    • uses GStreamer (more consistency across applications, plus improved device selection)
  • Deprecated Mail/Wireless/CDPlayer applets
  • Sticky Notes
    • Now remain on workspaces where you left them

    • Act like Konfabulator ( What does this mean?)

  • New CPUFreq applet
• gedit
  • Highlight current line
  • Highlight matching bracket

  • Save Copy plugin with gnome-vfs support ( So this is like Save-As but continues to edit the original in the original place? This is confusing. I hope it's not in the default tarball. murrayc. PaoloBorelli: why is it confusing? It does exactly what it says: it saves a copy. For instance it's useful if you want to upload a copy of the document to a ftp server etc. At the moment PaoloMaggi turned it's on by deafault, I'd be OK with having this plugin off by default... I suppose this should be brought up on the mailing list.

    • MurrayCummiing: It's confusing because it's too much like SaveAs, so could even lead to data loss, and it's inconsistent with other applications. PaoloBorelli: I don't see how it can lead to dataloss: you are *saving* a copy, beside the current document is not marked as unmodified so the user get still prompted for saving if he exits or closes the doc. Anyway as already said I'm not opposed at turning the plugin off by default, but I really feel that this wiki page is not the proper place to discuss this). PaoloMaggi: I think this problem has been clarified on the usability mailing list. Save Copy plugin will be on by default.

  • We also have syntax highlighting for a bunch of new languages, even if technically this is a gtksourceview feature. (We don't want to push gedit as a source code editor too much anyway. Most users are not developers. murrayc. PaoloBorelli: well, bash syntax highlighting is a pretty important addition for sysadmins and for the casual user which has to modify configuration files. PaoloMaggi: a lot of users edit simple .ini files or XML/HTML files. A lot of our users are technical people, expecially the user of a text editor. Normal users rarely use a text editor).

  • Undoing to an unmodified state resets the modified flag (GtkSourceView feature) (Sounds like just a bug fix. murrayc. PaoloBorelli: yep agreed, I guess PaoloMaggi added this because it was something we got a lot of complaints about. PaoloMaggi: actually I think it is a feature, a lot of people said us they were not using gedit also due to the fact this feature was missing).

  • Smarter HOME/END cursor movement ( What exactly? Is this just a bug fix? PaoloBorelli: nope, it's a new feature which improves keyboard nav in the text: when you press HOME the first time the cursor is moved to the beginning of the line, if you press HOME again the cursor is moved before the first letter on the line, skipping tabs and spaces at the beginning of the line)

  • Improved spell checker plugin ( How is it improved? PaoloMaggi: better selection of the language to be used by the document, the automatic spell checker does not mark a word as mispelled while you are writing it but only when you have finished to write it. It supports a lot of new languages)

  • Uses Pango fonts when printing ( Does this mean "higher-quality printouts"? PaoloMaggi: you can now uses all your fonts (if they are supported by Pango), so you will have a better support for non-latin languages too)

  • Improved startup time
• Keyboard:
  • they provide a single list of selected layouts (as opposed to two-paned display in 2.8, where you moved layouts from one list to the other), with "Add" dialog showing a *complete image* of the selected keyboard layout (so you can preview what will this layout look like) -- though, this is only what I've noticed -- Danilo
• File Roller:
  • AR, Debian and 7-zip archives support.
  • Password and testing for RAR archives.
  • Follows the Nautilus click policy. ( one-click or two-clicks)
• gnome-dictionary
  • integrated sidebar for spelling suggestions
  • open definitions and translations on external, configurable websites
  • print definitions (with preview)
  • open definition links in new windows (on middle click)
• Nautilus:
  • We concentrated on bugfixes and stability this time.
    • Mostly, although we also removed the usage of Bonobo for the UI, which has caused bonobo views to stop working. --alex
  • From NEWS
    • Change the look of the path button to make it easier to find.
    • Better drag-and-drop with Mozilla.
    • Alt-up selects the directory you came from. (actually in 2.8.1, but worth a mention)
    • Make creating new files in list view auto-rename. (actually in 2.8.1, but worth a mention)
• gnome-backgrounds
• gnome-system-tools
  • Networking
    • ESSIDs detection, WEP keys support for wireless interfaces
    • ISDN support
    • only allow to configure existing interfaces
    • apply changes to interfaces instantly
  • Users (easier user-in-group management)
• gnome-system-log
  • log file searching from a search bar
  • open multiple logs in their own windows
  • open zipped logs and logs in remote locations through gnome-vfs
  • simplified monitor mode
  • copy log lines to clipboard
• gfloppy
  • support for removable floppy drives via HAL (USB, etc)
  • support for formatting floppies in non-standard locations
• Gnome Meeting:
  • Integration with Novell Evolution - one common address book.

  • Zeroconf support (When you are in a meeting, you can browse to discover other GnomeMeeting users on the same network, they will be automatically discovered without the need for a centralized directory.)

  • New "side-by-side" view allowing to see the local and remote video side-by-side in the main GUI.
• Epiphany

  • Improved fullscreen mode ( What's improved about it?)

  • Favicon/security icon now in location bar
  • Extension manager
  • Export bookmarks function

* Metacity

• "Focus stealing prevention" (Gregory Merchan pointed out that this is a misnomer, but everyone seems to be using this name anyway--possibly just because Lubos does)

* evolution: from announcement emails:

• New IMAP provider (IMAP4rev1 account type for testing) that should improve reliability.
• Online/Offline for mail with syncing of message changes to server (IMAP4, Groupwise, Exchange)
• Online/Offline for contacts (ldap, groupwise, exchange)
• Online/Offline for calendars (webcal, groupwise, exchange)
• Attachments for calendar events
• Weather in the calendar
• Improved recurrence handling in calendar - exceptions can be made to
  • recurring events now without create a separate event
• Right to Left mail display

• GroupWise support for send options, shared folders

• Exchange support for folder sizes and password expiry warning

Rejected (by Murray):

• Yelp:
  • gecko engine (We are using yelp 2.8 instead of yelp 2.10 because of the accessibility regressions)
    • Elijah: yelp 2.8 doesn't exist (we used yelp 2.6 for Gnome 2.8 because of other regressions). Do you mean yelp 2.6?

    • DavydMadeley: when was this decision made? I don't recall this coming up in my discussion with Shaun. I think the a11y regressions are far outweighed by improvements for everyone else. Elijah asked whether it would be possible for distributors to provide two yelp packages, a yelp, and a yelp-a11y.

  • man and info viewer is back?
    • these won't be on by default (So, we can't mention it.)
• evolution
  • plugins (If we don't ship any plugins by default then this is information for developers, not users.)
    • AFAIK Plugins will ship by default, many things like Groupwise accounts have been shifted into plugins.
• Epiphany: (These items are too techy or not part of the release)
  • Support for Python extensions ('Pyphany')
  • D-BUS integration
  • New extensions: Find, Net monitor, Tab states
• GNOME System Tools
  • disks
    • Shows information on physical disks (This capplet will not be shipped by default)
• gnome-dictionary
  • open multiple definitions from the command line (command-lines are not for regular users. murrayc)
• Gnome Games:
  • New, whizzy, version of Same GNOME. Featuring better graphics, multiple board sizes and full undo/redo.

  • Network multiplayer for Nibbles (using Zeroconf). (See GnomeMeeting)

  • Better graphics for Aisleriot, Klotski, GNect and Same GNOME.
• gnome-system-tools
  • configure file sharing via SMB and NFS ( This is still on by default, though it ignores the whole gnome-user-shared discussion and was introduced without discussion. I'm not happy yet talking about this as a real part of GNOME 2.10.)
• gnome search tool
  • two scans search (Seems like bugfixing to me, and emphasises the less than ideal way that this works. murrayc)
  • follow nautilus click policy (Not enough alone to make it worth mentioning the search tool)