How has elementary OS Juno changed in the 8 months since its release ?
856elementary OS is one of my favorite distros of all time. Even though it only releases a new version every two years, the team doesn't stay idle either, and the OS has matured and gained a lot of new features since it released in october 2018. Here is a full rundown of what's changed since Juno's release !
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Desktop
While Pantheon's metaphor stayed the same, with a top bar and a dock, a lot of improvements have been added to the desktop itself.
In the Application menu, it's now possible to search for system settings panels, such as display, or keyboard. You can also look for system actions, in the language you selected or in english, such as reboot, shutdown, etc...
The indicators also have seen a lot of work: the date and time indicator now makes it clearer which day is the current one, and which day you've selected. The Bluetooth indicator has been largely revamped, with device names written in bold, and using a dedicated icon depending on which peripheral type it is. Each device also will show a badge to indicate its connection status.
The session indicator now displays keyboard shortcuts to lock the session, and logout, and the sound indicator now allows middle clicking on the microphone icon to mute audio input, and scrolling over its icon to adjust input volume.
Applications
Music has better sorting of tracks in all its various modes, and now sports an orange accent color, to match its icon. Music also now supports the older s3m file format, and its album art is now displayed at full resolution on Hi-DPI displays, which should make its interface really shine.
Files' search is now more discoverable, displaying a search icon in the path bar. You can now enable or disable thumbnails for documents and images.
Keyboard navigation has been improved, allowing you to cherry pick and select individual files or folders. Files also has seen a lot of code rewrite in 8 months, and should now be faster across the board, and use less memory.
elementary's calendar app has also been tweaked a bit, especially in the looks department. Events will now make better use of color, and you can pick a specific color for each calendar, from a selection based on elementary's color palette. These colors will be displayed in the calendar list, to make it easier to identify which calendar you want to display or not. When creating an appointment, you can also search through calendars, which should help users managing a lot of those.
The calendar app also has been given a nice lime color accent, in keeping with its application icon.
elementary Code, its text editor / IDE, has seen a bunch of work, most notably allowing users to change git branches from the context menu. A few issues also have been fixed to better handle file saving and restoring, especially in split view mode.
Settings
First, there is a new "appearance tab" in the desktop settings, allowing users to change the font size to better adjust to their display, as well as reducing animations, and disabling panel translucency.
In the display settings, it's now possible to select the refresh rate, and scaling changes are now applied instantly, instead of necessitating a reboot.
In the bluetooth settings, it's now more clear when the system is scanning for devices, with a small spinner at the bottom of the window, and in the keyboard settings, the shortcut to close an application is now user modifiable.
Mouse and touchpad settings have been broken up into 3 tabs, and are now clearer, and a few options have been added, such as the ability yo move the pointer with the keypad, to enable a long press secondary click, and to ignore the touchpad when a mouse is connected.
Finally, sound settings have been redesigned, displaying more devices, and generally being a lot more legible.
AppCenter
The AppCenter is one of the main advantages of elementary OS, but it hasn't seen many user facing changes since Juno's release.
Its categories now have better and more distinct looks, with beautiful colored banners that scale well with Hi-DPI displays. New categories also have been added, such as Communication, Finances, and Media Production.
A lot of bugs also have been fixed, and AppCenter should use less memory and be more reactive.
In general, the AppCenter now has 117 unique apps in all categories, available on Juno. A few of them still have not been updated for Juno.
While that's not yet in Juno, the AppCenter will soon support the installation of flatpaks, and app developers will be able to ship their apps on elementary as flatpaks.
Look and feel
Not much has changed here, the icons and the theme still look very similar, apart from a few slight changes. The switches now use a more vibrant color when using the dark mode, and they look better when using green or yellow accent colors. Badges displayed in a sidebar are also more subtle and legible.