70

The last release was Natty Narwhal (Letter N) for the 11.04. Then it was Oneiric Ocelot (Letter O) for the 11.10. This time, the newest one will be Precise Pangolin (Letter P) for the 12.04.

At this pace, what will happen when Ubuntu gets to Z? Will it start with numbers (007 Edition), will it start with double letters (AA Battery), or will it start from the beginning (Amazing Apple)? What will happen?

12
  • 21
    I'm hoping they will go with the Swedish letters Å Ä Ö. That would be awesome!
    – Alvar
    Mar 15, 2012 at 16:45
  • 23
    How about we just md5 the version number and use that... Ubuntu 17.04 (17 and 04) would be "Ubuntu 70efdf2ec9b086079795c442636b55fb 7d0665438e81d8eceb98c1e31fca80c1" - i tell you the more I think about this the more I think it'll be the only sensible solution.
    – rlemon
    Mar 15, 2012 at 16:50
  • 9
    Can't we just take the Apple approach and add a S to the end of everything to denote a newer version? 12.10 could be Precise Pangolin S
    – rlemon
    Mar 15, 2012 at 19:18
  • 7
    Reminds me of speculation about when Apple is going to run out of big cats to name their OSs after. Mar 16, 2012 at 1:48
  • 7
    13.04 Misinformed Mayans
    – rlemon
    Mar 16, 2012 at 15:03

10 Answers 10

52

Astonishing Antelope

As questions go - this pretty much will be a decision made by Mark Shuttleworth himself.

Maybe we could start doubling the initial like in Aalenian Aal or Aalenian Aardvark We could restart using flowers or plants instead of animals. e. g. Apologetic Anemone For release 17.10 i suggest Ambitious Aye Aye Maybe: Awesome Alebrije? I like the idea of using plants next. Or perhaps rocks/minerals.

Thus as you have indicated we are in the realms of speculation.

On the link below - the wrap around to A is described up to F - Flying Fox, etc., i.e., Ubuntu 20.04

What is beyond that - happy speculating.


Useful link:

  1. https://wiki.ubuntu.com/DevelopmentCodeNames
3
  • 10
    Nice. Can't wait till they get to Aaargh Aaargh! ;)
    – Carl
    Mar 16, 2012 at 2:03
  • 4
    @carleeto sounds like the pirated edition. Mar 16, 2012 at 9:39
  • So, it seems that it's Artful Aardvark?
    – cherouvim
    Jul 7, 2017 at 9:24
46

It could just follow ASCII, and ultimately Unicode, order.

  • ...
  • Xenophobic Xenopus
  • Yawning Yak
  • Zealous Zebra
  • [lumsy [aribou
  • \ashful \ackslash
  • ]ashing ]oberman
  • ...
  • ಠ ಠ
  • ...

This may eventually require genetic engineering to breed new animals with appropriate names.

3
  • 3
    Great, that's two sites where my highest scoring answer is a joke. 8-)} Mar 16, 2012 at 16:41
  • Squares! Squares follow me anywhere!
    – Braiam
    Aug 9, 2013 at 2:54
  • Alas, the XX, YY, and ZZ releases didn't follow my suggestions; they were Xenial Xerus (16.04), Yakkety Yak (16.10), and Zesty Zapus (17.04, not yet released), respectively. But fear not -- the Law Of Averages guarantees that 17.10 will be [lumsy [aribou. (That's how it works, right?) Dec 28, 2016 at 23:30
32

Artful Aardvark

That gets a lot tougher after AA.

But seriously, there are plenty of other verbs, adjectives and animals for each letter, so I expect it stay the same for 17.10.

And remember that is a long time (that's like a hundred years in Internet years) so Ubuntu might be doing something completely different by then.

Note: I look forward to you accepting (or down-voting) this in ~60 months time. Puts it on his calendar!

2
  • 3
    Briljant Oli! :D Abiding Abobat , Acurate Acuchis ...
    – Rinzwind
    Mar 15, 2012 at 15:35
  • In fact 17.10 is "Artful Aardvark". Oct 20, 2017 at 1:30
24

I think we need to use adverbs and start over with A's.

  • Actively Aggressive Alligator
  • Badly Bristled Badger
  • Completely Crazy Chicken

and so on...

I don't think people use adverbs enough in conversation, especially programmers like me.

5
  • Keep up making Adverbs!!, It seems Great to me :-D
    – Prasad RD
    Mar 16, 2012 at 5:55
  • 2
    Delightfully Delicious Duck! Um, that one might go too far for some people.
    – Kelley
    Mar 16, 2012 at 10:09
  • 1
    Easily Entertained Elephant Mar 17, 2012 at 4:20
  • 1
    Famously Friendly Finch Mar 21, 2012 at 18:26
  • Giftedly Graceful Giraffe Apr 28, 2016 at 18:21
16

Let's just get past the end of the Mayan calendar first, and then we'll worry about the Z of Ubuntu. It would be nice if the Z of Ubuntu would get as much attention as the end of the Mayan calendar though. It is actually somewhat similar. We have the 6-month cycle, the 24 month cycle and the big cycle, which is the turn of the alphabet :)

Countdown to Catastrophe

(Source)

What do you think Mark Shuttleworth thought when he came up with the Adjective Animal scheme? The guy on the right does have the same cool attitude that the SABDFL has, doesn't he? :)

3
  • 2
    Yes but... Who is this SABDFL guy you talking about? :-}
    – Prasad RD
    Mar 16, 2012 at 6:01
  • 1
    @Prasad: SABDFL is "Self-Appointed Benevolent Dictator for Life", the official title of Mark Shuttleworth, founder of Cannonical, in the Ubuntu project. See en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benevolent_Dictator_for_Life
    – MestreLion
    Mar 16, 2012 at 11:19
  • thanks, (this is the 3rd attempt to comment this!) looks like i dropped almost every little intel behind by catching those big ones! :-)
    – Prasad RD
    Mar 16, 2012 at 14:29
6

How about this! in maths after number 9, 10 comes. that means 1 and 0, as in the example ubuntu will be Amazing Badger, Amazing Catfish :-)

3
  • The thought it nice. But this means that the sequence is more like: 00, 11, 22, ..., 99 and then goes to 01, 02, ... Not very math-like. Mar 15, 2012 at 23:29
  • Amazing Catfish?! :v U r high bro
    – Naveen
    Feb 28, 2015 at 6:25
  • someone should have a drink...at least me :3
    – Prasad RD
    Feb 28, 2015 at 6:33
5

I suppose Apple will have to consider the same sort of thing eventually, when they run out of cats. Maybe they'll have a "Schrodinger's Cat" and then move on to something else. (Come to think of it, I wish WE could have a "Schrodinger's Cat!" Maybe that'll have to wait for "Ubuntu for Quantum Computing.")

1
2

It is most likely that Mark will start using Caribbean terminologies as we have such an extensive vocabulary to choose from in our dialects. I expect that he will probably start with Restarting Rastaman after Z, to signify the switch to the new naming scheme.

--

On a more serious note, by the time that happens, we will likely be advanced in many other areas, or maybe the world might have ended - in other words, we just don't know. It's like Ubuntu will just start using animals beginning with A and going down, or switch to just descriptive words.

1

Aquatinted Avocado

Im thinking after all the animal names get over, we will have <verb> <plant>

Like this:

  • Aquatinted Avocado

  • Baffling Blueberries

And so on


Offtopic

When we finish all the names. We should make something like the Pokérap. Maybe we can call it the UberRap

-2

I'd advised to call it:

Autistic Aardvark

That would rise autism awareness and PRs for Canonical which could donate to some organizations.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .