Introduced the first alpha release of the GNOME 40 user environment. Scheduled for 24 March 2021. As a reminder, the project switched to a new version numbering, according to which release 40.0 will be published instead of 3.40, which will make it possible to get rid of the first digit “3”, which has lost its relevance during the current development process.
Intermediate corrective releases will be delivered under numbers 40.1, 40.2, 40.3 … Significant releases will continue to form every 6 months, i.e. GNOME 41.0 will be released in fall 2021. Odd numbers are no longer associated with test releases, which now have alpha, beta and rc labels. We decided not to use 4.x version in order to avoid confusion and overlap with GTK 4.0.
From Changes in GNOME 40 Highlighted Switch to GTK 4 Branch and significant changes in the organization of work in the interface. For example, the vertical orientation was replaced with the horizontal one and the navigation in the overview mode and in the application selection interface was changed. Virtual desktops in overview mode are now arranged horizontally and appear as a continuous loop from left to right.
Seamless transition between program list and virtual desktops is provided.
GNOME Shell also includes GPU rendering for shaders, updated avatar styling, and added support for three-touch screen gestures. Added the ability to filter the output in the add-on installation application. The Nautilus file manager adds support for file creation times and uses the xdg-desktop-portal component to set the desktop wallpaper. Added support for two-factor authentication and connection muxing for sftp to gvfs. XWayland support has been improved in the Mutter compositing manager.
In the Epiphany browser, due to changes in the rules for accessing the Google API, protection against phishing is disabled by default, which was implemented through the use of Google safe-browsing technology. Changed dialogs for selecting search engines and data synchronization, as well as context menus. Added Alt + 0 shortcut to display recently viewed tabs. Improved support for flatpak package format.