NoobsLab | Eye on Digital World: nexus 7

Ubuntu Touch 1.0 first stable version hands-on review on Nexus 4 phone and Nexus 7 Tablet (Screenshots + Video)

Ubuntu Touch 1.0 stable version hands-on video review on Nexus 4 phone and Nexus 7 Tablet

Canonical has released Ubuntu 13.10 desktop and first stable version of Ubuntu Touch for phones & tablets. Ubuntu Touch user interface is aimed to offer the simple solution than other mobile OS like Android, according to canonical. The OS is fairly cool, though. You swipe on the edges of the phone to bring up the app launcher, visit your home screen, multitask, and view menus instead of hardware buttons. The home screen is a bit different than what you see on iOS and Android, showing your open apps along the top and your shortcuts on the bottom. Most of the Canonical's energy has gone into the first stable release of Ubuntu Touch than desktop but some rumors mentioned Canonical didn't ignored Ubuntu desktop. We are constantly testing Ubuntu touch on Nexus devices, After installing first stable release on Nexus 4 we can say you should give a try if you own Nexus 4 but on Nexus 7 Ubuntu Touch stuck with any application, anytime, zero results with this tablet. With Nexus 7 it can be Mir display problem but I couldn't figure out problem.
It runs smooth and fast on Nexus 4 without any problems. I can say at this stage you shouldn't expect this OS to compete with Android since it is first stable release and I am pretty happy with this release (But only on Nexus 4 device).

It is pretty easy to install on Nexus devices, You can follow guide here. For other devices you have to do some hacks and other stuff in order to run Ubuntu Touch, well it is not really easy to install on other devices if you are not developer/expert. You can see other supported devices list and their Ubuntu Touch status here. There is still no news on the release of first device that will come pre-installed with Ubuntu Touch OS, but we shouldn't expect them to appear before early-2014 at least. I can say Ubuntu Touch is stable but off-course it isn't finished yet, till now it's core apps completed 87% out of 100 percent. Battery life with Ubuntu Touch isn't great, it drains battery more quickly than Android.

What is available:

Animated lock screen (works perfectly)
Web browser (Perfect, also play flash videos but not smooth as expected)
Camera (On Nexus 4 front + back with flash works perfectly)
Contacts, Dialer, Friends (Online accounts)
Gallery (To categorize images)
Messaging
Update Manager
File Manager (Only able to open video files)
Shorts (RSS App)
Stock Ticker (App)
Calculator, Calendar, Clock, Notes (Apps)
Music Player (With basic controls)
Terminal
Files can be transfer via usb cable (only tested under Ubuntu desktop)
Sudoku and Dropping Letters Games.
Facebook (Much better)
Many other applications can be installed with just one click via More Suggestions.
Enable/Disable dash plugins.

What left:

Twitter App (It is available as webapp but not as expected)
Software Manager
Video Player (But videos can be played via file manager)
Dock Mode (HDMI desktop mode)
Ubuntuone (App)
File Manager (Lack of features)
Email client
And many more things are missing.

Question: Should you install it on your device?
At the end I can say at this stage Ubuntu Touch isn't for end users (for daily use) but more for manufacturers and carriers. If you want try it on your device.

Video: Ubuntu Touch on Nexus 4 Phone

Video: Ubuntu Touch on Nexus 7 Tablet

Screenshots

Review of Ubuntu desktop on Nexus 7, Easily install Ubuntu 13.04 Raring on Nexus 7 Tablet

Ubuntu desktop is great thing to try on Nexus 7, it is available for armhf architecture. As you know Nexus 7 devices is inexpensive tablet with great build quality compare to other famous tablets available in the market and Nexus 7 device has opened door to other operating systems to get in or moded Android roms (Nobody gonna stop you to use as you like, neither your Nexus device).
Canonical is working on Ubuntu Touch which is first OS by canonical for phones and tablets (All in one OS). We are constantly testing Ubuntu Touch but around one month ago we did review of Ubuntu touch on Nexus 4 and we can say canonical is going to right way (Still can't say anything about Mir display!!!).

Basically Ubuntu desktop for Nexus 7 is just a Ubuntu core with some applications installed by default (Any application can be installed if it is available for armhf architecture via deb/PPA), in order to make sure Ubuntu can work great on tablet devices. It is kind of developer edition and should not be use for daily work, since it has problems in it. Canonical stopped development of Ubuntu desktop for Nexus 7 for the moment and there is no latest news about 13.10 build for Nexus 7 tablet. So Ubuntu 13.04 was last build from canonical for this tablet.

As Mark writes on his blog:

"So I think it’s time to look at the core of Ubuntu and review it through a mobile lens: let’s measure our core platform by mobile metrics, things like battery life, number of running processes, memory footprint, and polish the rough edges that we find when we do that. The tighter we can get the core, the better we will do on laptops and the cloud, too.
Ubuntu is getting back to basics and we'll use the 13.04 cycle to get Ubuntu Core leaner and meaner. Note that this means that in 13.04 we will not be attempting to make a tablet specific experience. We will run the stock Ubuntu Desktop on the Nexus 7 while we focus on the core of Ubuntu. Below, you'll find a collection of resources to help you get started. We'd love your contributions!
Ubuntu is getting back to basics and we'll use the 13.04 cycle to get Ubuntu Core leaner and meaner. Note that this means that in 13.04 we will not be attempting to make a tablet specific experience. We will run the stock Ubuntu Desktop on the Nexus 7 while we focus on the core of Ubuntu. Below, you'll find a collection of resources to help you get started. We'd love your contributions!"

Ubuntu has provided PPA for Nexus 7 installer but for some reasons it doesn't work and throws error every time as I experienced. So I wrote a script to install Ubuntu desktop on Nexus 7 pretty much automatically. This script wipes all data from tablet, unlock bootloader and push Ubuntu image/files to tablet. There is also opportunity to install multirom and dual boot with other Roms + Ubuntu (link to xda-multirom post).

Notes:
We installed various desktops but most of them doesn't work properly. Only Unity, Gnome classic and (KDE - kind of) work properly in Nexus 7 with Ubuntu desktop.
Flash Player has some problems to render videos properly.
Bluetooth keyboard and mouse is good idea to use.
WiFi works without any problem.
Unity stuck sometimes but Gnome classic doesn't.
Dual boot option is available (check this link).
There are bugs....

See Ubuntu desktop in action on Nexus 7 [HD]

Warning: May bootloader unlock void your warranty.

Enable Developer options and enable USB debugging mode.
Setting > About phone > Start tapping (7 times) on Build number option 'you are now developer'
Then go to Setting > Developer options > Enable USB Debugging

Download and run script in Ubuntu 13.10/13.04/12.10/12.04/Linux Mint 16/15/14/13/and other related Ubuntu derivatives open terminal and enter following commands: