One of the new planned new features of the upcoming release of Ubuntu, Hardy Heron, is a fresh new theme. That’s right, no more brown and orange. While for many users just getting some nicer colors in to replace the “ugly” brown and orange is enough (I personally like the brown and orange a lot), I think the Ubuntu team should take this chance to get ahead of other distributions in another way.

I can not believe how many people think Ubuntu’s brown, Ubuntu is not brown! It’s ORANGE! Go ahead, if you’re running Ubuntu right now, open Nautilus and compare the title-bar color to the different shades of orange to the left.

Canonical has revealed the style of the new default theme that will be used in Ubuntu 10.04, the next major version of the popular Linux distribution. In a significant departure from tradition, Ubuntu is shedding its signature brown color scheme and is adopting a new look with a palette that includes orange and an aubergine shade of purple.

One of the common things I see around the net is people complaining about Ubuntu’s Brown/Orange Human theme. Now I know there is going to be a “new” theme for Intrepid but I just hope as much thought goes into it that apparently went into Human.

Ubuntu users were promised a radical new desktop theme with Ubuntu 8.04 and then that ended up getting postponed to the upcoming 8.10 release (a.k.a. the Intrepid Ibex). There was a new brown theme that had appeared early on in Intrepid but many users were dissatisfied with this work and Canonical ended up reverting the theme to that of Ubuntu 8.04 and earlier.

Anytime the theme or artwork of Ubuntu is discussed, the discussion seems to turn automatically to brown vs. other colors. I don't see brown as being the problem, though, so let me explain what I would like to see in future Ubuntu themes.

Having tried the Alpha 5 in September and finding it stable and fast in my laptop, I was very eager to try the official release. The verdict in 2 words is: It rocks!! And yes, the brown-orange theme has finally gone away!!

The big news out of the Ubuntu world this month is the radically refurbished look introduced to accompany Lucid when it's released in April, replacing the orange-brown "Human: theme that Ubuntu users have known and loved - or not - since 2004.  Here's a look at the new face of Ubuntu, with an attempt at abstract thoughts related to it.

They’re both ugly, orange and annoying. Ubuntu is a Linux distribution, a free alternative operating system, if you will. As a “hobbyist OS”, it was fine. So where does the orange and annoying come in?