Screenshot Tour: Ubuntu Touch 14.04 on a Nexus 7

We installed Ubuntu Touch 14.04 on our own hardware to see what those tablets will be like.

We don’t recommend installing this yourself, as it’s still not a polished, complete experience.

You’ll see the welcome screen when you boot up or unlock a Ubuntu tablet or phone.

If you don’t, you’ll just see a message saying “No data sources available.”

This is actually very similar to the Dash onUbuntu’s Unity desktop.

Here you’ll find apps you have installed and apps available to install.

Tap an installed app to launch it or tap an available app to view more details and install it.

The launcher isn’t just for apps.

This hidden navigation is used throughout Ubuntu’s different apps and can be easy to miss at first.

Swipe to the left or right to move between these screens.

These screens are also similar to the different panels in Unity on the desktop.

The Scopes section allows you to view different search scopes you have installed.

These are used to search different sources when you start a search from the Dash.

For example, searching in the Music scope will show you music results from Grooveshark by default.

The launcher will appear – keep moving your finger towards the right edge of the screen.

This will swipe the current app off the screen, taking you back to the Dash.

Once back on the Dash, you’ll see your open apps represented as thumbnails under Recent.

Tap a thumbnail here to go back to a running app.

To remove an app from here, long-press it and tap the X button that appears.

Swipe in from the right edge in any app to quickly switch between recent apps.

Swipe down from the top of the screen to dive into the indicator panel.

The Apps

System controls not included in the pull-down panel are available in the System controls app.

you might add Evernote, Ubuntu One, Twitter, Facebook, and Google accounts from here.

A free Ubuntu One account is mandatory for downloading and updating apps.

A Google account can be used to sync contacts and calendar events.

Some apps on Ubuntu are native apps, while many are web apps.

Theoretically, both types of apps will be able to scale to different screen resolutions.

Swipe up from the bottom of an app’s screen to view its interface elements.

Tap the button and you’ll see many more controls.

This is an overflow area for utility options and functions that can’t fit on the navigation bar.

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You got away this time, but don’t loop back and try.

We’d expect to see such Easter eggs disappear before Ubuntu Touch actually ships on real devices.

Ubuntu Touch has come a long way, but it’s still not something you want to use today.

Few apps are available, and many of the ones that are are just mobile websites.