The developers behind the increasingly popular Ubuntu and Fedora Linux distributions announced the availability of new beta releases last week. These betas, which offer users an opportunity to get an early look at the functionality that will be included in the next major versions, are already highly polished and showcase the growing maturity of the desktop Linux software ecosystem.

Ubuntu 8.10, which is codenamed Intrepid Ibex, will be released in late October. Fedora 10, which is codenamed Cambridge, will arrive in November. These distributions both loosely base their schedules around that of the GNOME desktop environment and will include GNOME 2.24, which was released last month.

The new version of GNOME brings some noteworthy improvements

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