Canonical, the company behind the popular Ubuntu operating system, has announced a new concept known as “Dangerous” Desktop Images. These specialized daily builds are designed for developers and power users who need access to the most bleeding-edge software. The new images will ship with the latest daily development builds of Ubuntu and will include all pre-packaged Snap applications from their “edge” channels, offering unvetted, experimental features.
The Ubuntu Release Management Team, led by Canonical engineer Tim Andersson, is spearheading the new initiative. The “Dangerous” images will be identical to the standard daily desktop builds for the current development series, but with a crucial difference: all integrated Snap packages will be sourced from their respective edge channels. This approach is intended to streamline development and testing, particularly for “spikes”—focused, six-week-long projects where various teams collaborate on a specific topic.
The introduction of “Dangerous” images is a direct response to a need identified during a previous “spike” on Trusted Platform Module (TPM) Full Disk Encryption (FDE). During that period, all Snaps for daily builds were temporarily switched to edge channels to assist developers. By creating a dedicated, “dangerous” image, the team aims to make such testing more efficient and reduce the need for temporary, system-wide changes to the daily builds.
While this new concept is intended to accelerate development and allow for faster feedback loops, it carries inherent risks. The “edge” channels for Snaps are the most unstable and least-tested, and as such, these images are not recommended for general use or on production machines. They are explicitly for developers who need to work with the very latest software components. The name “Dangerous” serves as a clear warning to users, advising caution and encouraging their use in isolated environments like virtual machines.
The first “Dangerous” images are expected to be built in conjunction with an upcoming “spike” focused on the desktop prompting-client. This project signifies Canonical’s continued commitment to using the Snap ecosystem and its channels to deliver new features and improvements more rapidly, a strategy that has drawn both support and criticism from the broader Linux community.