Launchpad is a platform for developing free software. Ironically, it is also a proprietary
platform—one of the ways Canonical makes money. Launchpad provides services to
people and companies who develop their own Linux distributions based on Ubuntu.
There are over 800 Launchpad projects, all of which use the tools described in Table 1-5.
Any user with a valid e-mail address can sign up for a Launchpad account. Launchpad
is constantly changing, and as of this writing, a new release is issued every four weeks.
The last major release was made at the end of July 2008.
Sign up for a Launchpad account at www.launchpad.net. It’ll help you keep up to
speed on bug reports and much more. Click the Register link in the upper-right corner of
the Launchpad site and follow the instructions to create a display name and password.
Be aware that participation is subject to terms of use, as noted at https://help.launchpad.net/Legal
Code Source code management using the Bazaar
version control system, intended as an
alternative to two other version control
systems: CVS (Concurrent Versions System)
and Subversion (SVN)
Bugs A bug tracker, also known as Malone
Blueprints A specifications tracker for documenting new
software features
Translation A community development tool for human
language translation, also known as Rosetta
Answers A community-developed knowledge base