Hello Developers,  As you may or may not know, there has been discussion in the last few weeks regarding including Abiword 2.6 in Hardy. I've spoken with several members of the release team including Sarah and Martin and the general consensus seems that being able to ship Abiword 2.6.x would be desirable. From an Xubuntu POV, this would be highly desirable as we use Abiword as the default word processor. For further rationale (and I think you'll find some of the arguments rather convincing), see <a href="https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/abiword/+bug/202174">bug #202174.</a>  <a href="https://bugs.edge.launchpad.net/%7Eabiryan">Ryan Pavlik</a> has championed this by doing the legwork of packaging and testing - not an easy task by any means. Although I haven't personally had the time to do an in depth review yet, the source package is in main and hence requires a core-dev sponsor. I'd like to find a (few) core-dev(s) who would be interested in taking the final steps to get Abiword 2.6 into Hardy.  Before I start getting flamed for ludicrous thinking, obviously the risks of making such a change of this type at this point in the release cycle was a part of the discussion held with the release team. However, as I understand it, the release team would be willing to approve an FFe if the packaging was of required caliber and appropriate testing occurred (and both cases appear to be true). See <a href="https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/abiword/+bug/202174">https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/abiword/+bug/202174</a> for more information and <a href="https://edge.launchpad.net/%7Eabiryan/+archive">https://edge.launchpad.net/~abiryan/+archive</a> for the PPA where Ryan is working on the packaging. The latest version at time of writing is <a href="http://ppa.launchpad.net/abiryan/ubuntu/pool/main/a/abiword/abiword_2.6.2-0ubuntu0%7Eppa18.dsc">abiword - 2.6.2-0ubuntu0~ppa18</a> (source .dsc file).  If we're unable to generate the interest required from core-devs to get Abiword sponsored then I'd like to recommend demoting Abiword (completely) from Main for Hardy as it would be unfeasible to support the 2.4 branch for three years considering the version we currently ship is already two years old. Thanks, Cody A.W. Somerville Ubuntu Developer -- Cody A.W. Somerville Software Engineer Red Cow Marketing & Technologies, Inc. Office: 506-458-1290 Toll Free: 1-877-733-2699 Fax: 506-453-9112 Cell: 506-449-5899 Email: <a href="mailto:cody@redcow.ca">cody@redcow.ca</a> <a href="http://www.redcow.ca">http://www.redcow.ca</a>