Ravi Sharma from the Ubuntu Foundations Team presented the results of the work carried out over the past year to ensure full support for the ARM64 architecture in Ubuntu. The improvements in tools and infrastructure, as well as changes to the main composition of the Linux kernel, have addressed specific issues on ARM64 devices. These issues included the distribution of packages through a separate repository, lack of support for live patches for the kernel, limited options for computer game enthusiasts, and unavailability of Secure Boot on laptops with Qualcomm Snapdragon chips.
The main achievements of this work are as follows:
- ARM64 architecture packages were moved from ports.ubuntu.com to the main Ubuntu archive, archive.ubuntu.com. This migration allowed for the use of the same infrastructure used for x86_64 packages, improving the speed and reliability of package delivery. Changes to cloud-init, live-build, livecd-rootfs, and ubuntu-release-upgrader packages were necessary for this migration, which has been included in Ubuntu 26.04 and is being backported to Ubuntu 24.04 LTS.
- The Livepatch service, which enables corrections to the Linux kernel without rebooting, has been extended to ARM64 systems. Previously, live patches were only distributed for x86_64 systems due to the lack of reliable stack trace support in the Linux kernel for ARM64. Live patch support for ARM64 is now available for Ubuntu 26.04 LTS and Ubuntu Core 26.
- A stable snap package with the Steam client has been created for the ARM64 architecture. This package allows users to run the Steam client, originally designed for x86 systems, on ARM64 devices using emulation. The package has been tested on laptops with Qualcomm Snapdragon X Elite, NVIDIA DGX Spark, and Radxa Orion O6 chips, supporting GPU forwarding and compatibility with Wine, Proton, DXVK, and vkd3d for running x86_64 games distributed through the Steam platform.
/Reports, release notes, official announcements.