Solaris 11.4 To Move From GNOME 2 Desktop To GNOME Shell

For those happening to use Oracle Solaris on desktops/workstations, Solaris 11.4 will finally be making the transition from GNOME 2 to the GNOME 3.24 Shell.

GNOME Shell has been the default GNOME user interface since 2011 while with the upcoming Solaris 11.4 update is when Oracle is finally making the plunge from GNOME 2.x to GNOME 3.24. Longtime Sun/Solaris developer Alan Coopersmith confirmed, "Gnome Shell is coming in Solaris 11.4, which upgrades GNOME to version 3.24."

This comes after sharing some Solaris screenshots with GNOME Shell previously:

I'd have to say it looks much nicer than the current Solaris desktop showing its age:

There's not a whole lot known yet about the other user-facing changes to find with Solaris 11.4, which is expected to be released sometime in 2018. Oracle Solaris 11.3 was released in October 2015.