Canonical on Jan 3rd announced a new version of Ubuntu designed specifically for smartphones to power everything from entry-level handhelds to "high-end superphones" that double as PCs.
Ubuntu for Android is a separate product, which Canonical will continue to maintain. The newly announced version of Ubuntu will run on smartphones without any reliance on Android.
Today, Canonical demonstrated a Galaxy Nexus running Ubuntu's phone interface at the Consumer Electronics Show, here are some pics.
Ubuntu phones don't use any hardware buttons or "soft" buttons for navigation. The interface presents the standard grid of icons popularized by the iPhone, eschewing something more radical like the Windows Phone live tiles or Android's widgets. Like most phones, Ubuntu can show notifications on the home screen.
Like the Ubuntu phone OS, the source code for Ubuntu for Android is not yet available. "We don't want users to install it on hardware that we're not sure it can support," Canonical's Richard Collins said, a statement quite similar to the excuse Google has given for delaying release of Android source code. Canonical officials have said Ubuntu phone development will (eventually) involve the community more than Android's does, however, following a model similar to the Ubuntu desktop code.