Dashing the hopes of thousands of children of the 80s, the Ubuntu development team has announced that Ubuntu 8.04 will not be named Hungry Hippo. The alliterative Linux distribution is always named after an animal and an adjective. Thus, Ubuntu 7.04 is Feisty Fawn, while 7.10 will be known as Gutsy Gibbon. 8.04 will be Hardy Heron.

While Ubunty 7.10 isn't even out yet, there are a few details we can share regarding 8.04. It will be the next "long term support" version of Ubuntu, which means it will be supported with security updates for three years on the desktop and 5 years on the server. That makes Hardy Heron both an appropriate name and a good choice for businesses seeking a Linux distribution that will be supported into the future.

Hardy Heron is scheduled for an April 2008 release. As one Digg commenter points out, there's still hope for a Hungry Hippo distribution. After the ZZ version of Ubuntu is released in another 7 or 8 years, perhaps Ubuntu will move to a three word naming cycle, and one day there could be a "Hungry Hungry Hippo."