Kate Stewart, Ubuntu Release Manager at Canonical, announced on the ubuntu-devel announce mailing list there will be no release candidate for the Ubuntu 11.04 Natty Narwal release.
What does this means for Natty?
It means Natty will go from Beta 2 into the final release.
Why is this being done?
To avoid releasing a RC over a holiday—many community testers and developers may not have the opportunity to raise or respond to issues.
Does this mean Ubuntu will slip a release?
No. It means they have re-arrange the release milestones in order to get the greatest amount of testing and fixes prior to the scheduled release date without having to worry about whether the community testers missed an update because of a holiday.
What will the release schedule be now?
The remainder of the release schedule is April 14th, 2011 Beta 2 release, the April 21st RC has been dropped and the final release is still scheduled for April 28th, 2011.