If you have a older slower computer, use MATE, if you're putting it on a newer computer you can try Cinnamon. Haven't tried the others yet. Mint is great though!
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Originally Posted By: glock19
At work I've been using Ubuntu for SSH and Python development. I've been curious about Mint but I'm wondering which desktop environment to try.
For those using Mint, are you using Cinnamon, MATE, KDE, Xfce, etc...?
MATE is a fork of Gnome 2 and should appear and work exactly the same way, as there have been very, very few new features added to the code base since the fork.
Cinnamon is a fork of Gnome 3 and attempts to bring a conventional desktop paradigm (menu, taskbar, minimize buttons, etc.) to Gnome 3 which is quite foreign to those coming from traditional desktops.
XFCE is built to be lighter and faster than the others; but these days I see little performance or resource usage advantages of XFCE over MATE and XFCE is lacking in a little bit of desktop "polish" that MATE (which is, again, just Gnome 2) provides.
KDE is a whole different ball game. It uses a whole different tool set (Qt versus GTK used by Gnome, Cinnamon, MATE, XFCE) and therefore sports a whole different set of default applications built atop that tool set. While many of the KDE applications are astounding (The Amarok music manager, Digikam photo manager and K3B disk burning applications are absolutely top-rate) many find it too busy and superfluous. You will find that all enterprise-grade distributions use Gnome, for example (Red Hat uses Gnome and Ubuntu's Unity is just a shell over a Gnome code base - Even OpenSUSE, KDE's "flagship" distro, uses Gnome in their enterprise offering!) KDE is a little too pretty and is almost infinitely configurable; and *in my experience only* has been a little prone to crashiness. KDE has also earned a reputation over the years as being a little resource-intensive; although in recent years Gnome, Unity and Cinnamon have caught up!
Mint has done a fabulous job of taking Ubuntu and returning a traditional desktop interface to it. They're not interested in forcing a single interface on your that will match your tablet and phone as Canonical is doing with Ubuntu and it's Unity interface. They also include codecs and other software like Java which are technically not-exactly-legal to distribute in the U.S., but which save you a bunch of time downloading, installing and configuring. Ubuntu cannot do this. I am a little concerned at times that Mint is basically just one person (Clement Lefebvre) who may one day decide he does not have the time to lead a small team of developers anymore; but MATE and Cinnamon are all open source, so I am sure the community would step up as they always do to ensure Mint's continued survival. Migrating back from Mint to Ubuntu is easy as pie because Mint uses almost exclusively Ubuntu software and repositories.
Unless you have a compelling reason to choose XFCE (perhaps for an older system) or KDE (in case you want/ need to run or develop Qt-based applications) the choice most have is between MATE and Cinnamon. I think Cinnamon is the way of the future as it is based on Gnome 3's code (and massive development team) whereas MATE is picking up and running with a depreciated code base. MATE is ridiculously stable and simple, though; and easier on resources, and does not require any fancy-pants 3D-capable video cards.
At work I've been using Ubuntu for SSH and Python development. I've been curious about Mint but I'm wondering which desktop environment to try.
For those using Mint, are you using Cinnamon, MATE, KDE, Xfce, etc...?
MATE is a fork of Gnome 2 and should appear and work exactly the same way, as there have been very, very few new features added to the code base since the fork.
Cinnamon is a fork of Gnome 3 and attempts to bring a conventional desktop paradigm (menu, taskbar, minimize buttons, etc.) to Gnome 3 which is quite foreign to those coming from traditional desktops.
XFCE is built to be lighter and faster than the others; but these days I see little performance or resource usage advantages of XFCE over MATE and XFCE is lacking in a little bit of desktop "polish" that MATE (which is, again, just Gnome 2) provides.
KDE is a whole different ball game. It uses a whole different tool set (Qt versus GTK used by Gnome, Cinnamon, MATE, XFCE) and therefore sports a whole different set of default applications built atop that tool set. While many of the KDE applications are astounding (The Amarok music manager, Digikam photo manager and K3B disk burning applications are absolutely top-rate) many find it too busy and superfluous. You will find that all enterprise-grade distributions use Gnome, for example (Red Hat uses Gnome and Ubuntu's Unity is just a shell over a Gnome code base - Even OpenSUSE, KDE's "flagship" distro, uses Gnome in their enterprise offering!) KDE is a little too pretty and is almost infinitely configurable; and *in my experience only* has been a little prone to crashiness. KDE has also earned a reputation over the years as being a little resource-intensive; although in recent years Gnome, Unity and Cinnamon have caught up!
Mint has done a fabulous job of taking Ubuntu and returning a traditional desktop interface to it. They're not interested in forcing a single interface on your that will match your tablet and phone as Canonical is doing with Ubuntu and it's Unity interface. They also include codecs and other software like Java which are technically not-exactly-legal to distribute in the U.S., but which save you a bunch of time downloading, installing and configuring. Ubuntu cannot do this. I am a little concerned at times that Mint is basically just one person (Clement Lefebvre) who may one day decide he does not have the time to lead a small team of developers anymore; but MATE and Cinnamon are all open source, so I am sure the community would step up as they always do to ensure Mint's continued survival. Migrating back from Mint to Ubuntu is easy as pie because Mint uses almost exclusively Ubuntu software and repositories.
Unless you have a compelling reason to choose XFCE (perhaps for an older system) or KDE (in case you want/ need to run or develop Qt-based applications) the choice most have is between MATE and Cinnamon. I think Cinnamon is the way of the future as it is based on Gnome 3's code (and massive development team) whereas MATE is picking up and running with a depreciated code base. MATE is ridiculously stable and simple, though; and easier on resources, and does not require any fancy-pants 3D-capable video cards.
It's not too hard to add Cinnamon to Ubuntu. I did it last night in about 10 minutes.
So if anyone is concerned about Mint support, you can simply add the desktop interface you like.
So if anyone is concerned about Mint support, you can simply add the desktop interface you like.
http://www.pcworld.com/article/2099903/u...-app-menus.html
OT:Apparently the switch is going back to local window menus with the next release of Ubuntu.
I particularly like Ubuntu Unity, not having to wade thru 15 apps I don't ever use.
OT:Apparently the switch is going back to local window menus with the next release of Ubuntu.
I particularly like Ubuntu Unity, not having to wade thru 15 apps I don't ever use.
Originally Posted By: simple_gifts
http://www.pcworld.com/article/2099903/u...-app-menus.html
OT:Apparently the switch is going back to local window menus with the next release of Ubuntu.
I particularly like Ubuntu Unity, not having to wade thru 15 apps I don't ever use.
That article makes it look like the menus, although put back where they belong, will appear and disappear as the mouse moves. This is great [sarcasm] because it gives the extraocular muscles extra exercise without the user having to type "free the fish" every time they login.
http://www.pcworld.com/article/2099903/u...-app-menus.html
OT:Apparently the switch is going back to local window menus with the next release of Ubuntu.
I particularly like Ubuntu Unity, not having to wade thru 15 apps I don't ever use.
That article makes it look like the menus, although put back where they belong, will appear and disappear as the mouse moves. This is great [sarcasm] because it gives the extraocular muscles extra exercise without the user having to type "free the fish" every time they login.
I have been using the 14.04 pre-release for a few months now: the menus, *if* you choose to place them in the window (they're still up in the upper task bar by default) are activated by mouse-over and are not visible until then.
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