I would like to apologize to the community, the media, and the journalists who wrote to us to know more about our upcoming release. We’ve been extremely secretive and 3 weeks past the Ubuntu release it’s still unclear for most people exactly what the next Linux Mint will look like. The reason we’ve been so silent is because we didn’t want to promise something we could not guarantee. Today we’re finally ready to give you an in-depth preview of Linux Mint 12, codename “Lisa”. I hope you’ll enjoy it and I look forward to reading your feedback.
Gnome 2 vs new desktops
In Linux Mint 11 we made the decision to keep Gnome 2.32. The traditional Gnome desktop, although it’s not actively developed by the Gnome development team anymore, is still by far the most popular desktop within the Linux community. As other distributions adopted new desktops such as Unity and Gnome 3, many users felt alienated and consequently migrated to Linux Mint. We recorded a 40% increase in a single month and we’re now quickly catching up with Ubuntu for the number #1 spot within the Linux desktop market.
As much as we’d like to keep Gnome 2.32 a little while longer we need to look forward and embrace new technologies. This doesn’t mean we need to change the way people use their desktops, not at all, it means we need to try and do our best for people to feel at home again, but on top of a brand new base, a new layer of technology, one that is actively supported upstream and that can be maintained properly going forward.
From a technological point of view, Gnome 3 is a fantastic desktop, and it’s getting better with every new release. It will take time for Linux Mint to develop a Gnome 3 desktop that is on-par with what we had with Gnome 2, but eventually we’ll be able to do much more with it than was possible with the traditional desktop.
With this in mind, the future of Linux Mint is Gnome 3, the present of Linux Mint is a simple question: “How do we make people like Gnome 3? And what do we provide as an alternative to those who still do not want to change?”.
Gnome 3 and MGSE
Gnome 3 is shiny, elegant and modern looking. It’s a sleek desktop but it comes with a few problems:
- It changes the way people use their computer
- It’s application-centric, not task-centric (you switch between applications, not windows)
- It doesn’t do multi-tasking well (you can’t see opened windows, system tray icons, etc..)
We’ve been using application menus, window lists and other traditional desktop features for as far as I can remember. It looked different in KDE, Xfce, or even Windows and Mac OS, but it was similar. Gnome 3 is changing all that and is developing a better way for us to interact with our computer. From our point of view here at Linux Mint, we’re not sure they’re right, and we’re not sure they’re wrong either. What we’re sure of, is that if people aren’t given the choice they will be frustrated and our vision of an Operating System is that your computer should work for you and make you feel comfortable. So with this in mind, Gnome 3 in Linux Mint 12 needs to let you interact with your computer in two different ways: the traditional way, and the new way, and it’s up to you to decide which way you want to use.
For this, we developed “MGSE” (Mint Gnome Shell Extensions), which is a desktop layer on top of Gnome 3 that makes it possible for you to use Gnome 3 in a traditional way. You can disable all components within MGSE to get a pure Gnome 3 experience, or you can enable all of them to get a Gnome 3 desktop that is similar to what you’ve been using before. Of course you can also pick and only enable the components you like to design your own desktop.
The main features in MGSE are:
- The bottom panel
- The application menu
- The window list
- A task-centric desktop (i.e. you switch between windows, not applications)
- Visible system tray icons
MGSE also includes additional extensions such as a media player indicator, and multiple enhancements to Gnome 3.
Here is what it looks like (click on the screenshot to make it bigger):
