Monthly News – September 2015

News

We’ve a lot of news this month. Before getting started and talking about what we’ve been working on, I’d like to thank all the people who helped us. More than 300 people donate to us every month and more so than the financial support this gives us, it’s also a sign of appreciation and happiness from our users and that really boosts our confidence. We also rely on a strong network of sponsors and partners and it’s a real pleasure to work in these conditions and with that level of support. So to all of you who are involved in helping us like that, I’d like to send a very big thank you.

I’d also like to take the opportunity to relay two old pieces of news from our partners.

In August, CompuLab completed the transition to Mint 17.2. New Mintbox 2 and Mintbox Mini units now ship with Linux Mint 17.2 Cinnamon edition.

And in February, HELLOTUX started shipping Linux Mint sweaters.

Apologies to CompuLab and HELLOTUX for covering this information so late.

“Rosa”, the codename for Linux Mint 17.3 was recently announced, and many new features were implemented in preparation for its release.

On top of the improvements which were mentioned last month, Cinnamon 2.8 will introduce a visual workspace switcher applet and a better sound applet:

MATE 1.12 received a lot of attention and will feature the following changes:

  • Better touchpad support (including natural scrolling, and middle-click emulation on three finger clicks)
  • Better session management (including screensaver inhibition on media playback with VLC, Totem etc..)
  • Better support for multiple monitors
  • Better display settings (using output names and a more explicit UI and letting you set the primary monitor)
  • Model/Vendor information in the power applet (so you can distinguish between multiple devices using batteries)

HiDPI support was improved for HTML themes in MDM. To take an example, on a 13″ Macbook Pro with a native resolution of 2560×1600, MDM used to blindly apply a 2x scale ratio and the login screen looked slightly too big (1280×800). It now works towards an “ideal” DPI value instead. In this case it applies a 1.3 scale ratio and the login screen ends up looking much nicer in what looks like 1969×1230.

The detection of HDMI TVs was also much improved. HiDPI would kick in by mistake on TVs which didn’t report their screen size correctly. That was fixed and some of these fixes will also be ported towards Cinnamon.

MATE and Xfce users will receive great window management improvements:

  • Better support for Compiz
  • Support for Compton and OpenBox
  • The ability to switch between various window managers

Although the Xfce edition will still use Xfwm4, it is likely to ship with Compton installed by default. On some computers, this compositing manager is known to reduce screen-tearing, and switching to it will be a breeze.

Last but not least, we worked on servers and mirrors. On the server side, extra.linuxmint.com was clustered and is now served by 2 separate servers. Repositories were also tuned to let apt-get know when files were last-modified. Although this is quite a small detail, it means two consecutive calls to apt-get update no longer re-download the same information (that information is tiny in size but it all adds up). We’re hoping this will improve response times and download speed on the main repository.

Linux Mint also benefits from a network of 68 repository mirrors and we’d like the OS to take advantage of that. Changes in the installer and in the Update Manager were planned and cool new improvements were added to the Software Sources tool:

  • Mirrors closer to you are now tested first (mirrors in your country first, then mirrors in neighbour countries, then mirrors in your part of the World and eventually mirrors in your continent)
  • Mirrors are tested one by one and their speed is much more meaningful than before
  • Mirrors are tested to check if they’re up-to-date and can be filtered out from the list

This was just implemented in the last few days. We’ll post more details about this soon on Segfault and we’ll probably make a package available for people to test these features before they land in Linux Mint 17.3.

Last month’s poll:

Thanks for taking part in last month’s poll. We got close to 2,000 votes and we have a better idea of what you think of Segfault. It looks like many people don’t or didn’t know about it, but that people who did were quite happy with it. In the comments sections people also asked for more articles.

We started writing more often and covering more news on the development of Linux Mint. And going forward, we’ll try to promote the Segfault blog a little bit more.

Poll of the month:

[poll id=”14″]

Don’t hesitate to comment to let us know where you get your games from, where you play them, and what reasons (if any) are holding you from playing them in Linux Mint.

Also don’t hesitate to share your experience on gaming in the comments section, if you think there’s something we should do to improve things on our side, or even simply to share your experience with other users.

Sponsorships:

Linux Mint is proudly sponsored by:

Platinum Sponsors:
Private Internet Access
Gold Sponsors:
Linux VPS Hosting
Silver Sponsors:
ThinkPenguin.com
Bronze Sponsors:
Vault Networks *
AYKsolutions Server & Cloud Hosting
7L Networks Toronto Colocation *
BGASoft Inc
David Salvo
Milton Security Group
Sysnova Information Systems
Community Sponsors:

To become a sponsor or to see the full list of Linux Mint sponsors, please visit: http://www.linuxmint.com/sponsors.php

Donations in August:

A total of $7,889 were raised thanks to the generous contributions of 347 donors:

$375, Blue Ridge POS, LLC aka “Dewey
$200, AP Style Studio
$159, Jean-luc V.
$112, Jacques J.
$112, Nathalie W.
$112, Andreas D.
$106 (8th donation), Hendrik S.
$106 (3rd donation), Rene V. D. H.
$106, Udo J.
$100, John P.
$100, Richard C.
$100, Henry N.
$100, Billy N.
$100, Richard R. S.
$100, Martin D.
$70, Glen P.
$67, Mark B.
$56, Jean B.
$56, Irénée P.
$56, Rosanna & Alex
$56, Régis B.
$53, Pertti P.
$53, Clément K.
$53, Daniele G.
$50 (64th donation), Matthew M.
$50 (7th donation), Yves L. aka “amadeus128”
$50 (4th donation), Paul L.
$50 (3rd donation), Robert S.
$50 (2nd donation), Mark M.
$50 (2nd donation), Richard C.
$50 (2nd donation), Stephen Niedzielski
$50, Charles P.
$50, Stephen H.
$50, Harjit T.
$50, Henk van L.
$50, Jon Y.
$50, Cecil B.
$50, John D. O.
$50, Anthony B.
$50, Ronald P.
$50, Jean-Francois R. – N0H1C
$50, Danny C.
$50, James B.
$50, Robert B.
$50, Lim C. B.
$50, Adam H.
$50, Vytas B.
$50, Robert E. H.
$50, David H. W.
$48, fourcultures
$45 (2nd donation), Tim V.
$45, Katica S.
$40, Donald M.
$40, Mallory T.
$40, Merritt D.
$40, Oblong Software Products
$39, Věroslav Olič
$34 (4th donation), David M.
$34, Jimi A.
$34, Hermann H.
$32 (66th donation), Olli K.
$32, Maurice M.
$32, Stefan M.
$32, Robert G.
$30 (17th donation), Wolfgang P.
$30 (5th donation), Brooke Dukes aka “BandonRandon
$30 (3rd donation), Amanda H.
$30, Steve S.
$30, Chris S.
$30, David H.
$30, Patrick M.
$30, Michael M.
$30, Dinesh R.
$30, A wannabe cryptographer
$28, Weber Technics
$28, René D.
$28, Matoso, P
$28, Christian K.
$28, Martin K.
$26 (9th donation), Joachim M.
$26 (2nd donation), Heinrich Goebl
$26 (2nd donation), Gopal P.
$26, Andrew L.
$25 (47th donation), Ronald W.
$25 (8th donation), Jobs Near You aka “Find Jobs
$25 (3rd donation), Nelson M.
$25 (2nd donation), John N.
$25 (2nd donation), Jeffrey B.
$25 (2nd donation), Nelson M.
$25, Edward F.
$25, Robert S.
$25, Jarle H.
$25, Scott M.
$25, Matthew P.
$25, Michael B.
$25, Lawrence D.
$25, Robert W.
$25, Vincent A.
$25, Charles B.
$23.81 (7th donation), Scott L.
$22 (6th donation), Ky LMDE
$22 (5th donation), Brendan M.
$22 (2nd donation), Ronan P.
$22, Tomaž S.
$22, David C.
$22, Philip P.
$22, Christian V.
$22, Stefan G.
$22, Benjamin F.
$22, Andreas K.
$22, Tobias S.
$22, Fabrice A.
$22, James C.
$22, Hermann W.
$22, Evie E.
$22, Markus B.
$21 (2nd donation), Zdzislaw P.
$21, Gary
$21, Peter S.
$21, Klaas T.
$21, Christian D.
$21, Klaus H.
$21, the.geremy
$21, Antti R.
$20 (6th donation), Curt Vaughan aka “curtvaughan ”
$20 (3rd donation), John C.
$20 (3rd donation), John B.
$20 (2nd donation), Henry W.
$20, C.w. R.
$20, Bruce M.
$20, Neil P.
$20, Фролов Г.
$20, Mike G.
$20, Steven W.
$20, Page IT Services
$20, Michael H.
$20, Juan G.
$20, Kenneth L.
$20, Mark M.
$20, VORIS&VORIS
$20, Rodney W.
$20, Kazzantra
$20, Cosmin-Robert R.
$20, Carlos L.
$20, Ryan D.
$20, Marc-andré M.
$20, David W.
$20, Sebastian D. L. aka “Sebadamus”
$20, Donald O.
$20, Stephen V.
$20, Kevin Y.
$17 (4th donation), Ib O. J.
$17 (2nd donation), Frédéric B.
$17, Marcus J.
$17, Савин А.
$17, Oliver S.
$17, Ralf Haeuser
$16 (2nd donation), Carlos N.
$16 (2nd donation), Stefan W.
$16, Jean-Yves C.
$16, Patrik J.
$16, George J.
$16, Graham S.
$16, Matīss J.
$15 (5th donation), Ian M.
$15 (5th donation), HJI aka “Hospital Jobs Inc
$15 (4th donation), Howard B.
$15 (4th donation), Timothy C.
$15 (2nd donation), Edward G.
$15 (2nd donation), Derek R.
$15, Matthew H.
$15, Samuel M.
$13 (2nd donation), Federico T.
$12 (53th donation), Tony C. aka “S. LaRocca”
$11 (21st donation), Mark W.
$11 (7th donation), Robert P.
$11 (5th donation), Stoyan
$11 (4th donation), Chris W.
$11 (4th donation), Queenvictoria
$11 (3rd donation), Robbieka
$11 (2nd donation), Marc S.
$11 (2nd donation), Mario Castro
$11 (2nd donation), Massimo C.
$11 (2nd donation), Tomi K.
$11 (2nd donation), Thorsten H.
$11 (2nd donation), Helmut P.
$11, Ismail G.
$11, Paolo V. S.
$11, Santino D.
$11, Fabiano
$11, Marc S.
$11, Kanthavel P.
$11, Jordi C. P.
$11, Ulrich B.
$11, Darren W.
$11, Meddy B. aka “o_be_one
$11, Michał Ś.
$11, Andreas S.
$11, Nicola D. G.
$11, Jason S.
$11, Thomas L.
$11, Ideja marketing
$11, Paul S.
$11, Michael K. aka “Schwäbische Alb”
$11, Thomas L.
$11, Damiano T.
$11, Axel H.
$11, Marin M.
$11, Rebekka K.
$11, Gabriele B.
$10 (45th donation), Tsuguo S.
$10 (11th donation), Dan Jackson
$10 (10th donation), Kouji K.
$10 (7th donation), Libertad Tecnologica
$10 (5th donation), Michael H. aka “hikiboi1969”
$10 (5th donation), hellman$31337
$10 (4th donation), Richard C.
$10 (4th donation), Jannik T.
$10 (4th donation), Murat Kutluer
$10 (3rd donation), Jannik T.
$10 (2nd donation), Michał B.
$10 (2nd donation), Gary N.
$10 (2nd donation), Jiří J.
$10, Tom B.
$10, Debbie R.
$10, Cobber
$10, Corey W.
$10, ALPHA COMPUTER SOLUTIONS
$10, Gary N.
$10, Carlos V. M.
$10, Sandra W.
$10, Ricardo R.
$10, Mick Popov aka “KDV
$10, Luciano A. C.
$10, Göran H.
$10, 6k8.co.uk
$10, Fabian B.
$10, Jack V.
$10, Kyle S.
$10, Fahd A.
$10, Olivier J.
$10, Jonathan R.
$10, Andrew H.
$10, Michel B.
$10, Food Recipes
$9 (5th donation), Jaime C. aka “Stop TTIP
$8, Vidosava S.
$7.5, Giles Weaver
$7, Nicolas B.
$7, Lucas P.
$7, Rocco S.
$6 (6th donation), Radim aka “myself42”
$6, Frank G.
$6, Nikola K.
$6, Alan B.
$6, Johanna S.
$6, Laurent C.
$6, Olindo Pindaro
$6, Craig Z.
$6, Elvedin G.
$6, Florian G.
$6, Christian Zanchetta aka “Fiscet
$5 (13th donation), Crusader
$5 (12th donation), Crusader
$5 (11th donation), frisky
$5 (11th donation), Crusader
$5 (11th donation), Leafs
$5 (5th donation), Graham A.
$5 (4th donation), Mauricio Hernández aka “Wicho”
$5 (3rd donation), Petri C. aka “Yalidev”
$5 (2nd donation), Wayne C.
$5 (2nd donation), Jeldert P.
$5 (2nd donation), Michael B.
$5 (2nd donation), Palaniappan C.
$5 (2nd donation), Salionov O.
$5 (2nd donation), Jason G.
$5 (2nd donation), Juwon L.
$5 (2nd donation), Michael C.
$5 (2nd donation), Gregory F.
$5 (2nd donation), Joachim S.
$5, Olaf B.
$5, Fabrizio M.
$5, Deven A.
$5, John H.
$5, Miguel D. R. M.
$5, Angelo D. V.
$5, Thomas D.
$5, Gordan S.
$5, Mattias E.
$5, William P.
$5, Alan G.
$5, Marc B.
$5, Andres P.
$5, Christopher A.
$5, Chuck Norris
$5, Arianne A.
$5, Ross W.
$5, Gerardo R.
$5, Aaron K.
$5, Johnny A.
$5, Dieter L.
$5, Michael H.
$5, Basil C. aka “blc”
$5, Anders Å.
$5, Pavel S.
$5, Anonymous Donor
$5, Markus S.
$5, Rodrigo G.
$5, Benjamin B.
$5, Sebastian P. O.
$4.81 (2nd donation), Andrew K.
$4, Elad Hen aka “eladhen”
$4, Lubos S.
$3 (8th donation), RoDi – Sprava IT
$3 (5th donation), Dan Å.
$3 (3rd donation), Marcin S aka “KotFryc
$3 (3rd donation), Jacqueem S. aka “Go Live Lively
$3 (2nd donation), Marko V.
$3, 李 梓.
$3, Ashot N.
$3, Бобков Д.
$3, Matthias S.
$3, Andrzej Z.
$3, Luca B.
$2.75, Jacques T.
$2.68, David B. aka “JohnBobSmith”
$2.5, Dennis Schotmeijer
$26.72 from 20 smaller donations

If you want to help Linux Mint with a donation, please visit http://www.linuxmint.com/donors.php

Rankings:

  • Distrowatch (popularity ranking): 3061 (1st)
  • Alexa (website ranking): 7027

110 comments

  1. I don’t play games that often at the moment, but when I do it is usually Steam.

    I usually only play indie titles because performance is rather poor in comparison to playing it on Windows 🙁 (such as Borderlands 2)

    I will be receiving my Steam controller around October 16, and I’m anticipating it will work out of the box for the Steam application!

  2. I play mostly native games like Freecol, ShisenSho and Widelands. I also play Civilization V through Steam which actually runs better in Linux than in Windows. I am looking for more of my favorites in Steam, probably something else by Sid Meier or the Settlers series. I play Slottomania on Facebook, but would love a native Slot Machine game. If anyone knows of one, let me know.

  3. I really appreciate the hard work and continuous focus by all devs and contributors to make Mint better each day. It is already my preferred OS by large margin.

  4. I have been using Mint for a number of years and it has improved so much! Thank you and all the developers for your impressive and dedicated work.

    I would like to install Mint for other users who have little to no administration capabilities. Is there a way for critical security updates to be installed without user interaction? Without that capability I am not comfortable ensuring the safety of those users.

    Thanks again,

    Tom.

  5. I have played for almost 400 hours in Linux Mint xfce in CS GO. I prefer playing on Linux, cause games are minimized immediately and Pulseaudio. One downside is that almost all gnome based DEs and XFCE do not let you to set mouse speed (speed, not acceleration). I am to do it in xorg config file. It is important to have unaccelerated pointer with the same speed as in game for saving your aiming skill.

    Also I love sometimes to make fun in GTA sa (wine) and to play some old titles in wine too

  6. Hi Sir,
    first of all Thanks for your Job!

    I just want to tell you few improvement I will find very usefull for the next MATE version!

    1) Possibility to RENAME a lot of files, giving name with progressive number: example sefsed.txt / gegr.txt / gergewr.txt –>became: file (1).txt / file (2).txt / file (3).txt [ as windows!!already do with rename function after having selected mupltiple files and press F2]

    2) In a directory where there are a lot of files then the windows is copletely full of file name, is NOT possible to use the right click of the mouse and create a new directory or use the PASTE function!!

    3) The copying progress bar is completely wrong if is copy large files: starts with very hight trasfer rate (tens of Mb/sec) then the bar stops to wait the REAL transfer speed. This happens with 10/100lan or 1gb lan or to an SD card. So with 10 mbyte/sec or 50mbyte sec. or 4/5mbyte sec as real transfer speed!

  7. Also I was tired to make default my usb headset in Pulseaudio settings every time I connect it, so I have added to Pulseaudio config file option that enables module “switch on connect”. Maybe it’s a good idea to load this module by default? (change default config of Pulseaudio )

  8. I play Dota2 on Steam everyday, I used to play Eve Online 2 clients using Wine. Thanks so much for this fantastic OS!

  9. Hi Clem and Mint devs

    I play plenty of Steam games…just not on my Mint machine. The RadeonSI drivers in Mint 17 are too old to do any meaningful gaming for me…and I’m not putting up with Catalyst, it always has some sort of problem. I end up using another PC within Ubuntu Gnome 15.10 to game on due to the more up to date open source graphics stack.

    I really love Mint…but I am contemplating moving to Fedora 23 due to the updated driver stack. Will see how Mint 17.3 turns out and whether there is an option to upgrade the open source drivers through the Mint update utility.

  10. I play my (mostly Steam) games on Mint whenever possible. Unfortunately, many of them still require DirectX so I play those on Windows (which I have installed in dual boot for games only). I really hope Vulcan will be lead to more games for Linux.
    For our old games, we’ll probably need Wine. Not sure if Mint could do anything to make Wine/Play On Linux more accessible for the average user.

  11. The improvements to repositories mean that intercontinental repos will also be tested after continental ones? Or will the test stops with the countries on the same continent?

    Here in Angola, Africa, we connect to the internet either through an Atlantic seabed cable or by satellite. Both link directly to European routers before being distributed around the world, which means even neighboring countries take much longer to reach than a country in either Europe or USA.

    Also, do you plan to maintain 17.2 updates for this feature throughout the support life of this version? Or as you say, you will only be releasing a test package once and we will be forced to upgrade to 17.3 to make effective use of your new repo benchmark algorithm?

  12. If more games worked on Mint I would never touch Windows again (that and of course NVMe boot support and a few other things, which Linux does a good job of getting quickly usually).

    Unfortunately the games I especially like generally don’t get Linux releases or even older releases just don’t work well on PlayonLinux. Also it can be pretty annoying to even work with Play in the first place.

    Audio drivers are also not always that good on Linux.

    I mostly prefer RPGs, and especially Bethesda’s open world games with modding support. This is another area where Linux struggles because the mod tools and directory structures are also designed for Windows.

    I get my games mostly off of GoG these days, who are making a push to have games on Linux. Steam is also trying to move that way. It is my belief that if gaming starts moving to Linux, that is the final nail in the coffin for Windows, but I don’t know if that will really happen. I am keeping an eye open though and would think it would happen in 5-10 years.

    Already I feel MS was wary of Mint and that’s why Windows 10 was a free upgrade. Games really drive computer upgrades on the consumer sector, as otherwise most people probably can easily just keep using 10-15 year old hardware to browse the internet and what not.

  13. On the MATE roadmap is noted that version 1.12 will add support for Wayland and systemd-longind
    http://wiki.mate-desktop.org/roadmap
    Any idea if these features will be ready in time?
    It looks to me that these 2 are pretty big and hard to implement

    Anyway, Im very happy with you dedicating your time to improve MATE and Compiz support

    Edit by Clem: No, they won’t make it in 1.12.

  14. I don’t play games on Linux because most of the games that I want to play are made for Windows. Trying to get them to run on Linux is a pain, if they will even run at all.

    Skyrim is a good example. I could get it running, but every time I would exit it, it would completely freeze up the system, requiring a reboot. Even then, I could never get a mod manager working with it on Mint (Cinnamon) so the main reason for playing Skyrim was lost (too much of a hassle to install mods manually).

    So long story short, if you want people to play games on Linux you need a simple installer.

  15. I’ve been using Linux Mint for about a year and a half now, I’ve tried out other Linux Distros, but none of them bring me the comfort and satisfaction of Mint. Thank you so much for providing such a wonderful system.

    I also have simply three requests for future updates
    1. Sound Applet retains app specific volume control (that’s important)
    2. Outdated Spices (applets, etc) are hidden by default (check box to show old)/or option to hide spice in the list until it’s next update
    3. A Mimetype editor (I’d love to give some different file types their icons ^^)

    I’m only genuinely hoping for that first one, but the other two would be nice as well.

  16. Im a Linux Mint newcomer.
    I really do think an effort should be made to enable Wi-fi on start up.
    I have read many people have trouble with there Wi-fi on Linux Mint 17.2
    I myself need to use a dongle to get my Wi-fi to work.
    Yet, if i fit another hard drive with Windows on it, my laptop gets my Wi-fi straight away.

    Other than that point a like Linux very much.

  17. It was a very special day – I downloaded Wasteland 2 from GOG and I’ve started to play it on the best OS ever made – my favorite, Linux Mint!
    Humble Bundle and GOG are great if you want some DRM free games, Steam is also nice and easy to use. If we only had better graphics drivers… But, we are getting there!

  18. I play Civ 2 in wine, and in virtual box. IF GTA V played in Linux, I would play that too, especially if I could play in VR.

    The reality though is that I don’t have much time for games these days, and I use Mint to manage about 600 Debian servers spread across the state. And LMDE2 is the IDEAL OS for that activity.

    https://youtu.be/qWPpEi5wJfU

  19. My two boys and I all game on Mint, and have for at least the least two (2) years. My youngest uses XFCE, on an older setup, my oldest uses Cinnamon on a not-so-old setup, and I prefer KDE on a better setup.

    The bulk of non-web-browser gaming is in Steam. I used to play World of Warcraft (through patch 6.2) via WINE, but WoW just doesn’t do it for me lately. I might go back when the next major upgrade comes out next year.

    As it is, I enjoy the MASSIVE (compared to years ago) amount of titles offered on Steam. Some of them are really good (Wasteland 2, XCOM, Pillars of Eternity, CS:GO, Guns of Icarus, etc.). I think I have over 110 games for Linux.

  20. I also gave a second donation, as well as became a community sponsor, but I am not seeing that listed… are the donations not going through Paypal?

    Edit by Clem: Hi Brian, please contact us by email at root@linuxmint.com. Note that these stats show donations/sponsorships for the previous month (i.e. August).

  21. @plata it has been already implemented to Pulseaudio.

    To enable automatic switch on connected device do command:
    For system-wide: sudo echo “load-module module-switch-on-connect” >> /etc/pulse/default.pa
    For user profile: echo “load-module module-switch-on-connect” >> ~/.config/pulse/default.pa

    But it would be better to have priority queue, support my feature request on Pulseaudio bugtacker: bugs. freedesktop. org/show_bug.cgi?id=91215 (link contains two spaces for sp@m-detection protection)

  22. @Brian D. same here…
    some of my donations did show but neither of my community sponsorships (2) showed on the list
    Paypal: I have had huge problems with them, I stopped all further payments.
    an alternate method without Paypal needs to be created…

    Edit by Clem: Hi Peter, please contact us via email directly with your paypal address so we can check these with you. Note that these represent donations/sponsorships happening in August.

  23. I used to try gaming in linux mint. I had a hard time installing, with all the commands and such. Having to spend time googling how to install a game seems pointless to me. Then more time on google for bug fixes. I am not great with that kind of thing. I also found it to be a pain to get the games to even run correctly. Perhaps if it was as simple as point and click I would give it a try again.

  24. Hi Clem & Team, thank you for your continued work on Linux Mint, I’m still on 17.1 and here you are with 17.3 almost at the doors. About 1 year ago this same month I ditched Windows completely and have been on Mint ever since. It has been a great experience learning Linux and the great advantages I found with it.

    With Mint I also found something I had lost, the fun in using the computer. Thank you for everything, I’m really excited for 17.3.

  25. I quit video games some years ago. But last month I got some nostalgia for old pc games I used to play like doom, prince, etc… Also snes games. So I started an investigation and gave some linux emulators a try, Its amazing how much emulation has evolved and how great they work.

  26. @17 – Like the idea about outdated spices. This would give the system a much more user friendly/professional feel, especially for new users.

  27. hey together,

    Nice Article once again.

    Then in this Article, the question was raised, where we get our games from. To be honest, I get them from the package-manager. But I would also like to have some more package-repositories for games, so that I can install them via package-manager (Synaptic).

    I do not use Windows-Games at all, because I don’t want to damage my installation with such shit.

    And to say something more: I am happy with my LinuxMint and why should I have the need to install Windows-Programs?? I do not miss them at all. I personally preferr native opensource Software. And I am happy that the European Highcourt will soon rule, that such proprietary software could be forbidden along with this data-collecting through governments, secret services, search-engines and so on.

    And to be honest with one more thing: I would never install proprietary software, when I can have something better opensource. So my wish would be, that all drivers (graphics, mouse, Monitor, Keyboard, touchpad and so on) should be opensource as standard and not proprietary!!

  28. @ 25 peter e:

    here I found an english article about this paypal-abuse:

    http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/german-users-hit-by-dirty-mobile-banking-malware-posing-as-paypal-app/

    “Additional analysis by Joachim Capiral”

    “Mobile banking is now used by more and more users, so it shouldn’t be a surprise to see banking Trojans trying to hit these users as well. We’ve seen spammed mails that pretend to be an update notification for an official PayPal app. These mails ask the user to click on a link to download the update; users in Germany appear to be the target of this spam run based on the language used.”

    “As is the case with all spam campaigns, multiple IP addresses from different countries spammed this particular mail at its intended German targets. 41% of these senders were in Vietnam, with other countries such as Ukraine, Russia, Brazil and India accounting for the remainder. Some variants of this message were sent more than 14,000 times.”

    “The links in these messages lead to a mobile online banking Trojan that targets various banks and financial institutions. This malicious app is not hosted on the Google Play store. Aside from PayPal, the apps of high-profile European banks are targeted as well. The names of these banks were found in configuration files downloaded by the malicious app. We detect this as AndroidOS_Marchcaban.HBT.”

    “If the user does go ahead and download and install the app, it will first ask the user to make it a “Device Adminstrator”, which would allow the app to act as system administrator. This is a technique that we’ve seen in other Android malware, and is used to render the app invisible and difficult to remove.”

    “It also asks for other permissions such as changing the screen-lock password, setting password rules, locking the screen and encrypting the stored application data – all red flags that this is not a legitimate app, but a malicious one.”

    “Even if the user decides to not grant device administrator privileges, the malicious app will still disappear from the home screen and continue to run in the background. It is also removed from the launcher screen, making it almost impossible to interact with and/or remove.”

    “The background service also monitors phone activity, which means it can detect which app is running. This allows the malicious app to perform UI hijacking.”

    So LinuxMint should no longer support paypal and find another way for donations!

    @ Clem: warn your users!! This is alert red!!

  29. As for games: I do play some on my linux box which is in a room where it disturbs less people during my noctournalness then my windows box. While I mostly play through Steam, I do have some GoG and opensource stuff installed too, as well as some java things (hello Minecraft…)

  30. @Clem what about compton configuration? Will shadowing be enabled by default?
    Run command: compron –vsync opengl –backend glx

    I as using compton for a year, that’s my configuration
    # Shadow
    shadow = true; # Enabled client-side shadows on windows.
    no-dock-shadow = true; # Avoid drawing shadows on dock/panel windows.
    no-dnd-shadow = true; # Don’t draw shadows on DND windows.
    clear-shadow = true; # Zero the part of the shadow’s mask behind the
    # window. Fix some weirdness with ARGB windows.
    shadow-radius = 12; # The blur radius for shadows. (default 12)
    shadow-offset-x = -12; # The left offset for shadows. (default -15)
    shadow-offset-y = -12; # The top offset for shadows. (default -15)
    shadow-opacity = 0.5; # The translucency for shadows. (default .75)

    shadow-exclude = [ “_GTK_FRAME_EXTENTS@:c”,
    “n:e:Notification”,
    “! name~=””,
    “name = ‘Notification'”,
    “name = ‘Plank'”,
    “name = ‘Docky'”,
    “name = ‘Hangouts'”,
    “name = ‘Kupfer'”,
    “name = ‘xfce4-notifyd'”,
    “name = ‘csgo_linux'”,
    “name *= ‘VLC'”,
    “name *= ‘skype'”,
    “name *= ‘compton'”,
    “name *= ‘Chromium'”,
    “name *= ‘Chrome'”,
    #”name *= ‘Whisker Menu'”,
    #”name *= ‘Firefox'”,
    “class_g = ‘Conky'”,
    “class_g = ‘Kupfer'”,
    “class_g = ‘skype'”,
    “class_g = ‘Synapse'”,
    “class_g ?= ‘Notify-osd'”,
    “class_g ?= ‘Cairo-dock'”,
    “class_g ?= ‘Xfce4-notifyd'”,
    “class_g ?= ‘Xfce4-power-manager'”
    ];
    # Exclude conditions for shadows.
    shadow-ignore-shaped = false;
    #shadow-exclude = “n:e:Notification”,”Hangouts”;
    #shadow-exclude = [ “_GTK_FRAME_EXTENTS@:c” ] # Fix dual shadow on some gtk3 powered applications
    detect-client-opacity = true

    Edit by Clem: We could consider it I guess. So far we weren’t planning on changing Compton’s default configuration though.

  31. I miss one option in the poll: GoG – which is a DRM free alternative to steam and offers many games runnable under Linux (native, Wine, DosBox…)

  32. @Yan Pas: I think it would help already if the existing pulse abilities could be configured via the sound settings.

  33. I wanna to play Far Cry 3 few days ago, install this game via wine, but there was no sound in game. But ingame video has sound(

  34. I play some wine games within linux
    i use the linux mint 17.2 xfc edition
    So far linux steam games has increased.
    Waiting for insurgency port!
    😀

  35. hi clem,

    just one suggestion from me.please fix this enable mobile broadband bug. it unchecks frquently if connection drops or if usb dongle is removed or if i restart pc.

    i am using usb mobile broadband dongle for data connection. i want to report you that autoconnect to network is not working even if i check the autoconnect setting in edit connection.

    it doesnt autoconnect at bootup and also during session if connection drops then it fails to reconnect or resume my internet. also if i unplug and reinsert my usb device back in usb port it fails to resume my connection.

    i know this can be done by using script or workaround. but please implement this as inbuilt feature. i checked in manjaro xfce they have fixed it. but in mint xfce bug still there.

  36. I first check for a DRM-free version on GoG.com, if it’s not there, I’ll take the steam version. Also run steam through wine if I have to.

    Made a pc for a family member that plays mostly Guild Wars 2, it’s one of the worse games, didn’t get it artefact-free on a 7850 and installed Windows again.
    Oh, and what some said about missing Skyrim mods: there are a few cool “tweaks” for GW2 (combat-mode to change the movement controls, multiwars to run multiple instances) that do not run under wine.
    And, one final problem: windowed fullscreen and switching between game and browser / alt tabbing never worked correctly.

    Looking forward to Linux gaming + FreeSync + open AMD drivers next year though, hope that will work out of the box in Mint 18 and LMDE 2 at some point.

  37. I voted that I game on mint with steam, which has at times been true, but I also have dabbled with wine, native and dual boot with windows. I found myself seldom taking the time to boot to windows, though of course the experience was usually better, and stuck to games that would run on linux. (For everything else, Mint is so much better than Windows of course, so that’s the os normally loaded). Maybe its my age or the pain of getting things to run on linux, but I find myself gaming much less these days overall.

    Recently I’ve played some minecraft on mint, and that works great.

    I am curious the effect DX12 will have on things. That promises to greatly unleash “latent” power in my AMD processors. I don’t know if I’ll actually care about gaming by the time games fully adopt it.

  38. Dota 2 & testing of many others, but aside from games. This is the best O.S. I’ve tested & has developed so much in the last few years (first build was in 2010). The one thing that can really change the world, wish I had more to donate to help development (http://linuxmint.com/donors.php) & Linux Mint really needs to get on the armhf builds if in anyway possible?

  39. I couldn’t find any mention of it, but i am waiting for some sort of overhaul on Network Manager or a switch from NM to something else. It is always riddled with bugs and it is THE single most annoying thing about Linux Mint in my opinion.

  40. I play rugby. On pitch. I hear it’s very popular in France too 🙂

    I used to play a huge amount of Elite/Frontier/X2… on the old WinXP pc and switched to Oolite on linux, which is superb.

    Work got in the way, so I have weaned myself off the gaming 🙁

  41. I don’t play games in Mint because the only games i like are World Of Tanks, League Of Legends and the Total War Series.
    None of which are native to Linux.
    Sure there’s Wine, it always has some quirks and after a while i just get fed up and go back to Windows.
    If they had native versions in Linux i would definitely move over 100%.

  42. I notice some attention being directed towards touchpads. I’d really appreciate if you could include a tickbox for locked drags. It’s an available parameter on my touchpad, and a feature I’ve used on windoze & mac for years. At the moment (in 17.2 xfce) I have to add:

    Section “InputClass”
    Identifier “touchpad”
    Driver “synaptics”
    MatchIsTouchpad “on”
    Option “LockedDrags” “1”
    EndSection

    as an xorg.conf in /etc/X11/ . It works, but it’s annoying that I have to remember what the heck I did, and add this myself with each install, when it could so easily be implemented in the GUI.

    All in all, running really well – Thanks for all the hard work!

  43. I’ve recently switched to linux at home.

    On an i7 with a gtx970 (proprietary driver) & 16GB ram I’ve been playing lots of linux native games.

    gog is the place to go since I really don’t like drm.

    Linux mint is really good and with the upcoming official release of steam os hopefully more developers will port their games on linux. 😀

    Cheers!

  44. 🙂 Games – good survey. The kids play a ton of those pesky flash games, on FireFox. One client family I set up with Mint (finally!!!!).. it took their their 14yo a hour or less to add Steam and start playing. Myself – no. Just no time. The occasional Mahjong or Cards to pass time while a long process cooks. Otherwise its full-on web, DTP and photo production.
    Hope that with Rosa we can get LibreOffice 5.x and VirtualBox 5.x – if these are deemed stable / reliable enough. Scribus (DTP) has also jumped from 1.4.x to the 1.5.x range with many improvements. It must be a hard job keeping up with tens of thousands of applications which randomly update all the time.

  45. “No, I don’t really play games” normally but when I do then I would like to play following games on Linux i.e supertux, frozen-bubble, pingus, assaultcube, chromium-bsu, xmoto, blobby, njam, ceferino, nibble, , etc. These really nice games any way.

  46. The only thing preventing me from abandoning Windows entirely is the inability to play some MMO games like Guild Wars 2. I’ve tried using PoL but the frame-rate was below 10FPS which makes the game unplayable. At the moment I’m running my machines on Mint 17.2 KDE/Win 8.1 Dual boots and only run Windows to play games.

  47. My gaming is split ca. 60/40 Linux and Windows. Native games I like playing on Linux, due to the media control overlay and the ability to switch workspaces which is a great feature for P&C adventures. I get games through Steam and GOG.

    Fiddling with WINE has proven a bad idea for me. It’s just a second class experience, even when it finally works.

    I got a lot of problems though. Trine 2 (both Steam and GOG versions) are dog slow on Linux- Intel HD 5000- and Grim Fandango Remastered showed a black screen because Intel OpenGL 3.3 support was missing in the 3.13 kernel’s driver stack. No easy way to get newest stable drivers, too.

  48. I play a LOT of games almost completely on Steam and the only problem I see with playing on Mint is that the Bluez stack is too outdated…. the only controller I have is Wii U’s Pro Controller and I need a higher version of Bluez to use it on Linux…. I don’t remember how high exactly now.
    I also tried to update it myself but that didn’t end up well, so if Mint came with an updated Bluez, that would make me happy enough already.

  49. New to Linux – made Linux Mint (Cinnamon) my default. It’s my only and full-time OS now. I know gamers are an enthusiastic bunch but I hope that nothing in Linux Mint is compromised in order to make the OS gamer-friendly.

    The focus should always be on improving security, setting up the best defaults (good firewall w/intrusion detection, ARP protecton, etc), package management (this could use work – I’m finding it’s easier to Google for apps than through scroll down a list of odd sounding names, libraries, etc when looking for a popular app that the search can’t locate).

    Other distros have custom menus to configure the system with specialties. No need to focus on any specialties here – just keep on providing a top-notch OS that doesn’t get in the way by trying to appease the lowest common denominator:P

  50. In cinnamon desktop the bar on bottom(with menu, currently running programs, tray…) doesn’t dissappear when I play games fullscreen with Wine.

  51. Made the switch years ago when Loki was around. I mainly play my games through steam, secondary library with gog.

  52. Regarding games, My time is actually split pretty evenly three ways: Native w/o Steam, in PlayOnLinux (Wine), and in Steam. Aside for minor fiddling on my phone, I do all my gaming in Linux.

  53. For those having trouble with GW2, there’s a page on the GW2 wiki that explains how to install it using Wine or PoL. I used PoL, installed latest Wine staging, activated CSMT, and while FPS is less than it was with Windows, it’s definitely good enough to play (around 30-45 on my modest GPU).

    I don’t use Windows at all anymore, and most of my gaming happens on Mint Cinnamon, because Cinnamon seems to exhibit less screen tearing than KDE and other compositing window managers. It would be nice to be able to turn off vsync for some games to see if performance can be improved. Most window managers force vsync, even on full screen windows.

    Another thing that helped a lot with gaming was adding the new “graphics drivers” PPA. NVIDIA’s latest Linux driver is much better than the one in the base repository.

    I play Linux games via Steam and whatever Windows games I can get working on Wine. DX11 is still a show-stopper sometimes, as Wine’s support for it is still nascent.

  54. Where’s the poll option for “I play all my games on Linux but, at present, on a non-Mint distro”?

    (Specifically, Lubuntu, because, last I heard, Mint was inferior to *buntu at comfortable release-to-release upgrades and Lubuntu wastes the least resources on bling or features I don’t use.)

  55. I play about 5-10 hours a week and get games mainly from GOG, Humble Store and Itch.io since I dislike Steam even though Linux gamers owe a lot for Valve for bringing games to Linux.

    About 90% of my games I play on Mint while rest run on my crappy old windows machine that I use only for gaming.

    I personally have had no big issues with gaming, but calibrating wheels and controllers is a mess. Some devices can be calibrated with jstest(-gtk) while others require much more work.

  56. Windows Games are the only thing that keeps windows on any of my computers. Its the only thing that Linux doesn’t do well (due to lack of support). last I read 80% of the population plays video games. Perhaps the rest of the people who are not voting are busy playing those games? Honestly and sadly, I don’t have a lot of free time to hit this blog often enough. So I’m not sure how much dev faith I would base on those votes. Also, I wouldn’t have even known about this if someone hadn’t told me. Perhaps a different type of communication system (emails?)to the users who don’t stalk the blog?

    I love what you all do with Mint. It’s the best. I try to get others to use it whenever I can. keep up the good work!

  57. I am using Evolution 3.10.4, 17.2/Cinamon. I like it and do not plan to switch to Thunderbird, any news on how to upgrade? Evolution freezes sometimes when I open PDF attachment. I want to upgrade to new release. Any plan to get an upgrade into official repository or is is scheduled to be upgraded soon?

  58. Hey – long time user

    I play Steam games on both Windows and Linux (Ubuntu usually, as my media server is on mythbuntu) but have tried on my laptop Mint install recently. Generally the Linux graphics performance is comparatively poor vs Win (not a cause for celebration) for fast paced games. Perfectly fine for less graphics intensive stuff, though (Prison Architect, Democracy etc). Had issues with my 17.2 install freezing though – not sure if its Firefox/Steam related or not. Bit of a problem with gaming.

  59. hi, buddy, I have downloaded linex mint file but i cannot install it over my windows os. when ever I opened it, I didn’t get any option to install. i never did this before but i wont have any option. how do install it by overriding my windows 8.1 please assist me.
    or you can reply me on cnishant62@gmail.com. I really need your help
    thanx
    nishant

  60. Hi Clem,
    Thank you for LM. I think it’s the most usable and functional linux distro currently. Congratulations to you and to all LM developers…
    I’ve installed Cinnamon version on my macbook pro mid2012 and there’s only a problem: the battery drains very quickly….why…? 🙁 On LM forum many people have the same problem with macbook and other laptops…
    KDE version also freezes at boot (during mint logo)…the only way to go on it’s to shutdown from power button and restart…..then it works well…..It happens occasionally but is annoying….
    Do you think you can solve…?
    THX 🙂

  61. I play games Steam or wine Play on linux I would love to see more compatibility, Direct X 10 would be great. The only reason Windows is still on my computer is the cause of some games that will not load on mint.

    Great job on mint the best so far, all of our home computers run it now. Donations sent and more will follow. It is a pleasure to use and if the gaming gap could be bridged it would be curtains for Windows.

    TA
    A new and very happy user of Linux Mint

  62. I’m using 17.2 Cinnamon and I would LOVE to regularly play “triple-A” Windows-only games on WINE….. but the games that I already legally own don’t perform well on my hardware at all on WINE or PlayOnLinux (POL), no matter what tweaks I make to the WINE configuration(s), the games’ respective preferences, or even by using the latest graphics driver available for my card (NVidia GTX 750ti). On the other hand, those same games perform flawlessly on my Windows partition (on the same hardware setup).

    Right now, I have Assassin’s Creed 1, 2, and Brotherhood installed on both Windows and Mint 17.2 Cinnamon. I can tell you that, even on the same hardware, all 3 games lag TERRIBLY under Linux. I don’t know if it’s Mint’s fault specifically…. or just a limitation of WINE itself. Maybe I don’t know what I’m talking about… but for now, I’m still booting into Windows more than 65% of the time just to game. If I need to quickly take care of business or use KODI to watch TV, I boot into Linux………… so…. I’d like to change that percentage drastically if I could without loosing too much proprietary gaming capability!

  63. I mostly game in Windows 10 – because using rEFInd Boot Manager and an SSD it’s so quick to switch between environments. Also I can’t deny how good windows 10 is for gaming.
    When I do game in Mint I have found that I get much better performance from my Radeon using the open source drivers and Linux Kernel 4.2 which I built from Kernel.org.
    Doesn’t WINE only provide .EXE’s with access to a single thread? That would make for slowness.

  64. @2:
    Install pyRenamer for renaming multiple files in GUI.
    Write it to Mint search box and install, or on command line:
    sudo apt-get install pyrenamer

  65. I started my migration to LM 17.2 several months ago, both at home and at work. Initially as duel boot systems with Win7Pro64. The transition has been almost painless and I’ve since switched to LM 17.2 as my only OS at home. If I had one complaint, it would be the lack of support for high end graphics cards and video games. Honestly, if the Linux community is serious about increasing the user base, I don’t understand why creating a Linux version of DirectX, etc, has not been a priority. I get it that not that many people are presently using Linux at present and developers want to target the mass market. That being said, I’m convinced that, “If you build it, they will come!”.

  66. I use Linux mint 17.1 rebecca (mate) to play every game I have, I sometimes use steam but I mostly use games with Launchers like Minecraft and Starmade. I use Linux because it allows me to have the most memory free, and I can run at 60 FPS on linux, compared to 25 on windows on my computer. (Minecraft & Starmade)

    I think linux is setup the best to play anything because the amount of customization and tweaks one can do to their setup.

    Thanks for this Amazing System

  67. I have LMDE installed on several machines.
    I stick with the level 3 updates as a rule. Today I note that one machine had FF v 41.0.1 , yet another has FF v 37.0
    Synaptic shows “upgradable” but only remove and complete remove options are available.
    this is not an “issue” but it is confounding how it got into this state, and what is the preferred method to resolve.
    Thanks

  68. Counter-strike, CS:GO, HF2, and Kerbal Space Program all work quite well in Steam, I play them quite often and haven’t had a need to boot into Windows for many years now. Thanks to the Mint, Ubuntu, and Valve teams for making everything work right out of the box!

  69. “LibreOffice is pinned in Linux Mint 17.2 and can’t be upgraded by using a PPA.”

    please solve this for the next edition! it was not a very good idea.

  70. @dd — I don’t know where your quote is coming from, but I’m using Linux Mint 17.2 with LibreOffice 5.0.2.2 from a PPA at this very moment. No issues whatsoever…

  71. Pluma: every now and then I end up with a saved text file, where either at the very top at the very end there occurs some corrupted data, usually originating from some other file, after changes have been written back to a USB FLash drive.
    The problem now lies in Pluma’s stubborn inability to open said corrupted file, despite manually selecting the correct character coding. While even brain-dead Notepad on Windows has no problem opening such a file, Pluma just can’t be forced to do the same, so that the questionable line(s) can be deleted and the file properly written back to the Flash drive. This of course makes Pluma rather useless as ‘the’ text editor to use.

    Is there a way to implement a force-open in Pluma, overriding its annoying know-it-better attitude?

    And while I am at it, I also am dearly missing a shortcut and p/d menu option to quickly toggle word-wrap mode. Having each time to go through the setup configuration is a major PITB.

    The corruption may f.e. look like this:
    20 leading NUL characters (which can’t be C&P’ed in here) immediately followed by more of something like this:PHIJQiK-ezew’,”,’0CDoQFjADahUKEwjemfLlhYvIAhWCkQ0KHZ-xAyA’,”,”,event)\\\”>firefox – Can I limit intensity of fsync’s of webappstore …<cite ………..

  72. hi i heard ubuntu 16.04 will be the last 32 bit release will that include linux mint?

    Edit by Clem: Hi David, I can’t find a source to confirm this info. If that was true that would mean the four Mint 18.x releases coming between 2016 and 2018 would be the last to support 32-bit, and Mint 19 wouldn’t. Note also that these releases would be supported until 2021.

  73. Hi clem is possible to reso,ve the problem about flashplayer plug-in on Mint 13? It’s been a while since the last firefox update but flashplayer is still blocked becouse is outdate. Can youplese help me? Thanks for your attention!

    Edit by Clem: Hi John. Yes, sorry about the delay, it will be upgraded this weekend to 11.2.202.540.

  74. Since I don’t use Steam I try to play games on Linux. However, sometimes it is real difficult to setup all the things I need for a smooth playing. This is the reason I resort to Windows for some games (unfortunately).

    With older games I don’t have that kind of problem, but with the newer ones I can’t play them on Linux (sometimes it is mainly the Wine problem).

    I hope that something will improve with time so that I can enjoy Linux even more. Because, only 2 reasons why I have Windows around are the games and Adobe graphic programs. From my perspective if I could solve these 2 problems I’d say goodbye to Windows definitely.

    – By the way I wish to THANK all you who work in developing Linux Mint, your work is appreciated and I wish you all the best! –

  75. *On Mint (13) I often play Solitaire, Gweled, Assault Cube and Sauerbraten. Sometimes GL117.
    *Via DOSBox (on Mint) I sometimes enjoy a few oldies.
    *Via Wine (on Mint) I sometimes play with an obscure old Win98 flight sim.
    *Two old Win98 games I have always really liked do not work in Wine, and VirtualBox does not provide hardware acceleration for Win98, so they are still on my old Win98 box. Rarely play them, though.
    *I often enjoy a few favorites on my Nintendo DS and my Android tablet.
    *My M$ flight sims are on my XP machines (rarely used anymore).
    *And I have FPS Creator on a Vista laptop. It does not work in Wine. I tried.
    *I do not use Steam.

  76. I know the bulk of the Linux users that voted in this poll are not gamers but it would be a new group of users that would join the ranks. If you could satisfy the hard core gamer, it would only increase the Linux user base and that would be more money in donations for development.

    TA

  77. I have been a huge fan of Linux ever since Red Hat 5.
    I had issues with Windows 7 running on my HP Mini 3100 series and I decided to install Linux Mint 17.2, I could kick myself in the A&& for not doing it from the get go. Was worried about driver issues and some not being available for this laptop.
    Right from install it loaded up and found everything this little baby needed and much more. Linux Mint 17.2 is the perfect mate with the Atom CPU. Boot time is fantastic and everything just flows and it never overloads the resources.
    I commend you all for such an excellent OS, even the graphics are better. This laptop will NEVER see another OS other Linux Mint series.
    You guys are the best, don’t stop the great work.
    As for games,I don’t play online much any more. My favourite game was Quake 2 but most people now have gone to W.O.W and I am not about to pay the fees every month to play online. But I do enjoy the list of available games for Mint and have downloaded several of them and plan a bunch more. They all have no issues with graphics on this HP Mini either smooth as silk.
    Once again, well done and as soon as I can raise extra cash. You can bet the farm I will be donating as much and often as I can.
    With words from WinAmp….”Linux Mint Kicks All other OS’s ASS!

    Kind Regards

    Mike D.

  78. I don’t know it this is an issue with mint, but one thing I’ve encountered while gaming on ubuntu (running cinnamon) is that some times my resolution doesn’t return to normal from whatever wacky setting the game uses. Especially if the game crashes. It’s a minor annoyance, but if there is a way to prevent it, I think it would improve the overall experience of mint for gamers.

  79. Now is the time for considering the feature “xSwipe” like multitouch gesture would be loaded as a default feature of the Linux Mint.

  80. Iused to be a big FPS player back in the 90s, early 2000s, but just kinda faded over time. When I did game it was always on Windows ’cause they had the better drivers. Now, I don’t know.

  81. Why Linux Mint o Ubuntu-Debian don’t develop one copy manager that permit pause copy, make a queue or save the list of files for continuous a copy in the future? The KDE copier is a good example but it is limited yet. Thanks Linux Mint for exist.

  82. I run Forgotten Realms Unlimited Adventures in both Windows and Mint, and in both it works perfectly thanks to the Linux .sh installer that GoG provides for it. Other game design platforms, sadly, are not available for Linux at all, and the few that are available are substandard.

  83. I have been a Linux user for many years and have sampled many different Linux distros. Mint by far has been my favorite as it offers a complete experience. A huge thanks goes to the team(s) responsible for creating such an excellent distribution!!!

  84. Why not going with arch linux… was a long time mint user now rolling with manjaro…
    seriously guys ubuntu have troubled you enough to ditch this time.
    theres nothing which m deprived of here with AUR support.
    please consider with rolling arch.

  85. I started Linux 10+ years ago and played with it on and off. Slackware, Arch, Gentoo, and few others. I did learn a lot from them, now that I’m back on Linux I am using Linux Mint. I know Linux Mint is just so good it keeps me from having to do a lot of config which may keep me from learning, or it may not. I think by reading and trying stuff to do manually I will start to learn more again. Thanks for a great Distro.

  86. please don’t follow ubunu footsteps i don’t want to move to 64 bit only since my hardware is 32 bit only. and everything works. not to mention i like to continue upgrading my system.

    btw the website that stated this is down.

  87. I mostly play on Windows due to compatibility issues and lack of Linux support. Some games work fine under WINE, but some just don’t. Most of my gaming is using Steam these days, whether the Windows version, Linux version or Windows on WINE depends on the game and PC!

    Admittedly there are a fair few older games in my collection that run better using WINE than Windows 10…

  88. Multi-Monitor and full-screen applications are still a painful experience. If you have your main monitor to the right, almost every full-screen application is going to start on the wrong display. This is really annoying for flashgames, videos and normal desktop games.
    If you are interested in increasing game experiences then this would be one big thing to do.
    – Simple solution for users to chose the main-screen on application-startups (does not really work actually)
    – Simple solution for switching monitors for full-screen application during runtime
    – Make Alt-Tab work correctly for every full-screen application

    Thanks for your work until now!

    Edit by Clem: Hi, I’m running the soon-to-be-released cinnamon 2.8, so I’m not sure if this is already in 2.6 or if it’s coming towards you.. but applications open on the monitor where your mouse cursor is, including full-screen ones. Alt-tab includes fullscreen apps also, and you can of course switch monitors (there’s a couple of ways.. if you can’t access the titlebar/panel because you’re in full screen, use the keyboard shortcut Super+Shift+Right or Super+Shift+Left to switch monitors.. or define your own shortcut for that in the settings). There’s been a good amount of multi-monitors improvements in 2.8, but if I remember I think most of that was already there in 2.6. I’m testing all that with 2.8 here on dual-monitors and a video playing full screen with MPV and it’s all working well.

  89. Maybe the Mint group should adopt an alternative financing method used by many public radio stations and non-profits: monthly ‘sustainer’ donations, paid by credit card or bank draft.
    This might take a little effort, but those who commit to becoming a sustainer would help ensure that Mint receives a steady (and hopefully rising) level of monthly funding over time.
    I personally use this method to support my local public TV and radio outlets, and some other non-profits as well, like Doctors Without Borders.

  90. I’m a Linux enthusiast and I game on LMDE2. I prefer Mint Mate Debain instead of pure Debian because it’s got all the extras that are basically required for daily use of a computer. It come pre-built. I do not use windows except for gaming and would like to never use windows.

    I have 3 monitors and my primary is on the right. Yes, I agree. It’s still a nightmare. All kinds of issues. Get with it Mint Devs so I can kick windows to the curb for good!!

  91. I would buy Mint Ultrabook/SubNotebook or filmy suported/certifited machine by Linux Mint Team instead od mint boxes…

    Od test wilk happen TAKE MY MONEU ?????

  92. clem: i entered little by little into linux thanks to mint, thanks again.

    for the next release please consider the posibility of apply desktop styles to the windows not only to the bar. (i know that i could be done by “hand” but having a visual interface for that would be grate.)

    when i play i do it thru steam, but the games i like are on windows only (which i hate)

    i guess that the steam console will push the linux games development 😀

  93. I’m using my Toshiba Satellite laptop for Linux Mint and still didn’t manage to install Nvidia drivers into… Laptop has Nvidia Tegra 525M graphics card and every time I’ve installed (have tried several versions of drivers and none worked) Nvidia drivers I’ve ended with black screen after restart… Please fix this, it’s really nice OS and would like to use it … 🙂

    Edit by Clem: The upcoming Linux Mint 17.3 introduces an upgraded mesa/xorg stack, a newer kernel and in particular an updated Driver Manager and improved support for NVIDIA GPUs. It’s tested on many different platforms. On an imac for instance, the upgrade xorg/mesa stack allows 17.3 to boot without nomodeset. On one of our ASUS laptops, the improved support for NVIDIA GPUs (mintdrivers + ubuntu-drivers-common changes) fixes a black screen issue on reboot after installing the NVIDIA 346 drivers. Linux Mint 17.3 Cinnamon 64-bit just passed QA, I’m confident we’re just days away from a BETA release.

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