June 2022 – The Linux Mint Blog

Many thanks to our sponsors and all the people who donated to us. Thank you for your generous donations!

Many thanks also to our developers, moderators and all the people in our community who help us in different ways. This is a fantastic project, it’s a real pleasure to work with you.

Timeshift adopted as an XApp

System snapshots are at the heart of our update strategy.

A perfect system is a system where bugs and security flaws are fixed rapidly but where nothing that already worked ever starts to break. It’s a system where both security and stability are key, with no compromises. It’s a system where a a constant flow of code changes are applied to fix bugs and vulnerabilities but where a solid mechanism is in place to revert changes when regressions occur.

Thanks to Timeshift, Linux Mint has been able to come up with a robust update strategy and a very clear message: Take snapshots, apply all updates.

Timeshift was created and maintained by a very talented developer called Tony George. You probably also heard of UKUU and Aptik, Tony develops many exciting tools: https://teejeetech.com.

Unfortunately he had to stop developing Timeshift to focus on his other projects. We got in touch with him to see how we could help and the decision was made to take over the maintenance.

Timeshift is now maintained as an XApp and its translations are done on Launchpad.

If like us you’re a fan of Timeshift and you want to send Tony a donation visit https://teejeetech.com/product/timeshift-donation/.

Blueman replaces Blueberry

A long time ago Linux Mint shipped with GNOME Bluetooth, a utility which worked well in many desktops.

When it lost its frontend to become part of gnome-control-center, GNOME Bluetooth suddenly only worked in GNOME. We need a solution for Cinnamon, MATE and Xfce. It didn’t make sense for each desktop to develop its own bluetooth tool and we didn’t want to write an entire Bluetooth app from scratch so we wrote an XApp to bring back the missing frontend that had been removed.

This XApp was called Blueberry and it was just that, a missing frontend for GNOME Bluetooth. This allowed us to continue to use GNOME Bluetooth in many desktops for the last 7 years.

Blueberry was great because it provided that solution, but also because it didn’t do much and had a simple user interface. For most people this was perfect. When it wasn’t enough we recommended another tool to people, called Blueman, which provided more features and better troubleshooting.

Starting with version 42 GNOME Bluetooth is no longer compatible with Blueberry. Blueberry would need to undergo significant changes to work with it. There is also frustration upstream from the GNOME Bluetooth development team who simply does not want to have users from other desktops than GNOME and so Blueberry will probably get discontinued.

Blueman on the other hand welcomes users from all desktop environments. It does not rely on GNOME Bluetooth. It’s a GTK frontend for the Bluez bluetooth stack.

Its user interface is more complex but that’s because it provides many more features.

2 years ago, we started talking with the Blueman team about a switch and potential improvements. The developers were very open to our feedback.

We recently started contributing changes to Blueman and we look forward to switching to it in Linux Mint 21.

Sponsorships:

Linux Mint is proudly sponsored by:

Gold Sponsors:

Silver Sponsors:

Bronze Sponsors:

Donations in April:

A total of $7,064 were raised thanks to the generous contributions of 327 donors:

$250, Benjamin M.
$216, Hans V. Stichting Kringloopwinkel Ermelo
$200 (5th donation), Robert E.
$200, John A O.
$108, Michael L.
$108, Wolfgang H.
$100 (14th donation), Samson S. aka “Samtastic”
$100 (9th donation), Plamen Atanasov
$100 (7th donation), Matthew P.
$100, Bassam R.
$100, Robert J.
$78, Zoltan K.
$75 (10th donation), TM
$60 (6th donation), Erich K.
$54 (15th donation), Naoise G.
$54 (6th donation), Dirk B.
$54 (6th donation), Mikko I.
$54 (3rd donation), VVV
$54 (2nd donation), Martin C.
$54 (2nd donation), Henk B.
$54, Mark L.
$54, Andrey P.
$54, Hector Dardo R.
$54, Marek J.
$54, Dr. S. K.
$54, Matthias M.
$54, Christian K.
$54, Alexander S.
$50 (60th donation), Anthony C. aka “ciak”
$50 (6th donation), Michael K.
$50 (5th donation), Ricky G.
$50 (4th donation), W G. M.
$50 (3rd donation), Rajesh K.
$50 (3rd donation), Stephen M.
$50 (2nd donation), Gerard S.
$50 (2nd donation), Brian H.
$50 (2nd donation), John W.
$50 (2nd donation), Alfonso D.
$50, Deborah S.
$50, John P.
$50, Rupert R.
$50, Laurence S.
$50, Landon L.
$50, Kyle A.
$50, Roger W.
$43 (6th donation), Ken W. aka “Tracknut”
$43, Wolfgang R.
$43, Chris M.
$40 (19th donation), Geoff P
$36, Igor D.
$34, David V.
$32 (13th donation), Henk van C.
$32 (3rd donation), Chris C.
$32, Joseph W.
$32, Andy
$30 (4th donation), John Eady
$30, Robert S.
$27, Sean M.
$27, Phil N. aka “ZiRiS”
$25 (15th donation), Linux Mint Sverige
$25 (13th donation), Bill S.
$25 (8th donation), Richard N.
$25, Chaz C.
$22 (24th donation), Peter E.
$22 (19th donation), Denis D.
$22 (12th donation), Bjarne K.
$22 (9th donation), Bernhard M.
$22 (8th donation), Filip N.
$22 (5th donation), Emanuel C.
$22 (5th donation), Jürgen B.
$22 (5th donation), Maurice G.
$22 (3rd donation), Frank B. aka “poypoyfrank”
$22 (3rd donation), Günter J.
$22 (3rd donation), Bernard L.
$22 (2nd donation), Oliver Hosp
$22 (2nd donation), Austin Security Guard Service
$22 (2nd donation), Alexandre Gambier
$22 (2nd donation), Johan P.
$22 (2nd donation), Axel P. aka “Lukess “
$22 (2nd donation), Tony B.
$22 (2nd donation), Jonas U.
$22, Ramon N.
$22, Luis D.
$22, Renaud P.
$22, MWI – Markweb Informatica
$22, Susanne K.
$22, Szymon N.
$22, Daniel T.
$22, Steffen S.
$22, Matthijs R. aka “Developenguin“
$22, Esa A.
$22, Catnap
$20 (45th donation), Bryan F.
$20 (39th donation), Stefan M. H.
$20 (30th donation), John D.
$20 (14th donation), Mr. Bee
$20 (12th donation), David Kelly aka “Daveinuk”
$20 (8th donation), C T Johnson, Inc
$20 (7th donation), Stephen F.
$20 (7th donation), Aimee W.
$20 (7th donation), Carl J.
$20 (6th donation), Mark F.
$20 (5th donation), James M.
$20 (4th donation), Lal C.
$20 (4th donation), Stephen Mayo Shaffer aka “Bruder Stefan”
$20 (3rd donation), Daniel J.
$20 (3rd donation), Josh T.
$20 (3rd donation), Alan B.
$20 (3rd donation), Debra D.
$20 (3rd donation), R. C. F.
$20 (2nd donation), Stacey U.
$20 (2nd donation), Stephen B.
$20 (2nd donation), Adam S.
$20 (2nd donation), John B.
$20 (2nd donation), Dan R.
$20 (2nd donation), Claude A.
$20 (2nd donation), Thomas G.
$20, Lisandro O.
$20, Leigh B.
$20, Michael F.
$20, Max-elie S.
$20, Eric H.
$20, Norman S.
$20, John B.
$20, Serhii H.
$20, Christopher P.
$20, Katherine K.
$20, Larry F.
$19 (4th donation), Fred D.
$18 (2nd donation), Jeste S.
$16 (63th donation), Andreas S.
$16 (2nd donation), Daniel T.
$16, Hartwig H.
$16, Glen R.
$15 (11th donation), Fred B.
$14 (69th donation), Johann J.
$14 (41th donation), Michael R.
$12 (5th donation), Stephen W.
$12 (3rd donation), Terry R.
$12, Richard J.
$11 (35th donation), Francois-R L.
$11 (25th donation), Daniel S.
$11 (20th donation), Piotr L aka “xpil“
$11 (17th donation), Arvis Lācis aka “arvislacis“
$11 (15th donation), Slobodan Vrkacevic
$11 (15th donation), Janne M.
$11 (15th donation), Marko U.
$11 (13th donation), Štefan V. aka “Thinker8”
$11 (13th donation), José G. aka “picaso”
$11 (10th donation), Gabriele I.
$11 (7th donation), Adis H.
$11 (7th donation), Hans-Dieter S. aka “hadisch”
$11 (6th donation), Robert Z.
$11 (6th donation), Adam P.
$11 (5th donation), Darius O.
$11 (5th donation), Bernhard L.
$11 (4th donation), Lazo L.
$11 (4th donation), Eduardo K.
$11 (4th donation), Giorgio C.
$11 (3rd donation), Viktor D.
$11 (3rd donation), Ivan Stamenov
$11 (3rd donation), Tugaleres.com
$11 (3rd donation), Cornelius B.
$11 (3rd donation), casca de copiat
$11 (3rd donation), Julio Abel M.
$11 (3rd donation), Javi Dieltron aka “ososoft“
$11 (2nd donation), Jean-marie R.
$11 (2nd donation), Thomas W.
$11 (2nd donation), Carle C.
$11 (2nd donation), Roy R.
$11 (2nd donation), James L F.
$11 (2nd donation), Jarmo K.
$11, Roman S.
$11, Maximilian G.
$11, Brian L.
$11, Matthew B.
$11, Aime A.
$11, Harold H.
$11, J.h K.
$11, Tomasz D.
$11, Vilmar M.
$11, Philip G.
$11, Andrea C.
$11, Michael O.
$11, Ja P.
$11, Rolf Peters cirkusdisco, Töreboda
$11, Csongor K.
$11, Magid E.
$11, Giovanni M.
$11, H C C.
$11, Boris R.
$11, Torben B.
$11, Silke S.
$10 (74th donation), Thomas C.
$10 (69th donation), Frank K.
$10 (51th donation), Rick R.
$10 (22nd donation), Carpet Cleaning Winnipeg
$10 (21st donation), Christopher R.
$10 (13th donation), Edward A.
$10 (11th donation), Harold R.
$10 (10th donation), Joshua O.
$10 (9th donation), Sergei K.
$10 (8th donation), Kent J.
$10 (6th donation), Phil aka “Smithereens NZ”
$10 (6th donation), apuestas deportivas
$10 (5th donation), Home Renovations Kelowna
$10 (5th donation), Andrei Sinkevich
$10 (4th donation), Ricardo N.
$10 (4th donation), Antonio M.
$10 (4th donation), Acoustic Ceilings Austin
$10 (2nd donation), Wojciech S.
$10 (2nd donation), Józef S.
$10 (2nd donation), Brandon H.
$10 (2nd donation), Reginaldo Bezerra Gervásio
$10, Alban K.
$10, Hung Clapham
$10, Alexander R.
$10, Julia G.
$10, Eric W.
$10, Daniel K.
$10, Robert S.
$10, Neil M.
$10, Johnson P Dilz, Esq.
$10, Gilles S.
$10, Bradley B.
$10, Jordan B.
$10, Yousaf A.
$10, Justin H.
$10, Isaac B.
$10, Gil G.
$10, Alon S.
$10, Michael S.
$10, Anthony L.
$10, Daniel R.
$10, Robert M. Jones
$10, Gilson B.
$10, Jorge B.
$9 (12th donation), Luk
$9, Skyler A.
$9, Manuel A.
$6 (21st donation), Sérgio D. S. S. aka “sersantos”
$5 (70th donation), Eugene T.
$5 (59th donation), Bhavinder Jassar
$5 (35th donation), Hristo Gatsinski
$5 (28th donation), Thomas R.
$5 (16th donation), Teobaldo D.
$5 (11th donation), Felipe P.
$5 (6th donation), Rafal K.
$5 (6th donation), Bruce M.
$5 (5th donation), Ernaelsten G. aka “MaitrePylos”
$5 (4th donation), Lucas DH
$5 (4th donation), Pierre-marie R.
$5 (3rd donation), Peer V.
$5 (3rd donation), Sinisa B.
$5 (3rd donation), Francisco Quintero
$5 (2nd donation), George D.
$5, Uwe J.
$5, Piotr K.
$5, David M.
$5, Anto Jakic Subara
$5, Lynn Z.
$5, Joseph S.
$5, Georgios P.
$5, Juris M.
$5, CSV Corp.
$5, Wojciech M.
$4 (8th donation), Ashraf H.
$4 (3rd donation), Dale D.
$3 (4th donation), Sergei M.
$3 (2nd donation), R T
$3, Doug M.
$13 from 10 smaller donations