Getting ready for the release…

As you probably know the release of Linux Mint 6 is coming very soon. In fact the ISO itself is ready and some of you may have already found it in one of our mirrors. Be patient and bear with me for a few extra days. Although the ISO is ready, a few other things remain to be done before we can officially release Mint 6 Felicia.

I’m currently working on the Universal Edition (which replaces the “Light Edition”, comes with a text-based grub for improved compatibility, removes codecs from the Main Edition and adds language packs on a live DVD media). The reason it’s taking time is because I still don’t have broadband… and the size of some of the language packs makes it difficult for me to perform this ridiculously simple task 🙂

I just finished editing the Linux Mint 6 User Guide. If you want to help please read it and report any typos/mistake you may find in it:

http://ftp.heanet.ie/pub/linuxmint.com/stable/6/user-guide/english.pdf

The Software Portal is ready but one thing is missing: Your ratings and reviews. The new Software Manager (mintInstall 5) is a great tool but it relies on YOU to know which apps are popular and which apps are not. So PLEASE log in the Software Portal and start rating and reviewing the applications for Mint 6:

http://linuxmint.com/software/?sec=categories&release=4

To be realistic we’ll probably be fully ready and announcing the officialy release of Linux Mint 6 early next week. That leaves you a few days to review the user guide and the rate applications in the software portal.

Sorry again for the delay. Thanks for being patient and thanks to all of you who contribute and help Linux Mint get better all the time.

89 comments

  1. Great news!
    Any estimates about the release of the 64bit version?
    I’m so looking forward to install this masterpiece!

  2. Awesome…How is the 64bit-version coming along? Is it to be released simultaneously? I know you mentioned it in an earlier post but it only says “it might be”.

  3. Thanks Clem. Take your time. I don’t want this wonderful distro to be rushed out.

    It was good of you to keep us informed of the progress as well, rather than just have us wait in the dark.

    Mint 4EVER

  4. I can Believe it … My Lovely ” Mint ” … is coming out to us … Really thanks a lot to you Clem for this great work … and for all mint team …..

  5. I noticed you still refer to the Light Edition on page 5, par. 5 in the Userguide. Should probably be “Universal” now.

  6. I dont know why but the software portal “Account” is not working for me.. i wanted to try out reviewing some stuff but i simply could not access it. it simply didnt recognize me.

    did anyone else try to log in and post a review and faced the same problem?

  7. saw something in the user guide, in the Introduction to Linux Mint in the Editions section it says “If you intend to redistribute or to make commercial use of Linux Mint in the USA or in
    Japan and if you’re not sure about patent legislation you should use the Light Edition.”

    should it now say Universal Edition?

    ive updated RC1 using the instructions from a recent blog you posted, will there be any updates those that did that will need to do? im sure you will tell us.

    Linux Mint is the best, thank you Clem for all you do and thanks to all those who contribute to make Linux Mint the best!

  8. Talkign about Minstall, one thing that really bothers me , is that when you open minstall for the first time it ask you for reload, and it takes forever!

    Other than that and the artwork which look outdated, it’s a fine release.

    Great job Clem!

    elbeto

  9. Hi Mint Community. Here is my suggested corrections for the user Manual for Felicia.

    I might me anal, with some of my proof reading adjustments, but here is what I found to correct.

    In Purpose, last line of pg 3, it should read “to get to using advanced technologies”

    In the Edition section I assume you mean the Universal Edition when recommend using mint for commercial use in USA and Japan. There is no Light Edition mentioned.

    Next paragraph, should read “4Gb of (not “or”) ram”

    pg 17 first paragraph, last sentence, reads “However, it’s
    always a good idea to make a backup prior to this kind of things.
    ” There art many possible corrections “prior to doing these kinds of things.” “prior to doing this kind of thing.”

    Last paragraph of pg 21 shouldn’t have that “don’t” in there. “If you’re the only one using the computer and you don’t want to bypass the login screen,
    check the option “Log in automatically”.

    First line of pg 22. Note: “Make sure not to use capital letters in the username or the hostname.” You have not mentioned that the Computer name is the “hostname”

    Now here I get really nit picking. Pg 23, with the Ready to install screen shot. Clement is the “Name” and clement is the “User name”. You used “clem” for the username.

    First line of Pg 38. “and although it is very different than what you might be used to, you’ll probably love it
    once you got used to it.
    ” “you” should either be “you have” or the shortened “you’ve”.

    End of pg 50 and beginning of pg 51, details the OpenOffice apps, I could be wrong but on my Elyssa, the apps are called Base, Cal, Writer, etc…. not sure what to change, but is a little confusing calling OpenOffice.org Presentation a compatible app to PowerPoint and then it is labeled on my puter as Impress.

    Pg 52. “In the example above we’ve made Rhythmbox, Firefox, Thunderbird, Pidgin and Xchat

    our favorite applications and we’ve separated them in three different groups.
    ” I don’t see this in the example above, and I’m not sure what I see in the example above. It looks like just Rhythmbox and Sound Recorder in a menu and you are then right-clicking on Rythmbox to click on “Show in my favorites”

    Pg 53. Last line of “Change the appearance of mintMenu”, “immediately” is spelled incorrectly.

    In “Update your system and your applications” on pg 63. the sentence, “Some parts of the system are safe to update and some other aren’t.”. “other” should be “others”.

    End of pg 65, “For example, if you made all levels “visible” and only Level 1 and 2 “safe”, you would

    see a lot of updates in the list but MintUpdate would probably tell you that your system is

    up to date.
    ” the “but” needs a comma before it. Feel free to ignore if too trivial.

    Use this info to toss it in the bin. I’m looking forward to giving Felicia a ride, she looks lovely. I did like the, to use a Windows term, “Start” button named Elyssa in Mint5, and it looks like you are now calling it “Menu”. Pretty boring and mainstream.

    Thank you for all the hard work.

    I found that mirror you mentioned, have downloaded, burnt the ISO, and am about to boot into Felicia now.

  10. Looking foreward to this release! 🙂

    … but it doesn’t seem to be using the new logo for some reason 🙁 Really felt it was calm and pleasant to the eyes.

    One more thing, the annoying way Ubuntu lets you change your time-zone, will that be replaced with the older click and zoom funkction?

  11. Hi Clem,

    i’m reading the user guide and i noticed that the URL for Gnome desktop user guide is not valid anymore (page 34 chapter “The Gnome Desktop”).

    I also think that page 76 chapter “Archive emails and websites as PDF” need a little update. I haven’t installed yet Felicia but in Elysa when you select the pdf printer you don’t see “CUPS_PDF” …

    hope that helps a bit… not sure that it is the correct place to contribute. Any forum of bug report for people that review your documents ?

  12. I had a problem with the software portal as well. I could not register an account. Or if I did it is taking a very long time for the account information to reach my email account. I checked my spam box but nothing from Mint is in there.

  13. I have been using Linux for a couple years now, and switched from Fedora to OpenSUSE and finally I am currently using Ubuntu, which, of these three different distributions, is the most useful and user friendly. However, I’ve been looking closely to LinuxMint, and I am now ready to do the transition, however, I am going to wait until LinuxMint 6 (64-bit) is released to do the switch.

    Thanks for such a great distribution and keep it up !!

    by the way, I will look into translating the user guide to Spanish (Latin America).

  14. Well your version of WUBI works perfectly ad the install was flawless.

    Sadly there is a problem, presumably inherited from Ubuntu. I had to stop using Ubuntu because it does not agree with my soundcard, and Mint does the same.

    I have the popular Realtek HD Audio and the volume is barely audible, making it useless.

    The Ubuntu people have known about the problem since 2006 and done nothing. Sadly Mint has fallen foul of this, and my search for a Linux must therefore continue.

    I would like to thank you for listening to your Users. Few other distributors seem to bother. It is nice finding one that cares and listens.

    Thanks 🙂

  15. Great news, I’ve been waiting for this. I love Elyssa, but I also new releases.

    Um…Anyway the menu launcher on the panel can renamed to Elyssa or to anything else we want it to be?

  16. Thanks, Clem. Great work!

    Have reviewed the manual: on p.53 there is a missing “y” at the end of “immediatel.” on p. 68 it suggests “clicking on ‘View->History of Updates’.” Where does one find ‘View” to click?

  17. I had the same problem as mentioned by jungar…couldn’t log into the software portal to rate anything.

    That said, as a new convert to Linux, I’ve had a great time with Mint! Keep up the good work!

  18. Regarding the mirrors; you can access them via the Download menu on the Mint homepage. Click on Elyssa in the download menu,(even though you are after Mint 6!) and you have an option to access a variety of download mirrors (under Elyssa). Most of them have a folder marked “stable”; you will find Mint 6 ISO and checksum in there.

    I’ve downloaded and all okay so far.

    Regards
    John

  19. I hope Mint 5 gets backports of the new stuff soon. I’ve decided to stick with 5 rather than upgrade this time around.

  20. great work thanks
    i have one comment: ubuntu 8.1 is great but have some problems that may affect mint so (and sorry for that) errors and bugs in ubuntu must be solved 1st befor releasing mint 6
    i think mint 5 is better enough more than ubuntu 8.1
    i use mint 6 rc1 it is stable but have the same errors of ubuntu 8.1 (eg when activating visual effect and then open the open office you can find the address bar disappear when moving pointer on it)
    continue work it is great and the best Linux distro i tried since 4 years
    best wishes

  21. I had a HORRIBLE experience upgrading from Hardy to Intrepid, it was just the exact opportunity to try mint and I loved it despite I accidentally installed the 32 bit version instead of the 64 bit one.

    Now Im scared of upgrading to Mint Six… is there any way of doing it safely without wrecking my laptop?

    Also: is there any way to upgrade from a 32-bit version to a 64-bit?

  22. I have been trying a lot of different Linux versions. While I like Ubuntu 8.4. I have not been that impressed with its desktop themes.
    I was doing a google search for Desktop Linux and Mint popped and I started reading the reviews that I found. I downloaded Mint 5 and I have fallen in love with it. I am running the x64 version seeing I have a quad core and 8 gigs of ram. I will be looking forward to Mint 6 with x64 support. What impressed me was that my mp3s an avi files worked out of the box. And avis do not even work out of the box with windows.
    There are two sides to my computer life. At work I do support for MS servers mainly email but at home I do not even wish to look at a windows desktop; so the search for a linux distro that I could get to like. I do run and use a lot of virtual servers for learning so the need for gigs and I use VMware workstation due to being able to import the VMs into ESX servers at work.
    keep up the great work on Mint. And as I learn I will be helping others here in the future.
    I am coming back to my computer roots seeing I used Red Hat and even trained users to install in back with Red Hat 5 – 7. But I have not touched linux in a long time and it is going to take sometime to relearn.
    Thanks so much for a great distro

  23. I’ve been running it for a couple of weeks on one of my laptops and my workstation at work, very nice no problems.

    I’m hoping it won’t be long for the 64Bit release so I can upgrade my Desktop at home 😉

    Good work guy’s, every release shows an even more polish than the last. 😉

  24. Running now the live cd downloaded from the mirrors: works flawlessly! Great Clem, a very nice shot again!!

    Now, give me a working updater to pass from my Elyssa install to Felicia, and let me forgot Beranger sad switch!!

    Thanks for your invaluable work
    ___
    Max

  25. I installed Felicia last week. I have customized the desktop and some of the features and WOW, I’m pretty much a Linux Novice, but I can do so much. I’m always amazed by the hard work of Clem and the gang. This distro is easy for a beginner and has plenty of room to grow to advanced knowledge users. Thanks guys for your hard work!

  26. Upgrading from any version of linux to another is made easier if you have a seperate partition for /home. This way your settings and data are safe even if you trash your / partition. Great job Clem.

  27. couple of things I noticed on page 77:

    “…you don’t need but don’t want to risk loosing?”

    “…to a note is not exactly ideal, you’d loose the pictures,”

    -should be “losing” and “lose”.

    Keep up the great work Clem.

  28. Alternative install..Because i can`t boot from Live CD on my Hp laptop,and i`m not only one who have this problem.But i really,reallllllyyyy want to try and use LinuxMint. 🙁

  29. Thank you! No worries and no apologies necessary!

    Big cheers for everyone involved in making this possible!

    thanks Clem, we really appreciate it.

    mars

  30. Hi! This Linux Mint is SUPERB!!!
    I like it over all others distros! I have tested all, and best to me waas Ubuntu, but yours gets the best of all in only one simple distro! Please, take it seriuosly, because many business and enterprises may move to your distro and ask for prof service. Are you ready for this? Myself I am interested, because, for instance, a prof suscription for a limited number of technical questions per month would be very much welcome. Also you should be interested in getting a list of prof software compatibility con Linux Mint, since it would help to business to easily get their software, and another list of freelance programers so as to produce generic o personal software to any need coming out of any business.
    I would be glad to hep you in this way, since I want linux to overcome the “fence” of Windows kingdom and set linux his own.

  31. “I have the popular Realtek HD Audio and the volume is barely audible, making it useless.”

    That’s very easy to fix! Install gnome-alsamixer from Package Manager or using apt: sudo apt-get install gnome-alsamixer

    It will then show up in Sound & Video. Crank up the first three and last four (VIA) toggles to about 90% or 95%.

  32. I was using this “ready” .iso found on some mirror, and it has a few bugs. Can anyone tell me which place is best to report them? The bugs are: 1) freezing when choose “close” or “restart” from closing window.
    2) probably, I’m not sure, but it looks that there is some string in some config file saying that system is “debian 6(!)” and some apps are checking this, and refuse to work ///or maybe it’s just becouse of a bit new kernel used – Kernel- related apps not works, like that adding module for some modem

  33. Clement please would you tell me how to format a USB memory stick in Linux Mint 6. I really have a trouble here. Please help me. Thank you for this distro although it lacks this useful utility and that makes me me have to go to a friend’s PC to this ridiculously small thing. Please!!! God bless u for this work!

  34. Mint team thank u for this marvelous work. God bless you and your families. Let him provide more wisdom! amen. Waiting for the stable version. Keep it simple don’t rush Great Team. Behind you all. Take your time & make the world amazed at this gr8t Distro.

  35. Thanks for keeping us updated. May you get the broadband soon! wish u all the best. thanks for this great distro. Can you not format a usb stick in Felicia or is Fabien a newbie? Someone rescue Fabien, looks like he’s troubled with formatting his usb stick. I really haven’t formatted one too! Anyways great job. thank u all.

  36. great distro, great team great users. let’s be patient and give our team a little time to polish this great distro. amen. maybe a little tool for formatting usb keys would do. what do u think great team. it would simplify things for users like Fabien. Great idea. Thank u all.

  37. i love you mint team for this fresh mint in my mind. GOD bless you all.
    Fabien is right. why should i use gparted to perform such pretty small thing? formatting should be made a lot easier; right click and you find the option select it and after a few clicks u r done. (any format)

  38. wonderful distro but why are people complaining about formating a stick? is that impossible in Mint 6. I remember my uncle used to do that in the previous releases of mint…but it gave a lot of trouble, he once cried a river after deleting a wrong partition. hahahhahah sorry uncle Ronnie. Nice work Mint team. Carry on stay strong and let it shineeeeee*!

  39. Thanks for the brilliant job made by you, Clem and the LinuxMint Team.
    2 years user of mint now and allways satisfied, i have tested very much distros and tastes of GNU/Linux (debians,rpms,sources distros…) and i think Linuxmint is the better for user-friendly and out of the box features.
    THANKS…THANKS YOU VERY MUCH FOR ALL YOUR WORK.

  40. CLEM

    I can’t install 6 via the live CD. 5 Installed fine with the 5 Live CD but on my dell dimension 2400 with the stock intel gfx onboard card and 1gig mem, I get to the tones for the desktop….waiting for gui….waiting for gui….round activity mouse spins and spins and then locks….then the CD spins down and no activity. I would love to be able to upgrade to 6 but cannot with the CD.

    I can install in computability mode but that leaves me at 640×480 and the dell 17 monitor is not recognized when the utility is asked to find it…so I reinstalled 5 waiting to see what I can do

    Thanks for an awesome distro!!!

    You have my email addy, email me back….

    Rich

  41. mint 6 has been a good exp so far i did love mint 5 but i kept having issues when i printed from openoffice i even tried to print from koffice which worked the last time i had the issue it kept printing in code. so i felt a good opertunity to upgrade to see if this error would go away and viola works great and i love the fact that mint istall is out. this mintinstall was something i was waiting for my friends computer windows stopped working with the netcard so im sending the cd for her to use mint for the first time. i am hoping that she will leave the windows desktop and come to what i have learned to love

  42. Hi everyone!

    I installed Mint 6 yesterday to a friend’s dad and it worked like a charm! He is about 60 years old and have been a Windows user forever, but since a couple of months he start using ubuntu(he use to get his Windows system unusable due to viruses and spyware) and he was pretty much happy with it, running Windows in Virtualbox for a few tasks.

    Now I installed him Mint 6 and he almost had a happiness stroke when he saw he didn’t need to run Windows again! Not even a virtual one. Haha.

    I have been using Mint since Daryna and a wanted to my upgrade my Macbook Pro. I’ve always had that gfx-grub trouble when installing on my macbook pro, so yesterday I installed it without grub and then tried to install the regular grub, as done with earlier Mint versions. I had an issue with it, and got frustrated with not making it work. So I thought: maybe this is working out of the box now!

    So I reinstalled, with no tweaks and it worked perfect! Now gfx grub works fine on a Macbook pro(at least with ReFIT).

    So Macbook pro(and other conflicting hardware): Try first a regular install. Don’t assume all issues carry up to the next version 😛

    Thanks Clem and the team for this distro and cheers everyone!

    Marcos
    http://www.marcosaruj.com

  43. When is Mint 6 64bit going to be released, lm desperately waiting for it as l have found limitations running 5 64bit with virtual machines. Even though l have lots of memory, 8gig, it behaves like it have only 2gig?

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