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Many thanks for your donations and for your support and special thanks to all the people who helped us test the BETA.

Now let’s see what’s in our Christmas bag to kick off the holiday season 🙂

Linux Mint 18.1

The Cinnamon and MATE editions of Linux Mint 18.1 are coming out this week. I hope you’ll enjoy the release and have a wonderful time with it.

We’ll also make announcements as soon as paths are ready for people who want to upgrade to it.

New PIA Manager

We’ve been working with PIA on a new application to set up your PIA VPN connection.

Once configured, PIA and Mint work great together… it can be a little tricky to find all the information and to configure your connection at first, so we tried to tackle that.

With PIA Manager all you need is your username and password. You choose your gateway, press the Save button and your VPN is ready to go.

It’s not in the repositories yet, we still have ideas on how to make it better, but it works already so if you want to give it a try:

KDE upgrades for Kubuntu and Linux Mint KDE

Kubuntu and Linux Mint 18 KDE users should soon receive an upgrade to KDE Plasma 5.8 via the Kubuntu Backports PPA.

This upgrade will include:

  • KDE Plasma 5.8.4
  • KDE Frameworks 5.28
  • KDE Applications 16.04.3

You can help test this upgrade before it goes live. For more information please visit:

Linux mint 18.1 KDE will come with Plasma 5.8 out of the box.

If it gets delayed too much, the Xfce edition could be released on its own.

Mintbox Mini Pro

We get an email every time somebody buys a unit and we can see CompuLab has been selling many.

The Mini Pro should be available in the US, on Amazon.com in about 2 weeks and it should reach European Amazon stores early next year.

We’ve received the Mini Pro and we’re quite impressed. It goes hot but doesn’t run slow and it’s still as tiny and cute as the original.

CompuLab also sent us an Airtop with an NVIDIA GTX 1060 and accessories for the Mintbox Mini such as the fit-Uptime UPS, a large heat sink and a mounting bracket.

We’re hoping to review it all very soon.

Hoodies and T-Shirts

Last but not least, Hellotux recently added hoodies and girl t-shirts to their collection, so if you’re interested in Mint clothing, please visit https://www.hellotux.com/linux_mint.

Sponsorships:

Linux Mint is proudly sponsored by:

Platinum Sponsors:
Private Internet Access
Gold Sponsors:
Linux VPS Hosting
3CX Ltd
Silver Sponsors:

Acunetix
Sucuri
Bronze Sponsors:
Vault Networks *
AYKsolutions Server & Cloud Hosting
7L Networks Toronto Colocation *
Goscomb
BGASoft Inc
David Salvo
Milton Security Group
Sysnova Information Systems		 Community Sponsors:

Donations in November:

A total of $11,372 were raised thanks to the generous contributions of 537 donors:

$200 (2nd donation), Daniel V.
$200, Andy S. aka “troozers”
$200, Paul F.
$150, Peng Y. H.
$108 (7th donation), Frederic L. aka “”nofrog””
$108 (4th donation), Sten L.
$100 (2nd donation), Pasi K.
$100, Ken H.
$100, Eric B.
$100, Ty A.
$100, David B.
$100, Roderick P.
$100, J5C Marketing, LLC.
$100, Kevin aka “kevinhughes27”
$100, James F.
$100, Nicolas R.
$100, Hahn S.
$75 (3rd donation), JimM
$70 (8th donation), Doug L.
$69, H H.
$65, Timothy E.
$65, Detlef F.
$60, Dave W.
$55, Jeff N.
$54 (3rd donation), Dirk B.
$54 (3rd donation), Jan Joris Vereijken
$54 (3rd donation), Claude M.
$54 (2nd donation), Christian K.
$54 (2nd donation), Brian V. B.
$54, Roberto P.
$54, Karl-günter N.
$54, Frank S.
$54, Kelly H.
$54, Anon aka “Betty UK”
$54, Thomas B.
$54, Heribert S.
$54, Miguel V.
$54, Jesus J. L. M.
$54, Johannes A. W.
$54, Timo P.
$54, Peter G. aka “The MINT teacher”
$54, Johannes K.
$54, Tim S.
$54, Jeroen T.
$50 (15th donation), Anthony C. aka “ciak”
$50 (10th donation), Kwan L.
$50 (4th donation), George P. aka “taz840209”
$50 (3rd donation), Pamino F.
$50 (3rd donation), Alan H.
$50 (2nd donation), Christopher D.
$50 (2nd donation), Daniil K.
$50 (2nd donation), Kenneth K.
$50 (2nd donation), Vincent S.
$50 (2nd donation), Mirza B.
$50 (2nd donation), Robert E.
$50 (2nd donation), Cody W. H.
$50 (2nd donation), jcbrinfo
$50, Henrique B. D. O.
$50, Seamus O.
$50, Dinu P.
$50, Roger S.
$50, Molly M.
$50, Merchant Pagan/Card Ferret
$50, Gary S.
$50, Paul M.
$50, Dustin & Tess S.
$50, Gurtej B.
$50, Chris G.
$50, Victor I.
$50, Gary B.
$50, Louie T.
$50, Edwards W.
$50, Andreas S.
$50, Geoffrey A.
$50, Ilya K.
$50, Vincent G.
$50, Donna B.
$43, Birgit S.
$42 (2nd donation), Martin K.
$40 (4th donation), Torben C.
$40 (2nd donation), James C.
$40, Nicholas C.
$40, Patrick A. C.
$40, Andita S.
$40, Enirita S.
$40, Anders U.
$39.37 (2nd donation), Lupe A.
$32 (81th donation), Olli K.
$32 (2nd donation), Günter J.
$32 (2nd donation), Iain U.
$32, Christian V.
$32, Christian D. K.
$32, Peter B.
$32, Barry J.
$32, David B.
$32, Tomas S.
$32, Gerard N.
$32, Richard B.
$31 (2nd donation), Frederico P.
$30 (3rd donation), Robert E. S.
$30 (2nd donation), Jason H
$30 (2nd donation), Jean-michel R.
$30, Hannes L.
$30, Andita S.
$30, Barry S.
$30, David K.
$27 (4th donation), Peter Fitzsimons aka “Peter4933”
$27 (3rd donation), Karl M. H.
$27, Paolo P.
$27, Jogge Fejø
$27, Erik W.
$27, Albertus D. J.
$27, Georges R.
$27, Tabe V.
$27, Klaus K.
$27, fsa2009
$27, Herve B.
$25 (64th donation), Ronald W.
$25 (16th donation), Peter D.
$25 (5th donation), Bill Metzenthen
$25 (4th donation), Ewa K.
$25 (3rd donation), Basic I. I.
$25 (3rd donation), Bruce E.
$25 (3rd donation), Jack C.
$25 (3rd donation), Murray C.
$25 (2nd donation), Joachim T.
$25 (2nd donation), Stuart S.
$25 (2nd donation), Daniel W.
$25 (2nd donation), Raymond O.
$25 (2nd donation), Alex K.
$25 (2nd donation), Ashwin P.
$25 (2nd donation), Anatoli K.
$25 (2nd donation), Robert A.
$25 (2nd donation), MarlynScott
$25 (2nd donation), Billy Bob Roach
$25, Edmund D.
$25, Denis G.
$25, Tajvia C. W.
$25, Scotia D.
$25, Steven S.
$25, John S.
$25, Mohan D.
$25, Timmn
$25, Midsouth K. S.
$25, Tod M.
$25, Chris K.
$25, Timothy R.
$25, Christian E.
$25, Anonymous
$25, Mathieu D.
$25, Daniel B. M.
$25, Frank C.
$25, Al M.
$25, Robert M. G.
$25, Ralph H.
$25, R. H.
$25, Reynold A.
$25, Joel E. S.
$25, Peter A.
$25, Bill Williams
$22 (11th donation), Dr. R. M.
$22 (10th donation), Matsufuji H.
$22 (4th donation), Juan T.
$22 (4th donation), Dea Engineering s.r.l. aka “Andrea Tozzato”
$22 (3rd donation), Gabriele G.
$22 (3rd donation), Dennis V.
$22 (3rd donation), Derek R.
$22 (2nd donation), Gauthier B.
$22 (2nd donation), Thomas T.
$22 (2nd donation), Kuno G. aka “nuko”
$22 (2nd donation), Marien L.
$22 (2nd donation), Daniel M.
$22, Benoit B.
$22, Renaud B.
$22, Andreas G.
$22, Fabio A.
$22, Kamil Z.
$22, Roberto B. R.
$22, Joachim K.
$22, Salvatore C.
$22, Dieter B.
$22, Karsten S.
$22, A. J. R. S.
$22, Michael J.
$22, Norbert M.
$22, Arend J. D. W.
$22, Jose Luis Nuñez Crespi
$21.37, Jostein N.
$20 (20th donation), Curt Vaughan aka “curtvaughan ”
$20 (20th donation), Go Live Lively
$20 (11th donation), Julie H. aka “Kjokkenutstyr”
$20 (8th donation), Larry J.
$20 (5th donation), Dariusz Panasiuk aka “loczek”
$20 (4th donation), Matej V.
$20 (3rd donation), Angus B.
$20 (3rd donation), Wayne M.
$20 (2nd donation), Richard L. S.
$20 (2nd donation), Edgar C.
$20 (2nd donation), Manuel J.
$20 (2nd donation), Donald S.
$20 (2nd donation), Michael M.
$20, Kenneth B.
$20, Boris B.
$20, Arend D.
$20, Anthony S.
$20, David M.
$20, Wayne D.
$20, Robert M.
$20, Stephen M.
$20, Mohammed A.
$20, Yury M. aka “YPM”
$20, David W. H.
$20, Lars Händler
$20, Danny A.
$20, Enirita S.
$20, Kenny A.
$20, Thomas R.
$20, Bosse H.
$20, Daniel J.
$20, Michael E.
$20, Umarengan D.
$20, Kristian N.
$20, Charles N.
$20, Piergiorgio V.
$20, Hans M.
$20, John M.
$20, Michael H.
$20, Keith T.
$18, Alejandro A.
$16 (8th donation), Ib O. J.
$16 (2nd donation), Colin C.
$16, Petra T.
$16, Willem L.
$16, Barry J.
$16, Peter E.
$16, Mikael P.
$15 (3rd donation), Brian G.
$15 (2nd donation), Victor W.
$15 (2nd donation), David R. M.
$15, Klaus D.
$15, Charles P.
$15, Calin Ciobanu aka “calin”
$15, Robert H.
$15, Johannes A.
$15, Rafael S. C.
$14, Abdullah H.
$13 (7th donation), Anonymous
$13 (6th donation), Martin C.
$12 (68th donation), Tony C. aka “S. LaRocca”
$12 (14th donation), Jobs Near Me
$12 (8th donation), Stefan M. H.
$12 (3rd donation), Mihir D.
$12, Y.-Y. Mao
$12, Bogdan G.
$11 (13th donation), Andreas S.
$11 (4th donation), Marc V. K.
$11 (3rd donation), Thomas Klang
$11 (3rd donation), Martin S.
$11 (3rd donation), Jordi F. N.
$11 (3rd donation), Tanguy S.
$11 (3rd donation), Gerard M. Cormick aka “gmacor2”
$11 (3rd donation), Antonio P.
$11 (3rd donation), Michal W.
$11 (2nd donation), Peter B.
$11 (2nd donation), Manfred W.
$11 (2nd donation), Juergen M. B.
$11 (2nd donation), Mario B.
$11 (2nd donation), Volker N.
$11 (2nd donation), Francisco A. V.
$11 (2nd donation), Karin B. A.
$11 (2nd donation), Tiny W.
$11 (2nd donation), Alexander G.
$11, Colin D.
$11, Markus G.
$11, Luciano D.
$11, James M.
$11, Michael S.
$11, Uwe V. R.
$11, Andrei B.
$11, Frans A.
$11, AtelierHL
$11, Dieter S.
$11, Johannes S.
$11, Aliki K.
$11, Michael S.
$11, Andreas F.
$11, Paul B.
$11, Andreas E.
$11, Stephen L.
$11, Thomas F.
$11, Karri N.
$11, Pierre V.
$11, Stanislav K.
$11, Martin H.
$11, Alberto A.
$11, Kurt H.
$11, Christian R.
$11, Grzegorz S.
$11, Eckehard S.
$11, Vítor Fernandes aka “balhau”
$11, Sergio F.
$11, Michael C.
$11, NordVPN Coupons
$11, Sergej B.
$11, Bernard D. B.
$11, Giovanni F.
$11, Ilya L.
$11, Giuseppe P. W. M. C.
$11, Mattia M.
$11, Wolfgang W.
$11, John O.
$10 (57th donation), Tsuguo S.
$10 (12th donation), Thomas C.
$10 (5th donation), Luis G.
$10 (4th donation), Jeri H.
$10 (4th donation), ERESES INC.
$10 (4th donation), George H.
$10 (4th donation), Kazimir D.
$10 (4th donation), Frank K.
$10 (4th donation), Platypus Products
$10 (3rd donation), Dean A. aka “LinuxGeek”
$10 (3rd donation), William C. aka “N4ES”
$10 (3rd donation), Paul O.
$10 (3rd donation), Agustin K. aka “Kana”
$10 (2nd donation), C S.
$10 (2nd donation), Sergey A.
$10 (2nd donation), Galina S.
$10 (2nd donation), Joseph C.
$10 (2nd donation), Kai-ming L.
$10 (2nd donation), Ali S.
$10 (2nd donation), Barry J.
$10 (2nd donation), Joshua S.
$10 (2nd donation), Agenor R.
$10 (2nd donation), Car Rentals Near Me
$10, RG
$10, Ampers
$10, Nart N.
$10, Csaba G.
$10, John A.
$10, MVCaraiman
$10, Claude P.
$10, Przemek D. aka “Pseudodrummer”
$10, Monte M.
$10, Jean-pierre B.
$10, Björgvin O.
$10, Marius G.
$10, Larry L.
$10, Daniel B.
$10, Leszek Bober
$10, Alexander K.
$10, Damian C.
$10, Andita S.
$10, Alexander K.
$10, HugeServer Networks LLC aka “HugeServer”
$10, Mert I.
$10, aka “love”
$10, Jorge M.
$10, Austin F.
$10, Dellton F.
$10, Katarzyna G.
$10, Robert A.
$10, Andre Cardoso
$10, Gabriel Tardif aka “Vulgarisateur Informatique”
$10, Zhenge L.
$10, Sudhakar G.
$10, Jiayue Wang
$10, Rolando R.
$10, Bruce J.
$10, Kori H.
$10, Dirk S.
$10, Bo
$10, John P.
$10, Terrance G.
$10, Hamilton F. L.
$10, Chris H.
$10, Charles S.
$10, Tibor H.
$10, Denis K.
$10, Fernando P. M.
$10, Victor K.
$10, Pauline V. B.
$10, aka “Coding Supply”
$10, Gerald W.
$10, Agenor R.
$10, Bart R.
$10, Werber César aka “Werber”
$10, Kourosh P.
$10, GrowthPath Pty Ltd
$10, Jon B.
$9, Bruno C.
$9, Konstantin Y.
$8 (2nd donation), Ronyclay B. D. S. B.
$7 (5th donation), CV Smith
$7 (2nd donation), Alexandre Vikol aka “Alex”
$7, Free Web Hosting Services aka “Piotr T.”
$6.04 (3rd donation), Salitynam Waterlily
$5 (27th donation), LM aka “LinuxMint”
$5 (19th donation), Libertad Tecnologica
$5 (8th donation), Eugene T.
$5 (5th donation), Steven L.
$5 (5th donation), Matthew B.
$5 (4th donation), SEO Las Vegas
$5 (4th donation), Gabriel S.
$5 (4th donation), Risikolebensversicherung-Vergleich
$5 (4th donation), Ian B.
$5 (4th donation), Scott L.
$5 (3rd donation), Jim A.
$5 (3rd donation), Edward F.
$5 (3rd donation), Soul-Herbs.com aka “Ayahuasca”
$5 (3rd donation), Darren W.
$5 (3rd donation), Berkant I.
$5 (3rd donation), Joel E.
$5 (2nd donation), Gianfranco C.
$5 (2nd donation), kuponiarnia.pl
$5 (2nd donation), Andrew Thompson
$5 (2nd donation), Andreas M.
$5 (2nd donation), Matus I.
$5 (2nd donation), Linux Hardware Guide
$5 (2nd donation), Jobs Near Me
$5 (2nd donation), Phoenix Real Estate Photography
$5 (2nd donation), J M. H. C.
$5 (2nd donation), Gabriele S.
$5, Arndt (Games4Linux.de)
$5, Jamie W.
$5, Dmitrii C.
$5, Jose S.
$5, Jose C.
$5, Mick G. aka “Pacific Attorney Group”
$5, Luca C.
$5, Raffaele I.
$5, Kleiner F.
$5, Gerhard Z.
$5, Roman A.
$5, SUPER FM
$5, Jamie S.
$5, Jorge P. C.
$5, Oscar A. A.
$5, Dan B.
$5, Nicolas R.
$5, Jose L.
$5, Weihan L.
$5, Joeri V. R.
$5, Graziano A.
$5, Pablo U.
$5, James H.
$5, Henrik J.
$5, Theodore H.
$5, William T.
$5, Miqueias P.
$5, Krzysztof S.
$5, David M. A.
$5, Andreas P.
$5, Stefano S.
$5, Jaroslaw K.
$5, Rene van Mook aka “Mookie”
$5, Elia B.
$5, Labinot O.
$5, Thomas H.
$5, Jörg W.
$5, Enirita S.
$5, Richard G.
$5, Anonymous
$5, Michael H.
$5, Richard C.
$5, Matthew S.
$5, Harry T.
$5, Benjamin D.
$5, Ariel L.
$5, Joaquim P. Q.
$5, Enrique B.
$5, Adam P.
$5, Rafał Z.
$4 (4th donation), Catalin Toader aka “catatoa”
$4 (2nd donation), Evzen M.
$4 (2nd donation), Peter H.
$4, Christian S.
$3.72 (2nd donation), Liam Whiteside
$3 (8th donation), elogbookloan
$3 (5th donation), Canister Filter
$3 (4th donation), Marko Jagodić
$3 (3rd donation), TrustedSkinSource.com
$3 (2nd donation), Best Laptop for Video Editing
$3, Janelle M.
$3, Carmela T.
$3, E O.
$3, Rodolfo T. D. O. N.
$3, Bojan M.
$3, Best Laptops for College Students
$3, Piotr Z.
$3, Prateek S.
$57.32 from 47 smaller donations

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

Rankings:

  • Distrowatch (popularity ranking): 2828 (1st)
  • Alexa (website ranking): 4908

by ·59 Comments

Many thanks to the Kubuntu devs

I’d like to send a huge thank you to the Kubuntu team.

First, because they’re very nice people 🙂

Second, because Kubuntu is an essential part of what we provide with Mint KDE. I know some of you mistakenly think we could base on top of Neon, or simply package KDE ourselves but realistically, we cannot. Our KDE community is small, packaging KDE represents a huge commitment and because Plasma 5 is still reaching maturity it’s a continuous process which cannot get frozen for an entire 2 years. At the same time, we have high expectations, stability is important to us and if we do something it has to work. With this in mind, if it wasn’t for Kubuntu and their Backport PPA, I don’t think there would be a KDE edition in Linux Mint.

Third, because they put a massive amount of efforts into backporting Plasma 5.8, along with the new KDE apps and frameworks and the new version of Qt it depends on. This had to be done with a lot of care, a lot of testing and a lot of respect for the other components in the Xenial package base.

How to test Plasma 5.8

Plasma 5.8.4 is currently in the Kubuntu Backports Landing PPA.

If you are running Linux Mint 18 KDE and you want to help us test it:

  • Open the “Software Sources” tool
  • Click on the “PPA” tab
  • Click on the “Add a PPA” button
  • Enter “ppa:kubuntu-ppa/backports-landing“
  • Validate and click the “Refresh the cache” button

You can then use the Update Manager to upgrade Plasma and the many KDE components.

Plasma 5.8 in Mint 18.x

Once testing is complete, Plasma 5.8 will move towards the Kubuntu-Backports PPA and it will then be available as an update to all users of Linux Mint 18 KDE.

If necessary, we will delay the release of Linux Mint 18.1 KDE to ensure it ships with Plasma 5.8 out of the box.

Remove the PPA when you’re finished

Please remove the backports-landing PPA from your sources when you’re finished testing:

  • Open the “Software Sources” tool
  • Click on the “PPA” tab
  • Select the lines for the backports-landing PPA
  • Click on the remove button
  • Validate and click the “Refresh the cache” button

This PPA is used to test new versions before they get into the Backports PPA, so things can get quite unstable in there at early stages of the preparation of an update.

by ·240 Comments

This is the BETA release for Linux Mint 18.1 “Serena” Cinnamon Edition.

Linux Mint 18.1 Serena Cinnamon Edition

Linux Mint 18.1 is a long term support release which will be supported until 2021. It comes with updated software and brings refinements and many new features to make your desktop even more comfortable to use.

New features:

This new version of Linux Mint contains many improvements.

For an overview of the new features please visit:

“What’s new in Linux Mint 18.1 Cinnamon“.

Important info:

The release notes provide important information about known issues, as well as explanations, workarounds and solutions.

To read the release notes, please visit:

“Release Notes for Linux Mint 18.1 Cinnamon”

System requirements:

  • 512MB RAM (1GB recommended for a comfortable usage).
  • 9GB of disk space (20GB recommended).
  • Graphics card capable of 800×600 resolution (1024×768 recommended).
  • DVD drive or USB port.

Notes:

  • The 64-bit ISO can boot with BIOS or UEFI.
  • The 32-bit ISO can only boot with BIOS.
  • The 64-bit ISO is recommend for all modern computers (Almost all computers sold in the last 10 years are equipped with 64-bit processors).

Upgrade instructions:

  • This BETA release might contain critical bugs, please only use it for testing purposes and to help the Linux Mint team fix issues prior to the stable release.
  • It will be possible to upgrade from this BETA to the stable release.
  • It will also be possible to upgrade from Linux Mint 18. Upgrade instructions will be published next month after the stable release of Linux Mint 18.1.

Bug reports:

  • Please report bugs below in the comment section of this blog.
  • When reporting bugs, please be as accurate as possible and include any information that might help developers reproduce the issue or understand the cause of the issue:
    • Bugs we can reproduce, or which cause we understand are usually fixed very easily.
    • It is important to mention whether a bug happens “always”, or “sometimes”, and what triggers it.
    • If a bug happens but didn’t happen before, or doesn’t happen in another distribution, or doesn’t happen in a different environment, please mention it and try to pinpoint the differences at play.
    • If we can’t reproduce a particular bug and we don’t understand its cause, it’s unlikely we’ll be able to fix it.
  • Please visit https://github.com/linuxmint/Roadmap to follow the progress of the development team between the BETA and the stable release.

Download links:

Here are the download links for the 64-bit ISO:

A 32-bit ISO image is also available at https://www.linuxmint.com/download_all.php.

Integrity and authenticity checks:

Once you have downloaded an image, please verify its integrity and authenticity.

Anyone can produce fake ISO images, it is your responsibility to check you are downloading the official ones.

Enjoy!

We look forward to receiving your feedback. Many thanks in advance for testing the BETA!