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Linux Mint 18.1 'Serena' Is Here For Christmas (betanews.com)

Posted by msmash on from the linux-build-drop dept.

Long time reader BrianFagioli writes: if you love Linux Mint and use it regularly, I have very good news -- version 18.1 'Serena' is finally here. There are two desktop environments from which to choose -- Cinnamon and Mate. Regardless of which version you choose, please know that it is based on Ubuntu 16.04, which offers long-term support (LTS). In other words, Linux Mint 18.1 will be supported until 2021. Linux Mint 18.1 comes with the updated Cinnamon 3.2 which looks to be wonderful. The Mint team touts a new screensaver/ login screen in the desktop environment, and yeah, it looks good.

9 of 62 comments (clear)

  1. And at what a price! by gnick · · Score: 3, Funny

    I know what I'm getting everyone this season!

    --
    He's getting rather old, but he's a good mouse.
  2. Never thought I would see the day by The-Ixian · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I never thought I would see screensavers and login screens as the touted new Linux features.

    Not a bad thing. I just think it speaks to how mature Linux has become as a general user OS. No longer are we talking about dependency hell or config file editing. Almost everything *just works*.

    My first distro was Slackware on several floppy images. I spent days tracking down and installing package dependencies just to try to get X11 to work and, giving up on that, working on simpler problems like getting Sendmail configured....

    Pretty amazing if you ask me.

    Though, I think Linux would still be strictly a hacker's OS if it weren't for commercial interests and money.

    --
    My eyes reflect the stars and a smile lights up my face.
    1. Re:Never thought I would see the day by Per+Wigren · · Score: 2

      Once it stabilized, PulseAudio is one of the best things that ever happened to Linux audio. Yes, it was buggy in the beginning and some distros made it the default a bit prematurely. Also, it depends on good ALSA drivers that fully implements the API. For a long time, PulseAudio was plagued by buggy and partially implemented ALSA drivers that lied about timings and other things and had only stubs for many functions. As PulseAudio exposed many driver bugs, it was often unfairly blamed by nontechnical people. Also, many distributions (Ubuntu was particularly bad) failed to make the default configuration of the applications/games/emulators/etc in their package repositories work with PulseAudio out of the box, creating an even worse user experience that PulseAudio was blamed for. Nowadays, pretty much all common audio cards have good enough ALSA drivers and distributions have fixed their default configurations so this is no longer a problem and PulseAudio is working flawlessly.

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      My other account has a 3-digit UID.
    2. Re:Never thought I would see the day by Per+Wigren · · Score: 2

      It's not unnecessary if you want seamless support for things like bluetooth headsets, network speakers (Airplay etc), audio from more than one application at a time, and more. If your audio playing needs are trivial and old school, then yes, it may be unnecessary for you. Some of these thing can be done with plain ALSA but far from seamless and transparent for non-technical end users with MacOS/Windows backgrounds. I have done my fair share of .asoundrc editing and magic dmix hacks and I love the simplicity that PulseAudio brought.

      --
      My other account has a 3-digit UID.
  3. Re:"Linux security". Good joke... by wizkid · · Score: 2

    No, because the patch was out before the announcement. And we don't have to wait until the second Tuesday of January to (Maybe) get the fix.
    All you need to do is patch your system.

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    I take no responsibility for what I say. Even though I'm never wrong :)
  4. Re:imaginary exploit? by uvajed_ekil · · Score: 2

    Careful not to feed the troll. Apparently the same anonymous coward is whining all over this thread about the same minor/questionable bug because he is a Mint hater. I'm unaware of an OS that hasn't had exploitable bugs at times, and I'm not the least bit concerned about the new Mint release. And I don't intentionally conceal my identity when I post about it.

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    This is a hacked account, for which the owner can not be held responsible.
  5. Re:No network installer? by Immerman · · Score: 2

    Oh I quite agree. The ability to do a network install of a desktop os targeting home (not corporate) users is critical. I mean, probably 0.001% of the potential user base considers it a high priority, so they should be allocating volunteer developer time to that rather than silly things like improving the user experience.

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    --- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
  6. direct to the source by xeno · · Score: 3, Informative

    Didn't see direct links -- just off to Betanews blather. So here they are...

    Disclaimer: Been using Mint for years now. It's the schiznit.

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    I think not...(*poof*)
  7. Dropping the ball with skylake. by LTIfox · · Score: 2

    The kernel in 16.04 simply does not work with skylake graphics (not anecdotal: ArsTech was bitching about that too). Even when I've moved to 16.10 I still had to hard reboot my machine from time to time. Now I'm on fedora 25 (cinnamon spin) and it is rock solid.