Misc. news

We’ve been very busy working on the upcoming Linux Mint 8 lately and I haven’t taken much time to communicate with the community, so here are some news of what is going on at the moment:

– The development of the LXDE edition never really started and so this edition is cancelled.

– Shane, the maintainer of the Fluxbox edition, had to focus on personal matters and is likely to be unavailable in the future. The maintenance of this edition might be delegated to another member of the team, to myself or to a new person in the near future, but in the meantime there will not be a Fluxbox edition of Linux Mint 7.

– A lot of new features and improvements were made for mintUpdate and mintInstall. Both tools are ready to be included in Linux Mint 8. Among other things, mintUpdate now comes with better error handling and the ability for the user to block particular updates based on the name of the package. The graphical interface was also enhanced.

– Linux Mint 8 will come with support for OEM installs.

– Drastic changes were planned for mintBackup and mintUpload and were partly implemented. Both tools are however far from being stable at the moment and so we might reduce the scope of these developments or include the old versions of these tools in the upcoming Linux Mint 8. For mintBackup, the ambition was to rely on rsync, for mintUpload it was to implement a brand new concept called an “Upload Manager”.

– I resigned and left the company I used to work for. To compliment the income generated by Linux Mint I also take part in contracting work based on the distribution itself. So in other words, I’m now working full time on Linux Mint and on projects based or related to it.

– The members of the team were asked to provide commercial support to customers buying it from Linux Mint, and are given the money generated through this activity. Although this isn’t enough for them to work full time on Linux Mint, it generates an income which helps them invest more time working on our project. So far, emorrp1 and husse joined in on that scheme. As we go along and as the overal income gets bigger, more money will be spent on the team and directed towards the people who are devoting their time to make Linux Mint better.

Now, with all I’ve said, you probably have even more questions than before 🙂 I would like to apologize for being so silent and for not giving more frequent news. A lot is happening under the curtains at the moment… we’re all running as fast as we can and sometimes in different directions, when Linux Mint 8 comes out, I hope the work we’ve put in it will be worth it and that you’ll enjoy it a lot. As always we’re planning to release in the end of November. In the meantime I’ll try to give you more news update and I’d like to thank everyone for their patience.

165 comments

  1. Nice one 😀

    Anyway to Mintbackup I would say you should simply reduce the new features to at least release something “new” in Mint 8 and put all time consuming stuff which cant be finished until the release of 8 to Mint 9 (just a suggestion).

    Anyway, great work and keep it up *first*

  2. Thanks for the update. I am amazed and excited by all the changes going on in the kernel and in Ubuntu’s design over the last few releases, and as always in they are applied in Mint. You’ve got a lot to keep up with and are no doubt being pulled in any number of directions. We understand and appreciate everything you and the team do to make freedom better tasting and more practical for everyone.

  3. Congratulations on succeeding to the level where you can now work full time on Mint. I know based on your past communication that this is a goal you have been working towards for a long time. I’m really glad to see that you’ve made the dream a reality.

  4. Excellent news all around. MintBackup is one of my favorite tools, so I am happy to hear about continued development with it. Sorry to hear about Mint LXDE, I was really hoping this would be a CE suitable for the lower powered netbooks but the way things are looking in the netbook industry, they’re all just turning into mini-laptops anyways. Congratulations on achieving your dream of working full-time on Mint!

  5. It’s good to read that you’re able to spend more time on Linux Mint. I appreciate all that you and the team do.

  6. Outstanding, good to hear you’re able to focus on Mint full time now. You’ve started something great here Clem and the growth/popularity of Mint is something to be proud of.

    Cheers

  7. Splendide distribution ! Enfin une distrib qui marche du premier coup avec tous les périphériques et où tout est simple et magnifique. Merci !!! J’ai hâte de voir les prochaines versions. 🙂

  8. I’m a new Linux user. I’m not anti-MS, but the continuous slowdown after each XP/AV update was driving me nuts. Tried Suse, but but was put off by KDE. Tried Linux Mint after reading the Dutch Linux Magazine: “A refreshingly easy distro”. Gave it a go, and it’s just true: it just works! With Linux Mint switching from Windows to Linux could not be easier. It even looks familiar (or is this blasphemy? 😉 ) Both my PC’s (Dell, one 7 years old, one 2) are now running on Linux Mint. Thanks for opening up Linux for me. Keep up the good work. Looking forward to Mint 8.

  9. Whoah, you now work full time on Mint? That’s incredible news! It really says something about Mint’s success! Congratulations!

  10. looking forward to mint 8, still running older version on downstairs machine looking forward to upgrading it. keep up the good work on the best distro out there!

  11. On behalve of all the dutch-speaking members of our forum (www.linuxmint-nl.org) we wish Clem and team all the success in the world! We keep following and supporting you…

  12. Congratulations, Clem! 🙂

    Great news, even if there are some loose ends. I think we all expected LXDE and Fluxbox to miss the Gloria pack, but the advancements in Mint Tools are more important. Reading Jared’s comment above made me think if Mint Tools are properly presented. What do you think about packing them all in a separate menu category? This would allow everyone find them easier and actually use them for what they’ve been designed and heavily worked upon. 🙂

    I’m glad the critical point has been achieved. 🙂 Allowing Mint’s developers to earn the money to sustain it full-time is what this community needs to do to ensure this distro’s future development. Thank you guys for your commitment. We need your skills to make our Linux experience better and better one release after another. 🙂

    CHEERS! 😀

  13. I love your work, and the update to mint software manager is right on. I wish you wouldn’t rush your releases and spend more time working on mint* software. I’m not convinced that every release of Ubuntu is worth updating. Maybe looking at changelog and voting on relevence for upgrading. Right now my LinuxMint install is rock solid. I don’t like the whole fedora test bed distro.

  14. Congrats to you to be able to get sufficient remuneration to be able to resign and concentrate on Mint. It’s nice to hear that emorrp1 and husse will be getting paid for work on Linux Mint.

  15. I am just learning the systems but want to say it is great. I am looking forward to the new release.

  16. Congratz on reaching your personal goals Clem, you’re inspiring, we know you want long ago to devote your time to Mint and make your living of it, well done!

    By the way, please, can you pack back Evolution on default installation? I really use it and installing it from repos don’t work as smooth and ‘glued’ to the system as it used to be back in Ubuntu 8.10.

    Also, I wonder what you say about deprecating Tomboy and adding Gnotes. Mono is not only ugly and bloated per se, but it’s a very dangerous threat to the GNU and we all should avoid it.

  17. Wow it’s a big move you made by resigning (in these times moreover)… Good news for Linux Mint, hopefully you won’t regret it !?

  18. This is fantastic news. Linux Mint has become a familiar topic among many of the community podcasters, and they always have great things to say. It remains the only distro that I have ever convinced a Windoze user to try –> three converts thus far!

  19. I am new too Linux OS, switched from windows not so long ago, tried about ~15 distros, and i have too say that Mint 7 is best of them all! It’s fast, easy too use, beautiful, always up too date. Sad that KDE distros dosen’t work good 4 me, always having some isues… Thanx 4 the hard work, can’t wait too see Linux Mint 8.:) Great work!

  20. Thanks for this Great Distro Clem!

    I hardly check the Forums these days, Mint just works so well it has become almost ubiquitous

    Agree with Kneekoo’s comment about giving more emphasis to Mint Tools by perhaps a separtae menu category. I have not taken advantage of these tools through lack of knowledge and awareness, so additional marketing may be usefull

    Congratulations on being able to go full-time on Mint, we all certainly will benefit from this, keep up the great work 🙂

  21. Great job Clem on the progress of Mint. I agree with the others that it is wonderful that the distro has grown to the point that you can now work on it full time. Am looking forward to Mint 8.

  22. I’d like to thank you guys again for this grwat distro and all the effort you are purring into it! I’m pretty excited about the new Mint 8.

  23. Karmic Koala looks like a significant step forward for Linux, I can hardly wait for the Mint Variant.

    Would concentrating on upgrading to an Ubuntu Karmic base while leaving Mint tools & backup static be a possibility in order to get these changes to the Mint Community asap?

    Mint is the first Linux distro that I have recommended to “normal” non-techie type people, and it seems that they love it, great work and thanks to all of the people on the Mint Team.

  24. Congrats on going full time. You and the team do a great job. Keep up the good work. Looking forward to Mint 8.

  25. Great news about Clem being able to devote more time to Mint which is a great distribution, with its greater emphasis on reliability and simplicity for ‘Joe Public’ ever since Felicia, although Linux guru mysticism sometimes creeps back in.
    Main Edition Mint-7 has been a great success, continuing the avoidance of Ubuntu ‘own goal’ problems. ‘Release when ready’ has been a great policy, long may it continue, and the volunteer-produced XFCE version looks almost ‘made for netbooks’ ? (I’m now even exploring KDE via Mint-7 ‘Live’ sessions.)
    Karmic is looking less hardware tolerant with audio problems almost akin to Hardy development, but ‘fingers crossed’ that its hopefully better RC and definitive releases don’t effect Mint-8, as I’m a Mint Main Edition fan.

  26. Congratulations on being able to work on Linux Mint full time, Clem. Let’s hope some members of the team can do like wise at some time. This will be good for all of us 🙂
    As always, I am very pleased to be using Linux Mint as my main operating system, and have been particularly impressed with Gloria.

  27. Sounds like a few growing pains but overall a general progression. I am slightly disapointed about the LXDE cancellation, I’ve always been fond of that DE; hope some more people come along that can pick this back up and continue with it or at least help, but alas we have Linux Mint XFCE edition so I shouldn’t complain. I am pleased to hear you are focusing full time on Linux and Mint for that matter Clem and would like to congradulate you and wish you tramendous success. To the other unspoken heros behind the curtin, I wanna say thank you from the bottom of my heart your efforts and endevours do not go unrecognized and you are a valuable thread in the fabrics of Linux, OSS, Mint, and freedom. Excellent Job On All The Fine Work You Do. Kudos to all. As inspired by another post, thank you for a better taste of freedom (I think this should be your new slogan or something.) or “Freedom with a better taste.” I wish I wern’t so poor so I could contribute a ton of money to this cause.

  28. Thanks for everything–you’ve been a key part of my journey into FOSS, and Mint will play a key role in my efforts to help others along that same road. The news that you’ve been able to hire yourself full time means that Mint’s popularity is growing, so we’re one step closer to world domination.

    😉

  29. I just have heard of Mint.
    I have had a few issues with Ubuntu.
    Can one connect up a mixed Ubuntu and Windows network easily with Mint?
    Is such a network enabled or disabled by default? (Ubuntu=disabled by default.) Has anyone picked apart the files left by the windows network wizard so as to use them in an automatic/wizard level network setup?

    What version of Wine are you using and why?

    How are futex errors handled? What if they stay around for hours?
    (futex errors hang users out to dry).

    Last I tried to get a Canon Printer to work I ran into compile/make file errors. Is there a tutorial on these?

  30. HUGS!! We love you for your work, for your dedication, for your efforts and for making our lives easier!! I hope you will always remember this! May you and entire team be blessed with loads of money to not only do it full time but also be rich.. as a reward for all your work.

    🙂

    Cheers

  31. Gloria works very well, Clem, so I expect to Helen all the time that is needed… (…ehum… of course, with a more stable Brasero… )

    Meanwhile, good luck with their new projects and…

    “Clem, Clem, that the force be with you …” 🙂

  32. I’ve been using the Gloria main edition for a couple of weeks now and I’m still discovering new functionality I never knew existed. I was using Windows 7 for a while before that and I miss less about that using Mint than vice versa. Youtube videos are choppy in full screen and I’m still looking for a good text to speech program but for the myriad of things that run well, these are minor issues I can live with for now. For being nearly command line illiterate, I’m completely comfortable with Mint.

  33. Way to go. I have been spreading the word and installing friends on Linux Mint. If only Flash was better supported in 64bit with Firefox.
    As a community we need to push game developers and Video card manufacturers to develop for Linux. As of Last month, I have no more windows running at home, except one virtual box because I still need to vpn to work with Nortel/entrust vpn mix. I am curious what everyone uses here for their daily apps, and commercial apps on linux.
    I still have a few bugs to work out, but I truelly enjoy Linux Mint.

    If only The Entire Adobe CS Suite was on Linux!!

  34. What are the new default apps? Did you switch to VLC, or Deluge, or Songbird? These are all better apps than the default ones in 7!

    Congrats on all your success! Keep up the good work!!!!

  35. Congrats on such a nice release on 7.
    And I am looking forward to 8!

    Good luck on your endevours down the road; After searching through various distro’s I came across Linux Mint and I have never turned back; I run it on my laptop and will be dual booting on my main design PC.

    Keep up the good work!

  36. Thank you, Clem for all the work, time, passion and enthusiasm already invested. I have been using MINT 7 on both of my work laptops and on my desktop. I really need the stability for my work (Consultant) and do not have time to test releases after they are proclaimed “stable”. I wonder why the XFCE Mint edition uses MORE memory than the main one. It certainly IS NOT suitable for low memory systems. For that the best ones are Antix (Deb. based), Vector Light and even Zenwalk (6.2 is a splendid achievement; more advanced then the most). Probably LUBUNTU will be covering that segment as well, though UBUNTU based distros are NEVER as low in RAM requirements as Slackware based distros or even pure Debian ones. Go figure! Again – Clem…keep on Swinging!

  37. That’s great to hear, working full-time and dedicating funds to further support.
    Looking forward to the update and future work to come.
    After reading the arguments of Mono, I was a bit sceptical about using it, but I guess there’s always a back up plan for if that situation turns sour.

    Keep up the good work.

  38. I’m curious about Mint 8 and suspend function.
    I Have Fujitsu-Siemens Li 2732 and Mint 7 and I really love it. But suspend wont work, tried everything what a newbie could do but nothing worked.
    So, does Mint 8 will have improved suspend function ?
    And thanks for such a great linux as Mint is.

  39. Clem,

    Wonderful news about you being able to go full time on mint.

    I am so impressed with the quality, the attractiveness, the functionality and most of all the stability of Mint. My distro now and I have been able to make one convert – yay

    geekman

  40. Congratulations Clem, I hope you feel comfortable with your move, and I’m sure it will prove to be the best decision you could make. I’ve been a loyal Mint user since Daryna, and I just wanted to say that I’m more than impressed with each release. Looking forward to Helena: Hopefully, I’ll have my new Sager NP8690 by the time she’s stable and I can give 8 the environment the OS deserves.

  41. Great news on being full time! Best distro ever! I agree with Bushwacker, we got to send him $$$$.. we need to supply him with Redbull, Monster, coffee and anything else he needs to keep on going…

  42. Mint is a really wonderful distro… But, as someone here already mentioned, it would be great to have vlc, deluge, perhaps aMule, gFtp, gMount included by default… That would be great. Of course, fitting it all on one CD is crucial, but… I think the choice of apps could be better. Perhaps a poll in the forum would be the way to decide? People vote, and then they have what they want.

    And I still stick to my idea of having more themes, wallpapers and even usplash themes included in Mint by default. The view of the system is important, too.. Well, that’s my opinion.

    Thanks You for a great distro!

  43. If every Mint-user would donate 1 Euro or approxim. 1 US dollar a month
    which I would happily donate,Clem and the other members could really focus on this awesome distro.es

    Keep up the good work Clem.

  44. G’day Clem, good on ya’ mate!
    Comhghairdeas. Éire buíochas leat.
    Félicitations et merci tellement.

    I’ve been following your work since 3, using Mint on & off since 4KDE, LOVE 7×64, love 7Main & love 7Xfce!

    Lxde probably has a better long-term future than Xfce, but both good…

    Concurrent 64b & 32b versions of Main probably better for the long-term rather than as separate editions, so community builders can use both concurrently too… I hope you get enough support by money etc. to do that 🙂

    You have a lot of courage moving now to work on Mint full-time. I’ll buy my CDs & DVDs from your affiliated stores from now on, to help support you financially. (hey readers, half the money goes back to Mint)

    What else can we say – Clem, Husse, Emorrp1 et al.: you’re doing “The Right Thing” ;D

    Thank-you!

  45. Clem, first of all, congratulations on being able to go full-time with Mint and being able to pay everyone that works on the distro. It sounds like you’re gonna have a distro that will be here for a good long time, and that’s just what the Linux world needs, IMHO.

    I’m also pleased to see that you’ve decided to go with GNote instead of Tomboy in the upcoming Helena release. Because of the Mono dependencies involved with Tomboy, that’s always been something I wish Ubuntu wouldn’t do, and that definitely scores points in my book.

    In fact, because of that, I’m currently using Ubuntu 9.04, but I’ve decided that instead of Karmic Koala, I’m gonna hold off until Mint Helena comes out and upgrade to that instead. Besides, with Mint’s upgrades coming out in May and November, that really fits my schedule better anyway, as I can do my file backups and distro upgrades during Thanksgiving weekend and Memorial Day weekend.

  46. I am excited for this, I hope my old laptop (which I’m using as we speak) can handle it. It runs Gloria Main Edition pretty well, all things considered (let’s put it this way: when I first got this laptop, it had winXP and took 10 minutes from power-on to be useable. Boots up with immediate network connection, all ready to go in about a minute now. May have to wait to see a lower-powered version to upgrade, but plan to dual-boot with my winxp PC once Helena comes out. Congratulations on an awesome OS!

  47. It’s great news that you have a full time job in something that you enjoy. Linux Mint is a relavation compared to other distro’s I have tried. I have converted over a dozen friends to Mint and they all say it is the best move they ever made. It’s fast, intuitive and enjoyable to use. Hope you get as much pleasure writing it as we like using it.

  48. Linux mint is by far the best distro ever and it would be a shame if for some reason the project gets slowed down
    everybody please spend some cash even just a dollar to help them make it even better.

    danyel from holland

  49. Clem, I’m glad Mint can help you dedicate your time fully to it’s development. Also I thank all the donors and sponsors for making that possible.
    Congratulations!
    Hernan.

  50. i like linuxmint but i have some problems installing inside windows.can you please think about linux-wubi? same than ubuntu? it wuuld be great. thanks and congratulation for this good job in mint gloria

  51. Is the XFCE edition going to be ready _that_ late after Xubuntu 9.10 is out?

    This is the main reason I prefer the original Xubuntu over Mint XFCE — especially since whatever is based on Jaunty screws my Intel video, but Karmic fixes it!

    Secondly, is Mint XFCE _really_ using _more_ memory than the GNOME one?

    The Linux Magazine article is not to be trusted — it’s not clear if they counted the buffers too, overall responsiveness was not considered, etc.

    Is the Karmic-based Mint XFCE going to compete with this memory usage of the original?
    http://beranger.tumblr.com/post/214114464/

  52. Clem, congrats on being able to work full time in mint! This can only mean good things for the Distro, and I can’t wait to see how linuxmint improves because of it. Good luck, have fun, and thank you Clem!
    ========================
    drazenb: I agree, Ubuntu seems to be bloated by nature. I’ve always dreamed of seeing a rolling release version of Mint based on Arch, or maybe Frugalware-Current, I just love the way Frugalware & Arch preform, and the lack of a need to do an entire distribution upgrade to get the most recent packages has always appealed to me. The one turn off is that they aren’t as user friendly as Ubuntu, which is why I always have thought that Mint could make a home there, and make it more userfriendly. But that’s just me, and whether it happens or not mint will always hold a special place in my heart.

  53. I recommend $2 optional donation for every download. That means that that the download link should take you to the donation page before going to the actual download page.

    I also recommend that the crew choose only one distro (currently GNOME works nicely), and devote all their energies to it. Remember, Microsoft has TEAMS of people working on Windows. Therefore it is important to not waste time and energy on several distros (such as KDE, LXDE, XFCE) that can never compete with windows. There’s no point in spending time on a distro that only “10 people” in the world are going to use. The objective is convert windows people to Linux and make open source mainstream; and the only way to do that is to make Linux Mint “FULLY AWESOME”!

    We support you 100%.

  54. Excellent job!
    The Mint Team is the greatest small linux distro team!!
    I wish and hope a Linux Mint KDE distro, officially supported by the team, like the GNOME distro, out near the kubuntu one.
    That decision will make me to switch and contribute to Mint.
    I hope Linux Mint shine in the future like the best distro.
    Greetings from Italy!

  55. I have tried many linux distros in the past. I am now using Mint ONLY as my Linux distro. Love how it JUST WORKS! You and the team deserve much praise. Please continue on the path you are on, it is definatelly working.

    Congrads on working full time on the distro! I am about to make my first donation! GOOD LUCK!

  56. Your work on Mint, if it has not already, is quickly becoming the stuff of legend Clem! Glad to see you finally able to devote full time to its development. Looking forward, as are the rest of the Mintaholics out there, to the newest iteration of what has come to be the single best distro available bar none!

  57. Running Mint 5 Fluxbox in a LiveCD session right now, and it smokes!
    I’m no Linux guru / mystic, but I’ve used Ubuntu, and am thoroughly enjoying Mint. Quick, stable, efficient, elegant. Hope someone in Redmond is paying attention to what an OS should be / is capable of being (on a much lower budget, incidentally).
    A very fine job Clem. Happy that you’re devoting all your time to this excellent distro.

  58. Started with Linux when I just could not keep up with Windows98’s problems at home (3 teenagers). Went from Suse to Mandrake to Ubuntu. I got fed up having to install codecs and decoders separately, so I started looking again, and found Mint. BEST distro I’ve ever come across!!! I’m running it on 3 machines at home, and have given copies to 2 people at work, who’ve installed it and love it. And they’re newbies!

    Keep up the good work!!

  59. Nice changes.
    I would like to mention some suggestions :

    – maybe a working kernel updater? I tried kernelcheck (a patched working version) and it failed compiling a new kernel..
    – multitouchsupport? n-trig devices for example are supported since the kernel 2.6.31 (there is a little project for multitouch gestures in compiz fusion)

  60. Congratulations and all the best in your endeavours, Gloria seems perfect to me and i cannot even imagine with my limited knowledge, that it can be improved upon. Today’s Linux user is truly spoilt for choice.

  61. Congratulations Clem! Mint is definatly one of the most beautiful distro’s around and I am delighted to read you managed to make a living on Mint and thus can dedicate more time to it.

    I have a small project where I recycle used computers and give them away to people who can’t afford to buy one. The computers are mostly 3-5 years old and I looked around for a long time for a distro that would run fine on these legacy hardware machines and at the same time provide a useful, complete and user-friendly system. Of course M$ OS is out of the question (I wouldn’t like to introduce costs on the people who get these computers). Mint is imho by far the most beginner-friendly distro there is, and so it is the default distro I install. On even older hardware I have exellent experiences with the XFCE version..

    Keep up the good work Clem! I will encourage any user to donate a little to support you and your fine work!

  62. Oh.. just a little addition to my previous post:

    Thanx a lot for the planned support for OEM installs! It will not only benefit me but also encourages others to ship new computers with Mint!

  63. PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE work on MintBackUp … although I make my own backups, this addition would be something I would use alot (every week or so) rather than the every month or so I do it now…. then again… if you do reduce the scope of details on the project, that is fine too because what you have here is a TOP SHELF O.S.!!! I will be donating some CAD ASAP. 😛 I have to go load my debit Mastercard to pay for shells so I will include some Mint cash as well…. I OWE you guys!!! I have been using Mint since & came out or around that time (coming from ubuntu) and after being a Windows user since Windows 98 and have never looked back since…. not even for ubuntu… didn’t even CONSIDER it! You have a stellar prodect here and I just HAD to write you guys to let you know how pleased I am and how much I look forward to Mint 8! (:

  64. I OWE you guys!!! I have been using Mint since & came out or around that time (coming from ubuntu)
    is supposed to read…

    I OWE you guys!!! I have been using Mint since Mint 7 came out or around that time (coming from ubuntu)

    😛

  65. I’m so EXCITED to distribute Linux Mint and/or PCLinuxOS here in East Africa on ex-Vista/XP desktops after reading stellar, passionate reviews of both products. I’ve been Googling a lot on my Nokia celly (in bed and on matatus) peeking what I believe is the beautiful transformation of Desktop Linux. My hats off to the DEVELOPERS and other peeps who are bringing out great distros like these 2.

    One key piece of advise: LESS IS MORE

    Peacies!

  66. Keep up the good work!! – best distro I have had. PC’s are a hobby of mine – have approx 7 pcs

    I recycle my used pcs and make them better.

  67. usually there is general negative comments on pages like this on other distros, but the guys here are quite different here!

    i love it too.

    best distro around!

    will

  68. Hello Clem and other Mint developers.
    thanks for the great work and hassle free system. i would just like to ask/point out a small feature that i think could be very much appreciated.
    mintupdate already has the priority and stability level included in the updates, wich is a great idea, but it would be very useful if we could take this a little further and give the administrators a way of automatically instal these stable and stability-classified updates without user interaction, sort of what windows and ubuntu do.
    my reason for this is quite simple and clear, as being the family “service geek” i end up more or less administering several systems at relatives houses. i’ve recently started moving people over to linux (mom, aunt, mother in law…), people that have relatively low understanding of a computer and just want to it to do the usual work of web, small games and letter and email writing…
    as such and because i don0t live at their homes, i end up being there often justo so that i can perfom the updates in order to not leave them with a 3 months old system or worse. if mint automatic updates were enabled they could just use their pc without any danger whatsoever and i could just stob by very rarely to do the checkup routine.
    some users on the forum suggested a chron task for apt-get update but as i see it, this updates every new package on the server right? it doesn’t take in consideration the stability classes of mint-update.

    other very interisting idea but i don’t know if can be easily implemented was that some failed updates or update needs and errors could be send by email for a remote “admin” as myself. so that i could be aware what was going on their pcs whithout having to be there all the time.

    and if i could really ask for the cherry on top, then it would be a kind of remote admin control panel where i could set this type of features on the pc and then leave it at their houses physically “unatendend”.

    just a thought of course!
    thanks for a good work and good luck with the new professional/hobby life!

  69. Having used SuSE exclusively myself for 8 years my 18 year daughter had had enough of problems with Vista. Wanting to find a more user friendly OS, than openSuse, for her I searched around and I came across Mint.

    I was amazed at how easy it was to get up and running and how intuitive it, and its menu system is to use, I had tried Ubuntu first and found Mint a real step up. My daughter was very happy, I have switched my machines over and I would happily recommend it to any user regardless of technical ability.

    Congratulations on an excellent OS and thank you for your efforts.

  70. linux is already eye candy all you really need is load time to be instant and you got all you need for productivity and some gamers

  71. My boyfriend is a brilliant linux man, I was trying to adjust to linux, sending thousands of texts to him”how do you ______?”. I ran across mint. Between he and I, I was the first one to try out mint, and I would like to thank you for letting me be able to school my boyfriend every once and a while :). The system is an easy learn, and very user friendly.

    Thank you from Chicago!

  72. Have recently changed from Vista to Linux Mint 7 and now will never go back to Windows. I tried a number of Linux distros and finally found Mint 7 which I think is exceptional to say the least. For those making the change I think this is the ideal OS.
    Wish you and the team all the very best. Keep up the brilliant work and I will look forward to the release of Mint 8.
    Congratulations on Mint’s success.

  73. Sorry for the long wait for Linux Mint 7 Xfce CE.
    My wife had a few health issues that took a lot of time away from working on it.
    I hope the next one won’t take as long to do.
    She still has some health issues that we are trying to get fixed.
    I will also be gone from Nov. 1st thru the 15th.

    Xubuntu no lower states it’s idea for lower RAM PCs.
    http://www.xubuntu.org/
    Also in the dev emails they stated that they aren’t trying to be for lower RAM PCs. 🙁

  74. I’m using linux Mint since version 6 and even dont bother to install Ubuintu anymore. I just wait for the next mint.

    I agree with filipe and would like to see an automatic updat possibility, so I don’t have to maintain the mint machines of my relatives that live somewhere else.

    Keep up the good work

    cheers, Jeroen

  75. I can’t wait to see Mint 8. This is going to be great! 😀

    Linux Mint is the real thing. I have been using Mint 7 Gloria as my only Operating System for more than two months and I’m plenty satisfied with it.

    I used to have other linux distros installed in a small partition of my hard drive. I always kept the ‘Win’ thing on the primary partition. Once I tried Mint I realized that I didn’t use the Winbugs thing anymore so I decided to remove it. I’m glad I did 🙂 I will not miss it…

    A happy Mint user.

  76. Sorry. i am very happy wich Gloria 7 and i cant wite for Helena. But i spect that the son will be impruved. Video is ok excelente but not de son.

    sincerely
    Margarete

    I am new in pc and ubuntu. Startede for 2 moth agou.

  77. Looking forward to Mint 8!

    I want you to know that Linux Mint was the OS that recently convinced me that Linux is not only for nerds, but on the contrary is a modern and mature OS that fully competes with – and in many cases exceeds – Windows.

    I have tried about 10 distros, but being a Windows user ever since Windows 3.0 I really couldn’t get used to the desktop. And besides, there was always some problems: Wireless networking didn’t work, one didn’t like my monitor, and none of them played multimedia content on the web.

    Then I tried Linux Mint and it took only 30 seconds to fall in love! The desktop was sufficiently similar to Windows to make me feel at home right away, and yet different enough to feel new and fresh.

    And everything worked out of the box. Really, everything. Wifi connected at first attempt, and I could browse my favorite websites as usual, watch streaming tv and listen to netradio etc.

    It has been a wonderful experience getting to know Linux Mint, and I wish to thank you and the whole community for this great distro!

    Martin

  78. @ M.J.Kramer:

    “With Linux Mint switching from Windows to Linux could not be easier.”

    PCLinuxOS GNOME 2009.2 is MUCH easier to use and configure!

  79. Just a quick word from a long term MS user, I’ve now had enough of MS’s disregard for their users, their outrageous pricing structure and other issues too numerous to mention. Have tried many Linux distros but found them unstable, difficult to use, and just plain unrefined when compared to MS and MAC.

    Then I tried Mint 7, this is truly the first Linus OS that I have found to be intuitive, everything is where you would expect it to be, it plays audio and video out of the box and it looks beautiful. It is by far the most refined Linux I have ever used. I have just read that you are now working full time on your project which gives me great heart. Congratulations well done and keep up the good work.

    However,being a Linux newbie I have a question. When Mint 8 is released will my Mint 7 installation update to the new version automatically or will I have to do a fresh install? Thanks again for such a quality distro.

  80. I almost forgot to tell you *how much* I love the redesigned bash, it’s allways a pleasure to open a terminal window!

    Many many thanks for your great work – it’s evident the love you put on it.

  81. thats cool load times can be taken care of you always can optimize as for the programs ram is not to expensive cpu and harddrive is so you have that

  82. I don’t know how often you read these; however, I wanted to say I am very grateful to you all for all your hard work. I’ve never seen a linux system like mint. It’s special and has quickly surpassed Linux ports in user experience (although,this does not diminish all the work before it.

    If I’m ever out of school and working again, you will have my tithe, that is certain. I write grants and currently pursue a Master’s degree with an emphasis on adult and organizational education. I would love to see it possible for our library and school district to start using your systems instead of the outdated Windows XP and expensive new computers that are not educational or effective in learning. In short, turn it into more of a taxpayer issue. Your work is elegant and deserves more resources.

    I learned how to build computers because of you, and someday I hope to learn enough on the programming end to contribute there. I teach others to build computers from recycled parts, and they all use Linux Mint. I don’t make any money and I target the poor who would have nothing otherwise. I think Linux mint could be an amazing disruptive innovation and would love to dialog with The Mint team to understand more about you all and Linux Mint. The time has come for Linux to take it’s seat at the front table.

    warm regards,
    zechariah aloysius hillyard
    north las vegas, nv

  83. I’ve played with many different Linux distros over the past 20 years but Mint has been the only one that I want to use, and do use, every day… in fact this is the only OS on my desktop machine.

    Well done… and looking forward to Mint 8.

  84. I would just like to say, I love linux mint, it always works really well and it is fantastically stable. I think linux mint is actually now the most popular distro! I always appreciate the hard work that has gone into this one and good luck with the rest!

  85. I have an obscure Sound card, The Yamaha SW1000XG and was wondering if this will be supported at all in the future? It’s not on the Alsa list.

  86. I tried versions of Linux before ie: Puppy, SUSE etc.. . they may be great BUT I do not have the time to learn them. Tried Mint 5(?)and remained hopeful. Tried again (many months later) Mint 7 and… WOW. I can hang with it. My daughter in law was on my computer and noticed the speed. She said “this comp is running fast, what did you do?” I said “Running Linux Mint” she said “whats that?” Wow, she noticed the menu was a little different BUT she navigated her way wistfully and was productive RIGHT AWAY!! And that is the key, being productive. I have customers and need to be productive w/o the worry of windows virus’s, security issues and costly upgrades . Your logo says it all “From freedom came elegance” Keep up the great work. Talking others into it and making the switch. Finally I can see the end to the Microsoft stranglehold!! BRING IT ON!!

  87. jdyk firefox informs me the top banner on your site is feeding to a malicious link…

    Thanks… :-/

    Edit by Clem: Removed the link. I think Google Ads was compromised, I couldn’t find anything malicious in the web pages that we serve at the moment. Please contact me by email if this occurs again.

  88. i have to agree its so awesome having 2 systems linux and windows bless is a strong word for me and i would have to say that

  89. anyone who can answer this would be appriciated i am on a pentium m laptop as of now because it is convinient will having it run full speed actually kill the computer or is that over a lot of time

    excuse my spelling

  90. With the new artwork for Ubuntu 9.10, I’m getting a little worried that Mint is going to be a step backwards in terms of looks if it stays with the same artwork as the last release. I’m not fond of orange/brown OR green/black, but right now I am preferring Ubuntu’s default look, especially the splash and login screens. Default artwork for Mint 7 was an improvement on Mint 6 and Ubuntu 9.04, but now my feelings about it is too much green, too dark, and it has this cheap “plastic” look to it. I know I can change the theme myself, and even make it look exactly like Ubuntu if I wanted, but I prefer not to.

    Also, I’ve heard you mention using Mint Tools on other systems, but I’ve read forums and tried, but I’ve never successfully implemented any of the tools. Any suggestions?

  91. also, I don’t like the branded boot menu. I feel that I should only see Mint branding if I actually select Mint from the menu.

  92. Congratulations on managing to go pro/semi-pro with Linux Mint; it’s a superb O/S and sooo much easier to use than other Linux releases.
    I’ve been a computer user since the early 90’s; but more recently have started a bit of a hobby refurbishing old computers. I’m planning on offering them to people who might like a computer but might not be able to afford one, probably using the ‘Freecycle’ network. I’ll be giving them away with Linux Mint installed and I’m hoping to be able to make a small donation for each install, (if my pocket money will stretch).
    Keep up the great work guys – looking forward to Helena

    THANK YOU !

  93. It’s a pity Shane will probably be unavailable in the future.
    Hope the rest of the team will make upgrading Linux Mint 7 to 8 as painless as possible.
    +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
    A friendly operating system should make the upgrade process smooth.
    My mom should be able to do it!
    +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
    In my opinion that should be the first priority.
    Greetings from Nederland.

  94. In Koala are not ACX Driver. Are in the new Mint the ACX driver? Can you implement this module in the kernel?

  95. Congratulations on succeeding to the level where you can now work full time on Mint. I know based on your past communication that this is a goal you have been working towards for a long time. I’m really glad to see that you’ve made the dream a reality.

  96. Dear Clem:

    I beg you consider including Evolution in Helena as it is a *must* for my everyday work and, installing it from repos don’t work as well because among other things Mail Notification don’t recognize Evolution – even it is not only installed but up and running with the “Mail Notification” plugin enabled.

    Best!

  97. La verdad estoy sorprendido del buen desempeño de Linux Mint y les agradezco su entrega y contribución en tan excelente distribución.
    Sigan adelante y Dios les guarde.

  98. Thanks for Mint! I am pacing back and forth waiting for Mint 8. I’ve tried others, but always come back to Mint.

    Jim — Programming since 1972 (punched cards!)

  99. Felicitaciones!
    Desde Argentina un gran saludo y muchas gracias por hacernos la vida más facil! Linux Mint es lo máximo y lo recomendamos entre los usuarios de habla hispana.
    Congratulations!
    From Argentina, thanks to make us the life more easy. Linux Mint is the best OS I know.

  100. I’ve just recently become a user of linux mint (and linux in general). And i’m happy with it!
    Thank you people for working on such a nice distro!
    Probably I’ll try to support you with money someday 😉

  101. And many greets from Germany as well. At the moment I keep hopping between Ubuntu and Mint, because I love testing the next release, but when Mint arrives, I switch back to Mint… and when the next Ubuntu Beta comes around… well…

    I wish there were Linux Mint Betas ! ! !

  102. @MB (post 134) –

    Have you tried putting the commands for your wireless drivers in /etc/rc.local? The system should execute anything in that file during the boot process.

  103. Congratulations!
    I used to be a windows user and I still remember very clearly the first time I connected my old printer to my PC with my freshly installed Linux Mint and…it just recognised it and was ready to work! I never thought an OS could be so easy to use.
    Waiting for next Mint!

  104. Pleas put in the concection sharing future this is holding me back from using linux. In windows u have a share internet conection option, please ad this so i can use linux. thanx

  105. Hello Mint team!
    I would like to ask you if you can make two versions of ISO of Mint 8 – normal and alternate with debian installer, like Ubuntu does. I would like to install Mint, which I consider as the best linux nowadays, with encrypted LVM. I understand not so many people want things like that, and I think it is even better to have installation progress as easy as can be – like it is now. On the other hand there is still few people like me who needs some special requirements…
    Actually maybe it could be better to add to GRUB on CD after boot option /boot in expert mode/ or something like that instead of making two separate ISOs;-)

    Thank you very much for your hard work for linux community. I think you guys do great job and thank to you more people come to linux!

  106. Great news! I hope that you are enjoying the new job…

    Gloria is awesome! Thank you so much for the great work!

    I will be flerting Helena as soon she became available 🙂

    Go Mint !!!

    Best regards,
    chopeta

  107. Pleas ad ics (internet conection sharing) simple gui to enable conection sharing in linux.
    Its complicated to enable masquarade. please this is holding me back from using linux. In windows u have a simple gui where you can enable ICS. But in linux its so hard.

  108. well its been 2 days since Final was released. I would have thought Clem would have already 8 released given he works full time now w/Mint 🙂
    Just kidding….would be nice to have a little bit of communication to us loyal users….

  109. Great news !

    What about Ubuntu One integration to Mint ? Could we imagine a switch between the esay uploads tools which we all know and the Ubuntu One project ? Money for server use for other ideas ?

    Thanks !

  110. First off, ty for the work you have all done on mint, I use the mint XFCE edition on my netbook. I do have to say however, I am disappointed to hear the LXDE edition was discontinued, I was REALLY looking forward to it, I think it would have been an excellent, low resource using alternative for netbook users like myself, an os with the mint goodness, but w/o resource claiming unnecessary programs. I have tested the debian version, and while its definately minimal on the resourses (resulting in longer battery life), it is also a bit TOO lacking heh… Have you any plans in the works perhaps for a mint equivalent of one of the *buntu netbook remixes?

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