The Linux Mint team today released the final version of the "Ulyana" distro, which is Linux Mint 20. It is the first release that comes as 64-bit only OS with snapd disabled, relying on classic repository apps, and flatpak.
Interested users can download Cinnamon, MATE, and Xfce editions of Linux Mint 20. It features Cinnamon 4.6, Xfce 4.14, MATE 1.24, a Linux kernel 5.4 and an Ubuntu 20.04 package base.
Linux Mint 20 will receive security updates until 2025. Until 2022, future versions of Linux Mint will use the same package base as Linux Mint 20, making it trivial for people to upgrade. Until 2022, the development team won't start working on a new base and will be fully focused on this one.
Linux Mint 20 is notable for the following changes.
Snap is disabled
Snapd is disabled by default and APT packages are not allowed to install it.
The Snap Store, also known as the Ubuntu Store, is a commercial centralized software store operated by Canonical. Similar to AppImage or Flatpak the Snap Store is able to provide up to date software no matter what version of Linux you are running and how old your libraries are.
Although it is open-source, Snap on the other hand, only works with the Ubuntu Store. Nobody knows how to make a Snap Store and nobody can. The Snap client is designed to work with only one source, following a protocol which isn’t open, and using only one authentication system. Snapd is nothing on its own, it can only work with the Ubuntu Store.
This is a store we can’t audit, which contains software nobody can patch. If we can’t fix or modify software, open-source or not, it provides the same limitations as proprietary software.
Following the decision made by Canonical to replace parts of APT with Snap and have the Ubuntu Store install itself without users knowledge or consent, the Snap Store is forbidden to be installed by APT in Linux Mint 20.
if you want to use the Snap Store, re-enabling and installing it is very easy.
sudo rm /etc/apt/preferences.d/nosnap.pref
apt update
apt install snapd
Home directory encryption
Home directory encryption, which was removed in Ubuntu, will continue to be available.
Nemo
The team looked at the performance of the file manager and changes are being made to the way Nemo is handling thumbnails. Although the generation of new thumbnails was done asynchronously, loading existing ones could sometimes have an impact on browsing content and navigating directories.
The main idea behind these changes is to prioritize content and navigation and to delay thumbnails as much as possible. As a result, the content of directories shows up with generic icons before the thumbnails are rendered, but the improvement in performance is quite noticeable.
Cinnamon 4.6
In Cinnamon the most notable features are the ability to change the monitor refresh rate and support for fractional HiDPI resolutions. The systray applet will also delegate support for indicators (libAppIndicator) and StatusNotifier (Qt and new Electron apps) icons to the Xapp StatusIcon applet directly.
Blueberry, mintupdate, mintreport, nm-applet, mate-power-manager, mate-media, redshift, rhythmbox all use XAppStatusIcon and give the tray a consistent look in Mint 20.
Cinnamon will let you choose the frequency of your monitors. This is a feature that has been requested a few times and which is available in other desktop environments.
Cinnamon 4.6 also introduces fractional scaling. At the moment your scaling is either 100% (normal mode) or 200% (HiDPI mode) and it is the same for all your monitors. The scaling will be able to be different for each monitor, and you’ll be able to set it to values in between 100% and 200%.
Other Cinnamon changes
- Middle-clicking the keyboard applet cycles keyboard layouts.
- Cinnamon screensaver supports custom commands, making it possible to use alternative screen lockers with Cinnamon.
Warpinator
Devs have decided to use 'Warpinator' as the permanent app's name.
There were quite a few good names, but the funny ones didn’t sound as good as the original and the serious ones sounded too much like a Web 2.0 service. So after looking at names such as “Ethernator”, “Datanator”, “XFiles”, “Overcast”, “Capsule”, “DropZone”, we finally went back to the original name and decided to stick to it. “Warpinator” does sound ridiculous, but many people liked it and after hearing it so much we kind of get used to it.
Wrapinator replicates the now-missing functionality of Linux Mint 6. It was powered by a third-party app Giver, which is now discontinued. To fill the gap, Warpinator will allow the user to easily share files across the local network. Without any server or configuration, computers would automatically see each other and you could simply drag and drop files from one to another.
Warpinator now encrypts communication on the network and includes all the planned features.
Gdebi
Gdebi will feature a revamped user interface:
Desktop Backgrounds
Linux Mint 20 features a new set of desktop wallpapers.
Mint-Y Theme Update
The Mint-Y theme will provide much brighter colors than before. The new color pallet is pleasant without being overwhelming, and the resulting GTK theme is nice to use. Here’s a comparison of some of the old colors (on the left) with some of the new ones (on the right):
Old Mint-Y blue:
New Mint-Y blue:
Yellow folders will also be available.
New welcome screen
Finally, a reworked welcome screen applet will allow you to pick a Mint-Y color, and directly switch between the dark and light theme variations.
NVIDIA Optimus
Linux Mint 20 features improved support for NVIDIA Optimus.
The NVIDIA Prime applet now shows your GPU renderer and you can select which card to switch to straight from its menu.
The NVIDIA "On-Demand" profile is also now fully supported. When you run in that mode, it is your Intel card which renders the session and a menu option is available to let you offload a particular application to your NVIDIA card.
Select an application in the menu, right-click and select "Run with NVIDIA GPU".
From the command-line, two new commands are available to offload to GLX or to Vulkan:
- nvidia-optimus-offload-glx
- nvidia-optimus-offload-vulkan
XApps improvements
Xedreceived the ability to join lines together and to remove trailing whitelines before saving files.Xviewerreceived fullscreen and diaporama toolbar buttons and remembers if its window was maximized.- In
Xreadera print button was added to the toolbar. - To guarantee better support for modern Electron apps and indicators XappStatusIcon received mouse wheel support and SNI (StatusNotifier, libIndicator) support.
Other changes
- The Grub boot menu is now always visible.
- Apturl switched backend from Synaptic to Aptdaemon.
- APT recommends are enabled by default for newly installed packages (not for upgrades).
- Snapd is disabled by default and APT packages are not allowed to install it.
- Live sessions running under Virtualbox automatically get their resolution bumped to a minimum of 1024x768.
- This release ships with linux-firmware 1.187 and the Linux kernel 5.4.
Download Links for Linux Mint 20
The download links can be found in the official announcement
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Very nice! I no longer use Windows 10 because of Windows 10 is really crap OS! From now on I’m going to use Linux Lite and Windows 7!!
Are you still using Arch Linux and Linux Mint??
Yep, however, I have switched from Mint 17.3 to Ubuntu 18.04 some time ago on one of my laptops.
:)
any reasons why you switched from Linux Mint to Ubuntu??
Yep. Less apps to remove right after the install. Check out what is ‘Mini.iso’ for Ubuntu. Very useful thing!
Otherwise they are the same, Mint XFCE and Xubuntu. I use the same apps everywhere.
:)
Major Problem with Windows 10 2004 Update, please watch this
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ffHIY6pOJUk
Windows 10 is always has lots of bugs and issues!
Windows 10 is always spying even though Ashampoo AntiSpy tool did blocked it!
Windows 10 is slow!
Windows 10 is always releases feature updates 2 times ever year!
Windows 10 is very less reliable!
Windows 7 is reliable!
Windows 7 is always has few bugs!
Linux is super reliable!
Linux is always has no bugs!
I permanently stick with Linux Lite and Windows 7!
After putting Mint 19.3 on a computer for a friend, I was planning to have him pick it up tomorrow. Now I can wipe the drive and put Mint 20 on it instead. Oh well . . .
Or you can upgrade it. But wiping is always better, that’s a known fact :-)
I’ve been testing LM 20 for a few days. Everything works on a Lenovo ThinkCentre M710q. Bluetooth takes a few tries before connecting unfortunately. But everything works. I will leave Windows for Linux now. Not for LM but for elementary OS. elementary OS 6 is coming soon too.
This is what my eOS looks like: https://i.imgur.com/dGt3wfr.png
I like it!
Too many problems with Windows nowadays!
50 Reasons Why I Love Linux
I love Linux so much I made a list of 50 reasons why I love it so.
I can extract something with one command without opening a separate program.
I can print a document without opening it.
I can update all applications with two magical words, apt-get upgrade.
Its free
Its free as in beer.
Its more secure than Windows
I can run on pretty much any hardware.
I love Linux8. It is highly scalable… I can install it on a 486 or a dual core.
Help is readily available and free of charge.
Well documented
No need for some obscure knowledge base
A standard help system that is actually useful (man)
Powerful CLI
Many of the best programs are available for Linux for free. ie. Apache, MySQL, ProFTPd, SSH, OpenVPN. You would have to pay hundreds if not thousands of dollars for Windows programs that accomplish the same thing. On top of that you will have to pay for support
No need to call a tech support center in India to activate your fully legal OS.
Linux can be configured to run without a GUI for max performance. This is especially useful for servers. Other operating systems don’t have this luxury.
It doesn’t ask me if I am sure I want to delete something….twice
Many of the programs are configured with a simple config file. This makes editing much easier than navigating through pages and pages of tabs and radio check boxes. You can even structure your config file with your own comments to make editing easier for you. Change something often? Put it near the top. If you switch something on and off often and it is buried behind 9 gui screens it might take you 10 5 times longer to switch it.
Linux will actually give you a reason why something had an error.
Linux wont tell me that my automatic updates are turned off every single minute of every day.
When I update Linux it won’t turn on a firewall automatically without my permission (Windows XP SP3 does this) and turn on services I had previously set to disabled.
Linux pretty much forces you to be a “non-administrative” user.
You can unmount something really fast with one command. Instead of double clicking on a silly icon navigating through all the USB devices plugged in select the right one only to find out that the device you are trying to unmount cannot be unmounted at this time.
Depending on the distro it is a lot easier to install than Windows.
Linux detects and installs more drivers for my hardware than Windows.
Linux comes with drivers for my onboard Sata where Windows XP does not.
Linux comes out with a new kernel constantly. Windows comes out with one once every couple years.
With Linux we can compile our own kernel so we don’t have to a wear a one size fits all hat.
You can choose which type of desktop environment you want.
You don’t have to worry about spyware, viruses, or worms. Even if they were prevalent they couldn’t be installed unless you did it yourself.
When you “end a task” in Linux it actually works.
You can check your CPU’s temperature without installing any software.
The command line auto complete feature works the way you expect it to.
To list the contents of a directory I only have to use two keys instead of three (ls vs. dir).
Linux’s CLI actually ads value to the OS.
I can build a computer myself and still get a good price on the retail version of Linux (free).
I can control my computer remotely with SSH. Windows comes with remote desktop which was not encrypted last time i checked. It also was slow and supports only a few connected users unless you pay Microsoft more money for a terminal server.
Linux tends not to hide details
I can see the OS uptime without installing some Microsoft power user program.
Linux comes with a program that will eject my CD-Rom. This comes in handy when making automated CD backups and other scripts.
Linux passwords cannot be cracked in seconds like Windows.
I can print an entire directory of pdfs with ‘lpr *.pdf’. In Windows you would have to open each with Foxit Reader or the bloated Adobe Acrobat.
You can have really cool desktop effects that rival even OSX effects.
You can choose a filesystem that better fits your needs. With Windows you have two options old out of date crappy NTFS or even more out dated FAT32.
If you loose your Linux CD or don’t feel like downloading one you can get one mailed for free (ubuntu).
It supports more than 3/4gb of ram without updates and hacks.
You can get all applications you need without opening your browser or getting out your wallet and many times they are better than commercial solutions.
It doesn’t crash… ever… Its so reliable companies have used it as dedicated router firmware ;)