Gnome 2 is Dead! Long Live Gnome 2 (Mate)! If You, like me. Have no interest or use for Gnome 3. But your not very fond of KDE, LXDE, XFCE, LMDE etc... Because Gnome 2 has everything that you want and need in a Desktop. And You're hanging on to you're Beloved Gnome 2, by running Fedora 14 or another Linux Distro that still has Gnome 2. Then you know that your happy days of working with your Favorite, Fast and Efficient Desktop, are Numbered!:( There are virtually no Updates of any kind coming out now for Fedora 14 (well just a few). And the Security of your OS is now in Question. Still, I Refuse to Conform to using a Desktop that is made for a Mobile Phone or a Tablet PC! Not on my Real Desktop Computer! I do not want to click 3 times to do one action. I do not want to be restricted to just one Desktop or Workspace. I need 6, to keep me going and working happily and efficiently. That's how I have my Gnome 2 Setup. I keep most all of my Running Apps in Full Screen Mode and can switch between them in one Instant Click! I have found no better way to work (for me). I've been watching Mate, the Gnome 2 Fork. Since it first came out. But, since I have stayed with Gnome 2 and it was still in it's infancy. I have not really tired it out, yet. I will try out Mate in Fedora 17 or 18 and in Mint Linux. Then, when I am ready to Install Fedora 17 or 18. I think that I will start with the KDE Desktop. So that I will be able to install my favorite File Manager, Krusader. Along with my other favorite KDE Apps, like Gwenview. Then I will install Mate. Sounds like a Plan... Now where did I put that Round - Tuit?...

Don

Update: 11-16-12

Install Mate

For every issue about MATE installation, you can ask in installation section in our forum or on IRC #mate channel on FreeNode.
There are some Linux distributions that include MATE in the official repositories:

Fedora
Linux Mint
Sabayon
Salix

Go there...

http://wiki.mate-desktop.org/download

Fedora Project Wiki

Features/MATE-Desktop

< Features

[hide]

1 MATE Desktop

MATE Desktop

Summary

MATE Desktop is based on GNOME 2 and provides an intuitive and attractive desktop to Linux users who seek a simple, easy to use traditional interface.

Owners

Name: Dan Mashal
Email: dan.mashal AT fedoraproject DOT org

Co-maintainers

Name: Rex Dieter
Email: rdieter AT fedoraproject DOT org

Name: Leigh Scott
Email: leigh123linux AT fedoraproject DOT org

Current status

Targeted release: Fedora 18
Last updated: 2012-10-15
Percentage of completion: 100%
Tagoh of i18n team has offered support to update imsettings for MATE Desktop - mate-imsettings

Update 10-11-2012: All packages approved and pushed to Fedora 18 stable. Comps commit made, is visible in Anaconda. Works out of the box after Anaconda install. Currently using lightdm. Still working out final kinks.
Setting up a QA test day.
http://i.imgur.com/k5LWa.jpg

Detailed Description

MATE is a traditional Gnome 2 like desktop user interface. Many users have expressed interest in this feature since Fedora 15 in which Fedora was switched from Gnome 2 to Gnome 3.
For the advanced user that doesn't want a cutting edge desktop and just wants to keep it simple this is perfect for them.
The popularity of MATE Desktop is very high. It is one of the 2 choices of DE's for Linux Mint which is one of the most popular Linux distros out right now.

Benefit to Fedora

Attract new users to Fedora.
Give users another choice and freedom to choose what type of DE/WM they would like to use. This is one of the core foundations of the Fedora project.

Scope

MATE DE tracker bug
List of packages being imported in to fedora:
mate-common -- Approved.
mate-doc-utils -- Approved.
mate-corba -- Approved.
libmatewnck -- Approved.
mate-conf -- Approved.
libmatecomponent -- Approved.
mate-mime-data -- Approved.
mate-vfs -- Approved.
libmate -- Approved.
libmatecanvas -- Approved.
libmatecomponentui -- Approved.
libmatekeyring -- Approved.
mate-keyring -- Approved.
libmateui -- Approved.
libmatenotify -- Approved.
libmatekbd -- Approved.
libmateweather -- Approved.
mate-icon-theme Approved.
mate-dialogs -- Approved.
mate-desktop -- Approved.
mate-file-manager -- Approved.
mate-notification-daemon -- Approved.
mate-backgrounds -- Approved.
mate-menus -- Approved.
mate-window-manager -- Approved.
mate-polkit -- Approved.
mate-settings-daemon -- Approved.
mate-control-center -- Approved.
mate-panel -- Approved.
mate-settings-daemon -- Approved.
mate-session-manager -- Approved.
mate-themes -- Approved.

How To Test

Upon approval of all packages (and changes to comps git) a user would type "yum install @mate-desktop" and it would be added to their list of sessions to log in to on start up.
A "nice to have" feature would be to be included in the Anaconda install from the DVD (from my understanding commit to comps would cover this).

User Experience

It will improve the user's desktop experience by giving them another choice of Desktops that they can use with Fedora.

Dependencies

Please see MATE-DE-Tracker for more information.
The main dependencies required by this package are python, GTK2, automake, libtool, gettext and pkgconfig.
mate-common will provide automake autoconf gettext intltool libtool so that it will not be in every package's buildrequires.

Contingency Plan

If this feature is not ready by the deadline it will be included in the next Fedora release.

Documentation

MATE Desktop website here.

Release Notes

This is the initial release of MATE Desktop for Fedora 17/18. It brings back a classic, intuitive, and easy to use desktop that users have been long requesting.
Release notes will be further updated as the completion of the project draws near. The import of the base packages is 100% complete. Extras are slowly being added.
For support please join #Fedora-MATE or #MATE on freenode irc or file a bug in redhat bugzilla.

Comments and Discussion

See Talk:Features/MATE-Desktop

Category:

FeatureAcceptedF18

The Fedora Project is maintained and driven by the community and sponsored by Red Hat. This is a community maintained site. Red Hat is not responsible for content.

This page was last modified on 10 November 2012, at 14:04.
Content is available under Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported.

Go there...
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Features/MATE-Desktop

MATE 1.2 released

Posted on April 16, 2012 by stefano-k

128

The team is proud to announce the release of MATE 1.2. This release is a huge step forward since the 1.0 and 1.1 development releases. MATE is more stable than ever and it includes support for many more applications, applets and backends.

Here are the main changes and improvements in this release:

Numerous bug fixes
All conflicts with GNOME were fixed
All configuration files were moved to ~/.config/mate
An undo/redo feature was added in Caja
Libmate’s mate-open command is now faster to open applications.
Mate settings daemon now supports the PulseAudio and GStreamer backends
New applications: mozo (alacarte fork), python-caja, caja-gksu, caja-image-converter
Artwork:

Mate themes were renamed to avoid conflicts with GNOME
A new MATE wallpaper was added
MATE now features its own icon

Install

Debian

Debian Sid/Wheezy: add the following repository to your ”/etc/apt/sources.list”:

deb http://packages.mate-desktop.org/repo/debian wheezy main

To install MATE:

sudo apt-get update  sudo apt-get install mate-archive-keyring  sudo apt-get update  # this install the base packages  sudo apt-get install mate-core  # this install more packages  sudo apt-get install mate-desktop-environment

Ubuntu

Ubuntu Oneiric Ocelot (11.10) repository

Add the repo to /etc/apt/sources.list via the following command:

sudo add-apt-repository "deb http://packages.mate-desktop.org/repo/ubuntu oneiric main"

or using a text editor of your choice add the following mirror to /etc/apt/sources.list:

deb http://packages.mate-desktop.org/repo/ubuntu oneiric main

Ubuntu Precise Pangolin (12.04) repository
Add the repo to /etc/apt/sources.list via the following command:

sudo add-apt-repository "deb http://packages.mate-desktop.org/repo/ubuntu precise main"

or using a text editor of your choice add the following mirror to /etc/apt/sources.list:

deb http://packages.mate-desktop.org/repo/ubuntu precise main

MATE Installation (both Oneiric/Precise)

Then run the following command to update your repositories and install MATE:

sudo apt-get update  sudo apt-get install mate-archive-keyring  sudo apt-get update  # this install base packages  sudo apt-get install mate-core  # this install more packages  sudo apt-get install mate-desktop-environment

Linux Mint

Linux Mint Lisa has MATE packages (1.0 release). See http://packages.linuxmint.com/list.php?release=Lisa#import.

Latest packages (1.2 release)

If you want to try the latest MATE packages, you can use the MATE repository for Ubuntu. Once set up the repository, you need to edit the /etc/apt/preferences file as follow:

Package: *  Pin: release o=linuxmint  Pin-Priority: 700    Package: *  Pin: origin packages.linuxmint.com  Pin-Priority: 700    Package: *  Pin: release o=Ubuntu  Pin-Priority: 500    Package: *  Pin: origin packages.mate-desktop.org  Pin-Priority: 700

LMDE

Linux Mint Debian Edition has MATE 1.2 packages.

Salix/Slackware

Salix and Slackware users can install Mate using the packages in the Salix repositories. See here.

Fedora

To install MATE on Fedora, follow those steps:

yum install http://dl.dropbox.com/u/49862637/Mate-desktop/mate-desktop-fedora/releases/16/noarch/mate-desktop-release-16-5.fc16.noarch.rpm  yum groupinstall MATE-Desktop

Archlinux

To install MATE, open

/etc/pacman.conf

and append this: (for i686 or x86_64).

[mate]  # Official MATE repo:  Server = http://packages.mate-desktop.org/repo/archlinux/mate/$arch

After do a pacman update

pacman -Syy

And install the package normally. You are likely to get file conflicts when installing, especially when you have Gnome or Xfce installed. Simply rename the offending files or install with the ”–force” flag.