Linux Mint 15 is the most ambitious release since the start of the project. MATE 1.6 is greatly improved and Cinnamon 1.8 offers a ton of new features, including a screensaver and a unified control center. The login screen can now be themed in HTML5 and two new tools, "Software Sources" and "Driver Manager", make their first appearance in Linux Mint.
MDM
MDM now features 3 greeters (i.e. login screen applications):
- A GTK greeter
- A themeable GDM greeter, for which hundreds of themes are available
- A brand new HTML greeter, also themeable which supports a new generation of animated and interactive themes
Interactive and animated login screens, in HTML5
The new HTML greeter supports most Web technologies such as HTML5, CSS, Javascript, WebGL and can be used to produce beautiful animated and interactive login screens.
Linux Mint 15 features a collection of GDM and animated HTML themes for MDM, including a WebGL theme called "Clouds GL" which simulates flying in 3D through the clouds :)
The layout of the GTK greeter was improved, and the GDM greeter is now able to draw frames around text entries if the theme asks for it (this significantly enhances the quality of some of the GDM themes).
MDM received a lot of "under the hood" improvements and bug fixes in the last 6 months.
The MDM configuration tool, mdmsetup, looks better and is more intuitive than before.
Software Sources
A new tool called MintSources, aka "Software Sources", was developed from scratch with derivative distributions in mind (primarily Linux Mint, but also LMDE, Netrunner and Snow Linux). It replaces software-properties-gtk and is perfectly adapted to managing software sources in Linux Mint.
From the main screen you can easily enable or disable optional components and gain access to backports, unstable packages and source code:
The new Software Sources tool
You can also switch to a faster mirror with one click of the mouse. The tool performs a speed-test of all available mirrors for you:
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