Linux Mint Pulls Ahead of Ubuntu | Hacker News Reader

Linux Mint Pulls Ahead of Ubuntu

beginlinux.com

15 pointsaweber6 comments

This ranking system is considered to be one of the most reliable around. Even if it is only a measurement of one website’s traffic.

What? This is even more ridiculous than the TIOBE index.

"I feel like GNU/Linux needs a stand out distribution that represents how easy Linux can be for beginners and new users. This used to be Ubuntu but now I think Linux Mint is in a position to take over."

I think this statement really misses the spirit of what is probably driving Mint to the top of the charts. "Beginners" and "new users" aren't the ones flocking to Mint (assuming we believe distrowatch.com is an authority). Disenfranchised Ubuntu users who are unsatisfied with the changes to their favored platform are. To the contrary, beginners would more likely favor Ubuntu's Unity interface because it is undeniably simpler. Beginners don't have any concept of features customizing panels, so they don't miss them.

It's the myth of the novice Linux user. This magical creature is both sophisticated enough and has the desire to install a new OS on his machine (perhaps even in a dual-boot configuration!) and learn to use a completely different computing environment, yet needs to be coddled with an unconfigurable, brain-dead GUI.

There's also the other myth about how you can have the same interface on a desktop and on a tablet, but that's so crazy that most people who believe it are locked up in institutions.

It's great if more people want to use Linux, of course. But it would be better if in so doing they came to have an appreciation for their device as one of the most powerful tools ever conceived by the mind of man, rather than another way to upload photos to Facebook and look at cat videos on Youtube. Those use cases are more than covered.

At any rate, Linux Mint is switching to Gnome 3 next release, although with some extensions to remove the suck apparently. So beware.

Thanks for bringing this distribution to my attention. I've been trying to force myself to adapt to Unity but I'm still not enjoying it. I feared switching to another distribution because I've grown accustomed to Ubuntu's ease of package management and hardware support. I don't have the time or inclination to fiddle with text file configurations any more these days.

Mint appears to address all of my concerns, providing a distro based on Ubuntu but stressing ease of use in ways Ubuntu was not willing to (including flash, full multimedia support, Oracle's java, etc in a fresh install). I am excited to give the live dvd a try!

I am especially encouraged by their plans for reconciling users' workflow patterns with Ubuntu's switch to Unity and the Gnome's new interface. Very pragmatic approach in my view.

A more realistic comparison is with Google Trends.

http://www.google.com/trends?q=Linux+mint%2C+mint+Linux%2C+U...

How is that more realistic? People using Ubuntu as a search term does not accurately reflect install base.

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