What if Linux Mint moved away from Ubuntu?

[samriggs]

so I decided to put LMDE
on the drive after wiping it and it was ok until I did an update. I suspect the updates came from Ubuntu?
-Dennis

If I got this right, your saying the updates came from ubuntu for LMDE, LMDE has nothing to do with ubuntu at all, it's all debian.
The only way anything of ubuntu can get into LMDE is if a person attempts to add a ppa which is not compatible with LMDE and can cause a whole wack of issues.
maybe it was something else.
Nadia is ubuntu based. LMDE is not.

[Spinnekop]

I hope Linux Mint does not drop Ubuntu.

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ubuntu_%28philosophy%29

Surely the philopsophy of Ubuntu is what Linux Community is all about.

But then I am an idealist.....

[3mutts]

I don't think Mint should drop the Ubuntu base due to most of the software coming from Windows are going with a Ubuntu base first, this means Mint gets those programs as well when they come out unlike Arch, Red Hat, Slackware, and Gentoo based systems which have to wait awhile. Also the Ubuntu base helps make Mint a noob friendly distro (imagine giving a grandma a Mint system based off of Gentoo or Slackware).

[Aleenik]

I think that's a horrible idea. I love that Linux Mint is based on Ubuntu. It provides some nice benefits. PPAs ftw!

[Condorman]

I hope Linux Mint does not drop Ubuntu.

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ubuntu_%28philosophy%29

Surely the philopsophy of Ubuntu is what Linux Community is all about.

But then I am an idealist.....

If Mint had to move away from Ubuntu as a base, then it would be less an ideological reason and more a technical one. Ubuntu is moving further and further away from anything resembling "community" and is developing its own in-house solutions such as Mir. It's going to be difficult for closer Ubuntu spins like Xubuntu and Kubuntu to go the Mir route, let alone something like Mint.

It's going to be an interesting 12 months. I have some expectation of a decent Mint solution as there's a lot of momentum. I just hope that both AMD and Nvidia give us a driver that can work on Wayland, Mir, and perhaps X still too. I suspect looking down the line that Mint will likely utilise Wayland, but it's too early to tell.

But if Mint had to move away from Ubuntu, I think the Debian based Mint is getting better all the time...

[3fRI]

If Mint were to drop Ubuntu, it'd only be logical to go with Debian as with LMDE. Using Debian as its base, Clem & Co. could then develop Cinnamon, MATE, KDE, Xfce, etc. versions. Just look at what the folks at Manjaro have done with their Arch-based distro! Anything's possible. So, why am I running CrunchBang (#!)? Because I love Openbox and I think that #! currently does Openbox best. Yet, I also love Mint and ran it from Mint 9 to 14. If I were install a Linux distro on a noob's' computer. I'd install Mint because it's intuitive and works out of the box.

Anyway, it doesn't matter what I think. I'm confident that Clem & Co. will figure out what's best for MInt--and whatever that is will be best for Mint and the Mint community.

[RavenLX]

I use Ubuntu servers at work so it was most familiar to me and one of the reasons I chose Mint in the first place. However, if they drop Ubuntu as a base, then I would have to switch to Kubuntu and I'd not be happy. Having an Ubuntu-based desktop OS is kinda a necessity for me as it makes it easier to do my work and write scripts, etc. test things, and so on.

Also I use a lot of .deb packages for things I need to do and would hate the hassle of compiling sources.

I hope they won't drop Ubuntu as a base. I don't think they will, though. I mean despite the LMDE being available, I think Mint may keep both types around and at least give us a choice.

[InkKnife]

I would hate to loose the large library of applications available from PPAs.

[jesica]

I like the idea

[Aleenik]

I like the idea

Looks at avatar.

[jonny_smith3]

I use LMDE, and i seems to be a bit more stable and faster then Ubuntu, as there are so many bugs becuase ubuntu always has the latest software.

Though it would be nice to have stuff other than Debian, such as:

LMFE( Linux Mint Fedora Edition )
LMAE ( Linux Mint Arch Edition )
LMSE ( Linux Mint Slackware Edition )

This will give people more choices on Linux mint suitable for them.

But, I do think Linux Mint should try making their distro from scratch, straight from the kernel.
Here are some advantages:

Reduced system bloat.
Can be tuned exactly for Linux Mint
Faster.

Only problem is that Linux mint will:
Have to create a package manager of their own (mint-pkg install <insert package name here> )
LOTS of work and patience required.

Are you serious? What do you do? You don't have any logical and business thought. I think there have to be only a few distros. Do you think if Windows has 20 different versions released at the same time it would be the most used operating system?
In my opinion Linux Mint must stop supporting KDE, Debian, Mate, etc. Mint developers should concentrate into Cinnammon and to make it rock-solid and to improve its very poor functionality.
If Linux Mint drops the Ubuntu I would stop using Linux for desktop at all.

[samriggs]

In my opinion Linux Mint must stop supporting KDE, Debian, Mate, etc.

Are you serious? they do that they might keep you and loose the other half of the people if not more.

LMFE( Linux Mint Fedora Edition )
LMAE ( Linux Mint Arch Edition )
LMSE ( Linux Mint Slackware Edition )
are run by other folks, they can put cinnamon in it though and have.

[jonny_smith3]

If Cinnamon was good enough Linux Mint community wouldn't loose anybody. Have you ever used Windows 8 or Mac OSX? If you had such a powerful distro would you change it?

[samriggs]

alot of us use other things besides ppa and ubuntu.
alot of use lmde because it has a debian base and not an ubuntu one, we like it that way,
alot other like kde, mate, xfce and other ones but like mint bringing it down to one you just narrowed it down to half an audience and yes it would suffer, especially getting rid of lmde and not only because I use it and like, a lot of folks like a rolling release over doing a reinstall every 6 months or even an LTS, but mainly because we prefer a debian base over a ubuntu one.,
you like ubuntu as base good for you I hope they keep it because your not alone, just like a lot like debian based instead, plus the kde folks that love that one and the xfce ones (which I also like) and a lot love mate. but just a ubuntu one lol naw aint gona happen.

[passerby]

If Cinnamon was good enough Linux Mint community wouldn't loose anybody. Have you ever used Windows 8 or Mac OSX? If you had such a powerful distro would you change it?

OS's like Win8 and OSX are what drove me here to begin with

[Condorman]

If Cinnamon was good enough Linux Mint community wouldn't loose anybody. Have you ever used Windows 8 or Mac OSX? If you had such a powerful distro would you change it?

Who says the Mint community is losing people?

I'm a bit unsure, after reading this and some of your other posts, if you are being serious or not. But I am sure that no matter what happens to Ubuntu, Mint will have a good plan and survive. They've gotten this far, and better than ever. I've no doubt they'll continue on their path, Ubuntu or no.

[rck2]

Ubuntu is a cornerstone of the Linux community, It's really not up to Linux Mint to drop Ubuntu. Its really how far away does Ubuntu want to move away from the direction Linux Mint would like to take. Ubuntu with the movement toward Mir, is taking a statement that it wants to migrate away from Gnome based, Cinnamon, and Xfce desktops. This is significant because many other distros will be effected as Ubuntu makes this Leeward shift. A lot of boats will be rocked! Think about how we finally get Steam to run on Linux, and How many of the game platforms are finally migrating to Ubuntu based systems. This is going to be a significant shift.

[Aleenik]

If Cinnamon was good enough Linux Mint community wouldn't loose anybody. Have you ever used Windows 8 or Mac OSX? If you had such a powerful distro would you change it?

Cinnamon will never be good enough for a lot of people, because people like different things. It doesn't matter whether they focus 100% on it or not, a lot of people still don't/won't like how it looks. If Linux Mint dropped support for all of the DEs that they support save for Cinnamon, they would lose people for sure. I know plenty of people who use Linux Mint, but absolutely hate Cinnamon. If that was their only choice, they'd switch distros. I myself use Cinnamon, but I think the more choices the merrier. Also, a lot of people hate the limitations and design of Windows 8 and Mac OSX, which is why they are here in the first place.

[RavenLX]

Thowing a wrench in the fire, so to speak...

Why wouldn't someone download, say Cinnamon Mint and then just install the DE of their choice (by adding the ppa and say getting KDE or whatever) and then uninstalling Cinnamon? Wouldn't it still work?

I guess if Mint even dropped all DEs except maybe Cinnamon, one could still add their own favorite anyway, I suppose.

[Condorman]

Thowing a wrench in the fire, so to speak...

Why wouldn't someone download, say Cinnamon Mint and then just install the DE of their choice (by adding the ppa and say getting KDE or whatever) and then uninstalling Cinnamon? Wouldn't it still work?

I guess if Mint even dropped all DEs except maybe Cinnamon, one could still add their own favorite anyway, I suppose.

If you're talking about will it work on Mir, then no. There's a discussion at the moment about KDE and what will happen if an Ubuntu user decides to install kde-desktop from the repository. They're trying to figure out how to handle that, but it's messy from what I can gather. I can only hope that if/when the graphics drivers from AMD and Nvidia come out, that they support both Mir and Wayland. So far though, not a peep has been spoken from their camps about any of this...