Mate vs. Cinnamon

[Xptical]

Hi all,

I was choosing between Mate and Cinnamon distros of Mint 13. I thought that Cinnamon looks a lot like the Win95 "start menu" and Mate looks, well, just like Gnome used to before it got all jacked up.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Mate_Desktop_Ubuntu.png

Well, I downloaded and installed the Mate edition. I'm comfortable with Gnome. But, upon entering the desktop for the first time, it looks like the Win95 "start menu" paradigm; not like Gnome at all.


I logged back out and confirmed I was using a Mate session. Am I missing something here? Did Mate get tweaked to provide a consistent desktop on Mint while still using the underlying GTK stuff?

Thanks for your time.
~Xptical

[AlbertP]

The default setting of both Mate and Cinnamon in Linux Mint is one menu button at the top left and one panel, just like Gnome 2 used to be in Mint 11 and before, because Mint customized it that way. Of course you can change that.
You can add a panel at the top in both, and in Mate (which has a W95 style menu indeed) you can add the Applications/Places/System menu as an applet and remove the existing one.

For screenshots of Mate and Cinnamon in their default configuration on Linux Mint 13, please take a look here: http://blog.linuxmint.com/?p=2031

[Xptical]

Thanks for the reply.

I think my underlying question is why does Mate on Mint look different than Mate from the screenshot above?

Maybe I can install the Cinnamon version and then grab a vanilla Mate so that I get that Gnome 2 look and feel back?

[bimsebasse]

Can you add a screenshot of how your MATE looks?

[AbuSteaf]

Maybe you've a problem with your Graphics card? go to mintmenu then look for "additional drivers" and try to install the missing driver.
and if post a screenshot of your problem so maybe the others can help you.

[Xptical]

No. It's not a problem with the display or with the desktop. It's just that I thought Mate was supposed to look like Gnome 2.0.

In Mint, Mate looks more like Cinnamon and less like Gnome.

[AlbertP]

Indeed, what you are seeing is not a graphics problem (Mate does not require 3D acceleration) but just how Mint chose to customize the desktop. Gnome 2 on Mint in the past also looked that way though it had a different menu. The screenshot is the default layout, like Ubuntu (and many other distros) have used when they still had Gnome 2.
You can change it yourself, add your own menu of choice (the old mintmenu is in the repository), add a top panel by right-clicking the panel, move applets to the top, ... Indeed, Mate is just as flexible as Gnome 2 used to be.