LMDE 4

[KBD47]

I tried Plex on an Arch system thinking..... great, everything will be up to date and should run smoothly. WRONG! Found out Arch wasn't officially supported and ran into lots of weird playback issues so I scrapped that test system and stuck with Mint. I'll -PROBABLY- update to Mint 19.3 when it's out or maybe hold out a bit longer and wait for LMDE 4 and go with that full time on my server.

I've used Mint Xfce in the past without any issues. Right now I'm switching to Ubuntu as it has a Plex snap (this should work on Mint as well) I'm hoping I can smoothly upgrade to the next Ubuntu release without issues and quit reinstalling Plex and all my files over and over.

[ChrisMW]

I have now also managed to find a replacement for system-config-lvm, the GUI for managing LVM volumes. It is called Blivet, and is a python 3 app. Works well, if you follow the manual installation, I used (all in a root terminal)

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apt-get install python3-blockdev python3-bytesize python3-pyudev python3-selinux python3-parted lvm2-dbusd adwaita-icon-theme git python3-pip python3-gi-cairo gir1.2-gtk-3.0 gir1.2-blockdev-2.0 libblockdev-lvm2 libblockdev-btrfs2 libblockdev-swap2 libblockdev-loop2 libblockdev-crypto2 libblockdev-mpath2 libblockdev-dm2 libblockdev-mdraid2 libblockdev-nvdimm2

then followed by (assuming you have pip3 installed)

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pip3 install wheel

<== this one is not mentioned, but I didn't have it, and it is required

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pip3 install pid

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pip3 install git+http://github.com/storaged-project/blivet.git@3.1-release

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pip3 install git+http://github.com/storaged-project/blivet-gui.git

One post suggested to install as user, I tried and it made things worse, so I wouldn't, but then, I'm not a python guru. But if you do, you will have to fix paths in the code post install. The only thing I needed to fix is the icon, which it wouldn't take from the default location, so I copied the 256x256 version to ~/.icons and used that. I also altered the launcher properties to remove the path from the command, because it is not where it expects it to be, not in /usr/bin, but it lands in /usr/local/bin.

It does however, nicely ask for the root password and launches. So now that's fixed, I currently don't have any problems with my LMDE 3+ that I know of.

[thefish]

Well, apparently there is a code name for LMDE 4 now, it’s “Debbie”. Excited to see this!

https://blog.linuxmint.com/?p=3802

[KBD47]

Well, apparently there is a code name for LMDE 4 now, it’s “Debbie”. Excited to see this!

https://blog.linuxmint.com/?p=3802

Same here. Good to see. I have Debian 10 with Cinnamon on a laptop right now and it works great. LMDE4 should be great as well.

[thefish]

Same here. Good to see. I have Debian 10 with Cinnamon on a laptop right now and it works great. LMDE4 should be great as well.

I have thought about doing that a few times (going with vanilla Debian plus Cinnamon) but I think that LMDE comes with a bit more “polish” that I might otherwise be missing. I wish that LMDE would be the primary focus but apparently the Ubuntu-based version has more fans.

[catweazel]

I wish that LMDE would be the primary focus but apparently the Ubuntu-based version has more fans.

The reason it doesn't get as much attention is because LMDE is a fallback in case Canonical goes toes up and takes Ubuntu with it.

[gm10]

I wish that LMDE would be the primary focus but apparently the Ubuntu-based version has more fans.

The reason it doesn't get as much attention is because LMDE is a fallback in case Canonical goes toes up and takes Ubuntu with it.

That, and in more practical terms: none of the devs use it as far as I'm aware.

[darknetmatrix]

a shame because lmde is a distro that should deserve more appreciation than just being a relapse option and test box

[xenopeek]

< Discussion about advantage of Ubuntu vs Debian as package base for Mint moved here: viewtopic.php?f=60&t=302830 >

[mike acker]

this is an interesting chat

from time to time there's been a little concern for the future of LMDE. I've always felt sad about this so I'm encouraged to see the positive notes regarding the future of LMDE here.

It is, and has been my feeling that the MINT project should focus on the LMDE distro; the reason being: we should make a point of keep clear of the commercially based systems. The link between MSFT and Canonical is of more than a little concern -- at least "IMHO".

I run two systems on Debian -- one on 9, one on 10, and two systems on LMDE/3. Actually, I think I prefer to work with the LMDE/3 distro.

Interestingly, it's not that hard to switch. We switched "Office1" from Debian-9 to Debian-10 by just using GPARTED to do a partition copy of the home partition. We actually moved it to a new 2T disc on a GPT partition table and then installed D-10 on an m.2 mounted SSD-- Ryzen-5 CPU and DDR4 memory

Cheers to the ROG -- I think ROG is key to keeping a lot of really good stuff going!!

[jelkemeer]

For those who can't wait!
I just installed latest updates on LMDE 3.
Then I opened a second terminal with Ctrl-Alt-F2 and logged in.
Then I changed repositories from 'cindy' to 'debbie' and from 'stretch' to 'buster'.
I upgraded by issuing the following:

1. sudo apt update
2. sudo apt upgrade
This can take a long time so be patient.
3. sudo apt full-upgrade
4. reboot

After reboot you will have LMDE 3 running on Debian 10 'buster' and you are ready for upcoming LMDE 4 updates.

REMEMBER!!! THIS IS ALL AT YOUR OWN RISK!! YOU HAVE TO KNOW WHAT YOU ARE DOING OTHERWISE
DON'T!!!

[papa33]

For those who can't wait!
I just installed latest updates on LMDE 3.
Then I opened a second terminal with Ctrl-Alt-F2 and logged in.
Then I changed repositories from 'cindy' to 'debbie' and from 'stretch' to 'buster'.
I upgraded by issuing the following:

1. sudo apt update
2. sudo apt upgrade
This can take a long time so be patient.
3. sudo apt full-upgrade
4. reboot

After reboot you will have LMDE 3 running on Debian 10 'buster' and you are ready for upcoming LMDE 4 updates.

REMEMBER!!! THIS IS ALL AT YOUR OWN RISK!! YOU HAVE TO KNOW WHAT YOU ARE DOING OTHERWISE
DON'T!!!

I did that too. But this is not completely working. After the update, for example, mintupdate, mintinstall or software-sources won't work any more.
In fact it seems that the repo for LMDE "debbie" is just a mirror of LMDE 3 repository.

[jelkemeer]

Everything is working fine now! Some packages have already been updated to 'debbie'!
Mintupdate , mintsources etc. have already been updated lately to match debian 10 buster.
Mintupdate version in Cindy is 5.5.4.2 but in Debbie it is 5.5.6!
Mintupdate installs new updates almost every day now! So 'debbie' is NOT just a mirror of 'cindy' but new packages are named 'debbie'

Have a look here: http://packages.linuxmint.com/list.php?release=Debbie

[papa33]

Everything is working fine now! Some packages have already been updated to 'debbie'!
Mintupdate , mintsources etc. have already been updated lately to match debian 10 buster.
Mintupdate version in Cindy is 5.5.4.2 but in Debbie it is 5.5.6!
Mintupdate installs new updates almost every day now! So 'debbie' is NOT just a mirror of 'cindy' but new packages are named 'debbie'

Have a look here: http://packages.linuxmint.com/list.php?release=Debbie

It seems that you are right (at least partially). Another example: mintinstall is 8.0.2 in debbie and only 8.0.0 in cindy. But I could not get it to work.
Maybe, I'll try again to upgrade, although I still consider it a bit risky.

But on the other hand, I read for example

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cinnamon 	4.2.4+cindy

[jelkemeer]

I have been using the upgraded version for over a week now and have yet not found any problems.
But the upgrade process takes a very long time.
As a result my 'LMDE 3' is in the process of being upgraded to LMDE 4 and it's running faster then before.

[ron69]

Thanks for this procedure. Works for me.
Afwachten,,,

[Nuts2u]

Yes it does work....I installed a test ver of LMDE3 in a VM and performed the upgrade. I've been monitoring it for 3 weeks and it does indeed appear to be working. However sevearl programs that I use on a regular basis wuill not yet run under Buster. When they are upgraded and work, then I'll proably move my production system to Buster using this procedure, unless the Mint team comes out with a upgrade tool.

[ron69]

I installed a fresh LMD3 partition. Did all the changes as described by Jelkemeer.
It took nearly 2 hours on an older laptop, gave just a single error, and after the last reboot, it delivered.
I will test this for abt. a month or so, and when that goes well, I will put it on my working machine.
Big thanks to everyone who made this possible.

It's a bit of a pity that the Linuxmint-team hasn't been more cooperative.

[axisofevil]

But the fact remains that the Busterised LMDE4 is only for test machines.

I've not received any updates or security fixes for my stable LMDE3 for sometime.
The last was a minor upgrade to VLC about 3 weeks ago.

Does this indicate a fault - I seem to remember LMDE2 getting regular updates throughout its lifetime?

BTW @ron69 I don't believe that criticism of the Mint/LMDE team is warranted and certainly not productive!

[axisofevil]

For those who can't wait!
I just installed latest updates on LMDE 3.
Then I opened a second terminal with Ctrl-Alt-F2 and logged in.
Then I changed repositories from 'cindy' to 'debbie' and from 'stretch' to 'buster'.
....
After reboot you will have LMDE 3 running on Debian 10 'buster' and you are ready for upcoming LMDE 4 updates.

REMEMBER!!! THIS IS ALL AT YOUR OWN RISK!! YOU HAVE TO KNOW WHAT YOU ARE DOING OTHERWISE
DON'T!!!

Just done this on a laptop - amazingly it works!!!!