Jeovani91 wrote:the last major Xfce update (4.12) was 2 years ago.
Abandonware doesn't even receive minor updates, lol.
Look at it like this: Xfce was basically a finished product at 4.10. Not finished as in "abandonware" but finished as in, well, a fully mature desktop environment that does all the things one could reasonably expect their DE to do.
IDK what the average team size for DEs is. I assume that this kind of thing is "a little" more involved than the average application. The Xfce team is small. Volunteers (as one might expect). You know how it goes... They're not clocking in every morning to spend at least eight hours per day, five days per week developing Xfce. They clock in that amount of time (whatever) to support themselves and their families. Other than that, they probably try to allocate time to SEE those families, lol. Perhaps they even sleep once in a while. And out of all the copious spare time left in their weeks (
), they spend a fair amount of it working on Xfce.
You would probably see more updates if there were huge show-stopper issues connected to Xfce - but, again, that's not the case. It's a usable product as is. You would probably
see more updates if you visited the Xfce community support forum and regularly viewed the "What's New in Xfce" thread. You would probably see more updates if you joined the Xfce mailing lists and your phone made a noise every time one of the developers posted a "new version of..." announcement, lol. And you would probably see more updates - lots more - if you downloaded the source from git or wherever it is that it gets posted, and compiled things yourself. You
won't see those right away just watching what shows up in mintUpdate (aka "Update Manager"). That's because Clem's focus for the main editions of Mint is, rightly, user security and stability. You can, therefore, expect that things will have been published for a time before you get served them in the form of compiled, ready-to-install updates.
I remember... IDK, Mint 14, I believe. Xfce 4.10. I discovered an issue. Not a show-stopper. More like an annoyance. For all I know, it didn't even annoy all that many people - but it annoyed ME, lol. I think that's why I joined some of the Xfce mailing lists, come to think of it. I hadn't paid enough attention to realize that I should post bugs at bugzilla.xfce.org, and I wanted to, err, complain
(actually, I wanted a solution, but...). So I complained - in the wrong online venue - and within a week or so, I read a post at the Xfce forum about how the lead developer had cherry-picked a few issues and dealt with them (or words to that effect). I think I had to add an Xfce PPA to my sources to get the updates quicker than I would normally see them. But I got a kick out of the fact that I complained about an issue and the issue was fixed shortly afterward ("Take THAT, Microsoft!" lol) .
One can also post requests for new features at the same http address where one posts bug reports. My understanding is that they're concentrating on switching everything to gtk3 - which has to be fun, what with the folks who punch out gtk3 updates taking such delight in breaking as much as they can with every update. But you never know.
What, exactly, is your issue? In other words, what do you feel that Xfce
needs at this point in order for YOU to consider it as a valid DE choice? I mean, well, you're not one of those kids who just wants to see lots and lots of updates because... they want to see lots and lots of updates, right? Like... When YOU go to work every day, you want to actually accomplish something, I would assume? You don't just show up and see if you can waste time all week whilst giving the people you work for (in this case, Xfce users) a smoke & mirrors show? Let's assume that the Xfce developers are the same way. Find a problem, let them know. Feel like Xfce needs a specific new feature, let them know. If not, feel free to let them know that, too. And be glad that they're not wasting their - and your - time by pulling a Google/GNOME/etc. and just shoving out arbitrary and pointless changes. Because that wouldn't be a sign of quality - more like the opposite, lol; that's a "clock-puncher" mentality, IMHO.
Here is the Xfce community support forum address:
https://forum.xfce.org/
Here is a list of the various Xfce-related email lists:
https://mail.xfce.org/mailman/listinfo/
(There are several, believe it or not.)
Xfce Git repository browser:
https://git.xfce.org/
Information on building Xfce (et cetera) yourself, using the newest source files:
https://docs.xfce.org/xfce/building#fro ... repository
You can try a distro that is closer to the... bleeding edge in terms of which versions of Xfce and Xfce-related files you get. But to paraphrase Clem, thar be dragons, arrr. I mean, only do so for a
reason (like when a new Mint version comes out). Opting for the absolute newest means that you won't get thoroughly tested components - it means that YOU will be testing them for others, lol. Which may or may not be fun for you, IDK. But either way, I wouldn't do so for your production / daily-use system.
I don't suppose I've said anything that everyone doesn't already know, lol.
Regards,
MDM