Linux Mint Debian Edition 3 Now Shipping

[Cerberus]

You can't make existing ones better if their leaders disagree with your vision.

If there is someone to blame for this specific case we can blame Ubuntu. Linux Mint was born when Ubuntu switched from GNOME2 to Unity.

Nice strawman you got there. Nothing stops you from fixing bugs and submitting code and patches to existing projects or submitting your work to the archives and maintaining it. And there is A LOT to be fixed, patched and improved in various parts of Linux desktop. You like KDE? Improve KDE. You like Gnome? Improve Gnome. You have an idea for a new desktop? Great make it and maintain it and if it's any good it will get in the archives.

[starshipeleven]

Because we need more distributions, you can't have enough of that, why pool resources and make existing ones better when you can fork and waste already thin developer resources of the Linux "community" even more.

You can't make existing ones better if their leaders disagree with your vision.

If there is someone to blame for this specific case we can blame Ubuntu. Linux Mint was born when Ubuntu switched from GNOME2 to Unity.

[starshipeleven]

And on the other hand: Debian already DOES offer both Mate and Cinnamon desktops you can choose them when installing Debian. It would be sufficient just to add a repo with those very few packages which are Mint only atm. (e.g. nemo-dropbox or nemo-share)

They package a few more applications than that, afaik Firefox is kept updated.

But still, they already have their own repo with their own stuff, and some packages ship configuration files to morph Debian into LMDE.

http://packages.linuxmint.com/

The rest of their sources.list pulls packages from Debian (or Ubuntu if it's not LMDE).

[Cerberus]

And on the other hand: Debian already DOES offer both Mate and Cinnamon desktops you can choose them when installing Debian. It would be sufficient just to add a repo with those very few packages which are Mint only atm. (e.g. nemo-dropbox or nemo-share)

Because we need more distributions, you can't have enough of that, why pool resources and make existing ones better when you can fork and waste already thin developer resources of the Linux "community" even more.

[starshipeleven]

edit 2: imagine ubuntu, red hat, steamos, clear linux, chromeos etc. as one.

The whole point of derivatives is having full control over what your distro ships and what not, and how.

So that when there is somethign to change or an issue to solve you can do it without having to deal with hundreds of different people that may or may not care about your specific issue.

[George99]

Would there be a difference if they added a bundle of packages to Debian

And on the other hand: Debian already DOES offer both Mate and Cinnamon desktops you can choose them when installing Debian. It would be sufficient just to add a repo with those very few packages which are Mint only atm. (e.g. nemo-dropbox or nemo-share)

[phoronix]

Phoronix: Linux Mint Debian Edition 3 Now Shipping

If you are a fan of Linux Mint and their GNOME/GTK-forked Cinnamon desktop but prefer not having the Ubuntu base, Linux Mint Debian Edition 3 "Cindy" is now available...

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=LMDE-3-Cinnamon-Shipping