The Linux Mint has released the newer version of its Operating system with so many Improvements. The popular Open Source OS i.e. Mint 18.2 has included changes to the Bluetooth application , Xed text editor, XPlayer, Xreader, Update Manager, etc. All the these are modified in terms of graphics & bug Fixes.
Linux Mint 18.2 is named as Sonya
The development team of Linux Mint has released the beta version of i.e. Sonya (Mint 18.2). It is based on Ubuntu 16.04 , MATE 1.18 and Cinnamon 3.4 are also two flavors that are the part of this release.
Features of Linux Mint 18.2
While most of the new announcements were made in February 2017. The ISO released recently has come with all the changes that were announced by the team. The final release will be coming soon in the upcoming months
Linux Kernel 4.8
There will be LTS updates in the other distros but Mint 18.2 still carries Linux Kernel 4.8 from the last release. The release of Linux Kerne 4.9 LTS has taken a lot of time , Mint 18.2 was expected to be based on Kernel 4.9.
New display manager
As we know that Mint has left the MDM for the LightDM as the default display manager. LightDM is a cross desktop display manager which offers support for differen display severs i.e.X, Wayland etc. It is a very light weight less memory intense for the system & but it does not mean it will take down the system performance.
LightDM is used in other famous distributions like Ubuntu which makes the development and troubleshooting process easier.
LightDM also powers up the new greeter in Mint 18.2 i.e. Slick (a fork of Unity greeter) that supports HiDPI displays. There is also a feature called Guest Mode feature which lets the random users to use the system with an user account.
Blueberry
Linux Mint 18.2 has launched a new bluetooth application that has revamped all the user interface for using bluetooth. With OBEX file transfer support, Blueberry has also the options to change your computer’s Bluetooth device name.
Before Blueberry , the functionality is done using command line. In the Bluetooth Tray , it also features as system tray status applet, similar to the battery and sounds applets.
Update Manager
To control the update process to stay safe , The development team has updated the policies & levels according to the impact of an update that cause on a system.
Updates which are marked as level 1 does not changes the OS. Then the level 2 which are carried by the most update packages & Level 3 includes updates like desktop environments, toolkits, libraries, etc. which affect multiple applications.
All the sensitive updates that affects the Kernel are marked as Level 4. In the most extreme cases Level 5 updates are downloaded as they are the most critical updates which are dangerous for the system. Mint 18.2 now support for Ubuntu HWE kernels in kernel updates.
After the inclusion of new CLI utility called miniupdate-tool makes it easier for the users to list, install, and schedule system updates by writing scripts, routines, and cron jobs. These tools supports regular update manager features like security updates, level selection, blacklisting, etc.
Xplayer
Linux Mint has also changes the visuals of Xplayer application. To appear Player neat , the control & seek bar have been placed in line & the bottom status bar is also removed. Many other bugs are laso removed like errors in the on-screen display.
Xplayer now includes support for automatically adding subtitles but are disabled by default, you can enable it by pressing S key.
Xed
The changes are made to Xed text editor application. The feature ‘word wrap’ feature that was under Preference menu is now under Menu. The update has new option to sort multiple selected lines using the F10 key.
Users can also switch between dark and light themes. The multiple tabs open in the text editor can now be switched using mouse scroll wheel. The bars that are on the bottom and side of the screen adjust the screen according to the content. Also, the search feature also supports regular expressions.
Xreader, Xviewer, Pix
XReader comes with a redesigned toolbar & sidebar to get a cleaner look with new buttons in the toolbar for faster switching between view modes. If you are working on a touch screen device then you can use the standard touch gestures.
The image viewer app of Mint 18.2 has some UI tweaks in the toolbar & has a support for Dark Theme. The image browsing app I.e. Pix comes with improved set of mouse & keyboard shortcuts along with easy navigation and visual changes.
Other changes
The Cinnamon spices add-ons have also went on to multiple changes. The update includes authentication, rating system, and comments for better sync with Facebook and Google.
The team will also maintain the spices with the teams of original developers. They have left the outdated themes & extensions from the repo & updated popular ones to make it compatible with Cinnamon 3.4. The website of Cinnamon Spices is revamped as part of an effort towards quality. Linux Mint 18.2 has some other set of high quality desktop backgrounds.
So if you find this article useful then please provide a comment on how it helped you. You can also like us on Facebook or Subscribe us for more Updates using your E-mail Id. Thank You
