Linux Mint 12 Lisa VS Fedora 16 Verne

Clem and Linux Mint have made a very grand effort in bringing Gnome3 to a wide market:

• Those unwilling to change - Who can choose MATE to make their computer seem like it has Gnome2.
• Those who want to try Gnome3 - Who can turn off a number of Shell Extensions to make Mint Lisa be more like default Gnome 3.
• Those somewhere in the middle - For these people Mint is just the way they need it.

When Mint loads up it is Gnome3 but with a host of Shell Extensions added. You can use Gnome Tweak Tool (renamed by Mint as Advanced Settings) to turn these extensions on and off. These extensions give Mint a nearly familiar Mint Menu and many other tweaks so that the user does not feel so out of place in the alien land of Gnome3.

I'm not digging it though.

I was going to switch back to Mint for this release. I love their polish, Update Manager and just the whole presentation of the Distro. I love how thigs like MP3, Flash and way more work from first boot and there is normally very little to do after installing Mint - it is Linux's version of "It just works".

My gripes though are that after turing off much of what Clem and co put so much work into, I result in a slightly broken looking Gnome3. I turn off all that stuff that gives the menu and this and that and I even turn off the extension that hides the Universal Access Settings - I mean why turn off something that is there to help users with imparemments be that to their sight, hearing or whatever their needs?

I use this setting to go: 'Universal Access Settings > Text Size > Small' as this makes the whole thing look far more appealing. The default setup is too BIG, the fonts are like a childs book and things like the top bar take too much space with the Large or Normal settings.

In Mint though, doing this breaks the theme. I can only assume that some CSS has been edited, and not in the standard way, resulting in a theme rendering that breaks under user interaction. The CSS was very well scripted by the original author who considered all modular tweaks such as simple ones like adjusting font size.

The result, as I said, is a broken looking Mint and a broken looking Gnome3, which is a pitty as I looked forward to returning to Mint.

Mint will however work great for other people - Many many I'd wager. Ths distro is set to be huuuge in the world of Linux this year.

Fedora 16.

Fedora has won me over since version 15. I loved the simple take on Gnome3 and I'm able to do all I want, simply. Fedora though is nearly paralized at first boot by their insistance to be totally Open Source. No Flash, no MP3, no... lots of stuff.

Fortunately there is a way that a fresh Fedora 16 instalation can be given all the bionic addons it needs in a few minutes and then you're set - A great and fully finctional, fast and stable Linux Distro that will last.

The trick is this. Install Fedora 16 and then open a terminal - paste this:

*Get the latest comand here*

Now run:

autoplus

and add all of those wonderful bits that the default instalation was missing.

ADDENDUM: Also very useful is: Fedora Utils.

Oh, and then go to your software manager and install Faenza icons - they just make the whole thing look a lot nicer. (Install gnome-tweak-tool to be able to choose the icons after instaling them).

Job done, no need for Mint (which is a pity) and I just hope Mint gets polished up nicely for their next big release.

In the mean time they are still doing a way better job than Ubuntu and are sure to be Distro #1 for some time to come.