Plasma 6.3 brings a myriad of changes and improvements, with the vast majority focused on fixing bugs and improving the overall experience. As a result, while there’s not many major new features, this release is a significant quality-of-life release that most users should install as soon as possible.

One year on, with the teething problems a major new release inevitably brings firmly behind us, Plasma’s developers have worked on fine-tuning, squashing bugs and adding features to Plasma 6 — turning it into the best desktop environment for everyone!

Fractional Scaling

One of the biggest improvements in this release is how fractional scaling works, something that has long been a week point for Linux, compared to macOS and Windows.

The most important news regarding graphics is a huge overhaul of how fractional scaling works. In Plasma 6.3, KWin makes a stronger effort to snap things to the screen’s pixel grid, greatly reducing blurriness and visual gaps everywhere and producing sharper and crisper images.

This works at very high zoom levels as well, as KWin’s Zoom effect switches to a sharp pixel-perfect representation and overlays a grid on top of the screen. You can actually see how individual pixels look relative to other ones. Very useful for artists and designers.

Plasma 6.3 also uses more accurate colors when the Night Light feature is enabled. Night Light is designed to reduce blue light in the evenings.

Drawing Tablet Support

Plasma 6.3 includes a number of improvements to Drawing Tablet integration, further solidifying Plasma as the leading DE for creatives.

The System Settings’ Drawing Tablet page has been overhauled and split into multiple tabs to improve how things are organized, and new configuration options have been added to each section:

• You can map an area of a drawing tablet’s surface to the entire screen area
• We have refined the tablet calibration feature so that it produces more accurate calibrations
• The stylus testing feature shows information about tilt and pressure
• You can customize the pressure curve and range of a stylus to chop off the high and/or low parts
• You can also re-map or swap the functions of the stylus’s buttons

Hardware Monitoring

Plasma 6.3 includes improvements to hardware monitoring, with System Monitor more accurately reporting CPU usage. In addition, the application itself uses less resources, leading to a better, more accurate understanding how resources are being used.

Improvements were also made to GPU and printer monitoring as well.

Info Center also provides more information, exposing data about all of your GPUs as well as your batteries’ cycle counts.

Monitoring printers is equally easy, as each printer’s print queue is shown directly in the widget. The widget also shows a little spinner on any printers that are currently printing, so you can see at a glance which ones are in use.

Tools

KDE made improvements to KRunner, used for quickly searching through files.

KRunner and KRunner-powered searches now let you jump between categories using the Page Up/Page Down keys and Ctrl+Up/Ctrl+Down key combinations.

It’s good to see KRunner receiving some love, as the tool is one of the best features of Plasma, but sometimes feels like it doesn’t receive as much attention as it deserves.

Similarly Discover, Plasma’s app center, will now highlight sandboxed apps with permission that are likely to change after being installed. This should help users identify potential issues with applications and identify “shady behavior.”

Usability

Plasma 6.3 includes a number of usability improvements.

Plasma 6.3 makes things easy without ditching flexibility. If you prefer using a mouse with your laptop, you can now configure its built-in touchpad to switch off automatically, so it doesn’t interfere with your typing. Also, if you set up your machine as a network hotspot, Plasma generates a random password for the network so you don’t have to think one up.

Finding help is easier in Plasma 6.3. A “Help” category has been added to the launcher (the menu that tends to live on the left hand side of your panel), and we have removed the Settings category entirely. Its contents have been merged into the System category, reducing the number of categories that don’t offer meaningful grouping.

Speaking of menus, the default Kickoff launcher menu now switches categories only when you click on them, matching the behavior of all other sidebar lists. However, if you preferred the old switch-on-hover behavior, it’s still available too.

We have made things clearer by adding a Show Target item to the desktop context menu for symbolic links, the digital Clock widget displays all events on days with more than five of them (giving you a complete view of upcoming commitments), and when you want to reboot into the bootloader menu the next time your machine reboots, the logout screen now indicates this.

To avoid overwhelming you with too much information, when notifications arrive while Plasma’s “Do Not Disturb” mode is engaged, exiting that mode shows the number of missed notifications, rather than sending them all in one giant torrent.

Additionally, a subtle but important change: when you drag a file out of a window that’s partially below other windows, it no longer jumps to the top, potentially obscuring what you wanted to drag it into!

Customization

One of Plasma’s defining features is the ability to customize it to be exactly what users want. Version 6.3 is no different, adding a number of improvements.

In Plasma 6.2, we introduced symbolic icons in Kickoff’s category sidebar. Some people didn’t like that, so in 6.3 you can undo the change yourself: we modified the implementation to pull icons from the standard data source, allowing you to set them to whatever you want using the Menu Editor app.

Speaking of the Menu Editor app, editing desktop files for apps from the “Edit Application…” menu item in Kickoff (and other launcher menus) opens the app in the editor, rather than showing you file properties. This lets you easily edit the entire applications list!

If you have ever lost a widget in the process of customizing your system, you’ll love this new feature: in Plasma 6.3, the Widget Explorer gives you the opportunity to remove every instance of a widget, including those that got lost or are only present on unplugged screens.

Conclusion

In our Linux Distro Review series, we looked at the major Linux DEs, including KDE Plasma. In that review, we praised Plasma’s gorgeous looks, powerful features, incredible applications, and the myriad of customization options, concluding it offered “a level of features and power that is unrivaled across any other DE or even any other platform.”

Unfortunately, the paper cuts that came Plasma (then version 5.x) resulted in our conclusion that it was “the one that could be king” if more work was put into improving stability and reducing paper cuts.

With the 6.x series, the KDE developers have done just that, making Plasma more stable, reliable, and solid than it has ever been, and Plasma 6.3 is a testament to that work.

Xfce is one of the oldest Linux desktop environments (DE), and is remains one one of the most popular, usually coming in just behind Gnome and KDE Plasma. Xfce is particularly known for being incredibly stable and efficient, providing a fast, reliable experience on everything from the newest computers to older machines getting a new lease on life.

Version 4.20 has been in development for nearly two years and brings a slew of improvements.

After almost two years of work, we are happy to announce the release of Xfce 4.20.

Since Xfce 4.18 a lot of major development happened. Our team added many nice new features, did a gazillion of bug fixes and did various minor improvements. Finally, all that was released for your pleasure.

The major focus during this development cycle was the preparation of the codebase to be ready for Wayland. So that we meanwhile have experimental Wayland support for most components. More details in the ‘Wayland’ section below.

Wayland

One of the biggest changes is experimental support for Wayland, the display server that is replacing X11 on Linux. Gnome and Plasma already have Wayland support, with both DEs planning to switch to Wayland-only in the future.

Smaller DEs—such as Xfce, Cinnamon, Budgie, and others—have been working to implement Wayland support, making 4.20 an important release for the project. Even so, the developers warn that Xfce support is still experimental in 4.20, meaning it should only be used by experienced users who don’t mind a bit of extra troubleshooting and paper cuts.

Important Notice: Please be aware that the Wayland support in Xfce 4.20 is experimental. It is recommended for advanced users only, as you may encounter bugs and experience incomplete functionality. Proceed with caution!

Thanks to Brian and Gaël almost all Xfce components are able to run on Wayland windowing, while still keeping support for X11 windowing.

This major effort was achieved by abstracting away any X11/Wayland windowing specific calls and making use of Wayland/Wlroots protocols. A whole new Xfce library, “libxfce4windowing” was introduced during that process. XWayland will not be required to run any of the ported Xfce components.

So far Xfce does not feature a compositor which supports Wayland. If you want to run Xfce in Wayland, Labwc and Wayfire will give you the best results. A detailed instruction on this can be found here. Please be aware that Wayland support is still experimental!

Plans are underway to add Wayland support to Xfwm4 while preserving its existing X11 functionality. However, such a restructurization will be a major effort and we cannot tell yet when/if it will be done, so please don’t hold your breath waiting for it.

Non-Wayland Features and Improvements

Aside from Wayland support, Xfce 4.20 includes a slew of features and improvements, including to the Thunar file manager, Appfinder, the Xfce panel, Power Manager settings, Desktop settings and views, as well as additional improvements to various settings and options.

There are a couple of changes in particular that will be welcome improvements for many users.

Power Manager

The Screen Locking settings under Power Manager have been improved and streamlined.

There is no dedicated “security” tab anymore. Lock screen management was massively simplified and “Light Locker” was dropped. “lock-on-sleep” is now synchronized with xfce4-session and xfce4-screensaver.

Screen locking settings are now only handled by xfce4-screensaver to avoid conflicts.

Similarly, the team added the ability to manager power profiles.

Support for handling different power profiles via power-profiles-daemon was added.

The overall charge state calculation was wrong for some cases and is now fixed.

When the critical power dialog pops up, unintentional user actions are now prevented.

There is now support for the hybrid sleep mode.

The device details tab now as well shows the energy rate.

Thunar

Thunar was already one of the fastest and most feature-rich file managers available, but the new version improves the performance even more, especially when dealing with a large number of files.

In the past, you might have faced situation involving bigger numbers of files in which thunar showed a freeze. Due to various different performance measures, thunar now is much more bullet-proof for action involving huge numbers of files.

This was achieved by using appropriate container types, moving some actions into separate jobs and throttling of view-updates.

A number of integration test cases will be used in order to keep performance on the current level in the future.

Similarly, file transfer speed has been improved significantly.

For file validation in thunar 4.18.x a md5 checksum was calculated for source and target file. This calculation turned out to be rather slow and actually superfluous. Now files are just compared directly. In addition, the usage of direct I/O operations now attempts to prevent comparison of possibly cached buffers.

An option was added to only copy files in parallel if the relevant devices are in idle state. This prevents possible fragmentation during copy for HDD drives.

Transferring files no longer steals the current focus.

The file transfer question dialog now provides the same options while having less buttons. In addition, file thumbnails now are properly requested by the dialog.

Conclusion

Xfce remains an important project in the Linux and Unix communities, providing users a fast, reliable experience, regardless of the hardware it’s deployed on. Version 4.20 brings some major improvements, and goes a long way toward moving the venerable DE into the future with Wayland adoption.

Those interested in reading the entire list of changes can find it here.

DistroWatch is often mistakenly cited as evidence of a distro’s overall popularity or the size of its userbase. In point of fact, DistroWatch’s rankings merely reflect the number of clicks a distro receives on the site itself. As a result, while not providing a complete picture of a distro’s popularity or installed base, it can nonetheless give an idea about which distros are currently trending and gaining in popularity, versus those that may be losing popularity.

For several weeks now, Linux Mint has taken the top spot in DistroWatch’s rankings, bumping the previous long-time favorite, MX Linux, to second place. Interestingly, Linux Mint has continued to gain ground, putting more distance between it and MX Linux since taking the top spot.

In our own reviews of Linux Mint, both the Ubuntu-based version and the Debian-based LMDE, the distro has is the only one to receive a five-star rating. This writer is an avid LMDE user, and finds the entire Linux Mint lineup to be the perfect blend of ease-of-use and powerful features. In fact, Linux Mint is one of the best, most complete Linux experiences one can have, easily rivaling anything from Apple or Microsoft.

To read more, please see our reviews below:

Linux Distro Reviews: Linux Mint 22

Linux Distro Reviews: LMDE

Linux Distro Reviews: Linux Mint

Linux Mint vs LMDE: Which Should You Choose?

WSL gives Windows users the ability to run Linux apps and packages within Windows. The layer has been a boon to developers, giving them access to powerful Linux tools even if they’re working in a primarily Microsoft-based shop. In addition, WSL is useful for testing and compatibility purposes when developing apps.

Despite its popularity, Red Hat was notably absent from WSL, at least officially. That has finally changed, with Microsoft announcing that “Red Hat is becoming an official WSL distro.”

Although you can run any Linux distro in WSL, being an official distro makes it easier for WSL users to install and discover it with actions like wsl –list –online and wsl –install. We’re excited to announce that Red Hat will soon be delivering a Red Hat Enterprise Linux WSL distro image in the coming months, and it will be shipped with the new tar based WSL distro architecture (which you can learn more about below). Thank you to the Red Hat team as their feedback has been invaluable as we built out this new architecture, and we’re looking forwards to the release!

“Developers have their preferred platforms for developing applications for multiple operating systems, and WSL is an important platform for many of them,” said Ron Pacheco, senior director, Red Hat Enterprise Linux Ecosystem, Red Hat. “Red Hat is committed to driving greater choice and flexibility for developers, which is why we’re working closely with the Microsoft team to bring Red Hat Enterprise Linux, the largest commercially available open source Linux distribution, to all WSL users.”

In addition, Microsoft is making it easier to make distros work with WSL with a new tar-based architecture.

We are releasing a new way to make WSL distros, with a new architecture that backs how WSL distros are packaged and installed. Up until now, you could make a WSL distro by either creating an appx package and distributing it via the Microsoft Store, or by importing a .tar file with wsl –import. We wanted to improve this by making it possible to create a WSL distro without needing to write Windows code, and for users to more easily install their distros from a file or network share which is common in enterprise scenarios.

Microsoft also touts some of the improved security and zero trust features that are included with the latest version of WSL.

WSL has 2 new feature updates to enhance enterprise security with improved integrations in Intune and Entra ID!

The first feature is Intune device compliance integration with WSL is now generally available! This feature provides IT administrators the ability to enforce selective WSL distribution and version usage in their enterprise with conditional access. This enhances organizations’ security posture by enabling IT administrators to gain greater visibility into Linux distributions and versions running on managed Windows devices. WSL compliance status is now included when evaluating overall compliance of a Windows device that has both Windows and WSL compliance settings configured. In addition, users are presented with the familiar guided noncompliance remediation experience in Company Portal when noncompliant WSL instances are detected. You can learn more about how to get started with this feature at the Intune docs.

The second feature is that Microsoft Entra ID integration with WSL is now available for private preview! It provides a zero-trust experience while accessing protected enterprise resources from within a WSL distribution. It does this by adding better security around passing Entra tokens (so they don’t get passed via networking packets), and automatic connection for Linux processes to use the underlying Windows authentication. Please see this link to sign up for the private preview today and stay tuned for more updates on this feature!

The updates to WSL, including Red Hat’s official inclusion, are good news for Windows and Linux developers and system admins.

Microsoft has been trying to convince users to migrate from Windows 10 to 11, but the newer version of the OS has yet to achieve the popularity of its predecessor. Windows 11 has arbitrarily high system requirements, meaning hundreds of millions of computers are not compatible. In addition, many users are hesitant to embrace Microsoft’s wholesale adoption AI throughout the OS.

The company has been getting increasingly pushy in its efforts to promote Windows 11, but the latest attempts are some of its most brazen yet, as Microsoft us using full screen ads that override whatever the user is doing.

Linux usage has been increasing in the last couple of years, reaching all-new heights. Given Microsoft’s aggressive tactics, and their failure to respect that users should be in control of their own computers, it’s little wonder that many users are looking for alternatives.

Debian is renowned for its stability, security, and reliability, making it one of the most popular distros for servers. With the latest 12.x series, codenamed “Bookworm,” Debian is better than ever for desktop and laptops, since it now includes non-free firmware and drivers by default, rather than making the user download and install them independently.

The latest version, Debian 12.8, includes a number of security and bug fixes.

This point release mainly adds corrections for security issues, along with a few adjustments for serious problems. Security advisories have already been published separately and are referenced where available.

As the Debian maintainers point out, 12.8 is not a new version of Debian, merely the latest update to the existing release.

Please note that the point release does not constitute a new version of Debian 12 but only updates some of the packages included. There is no need to throw away old bookworm media. After installation, packages can be upgraded to the current versions using an up-to-date Debian mirror.

Those who frequently install updates from security.debian.org won’t have to update many packages, and most such updates are included in the point release.

For users who want to install the latest 12.8, rather than use an older ISO and update in-place, the project is preparing new ISO images that will include all the security and bug fixes included in 12.8.

A previous proposal had pushed for KDE Plasma to become the default desktop environment for Fedora 42, taking Gnome’s place. There was never much chance of that proposal passing, given that Gnome is the default desktop for Red Hat Enterprise Linux, which is the downstream commercial distro based on Fedora, and that Red Hat is Fedora’s sponsor.

Nonetheless, the proposal started a conversation about the importance of the KDE Spin, which already has the ability to block/postpone a release of Fedora if show-stopping bugs are found in it. Elevating it to Edition status is a good compromise, especially since Gnome and KDE are the two most popular desktop environments in the Linux space.

The announcement was made on the Fedora issue tracker.

As discussed at Flock, the Fedora KDE SIG and the newly forming Fedora Personal Systems Working Group that will oversee the SIG are requesting that the Fedora KDE Plasma Desktop spin be upgraded to Edition status for Fedora Linux 42.

This includes the following:

• Listing Fedora KDE Plasma Desktop Edition at the same level as Fedora Workstation Edition on fedoraproject.org
• Production of a flagship site page for Fedora KDE similar to Fedora Workstation on fedoraproject.org
• Marketing support in a similar vein to Workstation at events

The Fedora KDE SIG will withdraw its Change for Fedora Linux 42 to replace GNOME with KDE Plasma on Workstation with the acceptance of this request.

Although KDE Plasma is in second place, in terms of usage, recent releases have seen it take a technological edge of Gnome, especially in the realm of graphics performance, as well as performance in general. Plasma also features a more traditional interface, compared to Gnome, making it a better option for users switching from Windows to Linux.

Elevating the KDE Spin to an Edition is a smart move, and should help bring more attention to arguably the best version of Fedora available.

Recall is a feature that takes constant screenshots of what a user is doing and makes them searchable via natural language interaction.

• While a promising idea, it immediately raised concerns over privacy and security. While Microsoft says all data is stored and processed locally, and never uploaded, that is merely a policy decision not a technical limitation. Many critics have expressed concern that, over time, the company could push users to allow Recall to upload and process the plethora of information it has access to in the cloud.
• From a security perspective, early iterations of Recall were a nightmare, with inadequate protections against data exfiltration. To make matters worse, the wealth of sensitive data Recall gathers will instantly make it a high-priority target for bad actors. It’s little wonder that cybersecurity researcher Kevin Beaumont said: “Microsoft are going to deliberately set cybersecurity back a decade & endanger customers by empowering low level criminals.”

In an effort to listen to feedback and beef up security, Microsoft delayed Recall’s rollout in mid-July, saying it would be available to Windows Insiders in October. October has now come and gone with no Recall in sight.

In a statement to The Verge, Brandon LeBlanc, senior product manager of Windows, said the rollout is now delayed until December.

“We are committed to delivering a secure and trusted experience with Recall. To ensure we deliver on these important updates, we’re taking additional time to refine the experience before previewing it with Windows Insiders,” said LeBlanc.” Originally planned for October, Recall will now be available for preview with Windows Insiders on Copilot Plus PCs by December.”

Given how controversial Recall has been, it’s a safe bet many users are hoping the rollout gets delayed indefinitely.

Linux Mint is one of the most well-regarded Linux distros available. While it is often recommended for new users, it’s one of the few distros that equally serves new and veteran users.

The new version builds on that pattern, bringing a host of improvements.

Catch our conversation on Linux Mint 22!

A New Base

One of the biggest changes with version 22 is the new Ubuntu base. While the Mint team maintains a version, LMDE, that is based on Debian, the mainline edition is based on Ubuntu LTS.

Mint 22 is based on the latest Ubuntu 24.04, bringing all the benefits that come with it, including updated applications, better performance, improved security, and newer kernels.

A major example of security is how the new base handles Personal Package Archives (PPAs), a popular option for users to get the latest version of some packages, as Ubuntu’s Oliver Smith highlighted in a blog post.

PPAs are a critical tool for development, testing and customisation, enabling users to install software outside of the official Ubuntu archives. This allows for a great deal of software freedom but also comes with potential security risks due to the access they are granted to your OS. In Ubuntu 24.04 LTS, PPAs are now distributed as deb822-formatted.sources files with their signing key directly embedded into the file’s signed-by field. This establishes a 1:1 relationship between the key and the repository, meaning one key cannot be used to sign multiple repositories and removing a repository also removes its associated key. In addition, APT now requires repositories to be signed using stronger public key algorithms.

Similarly, the Ubuntu 24.04 base improves the security surrounding unprivileged user namespaces.

Another significant security enhancement is the restriction of unprivileged user namespaces. These are a widely used feature of the Linux kernel that provide additional security isolation for applications that construct their own sandboxes, such as browsers which would then use that space to execute untrusted web content. So far so good, however the ability to create unprivileged user namespaces can expose additional attack surfaces within the Linux kernel and has proven to be a step in a significant number of exploits. In Ubuntu 24.04 LTS, AppAmor is now used to selectively control access to unprivileged user namespaces on a per application basis so that only applications with legitimate need can leverage this functionality.

Linux Mint benefits from these, and many other, improvements thanks to the rebase.

Linux Mint-Specific Improvements

In addition to the improvements Mint 22 inherits from Ubuntu, the team has also made some improvements that are unique to the distro.

Application Changes

Some of these involve rolling back changes that go against Mint’s philosophy.

For example, Ubuntu uses the Gnome desktop environment (DE), which has made it increasingly difficult to theme apps. In contrast, the ability to theme one’s desktop and apps is a core value of the Mint team and showcased in their homegrown Cinnamon DE.

Team leader Clément (Clem) Lefèbvre outlined the project’s divergence with Gnome’s direction, as well as Ubuntu’s continued dependence on Snaps.

An updated package base doesn’t just bring new technology, it can sometimes also threaten existing features.

Thunderbird continues to be available in Linux Mint 22 as a native .deb package. Following the decision by Ubuntu to move it to Snap, Linux Mint is now responsible for packaging it.

With GNOME 46, libgoa/libgoa-backend 3.50 moved to GTK4 and could no longer be used by GTK3 applications. This meant that Online Accounts support had to disappear from Cinnamon, Budgie and Unity. The XApp project implemented a standalone application called “GNOME Online Accounts GTK”. Not only did this bring the feature back in these three desktop environments, it also made it possible for it to be used in MATE and Xfce.

In Ubuntu 24.04, a number of GNOME applications moved to libAdwaita and stopped supporting the system theme.

Since selecting a theme is a core part of the desktops shipped by Linux Mint (Cinnamon, MATE and Xfce), apps are required to support it.

As a result, the GNOME Font Viewer was removed and the following applications were downgraded back to GTK3 versions: Celluloid, GNOME Calculator, Simple Scan, Baobab, System Monitor, GNOME Calendar, File Roller, Zenity.

Security

Mint 22 also hides unverified Flatpaks by default in the Software Manager, requiring users enable the option to see them. Although Flatpak, and the Flathub repo, are generally considered pretty safe, this measure is designed to protect newer users, while still giving experienced users the option to enable them.

Kernels

Linux Mint 21 stayed on the same kernel 5.15 series throughout its two-year life cycle. While users could manually upgrade the kernel post-install, the older kernel meant that Mint 21 could not be installed on some newer harder. To solve the problem, the Mint team maintained the Edge installation ISO, which was identical to the standard Mint 21, except that it included a newer kernel by default.

With Linux Mint 22, the team has decided to follow Ubuntu’s kernel release and adopt the HWE kernel. HWE refers to Ubuntu’s Hardware Enablement stack that updates LTS releases with the latest kernel and Mesa graphics drivers. Rather than sticking with the original 6.8 kernel that Linux Mint 22 shipped with, the Mint team will adopt the HWE kernel updates when they become available, eliminating the need for an Edge version altogether.

The change in kernel strategy should help keep Mint current with newer hardware, and eliminate one of the biggest complaints critics leveled against the distro.

Cinnamon 6.2

The Cinnamon DE is already one of the best DEs, in terms of offering a near perfect blend of features, stability, and simplicity. The DE is my personal favorite, offering the best of Gnome and KDE, without the annoyances of either.

The version included with Linux Mint 22 includes a number of enhancements.

• Nemo actions can be organized neatly thanks to a new Layout Editor.
• The Nemo actions layout editor
• Separators and submenus can be added.
• Labels and icons can be overridden to tune actions to your liking in your context menu.
• Cinnamon 6.2 also features many bug fixes, performance improvements and the following changes:

• Less printer added notifications (silenced for 2 hours)
• Wayland support: Clutter polkit agent
• Spices: keybindings support
• Better avatar support in polkit agent and user applet
• Workspace switcher: middle click removes the workspace being hovered
• Keybindings: ability to search by binding
• Cornerbar applet: shift+click action added
• Applets: improved precision in reporting VPN and battery states

The team is continuing work on Wayland support. While it is certainly improved over the initial release, Wayland support is still experimental, with the team targeting 2026 for stable experience.

Read More: Linux Mint vs LMDE: Which Should You Choose?

Daily Usage

I’ve been using Mint 22 since mid-September, having spent the previous year using LMDE, and several months of using Linux Mint 21 before that. Overall, I can easily say that this is the best version of of the Ubuntu-based Mint I have used to date—and Mint and LMDE were already our highest-rated Linux distros in this entire series.

There are a number of things that have led to that conclusion, at least in my experience.

Newer Kernel

The fact that Mint 22 ships with kernel 6.8, instead of LMDE’s 6.1, means it is better suited to newer hardware, such as my main machine, a Tuxedo Pulse with the AMD Ryzen 7 4800H. The chip is still new enough that AMD improvements to the Linux kernel directly impact that this chipset.

On older kernels, and especially the 6.1 series, I randomly experienced an issue where my computer would refuse to fully wake from sleep. The keyboard would light up, the screen would go from inactive to backlit black, but no image would appear and the machine would not respond to input. Because it was random, it was nearly impossible to diagnose, and there was never anything in the logs providing a clear indication of what was happening.

There have been several AMD-supplied additions to subsequent versions of the Linux kernel designed specifically to address power supply issues with various AMD chips, including mine.

While it is true that LMDE can use Debian backports and, therefore, currently has access to kernel 6.10, backports don’t receive the same support from the Debian Security Team, meaning backported kernels are not as safe as the standard one included with the release.

In contrast, not only is the 6.8 kernel included with Mint obviously supported by Ubuntu’s security team, but all HWE kernels that are released later will also have Ubuntu’s full support. As a result, Ubuntu currently provides a safer way to have a newer kernel that is more compatible with my specific hardware.

Newer Packages

While Flatpak has mitigated much of the outdated package trope that critics level against Debian, it doesn’t completely solve the problem. For example, Geany is my preferred text editor, but LMDE/Debian is still running the older 1.3.x series. While the latest 2.0 version is available via Flatpak, the Flatpak maintainer has said he may stop maintaining the package. In contrast, Linux Mint 22/Ubuntu 24.04 has the latest version, which brings a number of major improvements over 1.3.x.

This repeats across several applications. While backports are a valid option on LMDE, not all applications are available via backports. The newer version of Geany, for example, has not been backported.

While it is true that the situation will likely reverse in 2025, when Debian 12 and LMDE 7 are released, for right now Mint 22 offers a significantly newer package base and it’s been a pleasure to use it. What’s more, thanks to PPAs and Ubuntu’s habit of updating some apps mid-release, Ubuntu-based distros generally have a bit more support for finding the latest versions of apps if you need them.

Performance

Much like newer packages, this is one that may reverse when Debian 13/LMDE 7 comes out, but Mint 22 does have a performance edge over Debian 12/LMDE 6, at least in my experience. It’s not a major advantage advantage, it is there.

Given that Mint 22 is a year newer than LMDE 6, that performance edge is not surprising. But Ubuntu 24.04 also included a lot of performance-enhancing improvements over previous versions, so it will be interesting to see if Debian 13 leapfrogs it significantly (like Debian 12 did Ubuntu 22.04), or if Ubuntu 24.04 will hold its own against the newer Debian next year.

Spit and Polish

While LMDE is an outstanding distro, and my personal favorite, there’s no denying that Mint 22 has a bit more spit and polish that tracks with it being the main focus of the Mint team. LMDE currently only accounts for roughly 11% of the Mint user base, meaning just under 90% of the base is using the Ubuntu-based version of Mint.

For the most part, the two Mint distros are nearly identical, aside from Ubuntu-specific tools. For example, the Driver Manager and Kernel Manager included with mainline Mint are Ubuntu tools and there is no easy way to incorporate them into LMDE.

Even beyond Ubuntu-specific things, small things demonstrate the Mint team’s main area of focus. For example, Debian 12 introduced a bug where network notification dialogs do not respect the “Do not show this message again” option. While it is true that this is a Debian-specific bug, not a Mint one, the Mint team is well-known for their ability to smooth out Ubuntu-specific bugs and issues in mainline Mint. That specific bug persists in LMDE 6, however. To be clear, this is by no means a deal-breaker. In fact, the issue is very easy to fix. However, the fact that the Mint team has not fixed it—while fixing Ubuntu-specific annoyances on mainline Mint—shows where their priorities are.

Given that nearly 90% of their user base is on the mainline edition, there’s certainly no faulting the devs for that approach. Clem has repeatedly stated that LMDE exists as a proof of concept and a safety net, as well as a way to test the distro’s homegrown X Apps on the wider Debian base, not as a prime goal.

Clem addressed the issue himself in the comments pertaining to the release of LMDE 6.

I’ve nothing bad to say about 22.04. I hope Ubuntu continues to be as good going forward and doesn’t neglect its APT package base. If we don’t have a reason to transition we won’t. Ubuntu is still the best APT package base out there in our opinion. LMDE is there as a potential solution, but it is not a goal in itself.

Conclusion

For the past year, I have been a diehard LMDE user…and remain one. It is still my favorite version of Mint and, therefore, my favorite distro, period. I like a Debian base, and I like that LMDE is a community project based on a community project, as opposed to Mint 22 being a community project based on a commercial distro.

Nonetheless, my experience with Mint 22 has been so good that I would recommend it for most users, especially those just coming to Linux. I find Ubuntu’s kernel strategy and Mesa updates to be more beneficial for many users. And there’s no denying the benefit of using the version of the distro that is the main focus of its maintainers, as opposed to using what is essentially a side project.

In the meantime, despite thoroughly enjoying my Mint 22 experience—and firmly believing its where most users should look— I personally will continue running LMDE.

What about the future? It’s hard to say what the future holds, either for my own usage or for Mint in general. Some believe the Mint team will eventually be forced to switch to LMDE as the mainline edition if Ubuntu continues its “Snapification” of more and more internal components and makes other decisions the Mint team disagrees with.

Clem has directly acknowledged Canonical’s increased usage of Snaps, but doesn’t think it will force the team to abandon the Ubuntu base, saying he doesn’t believe the “Snapification” will continue.

It’s something we keep an eye on and invest time in, that’s true. It could potentially lead to a switch, it’s hard to say “always/never” because as you said it depends on what we’re dealing with. Realistically though I don’t think Snap will last forever. I see it getting abandoned just like Mir or Unity when it fails to get the traction and return on investment Canonical wants from it.

If he is correct, then the Mint team will likely never move off of the Ubuntu base, nor should they, given the benefits it provides.

If, on the other hand, LMDE does become the mainline edition, Linux Mint’s future will still be quite secure, based on one of the best, most stable distros in existence.

Rating

5 out of 5 stars

Snaps are containerized apps Canonical has pioneered in an effort to solve the complexity surrounding traditional Linux packages. Snaps, like competing Flatpaks, have all their dependencies in a self-contained package, rather than relying on the system’s libraries. As a result, Snaps provide a way to have the latest applications, even on older Linux distros. In addition, Snaps provide a measure of sandboxing, because the app is self-contained.

Listen to a podcast conversation on Ubuntu 24.10, and it’s new experimental feature!

In an effort to improve Snaps’ sandboxing and security, Ubuntu 24.10 will introduce permission prompts, as described by Oliver Smith, Interim Engineering Director for Ubuntu Desktop.

Hi folks! As a bonus update ahead of the main September post I want to switch things up a bit and introduce you to an experimental new feature landing in the Ubuntu 24.10 dailies soon.

Permissions prompting is a critical tool for privacy and security conscious users to control, manage and understand the behaviour of applications running on their machine. This implementation represents a significant step forward in application security, and distinguishes itself from traditional XDG Desktop Portals by enabling fine-grained access control over unmodified binaries without requiring changes to the application code. By leveraging Ubuntu’s AppArmor implementation, prompting enforces sandboxing and mediates access at the system call level to ensure that every action is tightly controlled and subject to user consent, even for applications that are entirely unaware of this mediation.

The snapd, security and desktop teams at Canonical have collaborated closely over a number of years to bring this feature to life and we’re excited to deliver an initial opt-in implementation to Ubuntu 24.10 focussed on home interface permissions so that we can refine the experience based on your feedback.

Smith emphasizes that the permissions prompting is a work in progress, but new features and abilities will be added.

In this release the Security Center is the home for managing your prompt rules, over time we will expand its functionality to cover additional security-related settings for your desktop such as encryption management and firewall control.

As always, the demo above represents a work in progress, with further UI improvements still to land over the next few weeks ahead of release (and beyond). This implementation, as an opt-in feature, is designed to surface as much information to the user as possible regarding what actions the application is attempting to perform, what permissions you will be granting and their duration. We expect this to be iterated over based on user feedback.

Permission prompting is a welcome improvement for Snaps and will help managing them much easier, while improving the security and stability of Ubuntu.

Recall is Microsoft’s controversial AI-powered tool that takes snapshots of virtually everything a user does on their computer. The goal is to provide an easy way to for users to find documents, messages, videos, text, and more, using natural language prompts. Unfortunately, Microsoft’s initial implementation was a security nightmare, prompting the company to delay its rollout.

First spotted by Deskmodder, the latest windows update appeared to open the door to uninstalling Recall, listing it in the ‘Turn Windows features on or off’ section of the Control Panel. Unfortunately, Microsoft has no plans to allow users to uninstall Recall, saying the dialog was a bug.

“We are aware of an issue where Recall is incorrectly listed as an option under the ‘Turn Windows features on or off’ dialog in Control Panel,” Windows senior product manager Brandon LeBlanc told The Verge. “This will be fixed in an upcoming update.”

It’s a shame that Microsoft believes an option to uninstall Recall is something to “be fixed,” rather than giving users who value their privacy an opportunity to get rid of the feature.

The Control Panel has been a feature of Windows since its earliest days, providing a central place for users to configure their system, set up peripherals, and administer their computer. In recent years, there has been overlap with the new Settings app, and Microsoft updated a support document several days ago to indicate the Control Panel’s days were coming to an end.

The Control Panel is a feature that’s been part of Windows for a long time. It provides a centralized location to view and manipulate system settings and controls. Through a series of applets, you can adjust various options ranging from system time and date to hardware settings, network configurations, and more. The Control Panel is in the process of being deprecated in favor of the Settings app, which offers a more modern and streamlined experience.

Tip: while the Control Panel still exists for compatibility reasons and to provide access to some settings that have not yet migrated, you’re encouraged to use the Settings app, whenever possible.

Microsoft has since updated the support article once more, making a significant change to the wording about Control Panel’s future.

The Control Panel is a feature that’s been part of Windows for a long time. It provides a centralized location to view and manipulate system settings and controls. Through a series of applets, you can adjust various options ranging from system time and date to hardware settings, network configurations, and more. Many of the settings in Control Panel are in the process of being migrated to the Settings app, which offers a more modern and streamlined experience.

Tip: while the Control Panel still exists for compatibility reasons and to provide access to some settings that have not yet migrated, you’re encouraged to use the Settings app, whenever possible.

The new verbiage leaves Control Panel’s future far more open than it originally did. At this point it’s unclear if Control Panel will still face deprecation at some point in the future, or if the Settings app and Control Panel will coexist. If they do, it’s possible the former could be a streamlined, easy-to-use configuration tool, with the Control Panel providing more in-depth features for advanced users.

Ultimately, only time will tell if Control Panel continues to be a core part of Windows.

Windows Recall is Microsoft’s AI-powered feature that takes screenshots of virtually everything a user does on a Copilot+ PC, giving users the ability to easily search through documents, videos, messages, and far more, using natural language expressions. Unfortunately, security experts quickly found major flaws with Recall, with it quickly being labeled a privacy and security nightmare.

As a result of the backlash, Microsoft opted to delay rollout of the feature, as Pavan Davuluri—Corporate Vice President, Windows + Devices—said at the time.

We are adjusting the release model for Recall to leverage the expertise of the Windows Insider community to ensure the experience meets our high standards for quality and security. This decision is rooted in our commitment to providing a trusted, secure and robust experience for all customers and to seek additional feedback prior to making the feature available to all Copilot+ PC users. Additionally, as we shared in our May 3 blog, security is our top priority at Microsoft, in line with our Secure Future Initiative (SFI). This is reflected in additional security protections we are providing for Recall content, including “just in time” decryption protected by Windows Hello Enhanced Sign-in Security (ESS), so Recall snapshots will only be decrypted and accessible when the user authenticates. The development of Copilot+ PCs, Recall and Windows will continue to be guided by SFI.

According to an update to a company blog post, Microsoft is now slated to deliver Windows Recall to Windows Insiders in October.

With a commitment to delivering a trustworthy and secure Recall (preview) experience on Copilot+ PCs for customers, we’re sharing an update that Recall will be available to Windows Insiders starting in October. As previously shared on June 13, we have adjusted our release approach to leverage the valuable expertise of our Windows Insider community prior to making Recall available for all Copilot+ PCs. Security continues to be our top priority and when Recall is available for Windows Insiders in October we will publish a blog with more details.

Microsoft clearly believes it has addressed the privacy and security issues that were painfully evident in the first incarnation of the feature, but only time will tell if the company has truly solved the issues.

As we wrote in our initial analysis, Windows Recall is a perfect example of the type of feature that exemplifies the old adage ‘just because you can do something, doesn’t mean you should.’ Many users expressed concern and doubts about a feature that essentially spies on everything they do.

Even if Microsoft lives up to its commitment to only process Recall data on-device, and not move it to the cloud, it still presents a tempting target for hackers and bad actors to exploit. Given Microsoft’s poort cybersecurity history, many users are reluctant to trust the company with such a powerful and invasive feature.

The Control Panel has been an important feature Windows for decades, but recent editions have seen more and more of its functionality moved to the Settings app. In a support article, Microsoft has finally acknowledged that the change is intentional and will soon be complete.

The Control Panel is a feature that’s been part of Windows for a long time. It provides a centralized location to view and manipulate system settings and controls. Through a series of applets, you can adjust various options ranging from system time and date to hardware settings, network configurations, and more. The Control Panel is in the process of being deprecated in favor of the Settings app, which offers a more modern and streamlined experience.

Tip: while the Control Panel still exists for compatibility reasons and to provide access to some settings that have not yet migrated, you’re encouraged to use the Settings app, whenever possible.

Microsoft has not given a date for when the change will be complete, but the writing is on the wall that Control Panel’s demise is imminent.

Spotted by Neowin, Microsoft has patched an option that allowed users to bypass Windows requirements by adding “/product server” during setup. While other methods still exist, this was one of the easiest methods available to users looking to bypass Windows 11’s requirements.

Windows 11’s system requirements have been one of the major issues slowing down its adoption. Even relatively new machines with powerful specs have been arbitrarily obsoleted due to not supporting TPM 2.0, or one of Microsoft’s other requirements.

If this latest move is any indication, Microsoft will likely continue to shut down unauthorized install methods.

Microsoft releases patches on second Tuesday of the month, in what is commonly called “Patch Tuesday.” Yesterday’s fixes addressed some 90 issues, including zero-day flaws. Of the 10 zero-days, six of them are being actively exploited.

The issues being exploited include the following:

CVE-2024-38106 – 7.0 – Windows Kernel Elevation of Privilege Vulnerability
CVE-2024-38107 – 7.8 – Windows Power Dependency Coordinator Elevation of Privilege Vulnerability
CVE-2024-38178 – 7.5 – Scripting Engine Memory Corruption Vulnerability
CVE-2024-38189 – 8.8 – Microsoft Project Remote Code Execution Vulnerability
CVE-2024-38193 – 7.8 – Windows Ancillary Function Driver for WinSock Elevation of Privilege Vulnerability
CVE-2024-38213 – 6.5 – Windows Mark of the Web Security Feature Bypass Vulnerability

Organizations are urged to update immediately.

Citing data from Mercury Research, Tom’s Hardware reports that AMD’s share of the server market for Q2 2024 hit an all-time high, coming in at 24.1%. That’s an increase over Q1 share of 23.6%. Similarly, AMD’s laptop share frew from 19.3% in Q1 to 20.3% in Q2.

The one area where Intel held on and actually scored a win was in the desktop market. AMD lost a point, going from 23.9% in Q1 to a flat 23% in Q2.

At the end of the day, Intel still has a commanding lead in all three markets, but AMD continues to march forward, slowing chipping away at its rival’s lead. For example, at the end of 2022, AMD only had 17.6% of the server market, 16.4% of the mobile market, and 18.6% of the desktop market.

Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger has been working to turn the company around, but has consistently faced headwinds, including disastrous quarters, issues securing foundry customers, and continuing to be behind its rivals technologically.

AMD is poised for yet more good news, with benchmarks showing the company’s latest chips may blow Intel’s out of the water.

It’s safe to say Q2 2024 won’t be the last quarter that sees Intel’s dominance erode away a bit more.

Immutable distros borrow a critical feature from systems like Android, rolling out atomic updates. In other words, an update is download, applied at restart, and either takes successfully or is rolled back to the existing version. As a result, there is virtually no chance of an update filling mid-update and leaving the user with bricked install.

Manjaro is a Linux distro based on Arch. As a result, it is a rolling release distro—as opposed to a point release like Ubuntu or Debian—but it moves at a slower pace in an attempt to provide additional stability and reliability. The company is working to improve that even more with an immutable version of the distro.

The Manjaro Team made the announcement in a forum post.

Powered by Arkdep 133 from the Arkane Linux 115 project this exciting new Manjaro variant is available for public testing right now!

The goal of this release is to gather community feedback on the technology powering Manjaro Immutable.

The devs emphasize that this is just an experimental release, and therefore not yet suitable for daily driving in a production environment.

Note that this is only an experimental release and not representative of the final version, there is also no support guarantee, so hold off on installing it as your primary operating system, at least for now.

Manjaro is already one of the more popular Linux distros, and one of the most common one users looking to dip their foot into rolling releases choose. Manjaro Immutable could end up being a very popular option.

Linux has been making some impressive gains on the desktop in the last year, crossing 3% share for the first time ever in July 2023. After taking almost 32 years to reach that milestone, Linux quickly topped 4% eight months later in March 2024.

According to Statcounter, Linux reached 4.45% desktop share in July 2024, an impressive gain over a mere four months.

There are likely a number of factors driving Linux adoption, including an increasing wariness of Big Tech among consumers and regulators alike, as well as Windows 11’s general unpopularity.

Microsoft’s increasingly aggressive tactics—including full-screen popups and ads—that it is using to push OneDrive, Edge, and other products, has led even long-time users to look for other options. The company’s wholesale effort to adopt AI, and push it onto customers has also disenfranchised some users.

Linux has proven to be a viable option for users looking to escape the Microsoft ecosystem, providing an easy-to-use OS that is open-source, privacy-respecting, and secure. Thanks to the effort of countless developers, the Linux app ecosystem is better than ever, giving users access to open-source and commercial software alike.

Users, organizations, and companies interested in making the switch to Linux should check out our Linux Distro Reviews series, with special attention to Linux Mint and Linux Mint Debian Edition, the two distros to receive five-star reviews.

Aeon’s developers announced in mid-July that they planned on making FDE the default moving forward. While the vast majority of Linux distros offer FDE, very few enable it by default, despite the security it provides. openSUSE has a long history of being one of the most security-oriented distros on the market, and Aeon’s devs wanted to take that to the next step by making FDE the default option.

In a post on Reddit, the devs announced the release of Aeon RC3:

The biggest change with this release is the introduction of Full Disk Encryption by default, configured automatically as part of the installation

Depending on your hardware, Aeon will automatically configure Full Disk Encryption in one of two modes

• Default Mode with “Measured Boot” – strong verification of bootloader, initrd and kernel before automatically decrypting your system
• Fallback Mode with no verification of boot components and requiring a Passphrase on boot to decrypt your system

For those leery of relying on the default mode, the devs previously outlined why it is secure, debunking myths regarding TPM in the process:

The Default Mode is the preferred method of encryption provided the system has the required hardware. This mode utilizes the Trusted Platform Module(TPM) 2.0 chipset with PolicyAuthorizeNV support (TPM 2.0 version 1.38 or newer). In this mode, Aeon Desktop measures several aspects of the system’s integrity. These including:

• UEFI Firmware
• Secure Boot state (enabled or disabled)
• Partition Table
• Boot loader and drivers
• Kernel and initrd (including kernel command line parameters)

These measurements are stored in the system’s TPM. During startup, the current state is compared with the stored measurements. If these match, the system boots normally. If discrepancies are found, users are prompted to enter a Recovery Key provided during installation. This safeguard ensures that unauthorized changes or tampering attempts are flagged.

The devs do say that existing users will need to reinstall their system to take advantage of the new features.

RC3 is expected to be the last release candidate before a 1.0 release.