17.2 XFCE

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12 Monkeys

17.2 XFCE

Post by 12 Monkeys »

Hi guys!
According to this: http://community.linuxmint.com/iso
there is a RC out.
But I can't find it here: http://ftp.heanet.ie/pub/linuxmint.com/testing/
Probably jumping the gun, again... :lol:

Regards
Mikael
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xenopeek
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Re: 17.2 Xfce RC?

Post by xenopeek »

12 Monkeys wrote:Probably jumping the gun, again...
Yes. The ISO has been approved for RC release but that doesn't magically make it instantly available. That still takes work and time. Follow the blog, where availability of the ISO will be announced along with the information you need to know (like known issues).
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Re: 17.2 Xfce RC?

Post by thom_A »

I'm looking forward to this. (I'm in no rush, though.) KDE is too complex for me and I don't need all those hundreds of customization features. I'm not a fan of KDE and Mate's start menus. All I need is a two column default. Favorites on the left side and Categories on the other. You cursor should navigate smoothly and in the right direction.

I would have just sticked with Xfce had it have Cinnamon's applet system. Right now, I have Cinnamon and Xfce in my multiboot system alongside with Win7. My experiences have generally been positive. I rarely launch my Win7 for the past few months and don't have to run virus checkers. :)
12 Monkeys

Re: 17.2 Xfce RC?

Post by 12 Monkeys »

Thank you!
Downloading as we speak.
Gonna test it tonight :D
Cheers
Mikael
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Re: 17.2 Xfce RC?

Post by exploder »

An official announcement should come soon. Both the Xfce and KDE editions have passed QA and I saw them listed on DistroWatch today. Although some will download the iso's early it is always better to wait for the official announcement because there could always be a last minute change.
12 Monkeys

Re: 17.2 Xfce RC?

Post by 12 Monkeys »

@exploder You are of course right.
I always wait for the good stuff before
I upgrade my laptops.
The Rcs is strictly Virtualbox fun :wink:
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Re: 17.2 Xfce RC?

Post by exploder »

We all know some find the iso's as soon as they are uploaded. :) The official stance has always been to wait for the announcement because sometimes things change. Chances are the iso's are fine though and no one really minds if you try them. With the official announcement you get the release notes and it saves you from reporting known issues and gives you an overview of new features. As far as trying the RC in Virtualbox that sounds fine.

Edit: Keep in mind that you don't want to start downloading an iso that Clem might still be uploading that will cause problems...
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Re: 17.2 Xfce RC?

Post by xenopeek »

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Re: 17.2 Xfce RC?

Post by Hoser Rob »

ByeByeXP wrote:.... Perhaps just a glitch of the live-DVD? I'll' now more after doing a full install....
Well, RC means it's a beta if not alpha release.

While I certainly don't mind people using beta level OSes, it's not noob friendly. Expect problems. It may work just fine on install but the chance that a system update will bork it is pretty good. Do you have decent CLI linux recovery skills? You need them.

Actually installing a beta OS that's almost certain to break could probably be a good noob learning tool, but I wouldn't do it on my only computer.
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Re: 17.2 Xfce RC?

Post by Pjotr »

Happily testing it on my test rigs.... :mrgreen:

I've noticed that the system tray icon of the new Power Manager in Xfce 4.12 wasn't enabled by default on two different test laptops. I had to enable it myself.

Furthermore, the system tray icon of Power Manager doesn’t show the remaining battery power / remaining time of battery use anymore, when I hover the mouse pointer over it. Even left-clicking on it reveals no information about that…. Only by an annoying procedure did I get to see those vital data: right-click mouse - settings - etc.

That’s a pity, and a usability regression compared with its predecessor in Xfce 4.11 and earlier. Did any of you have the same experience?
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12 Monkeys

Re: 17.2 Xfce RC?

Post by 12 Monkeys »

I'm running it in Vbox and now also on an older laptop.
As this is RC country, I expect bugs of course.
But I have to say most everything works.
Been having up to five workspaces open.
Chrome, Vpn CLI ++, Virtualbox, Transmission and Steam.
Smooth, really smooth.
Looking forward to the release, will upgrade asap :)

@Pjotr I also had to enable the battery thingy but
left click and the rest worked fine for me.
Both in Virtualbox and on the laptop.
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Re: 17.2 Xfce RC?

Post by MtnDewManiac »

ByeByeXP wrote:The default Xorg-driver for my Nvidia-card caused some display flickering (17" Compaq FP7317 flatpanel @ 1280x1024), even at 75Hz refresh rate
According to this web page:

Code: Select all

http://www.cnet.com/products/compaq-presario-fp7317/specs/
your monitor operates with a vertical refresh rate of 76 Hz and 80 Hz (and a horizontal refresh rate of 81 kHz?).

Regards,
MDM
Mint 18 Xfce 4.12.

If guns kill people, then pencils misspell words, cars make people drive drunk, and spoons made Rosie O'Donnell fat.
12 Monkeys

Re: 17.2 Xfce RC?

Post by 12 Monkeys »

Did the upgrade on my main machine today.
8 hours and counting. I've tried most everything I can think of.
No problems at all, XFCE 17.2 is running smoothly.
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Re: 17.2 XFCE

Post by Pjotr »

It's a bit quiet around 17.2 Xfce.... The final iso apparently takes a long time to stabilize. Are there any unexpected problems, or is it merely because of the holiday season?
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Re: 17.2 XFCE

Post by MtnDewManiac »

Holiday season? Hmm... The 26th was Parents' Day, whatever that is. The 1st will be Colorado Day, I guess that's for the state. IDK about European holidays - I think Clem might(?) be from France, and I see by glancing at Firefox's address bar that this website is hosted in the UK.

I would guess that they're working on the distro more or less constantly, but there are four (DE) versions and I think that Cinnamon and MATE are probably used by more people than the Xfce one (not sure about where KDE would rank), although I could be mistaken.

It might be that there aren't a great many people who have both installed the Mint Xfce RC and who are willing to provide useful troubleshooting information (have enough knowledge to know which logs might be relevant, know commands that would be helpful in diagnosing issues, et cetera), which would of course slow the process down; The development team presumably have installs running, but that'd be a limited set of hardware to draw conclusions from. Not a particularly uncommon situation, methinks - just because their systems are stable (assuming for the sake of argument that they are) doesn't mean everyone's will be, and it might be somewhat of a PitA for all concerned to release something and then learn after the fact that a fair number of people have started seeing issues. I have read about one with the "Appearance Settings" dialog, for example and there is a post at bugzilla.xfce.org about it... But the person who posted it mentions Mint specifically and IDK if anyone has posted similar reports on the Xfce community forum (which is distro-agnostic, so to speak) - which means that I haven't a clue as to whether it's an Xfce issue or something brought about by the way that Mint uses it. <SHRUGS> Things like that can complicate the process somewhat, yes? I don't suppose that Clem (et al) work directly with Nick and the rest of the Xfce developers and do not know if there is some sort of liaison between the two teams - which would be helpful in situations like the aforementioned, but obviously with two separate projects/teams, both of whom are for the most part volunteers, "man-hours" will be limited so it might not even be feasible.

A few (IIRC) months ago, I added the Xfce 4.12 PPA to my Mint 17.1 Xfce sources, ran mintUpdate, and accepted all of the updates that showed up after I refreshed it. I haven't noticed any problems (but I haven't had need to use that "Appearance" thing, so IDK?) with that. So I would speculate that the Xfce 4.12 stuff, on its own is fine for release (and some distros have been using it already). Others are happily using Mint 17.2 with one of the two DE versions that have been released, so I would say the same for "17.2." Again, however, one can only guess about how well the two interface together at present. I'm guessing that the answer is "fine, for the most part, for most people," but it'd be that little remaining part that would be of concern (and which is also, perhaps, the hardest part to deal with each time a new version - of anything - is released).

Right now, both Mint 17 and 17.1 are supported and work well for most (all?) people. We really want Mint 17.2 Xfce to be released, lol; but that is really only an incremental release. I, myself, eagerly awaited it for a long time because I had read that it would include Xfce 4.12... Then I remembered that there was a PPA (and had been for some time), and tried it out. So, while I'm still anticipating the eventual release version, I'm not quite on the edge of my seat like I was. I would feel differently about things if I was about to lose support for my distro version, but as that is not the case...

So I'm not going to nag the developers about it (no, I don't consider your post to be nagging). I figure that the more time they spend on testing and trying to break it, lol, the less likely it will be to break unexpectedly on me when I do install it.

I just hope that Clem knows that he does have users who favor the Xfce DE, even though we have mostly been patient and haven't been bugging him so much. They say the squeaky wheel gets the grease, but try telling that to the recruit in boot camp who stands out :lol: .

Anyway, I'm just rambling and thinking out loud. If you want to try out the newest version of Xfce and its related components, all you have to do is add the PPA to your sources list. It won't be Mint 17.2, of course, and most of the changes in Xfce are not "vastly revolutionary" - more like just evolutionary - but there have been a great many of them since 4.10, so it'd give you a lot of things to discover, I guess.

Err... If you have already updated Xfce to 4.12 - or have installed the RC of Mint 17.2 Xfce - then you can disregard the above.

Regards,
MDM
Mint 18 Xfce 4.12.

If guns kill people, then pencils misspell words, cars make people drive drunk, and spoons made Rosie O'Donnell fat.
12 Monkeys

Re: 17.2 XFCE

Post by 12 Monkeys »

There you go. Good people caring for the community!
Great post MDM
Even being a newbie I will not hesitate to post anything on here.
The only way to learn is to ask :)

And this... Love my XFCE I do. Thanks Clem et al.
MtnDewManiac wrote:....I just hope that Clem knows that he does have users who favor the Xfce DE, even though we have mostly been patient and haven't been bugging him so much. They say the squeaky wheel gets the grease, but try telling that to the recruit in boot camp who stands out :lol: .
Cheers
Mikael
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Re: 17.2 XFCE

Post by blaster3 »

MtnDewManiac wrote:Holiday season? Hmm... The 26th was Parents' Day, whatever that is. The 1st will be Colorado Day, I guess that's for the state. IDK about European holidays - I think Clem might(?) be from France, and I see by glancing at Firefox's address bar that this website is hosted in the UK.

Regards,
MDM
i believe he was referring to vacation season & most of the world will say "i'm going on holiday next week". thought you would like to know
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Re: 17.2 XFCE

Post by xenopeek »

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12 Monkeys

Re: 17.2 XFCE

Post by 12 Monkeys »

Thanks Xeno!

I had some very, very minor bugs, (using the upgrade path), but kind of niggling ones.
Two examples: When booting, the splash screen was black instead of showing a wallpaper.
And when I tried to add something to the panel from favorites I got Firefox showing up every time.
Then, doing it over directly after I got what I wanted.
(These bugs kept keeping on after all updates and and etc etc...)

I have now done a clean install using this final ISO on my main works laptop.
So far, no minor bugs and absolutely no major ones :D

Cheers
Mikael
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