Linux Mint 20.1 beta arrives

I'm a continued time fan of the Linux Mint desktop, so I've been attractive advanced to the abutting abiding abutment (LTS) adaptation of Mint. Now, the beta, Linux Mint 20.1 Ulyssa, is actuality and I can hardly delay for the accepted release. Based on the aboriginal Mint 20.1 beta bug reports, it won't be continued until the new Mint's accessible for assembly use.

 

One acumen I'm aflame about the Mint 20.1 absolution is that it's based on Ubuntu 20.04, which is an outstanding Linux desktop in its own right. This new adaptation of Mint will be accurate until 2025. So, if all goes able-bodied I plan on application it for years to come.

 

As always, this new Mint will run on systems so low-powered you'd contrarily adjudge them to the junkyard. For example, you alone charge a distinct GB of RAM, although 2GBs is recommended. For accumulator space, you alone charge 15GBs of deejay amplitude with 20GB recommended. And, as for your adviser and video, if it can abutment 1024×768 resolution, or alike lower, you're in business.

 

 

The alone barring for active Linux Mint on beforehand PCs is it no best supports 32-bit systems. Still, alike Microsoft assuredly gave up aircraft 32-bit Windows beforehand this year. Generally speaking, if your PC is eight years old or newer, it can run Mint. Alike beforehand machines from the 2000s will run Mint so continued as they accept 64-bit processors.

 

Under the Mint 20.1 hood, you'll find Linux-firmware 1.187 and the Linux kernel 5.4. With Linux 5.4, Mint now supports:

 

• Kernel lockdown mode: This alternative LSM (Linux Security Module) keeps preventing the basis annual from alive with atom cipher sometimes. This makes it abundant harder for compromised basis accounts to accommodation Linux systems. 

  
  

  • ExFat support: You can now use this accepted Microsoft accessory book arrangement with Mint

     

    
    

    As before, you can use three altered desktop looks with Mint 20. These are my own admired Cinnamon, which was aggressive by GNOME 2.x; MATE, a angle of the GNOME 2; and the ultra-lightweight Xfce. Most desktop users will be blessed with Cinnamon or MATE. I alone use Xfce on low-powered systems or back active Linux on Chromebooks or Windows 10 PCs with Windows SubSystem for Linux (WSL) 2.

    
    

    In the new Cinnamon 4.8, you're acceptable to apprehension Mint now enables you to run Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) websites, such as GitHub, Gmail, Microsoft Office Online, and SalesForce as desktop applications. The argumentation for this move is it's a lot easier to multitask amid applications on the desktop than it is amid tabs in a web browser.
    

    
    

    This is done in two ways. First by acknowledging Electron applications. These are cross-platform, open-source desktop apps application JavaScript, HTML, and CSS. These "desktop" apps, such as Slack on Linux, run on top of the Chromium web browser. It additionally supports affluent web interface applications by ambuscade the web browser beneath the desktop interface.

    
    

    In either case, you can use the Web App administrator to actualize your own desktop Web App. Once installed, these act like any added Mint desktop program. It has its own window, its own figure on the desktop, and the appliance menu. You can additionally pin it to your console if you appetite to admission it bound alike back it's not running.

    
    

    For printers and scanners, Mint afflicted to a new approach. Instead of continuing to use ippusbxd, an Internet Press Protocol (IPP) over USB, aka driverless press and scanning program, Mint is switching aback to application printer and scanner drivers. That's because Mint's users accept begin IPP over USB acquired added problems than it apparent back printer/scanner drives were present. To accomplish it easier to use printers and scanners, HPLIP has been upgraded to adaptation 3.20.11 to accompany the latest abutment for HP printers and scanners.

     

    If you'd rather try addition approach, Mint's fabricated IPP-USB and Sane-Airscan, two actual new yet able printer/scanner programs, accessible in Linux Mint 20.1 repositories. If these assignment well, they ability be included by absence in the future.

     

    The new Mint additionally appearance Mint's advance developer Clement "Clem" Lefebvre's own homebrew IPTV video-stream amateur Hypnotix. This supports alive TV, movies, and alternation streamed by video providers application M3U or Xtream API. By default, Hypnotix uses the chargeless IPTV provider Free-IPTV.

     

    As usual, Mint supports the latest versions of accepted Linux applications such as LibreOffice 7.0 for an appointment suite, Firefox 84 for web browsing, and Thunderbird 78 for email. It also, for the aboriginal time, includes Mint's own booty on the Chromium web browser.

     

    Put it all calm and you accept a actual able beta. I'm not accessible to about-face to it for accustomed use. But appear the day it ships, I'll be installing it.