Actually, there is. The MATE developers should have just done what they did when they created MATE itself, and stayed with the original source code tree from the earlier release, and dealt with any library back-porting issues .
I KNOW that this could have been done, because when mate 16.04 first came out, I found the dumbed-down disk utility so annoying that I removed it and installed the Ubuntu 12.04 version. This wasn’t easy, because I had to deal with a slew of missing dependency issues by installing a ton of other crap.
Specifically, I installed the following official Ubuntu 12.04 packages from the archives:
gnome-disk-utility_3.0.2-2ubuntu7_amd64.deb
libgdu0_3.0.2-2ubuntu7_amd64.deb
libgdu-gtk0_3.0.2-2ubuntu7_amd64.deb
liblaunchpad-integration-3.0-1_0.1.56_amd64.deb
libparted0debian1_2.3-8ubuntu5_amd64.deb
libudev0_175-0ubuntu9_amd64.deb
udisks_1.0.4-5ubuntu2.2_amd64.deb
This was several months back on my 16.04 install - so not sure this will even work with the current MATE releases, but it DID RUN and worked quit nicely including all those nice missing features like tracking USB device connection speed.
Wonder if someone could deal with any security backporting issues and package all this up as a snappy package for MATE? I am sure it would be greatly appreciated.
And while we are on the topic of ‘newer is not necessarily better’ I am also still running the gcalctool 5.28 calculator from all the way back in the 10.04 Lucid release because it has direct formula entry with cut and paste and backspace, and arbitrary precision math with up to 99 digits accuracy and a ton of other features lacking on the current version.
This more powerful older version of gcalctool doesn’t overwrite any of your other installed calculator options and will work seamlessly alongside the supplied “Galculator” in MATE 16.04 and the new “Mate-Calculator” in MATE 18.04.
To install the classic version of gcalctool 5.28, grab these debs from canonical archives:
liblaunchpad-integration-common_0.1.56.1_all.deb
liblaunchpad-integration1_0.1.56.1_amd64.deb
gcalctool_5.30.0.is.5.28.2-0ubuntu3_amd64.deb
Note: for security, the above debs are direct https secure downloads from the Canonical Launchpad source code pages.
Although no longer officially supported, this version of the gcalctool calculator has modest GTK2 dependencies which are all met by currently available standard packages from 16.04 and 18.04, with the minor exception of the two small launchpad-integration libs which provided the app with links providing launchpad source info. These libraries are from the Ubuntu Precise release, but are no longer used by default in Ubuntu and don’t conflict with any current libraries.
I was even able to compile a new ARM version of gcalctool 5.28 from source and create a deb to install on my Raspberry Pi and ASUS Tinker Board - and it works just great.
This classic version of gcalctool has a fairly basic GTK2 look and feel, and as a result isn’t as “pretty” as Galculator and the more recent Gcalctool versions, but if you are a scientist or engineer, you will find that this older version has a LOT more ‘under the hood’ while remaining really easy to use.