Benefits of running Gnome Ubuntu?

Norbert_X · 23 February 2022 14:02

There are no benefits to run GNOME Shell.

But there are tons of benefits running MATE (as in Ubuntu MATE). I'll cite my answer from askubuntu below:

The basics: MATE is desktop environment, Ubuntu MATE is an official Ubuntu flavor.
One can do fresh install of Ubuntu MATE using official ISO or by installing ubuntu-mate-desktop^ (task) package on top of existing system.

Then about the differences and benefits.
The complete list depends on your workflow and needs.
On my daily work in Ubuntu MATE I'm happy with following functionality:

Caja file manager for files and desktop:

have any objects inside my ~/Desktop folder, controlled by Caja (MATE file-manager, see screenshot here);

have fully functional drag-and-drop between any folders including ~/Desktop and MATE Panel;

have Dropbox, Git and Mercurial repositories integrated into Caja (see screenshot here);

have fully integrated Engrampa archiver to create password-protected archives;

have an ability to launch applications by visiting /usr/share/applications by Caja;

have a side pane opened by F3 in the Caja with various modes;

have infinite possibilities to expand Caja by scripts and actions;

have 400% large thumbnails.

MATE desktop overall:

have an ability to use Applications, Places, System menus on the top MATE Panel;

have an ability to set Ctrl+Shift keyboard shortcut to switch keyboard layouts with my PPA to prevent interference;

have keyboard access to the window frame mnemonics by Alt+Space;

have an ability to indicate current keyboard layout using country flag;

have an ability to set up Compiz with all its plugins like Annotate;

have customizable MATE Panel without plugins and extensions;

have an ability to install and use tiling utility named X-tile to effectively organize screen space;

have an ability to leave a message from screensaver of locked system for a user;

have well-integrated e-mail checker into Indicator Messages by Popper (on 18.04 LTS), MailNag or Ayatana WebMail (on 21.04 and newer);

have an ability to install some old but cool ScreenLets and custom widgets to be shown on desktop;

have an ability to list calendar events from Evolution in preinstalled Clock applet;

have an ability to check time and weather in different timezones using preinstalled Clock or indicator-datetime applet;

have media players like VLC or Guayadeque Music Player
integrated into indicator-sound as shown on image.