Just saw the news about Ubuntu MATE. All I will say is:
I knew it. I just knew it. Boom. Am very disappointed, too.
I have moved on to MX Linux XFCE, and am happy with it …
… but I always liked Ubuntu MATE (until all the bugs came up).
The GNOME2 interface is the best, IMHO. Sad to see this happening.
As I mentionned elsewhere, I did see the list of bugs, a sizable number, on the UM GitHub site, but I have never experienced those personally. Admittedly weird. Must be different context (hardware/applications/network). Even the new 26.04 has not given me issues, when I tested it. Waiting for formal release before committing.
I am going to use this as an excuse to jump to Xubuntu. I would imagine, as an official flavor, there will soon be a new team to work on MATE, but for a while now I have thought MATE just feels a bit dated and things like the taskbars/panels are too ridgid. I am ready to try GTK3.
I have been using LM for my home network and I must say, I really like it. I know it is considered great for beginners, and their Update Manager just borks things up, but it’s pretty slick and they are the leader when it comes to Cinnamon. Besides, it’s still Ubuntu under the hood.
I might be wrong, but I thought that UM and MATE Desktop were already mostly migrated to GTK3, but in a way that was adapted to retain the GNOME2 look and feel.
Sorry, Norm, but
does not imply built using GTK3 libraries. For some reason, I recall seeing that the code was indeed ported to GTK3-based code at some point, because GTK2 was being "decommissioned".
As always, I could be wrong on that point.
I have no idea.I just posted what I found.
All I know is that I like the MATE desktop. I can't even tell what GTK2 or GTK 3 is other than one has a higher number than the other!
I believe (but I havent checked all) that they are built witu GTK3.
In the past they could be built with either; but I believe that may not be the case now due to certain dependencies in the GTK2 case (that might be more of a packaging than a build issue however).
Xubuntu has always been good to me. From 8.04 up to 24.04. Even now that I jumped into Mint, I’m on their XFCE Edition until I can try their MATE Edition or install MATE DE on top of my current Mint.
I gotta get me some more computers to try all this stuff. 
Quite some people use me as the local computer dumpster for laptops that won't work under windows anymore. It has its upsides 
I’ve gotten a few that way but wish it was more. To often I have had to buy a refurbished laptop. I don’t know if people think they are doing something wonderful by taking it to a scrap dealer or if they are afraid of someone gaining access to their data. Regardless the first thing I do is wipe the hard drive (if mechanical) and reformat the hard drive.
