I donât know if Iâd say they are missing essentials but two of the first things I always put on my machines is ttf-aenigma (a bunch of truetype fonts) and the Greybird theme. Other than that I install easytag and swap out whatever music player there is and use Banshee, but those are because of my OCD preferences about my music files.
So, I have been working on packaging caja-actions for Ubuntu MATE. It will land in Ubuntu MATE 15.04. Back ports are possibleâŠ
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I think these should be preinstalled by default Mate Plugins
Also we should be able to remove Pidgin withought braking the system .
Not to important per say, but I have a habit of typing htop instead of top. It would be nice if I didnât have to install it on every distro I have ever used⊠keep up the good work.
+1 for htop
winbind to be able to browse windows shares on the network
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You can browse networks from Caja already, no winbind required 
Continuing the discussion from Is Ubuntu MATE missing any essential applications?:
Martin,
My fault, as I did not explained it detailed.
I believe it only happens browsing samba shares.
My experience is:
- I have a Lacie NAS attached to the home router
- In caja I can smb://xxx.xxx.x.x and even bookmark it
- However, in caja, I cannot choose âbrowse networkâ -> âworkgroupâ -> (?). It returns an error something like âcannot retrive shares âŠâ
This also happens with âmainâ Ubuntu, so not UbMate specific. I could only resolve it after instaling winbind. Was it a coincidence, and the âproblemâ is somewhere else (maybe me 
) ?
It is funny (or not) that in 2008 when I jumped definitely to linux, the âbrowse networkâ worked flawless .
Iâve my problems with my LaCie Cloudbox as well. See my post here: How to mont a smb folder?
Furthermore, I cannot play Videos or Music from encrypted folder. With the non-encrypted folder does it work.
I suggest a RSS Feed reader as a preinstalled application preconfigured with Ubuntu Mate and Mate desktop RSS feeds
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I wouldnât mind having Liferea installed. But itâs not by any means an essential app. I donât think RSS feeds are as popular as they once were.
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You are absolute right Wimpey.
I was able to remove winbind (and its dependencies) and browse network shares.
I believe the problem was in between the chair and the keybord
Thanks
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I love VLC is included by default⊠it is been long overdue since a Distro packaged it by default instead of something like totem or mplayer.
I always have to install powertop with every new install. I know that Distros like to use FOSS but adding applications like Chrome and Skype really win with the casual user.
Especially since Netflix doesnât currently work with any browser other than Chrome.
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My suggestion is Gnome Disk Utility (or Mate Disk Utility if the fork is being maintained).
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@abrowne mate-disk-utility is on the roadmap for packaging
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Hi,
We should try to keep it minimal and simple. One app for one task.
1 web browser (firefox or chormium, not both), 1 media player (I personnaly use VLC for video and music), 1 text editor etc etc
I used #! for more than 2 years, all basics where covers (at my humble opinion), so even if you can download packages (no internet or small/costy bandwith), you can be able to use your computer to communicate and entertain yourself.
The lacks of codecs is a major disapointement in the ubuntu distribution. i fully understand their motives, so i preferred others distros (and because of unity too).
Ubuntu + Mate + VLC makes me happy already. I donât thnik this distribution needs more preinstalled applications.
However we can participate to choose the one we want (thanks for that Martin, i think it is not the case on main distro that mere users had voices in the applications choosing).
I like MATE for its lightness, if i wanted more option i will choose KDE. I guess we can pute mate related tweaks but we should avoid 2GB isos.
So for me no facehuggers like steam, netflix or skype. People want it, they can installed it. I used to take an usb stick in Africa with an install iso of linux mint and deb packages for the softwares i wanted.
This post lackes it, but, guys, K I S S is the keyâŠ
Great! I do computer repair, so I use it every day.
@Bakaniko I completely agree with 1 application per task. I will not be double dipping I suppose I was really asking, are the applications that are currently selected the right ones? I know that is somewhat subjective, but Iâm always interested in hearing about alternative optipns.
I would like to create an minimal variation of Ubuntu MATE that has some of the extra applications stripped out so the distro currators have a smaller base on which they can build.
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@Wimpy I guess you should make a poll at least for the web browser. It is an important part of the distro, certainly the most used software, and th first we used to get assistance.
And maybe people want IE on Ubuntu MATE 
For other softwares, you can decide by yourself or create a working group who has to propose a software list.
Iâm recently watching a lot of shows about free compagnies where decisions are made by employees. You can use it there if you want since it is an open source project.
Just give directions and let people work. For now, the ubuntu MATE is small enough to do that.
But doing that is really challenging, for the community and you since it is your project.
I guess groups can make propositions and you can validate or not those propositions.
Do you have considered this aspect of the project ?
some ressources:
http://www.escpeurope.eu/nc/fr/media-news/news-newsletter/news-single/article/new-book-freedom-inc-by-isaac-getz/
Some english speaking people to dig in:
Vineet Nayar : http://vineetnayar.com/
David Graeber: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Graeber
I had some difficulties to find english ressources, but there is some french ones:
http://www.arte.tv/guide/fr/051637-000/le-bonheur-au-travail
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N_4DzvRn-Qg
Iâm maybe out of subject, so i propose to make an other topic (in General or Development Discussions)
If you look back through the Ubuntu MATE history on G±, and here, youâll notice Iâve used polls to get the community direction on important âstuffâ. Ubuntu MATE is âourâ project.
As for browser choice, we can really only chose between Firefox and Chromium based on what is it the official repositories.
Yeah, i saw that. Iâm trying to be proactive a little too much I guess.