In my previous post, I mentioned [re] creating a “Kutiny” test version utilizing KDE on a cattle laptop installed from an Kubuntu ISO, to see how viable it could be as a Mate replacement while maintaining all of my workflow requirements.
I’ll repeat, I really didn’t want to go down this path having used Ubuntu Mate for many years (just before the very first LTS release). I’ve mentioned Ubuntu Mate to anyone I could, especially those playing with the idea of trying Linux for the first time (I think the desktop panel variations are revelation to new Linux users) and secretly used it everywhere I could back in my corporate IT days for tons of things that Windows couldn’t do. I’ve been a huge fan and promoter of this distro (outside of this website) until now.
With reservation but determination, I have since modified my main workstation (Timeshift backups in place) and installed KDE Plasma 5 on top of my existing MATE install. Very carefully and conservatively I removed everything that was Mate related that wasn’t strictly required. In other words, practically speaking, Mate is gone and I post this message from Plasma.
WARNING: Plasma uses SDDM and will mandate (initially) that you use KWallet for your system secrets, eg, SSH keys, account passwords, etc. The existing Gnome secrets integration won’t work.
You can disabled KWallet and use KeepassXC as a replacement for gnome-secrets/seahorse if you are careful not to nuke the required gnome stuff while cleaning up the Mate components. I already use KeepassXC so I set this up too and as of this post, its working just fine.
If you want to do this too, or just test another DE, do not believe the various online suggestions to purge the Mate metapackages in one swoop. This would likely destroy your existing keyring information and basically, everything, even if you install the new DE first. Your underlying Ubuntu OS is, obviously, still gnome based. A new DE will use that then add the independent bits on top.
Removing secrets is an extinction level event if you don’t have backups, mentally remember all the passphrases, can recall your GPG keys, etc. (or expect to recover from a purge command).
Removing the Mate metapackage is very dangerous advice for another key reason: Xorg will be removed and a ton of other integral packages that will break things, badly, in both Mate and likely KDE on top of Ubuntu. Remember, KDE is still using xorg/x11 too. Purging the Mate metapackage will remove it!
Always use --simulate in your commands so you can see what gets removed and what actually happens. “Two packages will be removed” vs seeing the hundreds that actually get deleted in the terminal!
FYI: There’s a high ranking Google search result pointing to Reddit discussing a lateral move between Mate and KDE and others and back. Be warned. The original install, as I read it, used the Gnome edition as the base install, not Ubuntu Mate. The user swaps DEs frequently and has a isolated /home folder in a separate partition. That should not apply to us if you installed directly as a flavor from the Ubuntu Mate ISO. I wished I had a separate /home partition but I don’t and if you are a more casual user, you probably have it on your main partition too.
Once you have KDE Plasma installed (or others of your choosing), you may remove the mate specific apps using grep to find them explicitly, then replace apps with whatever you need/use. Some of the KDE equivalents are tightly integrated, others are useless (looking at you Kwrite/Kate) and they must exist and should not/cannot be removed.
Then you can go in with a fine scalpel and remove the remaining legacy Mate stuff, that is safe to do so, down to the plymouth loading screen, indicators, etc. Backup, backup, backup and test between both before you really apt-get remove and/or purge (as you feel you need). I have a limited main SSD for the OS, so I don’t like keeping tons of cruft.
A few thoughts after a week…
First, I’m a little more than disappointed I felt the growing need to do this. Almost sad.
88 messages in this thread and nothing from Martin. Yes, Mate was originally for his parents, but the continued silence didn’t sit well with me. People are starting to talk about respin. No thanks. An LTS has a certain official and professional blessing with expectations for both the maintainers and the users. The longer I thought about it, the more I disliked it all. We’re not Solus users after-all, are we?
Martin is obviously a big name to us, and we look to him for leadership. Mate is his baby. He has provided the community here and elsewhere a ton of things over the years, not just Mate, and is very likable. I want my gratitude to him and anyone still here or out on Github who has made this flavor viable, and better over the years, transparent.
I actually met Martin at SCALE in Pasadena, CA, years back, along with Popey and even Shuttleworth himself. Exciting times. Even a phone back then.
But the Canonical connection died a long, long time ago but some messaging should have been done here, even if it was: “guys, I’ve moved on, we’re shutting down, please fork it“ or “guys please step up and well get this going again, here’s the emergency checklist” or “guys, the new project will bring a new imagining of Mate.” Haven’t seen such messages?
The AI “revolution,” when reviewed carefully, does make even noobs more able to help out. Not without reservations or issues in the pipeline, but that doesn’t seem to be wanted either?
At, minimum someone (even donated) is paying for hosting here and they too have an expectation of communication. Relay it to the community, an end date, a migration…something?
Related: I know KDE supposedly missed the LTS deadline too from the news sources for 26.04 along with Mate, but I believe this will be updated moving forward as our distro did at least once before. If they don’t, well, I’m still sticking to ESM/Ubuntu Pro until circa 2032ish either way for 24.04: nothing gained, nothing lost.
Frankly, I just don’t see really see Mate getting through the X11-to-Wayland transition regardless, until someone else fixes the remaining, big breaking issues and those are hoovered up, if they are. I need remote desktop to work; I don’t care how it does. I need existing workflows to work; I don’t care how under the hood. And I need security and that means LTS.
Mate might come back to life once the heavy lifting is done and everything can be easily automated again as we have seen over the years with a few tweaks here and there, shims and the occasional regression or replacement package. That’s not really a viable model, less so with a single developer.
And to hell with all this Gnome GTK4 hidden menu, touch first UI, don’t-theme-my-app, we-know-better-than-you-for-your-PC ■■■■■■■■. I’m not wasting literal hours per year clicking through hidden menus while melting my eyes with the power of the Sun coming from my 42” screen. Do I dream of true Convergence, sure. But not at the expense of normalcy. #rant
Secondly, speed. Turn off animation within Appearance settings and KDE is just as fast as Mate but per your machine spec, YMMV.
Third, there’s a ton more customization. I’ve recreated the Mutiny layout but everything is tighter, slicker, looks better, modern and the DE has an easy way to apply themes back to GTK apps separately from QT themes, straight from the System Settings, in basically three clicks. Discover is the app store we all needed but didn’t know existed.
Fourth, Plasmoids are superior to applets. Ah, the little things!
My weather now uses WUnderground for hyper local weather vs the old stuff (I used a 3rd party vs Mate’s version because reasons). I was able to remove a ton of crusty 3rd-party indicators on top of that. The mate-dock panel (the “newer” alternatives really sucked) doesn’t crash every click anymore and things don’t randomly fail and I’ve been able to remove a lot of flatpak and snaps, restoring deb installs that would freak out the Mate DE panels. Less disparate system of systems.
Caveat: I did sorely miss Mate’s Alt-F2 launcher (Krunner is ok but visually tiny and top aligned by default) so I replaced it with Albert which is distro agnostic. Brisk was replaced in using KLaunch dash along with Simple Application Launcher for the old style list menu (though it does not follow the mouse location, sadly). Plasma-hud replaced mate-hud and works much better with the global menu equivalent + debs.
Fifth, there’s a ton of small things that are just better, faster, integrated, etc. Find them yourself such as improved window snapping, more options for custom commands, keyboard shortcuts, toggles, etc. Its like the DE is for more professional adulting vs. an old tired, basement project.
Conclusion: I’m satisfied with the jump (not to convey that I’m happy about it). I tested my work flow for about a week before gutting the Mate stuff, but so far everything is now in place. I could have probably done this in a single day if I was aggressive about it, or for those who can just nuke with a Kubuntu ISO install (likely better for upgrading without issues in the future) in a few hours to tweak everything back to what you had with Mate. Don’t sleep on it.
I mentioned before that my other tech also runs Mate. Self-hosted stuff. Those will stay on Mate 24.04 as long as possible with ESM support. I don’t see transitioning them as they are only touched if there’s a problem and the DE isn’t used unless required for easier troubleshooting.
I want to close this post (its long, sorry) that I believed in the Mate distro for a long time and championed it often but without some great invigoration by an actual team, I think I have, sadly and with some bitter-sweetness, moved on(?).