I am an avid Mate user. … I prefer Debian Mate, but that is off point.
I view the Mate Website and I don’t find any Basic User Guide… ( https://mate-desktop.org/ )
many folks try Mate and (depending on the distro) think Mate is the same as Cinnamon or something else (first impressions) and don’t realize the power and functionality… they just think Mate is “lightweight” for old low resource computers.
Sorry, probably preaching to the choir.
We Mate enthusiasts need to step up to the plate and get some Basic How To Guides going to help out the developers.
This is the only site I have found that appears to be Mate Specific… so I am jumping in. Forgive me if I am being redundant … noobs are like that
Hi mexsudo, I can’t make any promises, but I am more of a writer than a coder (doing BizTalk as work and having obtained an English degree). What would you like to see most in documentation? A bit of marketing as well or plain information?
To my point of view We need some beginner user guide of some sort, and get it on the Mate website.
Simple examples of the panel(s), and how to arrange them.
Examples of the add-ons to the panels, and how to configure them.
Menus: including Brisk we now have Four… noobs to Mate are usually unaware.
A web page type setup with snapshots is my vision.
I have search high and low, but little is to be found on the web.
Most of what I know now is just from my long use of Gnome2 and now Mate.
I hate to evangelize, but I hate to see Mate dismissed as “Cinnamon Lite” even more.
Many years ago I could author simple web pages, but that world has passed me by.
PS: the Mate developers have a great start at the nuts and bolts already, but we need something more Basic, for the noobs.
On thing Mate is not is “cinnamon Lite”. In terms of customization is it far superior to Cinnamon in my opinion. And, for me, customisability is everything. I just can;t stand it when devs start to make workflow and aesthetic choices for me.
I agree with Cinnamon being vastly different. If there are 3-4 beginner guides already, it’ll be difficult to improve them. Maybe add the viewpoint how MATE has reinvigorated Gnome two? I liked Xfce a bit more in the past, but Mate has made me a convert.
Like i did have a conversation with @vkareh. The Mate documentation is old. (Especially when we see xubuntu documentation that is top notch). We need users that have the time to update and improve all the documentation available on this site. I like these types of conversations so let’s keep the ball rolling.
I signed up on Transifex for translation work, but I’ve been quite busy for the last month couple of months with my thesis work and exams. I started translating though… I hope to finish that in a day or two…
Regarding the documentation, can you explain how I can contribute?
monsta made a comment “I agree - we need documentation/help maintainers.”
we have package mate-user-guide “User documentation for MATE Desktop Environment”
that documentation is not readily available… I can’t find it in the menus
the common Users should be able to provide some input and enhance whatever is out there
@mexsudo I really understand your desire regarding a guide to Mate Desktop.
Personally I think Mate Desktop is easy to use, and easy for default customization.
Is not like KDE, But even if I switch to KDE, witch is really bloated, and settings are messy, I manage to find the settings looking around desktop.
You just remember me a long time ago when I buy a 1000 page book on how to use windows 95. I think those days has pass.
Look even an Android Phone this days does not come wit an Android Guide (or maybe I am wrong), and When I buy one a long time ago for the first time, I simply look for tips on internet regarding my specific need for use or customization, sometimes I find new things on PC or phone even now and even without a book.
A guide will be nice, but will be good if will be more like a Reference Manual than a getting started one, at list for me that I use PC-s for a long time ago. Maybe for children's a getting Started one will be good.
The wiki exists, but the server has some issues that need to be addressed before it can be made functional again, unfortunately...
Regarding a guide, each MATE application has their own help guide (easily accessible by pressing F1), and we also have this website here, which serves as a repository of collective knowledge.
Unfortunately, documentation is one of those things that are really hard to do, and is a very thankless job, so we don't have a queue of volunteers contributing to an "official" guide. Although there's actually a guide for purchase at https://ubuntu-mate.boutique/
In my opinion, a combination of the F1 help and this website cover most of what 80% of users would need out of MATE.
We're still figuring out some DNS issues to give it back its proper URL, but this should be usable for the time being. We've moved the entire thing to using GitHub pages, which also saves us the headaches of running our own server for it.
@mexsudo, as the author of that guide, I can provide you with a copy at no charge if you would like to read through it. It is also licensed under Creative Commons so that you are free to use any portion of it with a simple attribution. I'd also be up to authoring or helping to author a similar guide for MATE. If you have any questions, would like a copy of the Ubuntu MATE guide,
or would like to pursue this further, please let me know.
what kind of docs?