Would be there a version of Ubuntu Mate for Raspberry pi 2

Hi, just yesterday appear Raspberry pi 2. This could suport Ubuntu Mate 14.04. Will be there a version for Raspbery, or this desktop version work well on this new device?

So far there is no release of Ubuntu MATE for ARM (the chip used in the Raspberries) so it isn’t available at this point. Not that it isn’t doable (and it might not be a bad idea consider the 2) but @Wimpy seems like a pretty busy guy as it is.

I remember reading an article a while back on running MATE on a Raspberry Pi with Arch Linux ARM as the base. The results were quite impressive considering that MATE does not make any compromise with respect to the choice of applications installed by default, unlike LXDE where lightweight alternatives ( web browser, office suite etc.) are preferred.

Edit:
@Wimpy mentions running MATE on a Raspberry Pi in this blog post. I guess he might have also used Arch?

I would like to get PowerPC support in 15.04 and at least one ARM platform in 15.10. If anyone wants to help with ARM stuff just dive in :smiley:

I did the work to bring MATE to Arch Linux ARM and run MATE on an Pi and Lapdock at home.

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I would love to help out with the porting to ARM :smile:
However, although I have used a lot of ARM boards (Raspberry Pi, Beagleboard, Udoo etc), I don’t have any experience of developing for the platform. It would be great if you could point me to a good starting point.

I bought my new Rpi yesterday and was actually wondering how it would go running Mate. Looking forward to trying!

Planning on buying one come pay day this week and experiment as it would be awesome. Quad-core 900mhz here I come :smiley:

Please tell me how did you install MATE on your Rasperry Pi… The same steps like with Raspian file, but with Ubuntu Mate ISO file?..

What PI did you used? The new PI2? Or an older one?

@Mihai_Buhaiciuc the Raspberry Pi has an ARM processor like what you find in small electronics, phones, and tablets. The Ubuntu Mate ISO is intended for an x86 processor like what you see in laptops and desktops. The architecture is different, so it will not work.

Further, the old Raspberry Pi was ARM 6 and the Raspberry Pi 2 is ARM 7. That’s a big enough difference that the image you use for one will not work for the other unless you’re using Raspbian. This is why the options you see at http://www.raspberrypi.org/downloads/ seem to have changed over night. The old Ubuntu image for ARM 6 was replaced by snappy core because snappy core is what can be used with ARM 7. Likewise some of the old options like ARCH are temporarily missing from that page.

If one wants to get Ubuntu MATE onto the rpi2, then it would probably need to work with the new and interesting snappy core, which could potentially be a really great thing.

I’m not totally sure, but for a while the difference between the Raspberry Pi and Banana Pi was that the former was ARM 6 and slow while the latter was ARM 7 and faster. Now that both are ARM 7, maybe some of the advances found here could be modified and used: http://www.bananapi.com/index.php/download?layout=edit&id=29

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I did some initial research last night and concluded I would like to add support for Ubuntu MATE 15.10 on the following armv7hf platforms:

  • ODROID C1
  • Raspberry Pi 2

I know there are hundreds of other boards available but the advantage of the two above is they are inexpensive, both retailing for $35.

If anyone has experience with building armv7hf images for Debian or Ubuntu then please get in touch. You’ll want to base any initial research on Ubuntu 15.04 since most of what you’ll need is in the official archive with my settings and artwork packages from the PPA being architecture independent.

The only ARM work I have done in the past has been with Arch Linux so I would appreciate some assistance. Personally, I won’t have time to research this seriously until the 15.10 cycle starts, so feel free to make a head start.

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Happy to test and help out where I can. My Raspberry Pi 2 literally arrived today!

Excellent choices. No idea how to help, but I will try to run them for sure.

Hi,
I participated on the conversation on G+.
I’m ready to help, mostly as user/Betatester on Odroid C1 (or raspberry pi B+).
As I said on G+, i really like the Odroid C1 and Mate, and Lubuntu works fine on the odroid, so trying to put these things together is quite an adventure for me.
I’m not a develloper, but i can follow instructions and it might help me to have a better understanding of GNU/Linux systems.
I’m able to produce an image and to upload it.

I tried earlier some commands from this site:
http://wiki.mate-desktop.org/download
after adding repos and updating/upgrading the packages; i tried this:

~$ sudo apt-get install ubuntu-mate-core ubuntu-mate-desktop
[sudo] password for odroid:
Reading package lists… Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information… Done
E: Unable to locate package ubuntu-mate-core
E: Unable to locate package ubuntu-mate-desktop

So i tried this:

sudo apt-get install mate-desktop-environment-extrasReading package lists… Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information… Done
Some packages could not be installed. This may mean that you have
requested an impossible situation or if you are using the unstable
distribution that some required packages have not yet been created
or been moved out of Incoming.
The following information may help to resolve the situation:

The following packages have unmet dependencies:
mate-desktop-environment-extras : Depends: mate-desktop-environment (= 1.8.0+7~ppa1~trusty1) but it is not going to be installed
Recommends: caja-gksu (>= 1.8.0) but it is not installable
Recommends: caja-image-converter (>= 1.8.0) but it is not installable
Recommends: caja-open-terminal (>= 1.8.0) but it is not installable
Recommends: caja-sendto (>= 1.8.0) but it is not installable
Recommends: mate-netspeed (>= 1.8.0) but it is not installable
Recommends: mate-gnome-main-menu-applet (>= 1.8.0) but it is not installable
Recommends: mozo (>= 1.8.0) but it is not going to be installed
Recommends: caja-share (>= 1.8.0) but it is not installable
Recommends: mate-user-share (>= 1.8.0) but it is not installable
Recommends: mate-sensors-applet (>= 1.8.0) but it is not installable
E: Unable to correct problems, you have held broken packages.

I guess there is no packages for arm yet. Can i help to make them or at least test them ?

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I have an ODROID XU3 running MATE Desktop on Ubuntu 14.10, works straight out of the box. I just upgraded it from Ubuntu 14.04 and selected the MATE Desktop Environment plus some other MATE goodies using synaptic package manager.

Trying the same trick now on a ODROID C1, first attempt to upgrade to U 14.10 failed, so trying again.

HardKernel steadfastly refuse to support above U 14.04, which might mean the end of using the C1 for me and a lot of other people who need to run java based programs and also software rendered OpenGL which 14.10 does well.

Installing MATE on U 14.04 fails due to some packages being 1.6 and others 1.8, U 14.10 is all 1.8 and works well.

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I’ve requested armhf support be enabled on my PPAs, this should help achieve 14.04 support on ARM :slight_smile:

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So Raspberry Pi 2 got an Ubuntu 14.10 image compiled for armv7h :smiley:

Hi,
I’m struggling to understand what we can do to port ubuntu mate on Raspi2 or odroid c1.
Is a arm ppa enough ?
How can we help to build packages ?

Just to say we are with you, but we need some guidance.

Thanks

Everything in the official archive is also compiled for armhf. So, the basic ingredients are there :smiley:

Mine has not yet arrived, but what would be the big differences between an Ubuntu Mate distro for the rpi2 and just using the ubuntu snappy core and loading the mate desktop?