Linux Mint with Cinnamon

After days of using gnome3, I felt it was missing something. I’m not going to write here what was lacking in gnome3, instead where I turned for salvation.

Cinnamon - alternative Desktop Environment for Gnome Shell

Cinnamon is created by Clement Lefebvre, the Linux Mint founder and lead developer. It is a fork of Gnome Shell, but with the look and feel, and even the functionality of Gnome 2. The focus of Cinnamon is to make the users “feel at home with an easy to use and comfortable desktop experience“. After trying it out, I am pretty sure it has achieved its aim.

Installation

The cinnamon package is already available in the Ubuntu/Linux Mint repo. If you are already using Linux Mint, you can easily install it via the command:

sudo apt-get install cinnamon

In Ubuntu, you will have to add the PPA before you can install:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:gwendal-lebihan-dev/cinnamon-stable sudo apt-get update sudo apt-get install cinnamon

This is not how I installed cinnamon. I did a fresh install of Linux Mint with cinnamon as the default desktop environment.

And my experience?

I’m more than satisfied. It combines what was best in gnome 2 and added few cool features from gnome 3.

Coolest feature I loved in Cinnamon?

Cinnamon settings - It provides sufficient capabilities to modify the settings without installing a third-party tool like gnome-tweak tool.

What I hated?

No matter what themes I try, the folders were always green. There were traces of green here and there as I was using Linux Mint.

Solution?

Install a new icon theme. I found Faenza icon theme really good.

Installation: