Table of Contents

General:

• Information about DuckDuckGo

Gnome 3 / MGSE:

• Switch to a single top panel
• Switch to a black panel, menu and window list (like in the RC)
• Quickly preview files without opening them
• Restart Gnome Shell when needed
• Debug Gnome Shell (for developers or to troubleshoot)
• Run Gnome Shell in Virtualbox (for testers and reviewers)

MATE:

• Install MATE from the CD edition
• Workaround for a disappearing MATE panel
• Workaround for 100% CPU usage

General

Information about DuckDuckGo

To familiarize yourself with DuckDuckGo and understand why it's the default search engine in Linux Mint 12, please read this blog announcement.

Gnome 3 / MGSE

Switch to a single top panel

By default, Linux Mint 12 features a top and a bottom panel:



If you're used to a single top panel, you can remove the bottom panel and have the menu and window list placed at the top:



First, disable the bottom panel:

• From the menu, launch the "Advanced Settings" tool
• Select "Shell Extensions"
• Find "Bottom Panel Extension" and disable it

Then, restart Gnome Shell, for the menu and window list to reload:

• Press "Alt F2"
• Type "r" and press "Enter"

Switch to a black panel, menu and window list (like in the RC)

Linux Mint 12 features two new themes: Mint-Z and Mint-Z-Dark.

Mint-Z looks like previous Linux Mint releases. It comes with a grey menu, window list and bottom panel:



Mint-Z-Black looks like the RC release of Linux Mint 12 and features a black menu, window list and bottom panel.



To choose between them or to apply other themes:

• Launch the "Advanced Settings" tool from the menu
• Click on "Theme"
• Change the value for "Shell Theme" to the theme of your choice

Quickly preview files without opening them

Linux Mint 12 features "Sushi", a file previewer for Nautilus.

When you're browsing directories in the file manager, select a file and press the "space" key to preview it.

Sushi can preview all sorts of files and contents: Pictures, music, videos, documents, pdfs...etc.

Restart Gnome Shell when needed

Gnome 3, Gnome Shell and MGSE are brand new technologies. They will mature with time and gain in functionality and stability.

If Gnome starts to act slow, or if it crashes on you, be aware that you can restart it without closing your windows or logging out.

Simply do the following to restart Gnome Shell:

• Press "Alt F2"
• Type "r"
• Press "Enter"

Debug Gnome Shell (for developers or to troubleshoot)

If you want to debug Gnome Shell or run it from the console:

• Switch to the console using "Ctrl Alt F1"
• Type "w" to find your display (usually it's :0.0)
• Export your display (usually with "export DISPLAY=:0.0")
• Restart gnome shell from the console by typing "gnome-shell --replace"
• Go back to your display using "Ctrl Alt F7"

Run Gnome Shell in Virtualbox (for testers and reviewers)

Linux Mint 12 comes with the Virtualbox guest additions pre-installed, so it's possible to run the live session with Gnome Shell and MGSE.

Make sure to configure your virtual machine as follows:

• Go to Machine->Settings->Display
• Give the virtual machine as much Memory Video as possible.
• Tick the checkbox "Enable 3D Acceleration"

Without 3D acceleration your virtual session will run in Fallback mode. If your settings are correct it will run with Gnome Shell and MGSE.

MATE

Install MATE from the CD Edition

To install MATE simply install the package "mint-meta-mate".

Workaround for a disappearing MATE panel

Many themes aren't compatible with MATE yet. If the MATE panel doesn't appear when you log in, simply change the theme. The following themes are known to work well with MATE:

• Mint-Z-Mate
• Carbon

Workaround for 100% CPU usage

Many themes aren't compatible with MATE yet. If you find MATE anormally slow and your CPU reaches 100% very often, try to change the theme. The following themes are known to work well with MATE:

• Mint-Z-Mate
• Carbon