14 DAY TRIAL // Ubuntu users have complained for a long time when the old GNOME 2 was removed from the distribution, but not they have a reason to rejoice. It seems that the GNOME 2 fork MATE will be available in the official repositories for Ubuntu 14.04 LTS (Trusty Tahr).
The GNOME 2 project spawned the MATE fork and, although it’s possible to install it from third party sources, the MATE project will be available in the official repositories for Ubuntu 14.04 LTS.
Making the MATE 1.6 branch available for install will certainly get a lot more people on Ubuntu’s side. A lot of users are still unhappy with the Unity environment and they might find some solace in this GNOME 2 fork.
The entire MATE 1.6 project is not yet available, but it will arrive in full soon. We might be even able to test it before the official launch of Ubuntu 14.04 LTS in April.