Ubuntu MATE For Linux

Ubuntu MATE Is one of the most popular and well-established Ubuntu official flavors and there's really no denying the fact that it offers a unique experience.

Ubuntu MATE 23.10 (Mantic Minotaur) is an interim release and, unsurprisingly, is based on Ubuntu 23.10 release. It comes with a series of small updates and improvements, including some new AI-generated wallpapers.

According to the Release Notes section, the main goal of this release is improving stability, which is exactly how things should be considering that we're going to get a brand new LTS release in a couple of months.

The changes include a new version of the famous MATE Desktop (1.26.2), as well as updates to caja-rename (23.10.1-1), libmatemixer (1.26.0-2), mate-notification-daemon (1.26.1-1), mate-system-monitor 1.26.0-5, mate-session-manager (1.26.1-2), mate-user-guide (1.26.2-1), and mate-utils (1.26.1-1).

Ubuntu MATE is all about providing users with a unique desktop experience (via the MATE component, of course) on top of the current Ubuntu release. Hence, Ubuntu MATE 23.10 uses the Linux Kernel 6.5, Firefox 118, Celluloid 0.25, Evolution 3.50, and LibreOffice 7.6.1.

As far as the wallpaper is concerned, just know that this particular new wallpaper is brought to us by Simon Butcher (the Head of Research Platforms at Queen Mary University of London).

Ubuntu MATE 23.10 Mantic Minotaur might seem a bit underwhelming, and truth be told, it somewhat is. There were a lot more chances and tweaks in the previous release (23.04), but that's not to say that this new version is not a good release.

Ubuntu MATE 23.10 is a very good preview of what's to come in 24.04 LTS, and despite not having the biggest list of chances, it totally hits the mark when it comes to stability and usability.