Developer Ubuntu MATE team Working state Current | ||
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Initial release 23 October 2014; 2 years ago (2014-10-23) Latest release 16.10 / 13 October 2016; 5 months ago (2016-10-13) | ||
Ubuntu MATE is a free and open-source Linux distribution and an official derivative of Ubuntu. Its main differentiation from Ubuntu is that it uses the MATE desktop environment as its default user interface, based on GNOME 2 which was used for Ubuntu versions prior to 11.04, instead of the Unity graphical shell that is the default user interface for the Ubuntu desktop.
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History
The Ubuntu MATE project was founded by Martin Wimpress and Alan Pope and began as an unofficial derivative of Ubuntu, using an Ubuntu 14.10 base for its first release; a 14.04 LTS release followed shortly. As of February 2015, Ubuntu MATE gained the official Ubuntu flavour status from Canonical Ltd. as per the release of 15.04 Beta 1. In addition to IA-32 and x86-64 which were the initial supported platforms, Ubuntu MATE also supports PowerPC and ARMv7 (on the Raspberry Pi 2 and 3).
In April 2015, Ubuntu MATE announced a partnership with British computer reseller Entroware, enabling Entroware customers to purchase desktop and laptop computers with Ubuntu MATE preinstalled with full support. Several other hardware deals were announced later.
Reception
In a May 2016 review Jesse Smith of DistroWatch concluded, "despite my initial problems getting Ubuntu MATE installed and running smoothly, I came away with a positive view of the distribution. The project is providing a very friendly desktop experience that requires few hardware resources by modern standards. I also want to tip my hat to the default theme used on Ubuntu MATE."