In Linux Mint’s Monthly Report you can read that QA testing for Linux Mint 21 Beta started this weekend. A beta version of the distribution based on Ubuntu 22.04 LTS is to be released next week.

Information about Linux Mint 21 Vanessa

As already mentioned, Linux Mint 21 is based on the current LTS version of Ubuntu, i.e. Jammy Jellyfish .

After receiving negative feedback on systemd-oom , the development team decided not to include it in three distributions.

I’m pleased that the option to encrypt the home directory is still available in the installer.

The os-prober tool is also still enabled by default to enable correct dual boot detection.

The xviewer and thumbnailer tools have received webp support.

It has long been known that Blueman (2.3) will replace the previously used Blueberry for Bluetooth matters. I’ve even used Blueman in Linux Mint 20 because it’s more complex but really better.

In rsync mode, Timeshift now calculates the required storage space for the next snapshot. If the execution results in less than 1 GB of free disk space available, the tool will skip the snapshot.

Check automatic updates

On June 21 at 3pm, mintupdate 5.8.3 was released. The update tool contained only two changes:

  • Removing files that are no longer needed
  • An update of the debhelper package from 9 to 10.

A few hours later, a user reported a bug that his previously automatic updates were now activated. The update to debhelper 10 was apparently to blame for this circumstance.

Afterwards, the debhelper version was quickly rolled back to 9 and mintupdate 5.8.4 was released on the same day. So Mintupdate 5.8.3 was only available for about 6 hours. But if you have imported it, your automatic updates are activated.

In Update management > View > Update history you can check whether you have received the update or not.

You can also check whether automatic updates are activated or not via Update management > Edit > Settings > Automation .

At Mint 21, mintupdate 5.8.5 will no longer solely rely on systemd/timer services. The team was surprised at the impact of such a seemingly small change. That’s why the team wants to rely as little as possible on frameworks like systemd or debhelper in the future.

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