Cinnamon on Mantis openSUSE 12.2 GNOME 3.4.2

 Cinnamon is the holy Mecca for all GNOME 2.X desktop users, enthusiasts and fanatics. It provides classic GNOME desktop experience on GNOME 3.X series. It is essentially a GNOME 3.X desktop under the hood and is a fusion of best of both worlds. The advantages of Cinnamon are:-

• Modern desktop under the hood and has support for latest hardware.
• Can run all modern apps designed using GTK3.
• It evokes nostalgia when used by traditional / old school GNOME users.

 Cinnamon desktop essentially brings back the following features to the GNOME 3.X desktop:-

• The familiar panels from GNOME 2.X which are highly customizable.
• The GNOME 2.X desktop icons.
• The applets which literally live on the panel and make user's life comfy.
• The GNOME 2.X applications menu / places menu which really made GNOME a popular desktop.
• The familiar notification tray.
• The useful "show desktop" icon is reinstate on the panel.
• We get the older version of Alt+Tab back.

 The last time I reviewed Cinnamon desktop was when it was newly introduced for openSUSE 12.1 / GNOME 3.2.1. It was fresh and piping hot. Now it is time again to review the Cinnamon desktop as Mantis, openSUSE 12.2, GNOME 3.4.2 was released recently.

Install Cinnamon
Things to do before install:-

• Take a look at this post to configure the necessary multimedia support, install required software and perform carious configurations etc.
• Create a new user profile for Cinnamon and use this new profile so that if something goes wrong it will be easy to set things right. This post should help you in creating a new user.

Installation Process
 First we press Alt+F2 to open command launcher. Here we type in "gnome-terminal" and press return or enter key. This will open the terminal. To install Cinnamon desktop we need to follow the following steps:-

•  Add Cinnamon repository to software repository list. To do this you can use the command "sudo zypper ar http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/X11:/Cinnamon:/GNOME34/12.2/X11:Cinnamon:GNOME34.repo" in terminal. The terminal output will be as shown below.
  mantis@linux-4cu3:~> sudo zypper ar http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/X11:/Cinnamon:/GNOME34/12.2/X11:Cinnamon:GNOME34.repo
root's password:
Adding repository 'X11:Cinnamon:GNOME34 (12.2)' ..........................[done]
...
URI: http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/X11:/Cinnamon:/GNOME34/12.2/
• Refresh the meta-data for all repositories. To do this we can use the command "sudo zypper ref" in terminal. The terminal output will be as shown below:-
  mantis@linux-4cu3:~> sudo zypper ref
Retrieving repository 'X11:Cinnamon:GNOME34 (12.2)' metadata .............[done]
...
Repository 'openSUSE-12.2-Update-Non-Oss' is up to date.
Retrieving repository 'rpms' metadata ....................................[done]
All repositories have been refreshed.
• Invoke Cinnamon Installation. To do this we need to use the command "sudo zypper in cinnamon" in terminal. The terminal output will be as shown below:-
  mantis@linux-4cu3:~> sudo zypper in cinnamon
Loading repository data...
Reading installed packages...
Resolving package dependencies...
The following NEW packages are going to be installed:
  cinnamon cinnamon-browser-plugins cinnamon-menu-editor libjpeg8 libmuffin0
...
Installing: cinnamon-1.6.1-1.1 ...........................................[done]
Installing: cinnamon-menu-editor-1.6.1-1.1 ...............................[done]

Logging into Cinnamon
 To Login correctly into Cinnamon desktop one must choose  "Cinnamon" session in the Login screen. To know more about it you can take a look at this this post under sub heading "Logging into user account".

Cinnamon Overview
 True to its nature after we login into a freshly installed Cinnamon with a new profile we get a desktop with no icons.

 The Alt+Tab problem is fixed. No more "Alt+Tab" and then "Alt+~". All you every need to press is Alt+Tab. You need to switch between three nautilus windows! No problem at all!

  After opening the "gnome-tweak-tool" and Turning ON the "Nautilus managed desktop" option we get the desktop icons back.

  The Cinnamon menu resembles the older GNOME menu but it is more advanced than the old one. It has a favourites bar on the left hand side and all the menu options are displayed on the right . The applications are divided into multiple categories. The menu can be launched using the key combination Alt+F1.

 The search feature in the menu saves a lot of time when locating a specific application in the menu. One can type mplayer in the search tool and locate the mplayer based client "gnome-mplayer" as shown below.

 The Cinnamon desktop features a cool dock like tool which sits near the notification area on the right edge of the panel. This dock shows all the open applications and one can switch between applications using this tool.

 Once you right click on the panel it will bring up the "Panel Settings". In addition it will bring up the Troubleshooting menu which has options to "Restart Cinnamon", open "Looking Glass", "Restore Settings". The restore settings menu essentially resets all the modifications done to he desktop including theme changes and hence must be used carefully. This right click menu also shows the settings for applets, themes and  menu items editor.

The panel is cool once more. The below image shows the date and calendar on the panel.

 The panel features a applet which shows the list of mounted flash drives. It makes managing the flash drives a lot easier.

 There are a large number of applets available by default and the below picture shows the panel loaded with various applets. Some of the applets seen are workspace indicator, Accessibility, Monitor Display settings, Recent files opener etc:

 The "Cinnamon Settings" tool is probably the most comprehensive collection of tools on the Cinnamon desktop. It is cool as well as functional. It has many applets which are used to set Desktop Effects, Change Themes, Manage Extensions, Change Backgrounds etc: This tool can be accessed by right clicking on the bottom panel.

 There are two types of hot Corner based switchers available in Cinnamon. The type of switcher can be changed using "Hot Corner" tool in "Cinnamon Settings". The two switchers are:-

• Scale(Application Window selector)
• Expo(Workspace selector)

Screenshot of Application Window selector

Screenshot of Workspace selector

openSUSE-Education Li-f-e 12.2 edition too cool

 openSUSE Edu Li-f-e 12.2 is a spin off ISO based on openSUSE mantis. Unlike the original ISO the Education Life ISO is a highly polished bit of distribution. As the name suggests it is tailored to cater to the needs of your everyday life. It also has a bunch of educational software bundled in it. After installing the Linuz you need not bother about installation of OSS and Non-OSS software etc. I have never tried out openSUSE Edu Li-f-e before but now that i have taken it for a spin it is amazing. openSUSE-Education Li-f-e 12.2 edition is too cool to miss. It openSUSE on steroids.

• It has KDE, GNOME and Cinnamon too.
• It has all the required multimedia codecs pre installed. It runs almost all the restricted formats(mp3s, mp4s, flvs..). No more multimedia related tweaks :-)
• It has almost all the applications that you will need on a day to day basis.

There are multiple options available to download the ISOs

• You can download them directly from this url
• You can download using torrent clients using this torrent file.
• You can download using metalink(fast download using multiple mirrors) using this link or this link using a Firefox / Seamonkey browser Add-on called DownThemAll!

 For more information about openSUSE-Education Li-f-e distribution and creating live USB stick check out the following links:

• Portal:Education
• openSUSE:Education-Li-f-e
• SDB:Live USB stick

openSUSE-Education Li-f-e 12.2 KDE desktop

openSUSE-Education Li-f-e 12.2 Cinnamon desktop

openSUSE-Education Li-f-e 12.2 GNOME 3.4.2 desktop

 openSUSE-Education Li-f-e 12.2 Educational Software
 There are wide range of Educational software that come bundled in the ISO like Avogadro (molecule editor), klavaro (Typing tutor), Kanagram(Anagram game), Stellarium (Astronomical simulator)

 openSUSE-Education Li-f-e 12.2 Games Software
 There are the usual set of Games packaged with any other openSUSE version like gbrainy(favourite), chess, Freecell

 openSUSE-Education Li-f-e 12.2 Graphics Software
  If you into editing images and stuff then you are in luck as you have a whole gamut of software pre installed namely Inkscape, Blender, Gimp, sk1(vector graphics similar to CorelDRAW). For amateurish work you can use mtpaint and mypaint.

openSUSE-Education Li-f-e 12.2 Internet Software
 You have Browsers (Konqueror, Firefox), Soft Phone (Ekiga), Chat clients (Empathy, Kopete, Konversation, Pidgin), Mail clients (Claws, Evolution, Kmail), RSS / News clients (Akregator, Liferea) ,Torrent clients (Ktorrent, Tarnsmission), Twitter Client(Choqok),FTP client(gFTP) etc installed under internet related software category.

openSUSE-Education Li-f-e 12.2 Office Applications
 You the LibreOffice package installed as well as alternative Office software such as Abiword and Gnumeric installed. In addition you also get ultra cool Stardict(dictionary), GnuCash(Financial tool) and FBReader (e-book reader)

 openSUSE-Education Li-f-e 12.2 Programming Applications
 The Bywater BASIC Interpreter (bwBASIC) brought back fond memories of writing simple programs in basic language which is considered to be the best language to start off with. BlueJ which happens to be a Java IDE with with inbuilt "Class Diagram" editor was pretty functional and novel.I liked BlueJ as it could automatically draw Class Diagrams as we develop the project which is pretty cool and it is quite light weight too. You also have other IDEs like KDevelop4, MonoDevelop installed.

BlueJ in action

bwBASIC in action

openSUSE-Education Li-f-e 12.2 Sound &Video Applications
 As i have mentioned earlier the distribution supports all restricted formats. It has VLC, GM MPLAYER, Totem, Kaffeine as the video players. The audio players / music managers consist of Amarok, Banshee and Audacious. Hydrogen Drum machine is simply mind blowing and very easily to use. I randomly whipped up something and viola it turned into cool music.

openSUSE-Education Li-f-e 12.2 System Tools & Others
 The distribution comes with Htop pre-installed which is very good thinking on part of the developers. The GSEBLinux application is a cool Linux guide for newbies. Disks or palimpsest is a pretty good disk management utility. The distribution comes preinstalled with wine which saves time installing it.Using Dosbox you can play all your favourite DOS games

 Wine and Dosbox

Post banner created using text from fsymbols.com and GIMP

Cinnamon Bread oops Cinnamon Desktop is piping hot

Brief
  This post is an overview of cinnamon desktop of mint origin on openSUSE12.1 and GNOME 3.2.1.Cinnamon works more like a GNOME 2 emulator for GNOME 3 . What I meant is , Cinnamon still uses shell but the interface is closer to GNOME 2 . Those who have been baying for GNOME shell blood please switch to Cinnamon . No more GNOME 3 hate clubs . Those who use fallback mode intentionally due to dislike for shell interface can switch to cinnamon.

Install Cinnamon
You need to have openSUSE 12.1 / GNOME 3.2.1 installed on your system so that you can install Cinnamon on top of it.
Step 1:-
open terminal and add the repositories and refresh them.Type in the admin passcode when prompted
sudo zypper ar http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/home:/cyberorg:/cinnamon/openSUSE_12.1/home:cyberorg:cinnamon.repo
sudo zypper ar http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/GNOME:/Cinnamon/12.1/GNOME:Cinnamon.repo
sudo zypper refresh
Step 2:- 
open YaST and install all the packages in both the repositories.
Step 3:-
Finally use the option "Switch installed packages to the versions in this repository" against the first repository listed above
Important Note:-I had to use this weird approach to install as Cinnamon is not fully openSUSE12.1 integrated as i write this post.You can ignore adding first repo once Cinnamon becomes stable on openSUSE12.1

How To Use Cinnamon

After installing cinnamon you can switch to cinnamon desktop using the desktop switcher.

Standard Cinnamon Desktop

What Can You expect in Cinnamon?

Weather Extension

==>You can get all the weather updates you need on GNOME 3 desktop now thanks to the weather applet.
==>You need to find the "Where On Earth Code" first for you city or town.
To get your woeid you need to search for the weather update at weather.com and then copy / extract the code from address address bar of your browser.The following image shows how to do it for a particular city

Alternatively you can also get woeid here
==>Set the woeid using dconf-editor.To do this type in Alt+F2 and in the quick launch window type in "dconf-editor" and then hit return,this will open dconf-editor .Navigate to org==>Cinnamon==>extensions==>weather and there set the woeid

Set woeid through dconf-editor

Screenshot of Weather Extension

The GNOME 3 style Window Switcher is retained 

Application Menu like GNOME 2.X

Application Menu supports application search too

cinnamon-settings

All settings can be controlled through either "gnome-tweak-tool" or "cinnamon-settings". Both can be launched through use of these commands in Alt+F2 quick launch application window.

gnome-tweak-tool
This tool is greatly useful to switch "on" the various extensions and apply themes in Cinnamon desktop.Chocolate theme applied through gnome-tweak-tool

Return Of the Classic shutdown menu

Citation :- GNOME_Cinnamon