Webopedia Term of the Day: What is Cinnamon?

Written By
Web Webster
Web Webster
Jan 23, 2012

“A desktop graphics environment for Linux and other Unix-like
operating systems. Cinnamon is a fork of the GNOME 3 desktop
environment that features a traditional layout similar to GNOME 2
but with GNOME 3’s more modern technology and newer features. The
mission of Cinnamon is to provide users with an “easy to use and
comfortable desktop experience” while also staying current with the
latest technology and capabilities.

“Cinnamon was developed by Clement Lefebvre, who also created
and continues to develop the Linux Mint distribution of Linux.
Linux Mint has also partnered on development of a somewhat
similarly focused GNOME-based desktop environment known as MATE.
But while MATE is built on a GNOME 2 foundation, only the desktop
layout of Cinnamon is similar to GNOME 2 — the underlying
technology for Cinnamon is based on GNOME 3.

“Cinnamon can be installed in Linux Mint and operate alongside
the GNOME 2-based MATE desktop environment as well as GNOME 3 with
Mint GNOME Shell Extensions (MGSE), a set of desktop layer
components developed by Linux Mint that sits on top of GNOME
3.”

Complete
Story

Web Webster

Web Webster

Web Webster has more than 20 years of writing and editorial experience in the tech sector. He’s written and edited news, demand generation, user-focused, and thought leadership content for business software solutions, consumer tech, and Linux Today, he edits and writes for a portfolio of tech industry news and analysis websites including webopedia.com, and DatabaseJournal.com.

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