Clem Lefebvre, head of the Linux Mint venture, has revealed the names of the upcoming Linux Mint 22.2 and LMDE 7. Linux Mint 22.2, which is due for launch round July, might be referred to as Zara, whereas LMDE 7, which is due round June, might be referred to as Gigi and based mostly on Debian 13.

Along with these codenames, Lefebvre additionally introduced that the Mint-Y theme, which is utilized by default, has obtained an ever so slight shade change to suit with trendy design rules. The sunshine theme has had the blue elevated to make it look extra metallic and trendy. The elevated blue makes it look extra chilly, somewhat than the impartial that you simply get from commonplace grey.

Lefebvre additionally stated that libAdwaita, utilized in Flatpak functions, has additionally not too long ago made the colour shift so issues ought to look a bit extra uniform. Total, these shade adjustments make the themes look extra trendy and the darkish theme and Cinnamon components are “softer and far nicer wanting”.

On the themes entrance, a small change has been made to one thing referred to as the XDG Desktop Portal XApp. The change implies that Flatpak apps that use libAdwaita can now use the accent shade you’ve set in Linux Mint, making apps mix into your desktop higher.

Lastly, Lefebvre stated some efforts have been taken to try to make libAdwaita apps work higher with Linux Mint. These apps are designed for GNOME and don’t play nicely in any respect with different desktop environments like Cinnamon, MATE, and Xfce which Mint presents.

To attempt to make them work higher, the Mint crew has up to date its Mint-Y and Mint-X themes to align extra with libAdwaita’s colours and it has modified libAdwaita itself to not implement its personal stylesheet and respect the system theme. This method has proven good outcomes when examined with GNOME Calendar, GNOME Characters, and Foliate.

With this stated, the Mint crew nonetheless desires a sustainable resolution long run. It may proceed to patch libAdwaita, create an XApp platform library like libAdwaita however for wider desktop assist, or fork functions, however the crew isn’t eager on this final choice because it’s seen as needlessly duplicating apps.