Migrating from LMDE 2 MATE to Sparky "rolling" 5.5 MATE -- any suggestions?

[Bill Statler]

Okay, I'll just leave a few more random tips, and call this done.

Next puzzle to solve: Why is MATE Terminal ignoring my ~/.profile file?

User error.  I confused ~/.profile with ~/.bashrc.

Tools for identifying and fixing MATE problems:

• ~/.xsession-errors -- log of errors and messages since last login
• Package 'dconf-editor' -- graphical interface for viewing/editing most (but not all) settings
• Command-line tool 'gsettings'

Make "Application in terminal" launchers use mate-terminal instead of xterm
There is no setting that controls which terminal to use for a MATE "Application in terminal" desktop launcher.  MATE depends on the GIO (Gnome Input/Output) library to select a terminal, and there is a hard-coded list in GIO's C code.  It uses the first one of these that it finds:
  gnome-terminal
  nxterm
  color-xterm
  rxvt
  dtterm
  xterm

MATE includes none of these except xterm.  But mate-terminal is just a fork of gnome-terminal, so I added a link to substitute the one for the other:
sudo ln -s /usr/bin/mate-terminal /usr/local/bin/gnome-terminal



I'm happy.  I have a working system, and the transition was not too horrible.  My thanks to everyone responsible for creating SparkyLinux!

[Bill Statler]

... I'm currently running LMDE 2 (Linux Mint Debian Edition), which is based on Debian Jessie, and MATE 1.18.0.  This will be end-of-life in a few months, and there is no convenient upgrade path to LMDE 3 + MATE, so it's a good time for me to consider switching to Sparky. ...

... I'm happy.  I have a working system, and the transition was not too horrible.  My thanks to everyone responsible for creating SparkyLinux!

LMDE2 ==> Sparky on my computer: 2 weeks.

LMDE2 ==> Sparky on my wife's computer: an additional 3 years.  :o  Just finished the upgrade today. My dear wife has been very patient, but using LMDE2 three years after its end-of-life was getting a bit problematic!

We are now a two-Sparky family. Thanks again to everyone resposible for Sparky!