Fedora 23 features the brand new Cinnamon Desktop Spin for users craving a more traditional user interface. The Fedora 23 Cinnamon Desktop Spin features version 2.8.3 of the Cinnamon Desktop which by default features a taskbar and applications menu at the bottom of the screen, and includes many applications that are also present in Fedora Workstation such as Firefox and Terminal. In addition to the applications it shares with Fedora Workstation, the Cinnamon Desktop Spin also ships with its own versions of some applications, including the Nemo file browser. The Cinnamon Desktop Spin also prides itself on being highly configurable by default with Cinnamon Spices, allowing you to easily customize your desktop with new themes, applets, desklets, and extensions.

Nemo File Manager

The Fedora 23 Cinnamon Desktop spin features Nemo as the default file browser, which is based off the GNOME file browser Nautilus, but with extra features and tweaks. Nemo features a compact view of files and folders in a directory, and also has the ability to display a treeview in the left side panel.

Taskbar and Applications menu

Cinnamon, by default, also features a taskbar and applications menu at the bottom of the screen allowing you to easily browse the applications you have installed, and to view the applications you currently have open, and switch between them with the mouse.

The panels in the Cinnamon Desktop spin are also highly customizable using controls built in to the panel. You can add new panels and move items like the taskbar, clock, and applications menu to different locations and panels. The built-in controls allow you to add new applets to the panels, and panels can also be easily resized and made to autohide.

Default Applications

The Fedora 23 Cinnamon Desktop spin comes standard with a range of applications designed to get things done, including Firefox for browsing the internet, Thunderbird for email, the LibreOffice suite, Pidgin for instant messaging, and Hexchat for IRC.

Cinnamon Spices

Cinnamon also features “Spices” that allow you to customize and tweak your desktop further. Cinnamon Spices come in four forms: Themes, Applets, Desklets, and Extensions. Each of these Spices comes with an interface in Cinnamon for finding, downloading, installing, and enabling your Cinnamon Spices.

Theme Spices

Cinnamon Theme Spices allow you to easily change the look and feel of your desktop. There are hundreds of different themes that can be browsed and installed directly from the Cinnamon Desktop.

Applet Spices

Applets in Cinnamon are small programs that you can configure to display in your Cinnamon taskbars. There are many different applets that can be browsed and installed from inside Cinnamon to do a range of tasks, including displaying the weather, displaying hardware usage graphs, even a quick button to take a screenshot or screencast.

Desklet Spices

Desklets in Cinnamon are small applications that live on the desktop, and provide quick access to information or performing simple tasks. Like all the other Spices, Cinnamon provides a GUI for searching, installing, and configuring desklets. Some examples of desklets in the Fedora Cinnamon spin include Clocks, stickynotes, and a calculator.

Extension Spices

The final type of Spice in Cinnamon is extensions. These allow you to tweak some of the underlying behaviors of the Cinnamon Desktop, like changing how Alt+Tab behavior works or enabling windows that wobble when you move them.

Get Fedora Cinnamon

Fedora 23 with Cinnamon is available for download now. For support, you can visit the #fedora-cinnamon channel on Freenode IRC or use the Users Mailing List.