The Linux Mint developers have announced today, March 30, in their monthly newsletter, that the team works hard these days to release the final version of the LMDE (Linux Mint Debian Edition) 2 (codename Betsy), as well as to implement its awesome new features to the upcoming Linux Mint 17.2 update of the current stable distribution of the project, Rebecca.

The Release Candidate version of Linux Mint Debian Edition 2 (Betsy) was announced a couple of week ago. Since then, the developers fixed some of the known bugs that were explicitly presented in the announcement for LMDE 2 RC for those who wished to test the operating system on their computers. Of course, this means that the final version of LMDE 2 is around the corner and will most probably arrive next week if everything goes according to plan.

“Bugs were fixed and we’re now getting ready for a stable release. Working on Betsy was very exciting and it paved the way for some of the work planned for Linux Mint 18 (in 2016). It also highlighted a few areas where things could be improved further, so some of Betsy’s improvements will also find their way into Linux Mint 17.2. I’d like to thank all the people who helped us test Betsy and who sent us their feedback,” says Clement Lefebvre.

Linux Mint 18 will arrive next year, in 2016

As noted in the newsletter by Clement Lefebvre, founder and lead developer of Linux Mint, the efforts put into creating the Linux Mint Debian Edition 2 operating system will pave the way for what they have in store for the next major release of the Linux Mint distributions, Linux Mint 18, which will arrive next year, in 2016.

Among some of the highlights that will be implemented in the upcoming Linux Mint releases, we can mention several speed improvements and bugfixes to the Cinnamon 2.4 desktop environment, including fixes for drag and drop freezing issues or black bars in the screensaver, better session detection in the MDM (Mint Display Manager) login screen, which will also support encrypted Home directories, and MintStick enhancements.