A very useful tutorial is available for all users

Jan 26, 2015 09:46 GMT  ·  By

Compiz was implemented by default in Ubuntu MATE 15.04 Alpha 2 and the developers have decided to put in some extra effort and make it available for Ubuntu MATE 14.10 and Ubuntu MATE 14.04 LTS, albeit it's still under testing.

The default window manager in Ubuntu MATE is called Marco, but the community has been pushing for Compiz support for quite a while and it looks like their wish has been granted. The fact is that Compiz is pretty versatile, coming with a ton of options and supporting some nice 3D effects that really set it apart.

This type of 3D showboating is not really popular right now and many distributions aim at providing a minimalistic and simple approach. Precision has been chosen over fluff, but that doesn't mean that we can't also have some fun once in a while.

Remember, Compiz support on Ubuntu MATE is still being tested

Compiz is actually a complex piece of software and it's not exactly easy to make it work. The developers of Ubuntu MATE know this and they are making quite an effort. The fact that they have decided to backport their work to earlier supported systems is almost as interesting as the adoption of Compiz itself.

"Compiz will be fully integrated in Ubuntu MATE 15.04, but not enabled by default. To that end I have been working on adding MATE support to Compiz over the last few evenings. I will submitting my changes to the Ubuntu Compiz maintainers, but I'd like to get some testing feedback first. I've backported my changes to 14.04 and 14.10 and built everything you need into a PPA. If you are feeling brave, let the destruction begin," said Martin Wimpress, one of the Ubuntu MATE developers.

He has a very handy tutorial on the Ubuntu MATE Community website and users are invited to install the packages and test the window manager, although it's advisable to avoid installing this on your production machine.