First impression of Zorin 18

Chat about Zorin
1

Yesterday I created a bootstick with Zorin 18 to take a look into the new version.

Overall, I'm a little disappointed that so much is still exactly the same as in Zorin 17 and that many suggestions for the design of the operating system, which were made during Zorin 17 under the Feedback section, have not been taken up.
I like the floating taskbar and the new window tiling feature.
Unfortunately, the appearance is not consistent, e.g., when you tile the file manager and a Libre Writer document (or the text editor, the terminal...) side by side. The file manager has rounded corners at the bottom, while the others have normal corners. This does not look consistent. Also, many programs do not have rounded corners at the bottom when maximized, which does not look nice together with the rounded corners of the taskbar. So you still need the gnome extension "Rounded window corners."

It didn't make me want to install Zorin 18 immediately and replace Zorin 17. Maybe when I'll take a closer look.

3 Likes
4

The Reason for the rounded Corners is the Base. GTK3 Apps mostly have at the Bottom sharp Edges. GTK4 mostly rounded Corners overall. Depending what a Progam is used, You get that Mixture.

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6

Is it me, or is the option to have ZFS during install? I'm putting it on a virtual machine now, and I don't see that option. Was it removed?

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Yes, this option has been removed due to instabilities within ZFS on Encrypted drives.

If you want to use ZFS (at your own risk), you can still do so. From the LiveUSB > Try Zorin > Terminal

sudo apt install zfsutils-linux zfs-initramfs zsys

When you run the installer, the ZFS option should now show up.

1 Like
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Thank you! Good to know!! Now that you mention it, I think I stumbled across that back when I tried ZFS on 17.x - the installer would crash, or something similar. I appreciate this sir!

EDIT: that was with encryption, the thinkbook 17.3 is installed on is running ZFS unencrypted.

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I'm just trying out a Zorin 18 ISO I just burned with Balena Etcher :scream: for a friend of mine (try before you install) seems pretty good unfortunately I will have to wait until the upgrade is released WHICH I have a few questions about this process ... Last time I did a clean install from Zorin 15 Pro to Zorin 17.1 ...

  1. Will I need to back up data just in case?
  2. Will all the Flatpaks and .deb files I have installed be unaffected?
  3. With the 10 browsers I have installed with my enormous volume of bookmarks will they be safe or will I also need to back these up?
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Backup is allways a good Thing before doing something like this - only for Just-in-Case.

For Programs, they could be the Point if You have added third-party Repos. That could cause Issues during the Upgrade Process and after it because then is a new Base there. So, it would be good to at least diable all third-party Repos - or even better: Delete them, upgrade Your System and then add them with the Configuration for the new Base.