Cinnamon desktop

Raised as a usability problem by 14 people on Hacker News over 13 years (2014–2026), in 14 threads.

People raised many different problems with Cinnamon desktop, but no single problem has yet been raised by 3 people in 3 different months and threads.

Unreviewed issues were grouped by machine: Claude Haiku labelled each comment as a usability complaint, named what it's about and summed up the problem in a line, and a small model grouped similar problems. Nobody has checked them by hand. Expect mistakes.

The newest 15 complaints

UI thread locks easily when using desktop or tray extensions, making it sluggish2026-01-01
Status icons can't be arranged in multiple columns and mixed-DPI scaling across two displays doesn't work2024-05-02
Vertical taskbar can't show status icons in more than one column2024-05-01
Flat design makes controls disappear, so elements don't look clickable2023-07-30
Fractional scaling doesn't work well, so display sizing is off2023-07-05
Display scaling sometimes renders wrong or crashes the UI when Firefox launches2023-06-19
Configuring panels requires visiting three unrelated places, and the right one is hard to remember2022-02-17
Desktop has problems with multiple monitors and changing monitor configurations, sometimes crashing when unplugging2021-11-06
Removing default shortcuts requires tediously clicking through the UI, taking about ten minutes2021-01-11
Rearranging multiple terminal windows takes effort and breaks concentration2020-02-17
Desktop stutters and feels slow when cycling windows or during notifications2019-04-18
Early Cinnamon felt slow, unstable, and difficult to customize2018-04-26
Crashes every time the user logs in, cause unknown2017-01-12
Desktop interface feels unpolished compared to GNOME's UX2015-12-26
Desktop environment is slow and buggy in everyday use2014-07-05