nux Mint is a Linux distribution based on Debian and Ubuntu,[4] with an alternative Linux Mint Debian Edition (LMDE) based purely on Debian. Mint provides full out-of-the-box multimedia support by including some proprietary software such as Adobe Flash.
At first new versions of the Ubuntu-based Linux Mint were released approximately every six months. The first release, named "Ada", was released in 2006. When the 17th version (named "Qiana". another long-term-support release) was released on May 31, 2014, Linux Mint developers decided that after that version all subsequent versions would use the source-code of the current Long-Term-Support release of Linux Mint until Ubuntu releases a new "Long-Term-Support release"; Basically, all "new version" releases would be based on Ubuntu's "Long-Term-Support" release, and all the "Point releases" (ie. the versions in between) would be based on the existing Long-Term-Support-release's source code. Version 17.2, code-named "Rafaela", was released on June 30, 2015.
In the past support for older releases ended shortly after the next version is released (with the exception of releases based on the source-code of Ubuntu's "Long-Term-Support" releases). After Linux Mint version 17 was released all future versions will be based on Long-Term-Support releases and will be supported for 5 years, while users can optionally upgrade to the next 17.x release if they so choose to do so.