I noticed already and installed the new package mate-power-manager but from ascii-backports because I use the newer Mate 1.18 packages and can confirm the bug by OP. Also the battery icon, when present on the panel, is just an exclamation sign.

If you do not want to wait for mate-power-manager to be accepted into stable you could use the xfce4-power-manager in the meantime to set the screen settings. It will handle dpms settings for you. 

I guess mate-power-manager is still in proposed. I usually do not add proposed to my sources list, some do and you can test some newer fixes for packages before they go into stable. Probably not recommended on mission critical systems but the quality of the packages is usually top notch.

Obviously Jesse was not installing Debian very often as the default Xfce desktop looks and acts just like when you install Debian, in a sense already mentioned here calling it "universal".

I always install from a netinstall, so the procedure was not different from Debian. Maybe the Refracta installer is not the best choice if you have to use the live ISO. The thing is that many people of course will go with the live version because it is available and shows already how your hardware works with it.
Other derivatives use still the Debian installer from a live environment and I think it is almost bullet proof. Though you can always make things better and there are others based on Debian with their own installers.

So he basically complained about the initial setup but then it was a relatively positive review. But in all honesty I never took Distrowatch very seriously.

What he probably means with "conservative" is that the pace is slower, with older, reliable, tested and stable software. Yep, that sounds like old-school Debian to me, quite positive. It is also true that you can use flatpaks to spice up your system. I know not everybody is a fan of it but hey, there is another choice to add some newer components to your stable system and it does not depend on systemd, if you want and really need to.

That is great news.

Though I am using 1.18 from ascii-backports and I am happy with it. Of course at the moment I am still using it with xfce-power-manager.
I am looking forward to Mate 1.20 especially if they fixed some problems with Gtk3.

Maybe this can help:

https://www.falkon.org/download/

There exists an AppImage and even a flatpak.

I guess "Universal Operating System" applies here.
There is only so much to do after installing as the user sees fit.

Of course every individual will have his/her own preferences and you could ask every one of them what they consider important post-install.

I use the package unifont to avoid those empty boxes in whatever language that is not Western or European.

I prefer just using apt because the syntax is shorter but apt-get is not deprecated and it should make no difference in this case.

Wow. That was quick. Nice!

OK, let's do it this way, if you want. I know how to make Compiz working but I guess we prefer a more simple and minimal approach. It works here on Mate Devuan Ascii installed from backports but it should also work on Mate 1.16.

I would suggest you remove the compton config you made or have, will be easier for me.

Firstly go to the Mate Control Center, to Windows and disable the built-in compositor, that could also be what was interfering.

Then start compton from the terminal with OpenGL:

compton -b --backend glx

That's it.

Do you see the appended -b, that makes an application running from terminal even if you close that terminal, so you do not kill the process.

Now take that command from above and put it into your autostart. Open again the control center and go to start programs and add it there.
It should look like this:

Report back.

Edit: One more thing. If compton was or is already running, kill it like mentioned, killall compton, before proceeding with my solution.

It is not a driver problem btw, at least not really, it is a vsync issue on Intel cards that is not present if you use a compositor that uses OpenGL by default like Mutter, Muffin, KWin or Compiz. Xfce has the same problem. Mate 1.20 fixed that finally.

Here a nice read from the compton dev:

https://github.com/chjj/compton/wiki/vsync-guide

Zephyr, wow I was not even aware that it was made by Steven Steigman.

Nice and minimal Openbox setup MSI.

OK, you seem to like dwm, here another one. No more info because I already took the scrot before but liked it enough to include it here.

But you can see urxvt, mpd running with ncmpcpp and conky included into the dwm bar on an ancient HP laptop that might die the next day.