Issues with install F23 MATE desktop

[Chris Adams]

I have a brand-new Dell Precision workstation, on which I'm trying to
install Fedora 23 (with my preferred desktop environment, MATE), which
is turning into the most frustrating Linux install I've experienced in a
long time (and I've been using Linux since before Red Hat existed).

I started with Fedora-Workstation-netinst-x86_64-23 on a thumb drive.  I
booted, selected automatic partitioning and MATE, and it started
downloading RPMs.  When it finished downloading, it rebooted.
Apparently, there's a conflict between release and updates on who owns
/etc/xdg/menus/mate-preferences-categoris.menu, and anaconda just
crashes and reboots (not even a traceback) on an install transaction
failure.

After a few passes through that before I figured out anaconda was not
going to install MATE (with frustrating waits for downloads each time),
I gave up and did a minimal install.  Then I did a dnf groupinstall
MATE, and that downloaded all the RPMs, then gave me the error about the
file conflict.  I tried to exclude one of the choices, use --best, etc.,
and nothing would solve it.

Also, when "dnf groupinstall foo" is run, even if it fails, dnf then
thinks the group is installed (and so a repeated groupinstall does
nothing).  I had to do a groupremove first.

I just manually installed the RPMs from the dnf cache to get around the
MATE brokenness, and then got systemd to do a graphical boot.

Now, when I get to the graphical login, my USB is dead.  I can boot
single-user mode and the keyboard works fine; as soon as the graphical
login loads, USB appears dead (keyabord is like it is powered off, no
Numlock, Capslock, etc.).  Tried unplugging keyboard, moving it to
different USB ports (directly on the computer instead of hub), etc. with
no result.  The fact that the keyboard works in single-user mode shows
there's no hardware problem, Linux USB issue, etc.

At this point, I guess I'll roll back and try Fedora 22.  If I ever get
a working desktop, I'll try to file some bugs I guess.  I found a BZ
about anaconda that appears to match my problem (1287841).  That doesn't
explain the MATE conflicts in the repos, dnf groupinstall fail, or
disappearing USB though.

-- 
Chris Adams <linux at cmadams.net>