Session

Mate Desktop Environment come with a Display Manager. It’s .

But, you can use any other Display Manager. Or not.

Without a Display Manager

To start mate-desktop, you should add mate-session to ~/.xinitrc file.

exec ck-launch-session mate-session

Now can type startx

Using GDM

Install it from your distro repository. GDM should autodetect Mate Desktop.

Using KDM

Install it from your distro repository. KDE should autodetect Mate Desktop.

Using Slim

Install it from your distro repository. Read this Archlinux page, should work in most distros.