Which WM - very confused ?

uxbod · Guru Joined: 30 Dec 2002 Posts: 474 Location: UK

Just installing Gentoo again on a second HD and trying to decide what WM to install. I have KDE 3.1RC5 running currently and it does seem to suck a lot of resources. Spec of machine at bottom. Fluxbox seems to be very popular. My main requirements for the environment is to be able to :

* Play MP3s, DVDs etc
* Sync Sharp Zaurus
* General office apps (documents, spreadsheets etc)

Suggestions please?

Gentoo 1.4RC2, P4 2.53Ghz, 1GB PC2700 DDR, MSI G4/Ti4600, SB Audigy, 2 x Maxtor 120GB H/D

Warri0r · n00b Joined: 03 Jan 2003 Posts: 12

WM has nothing to do with what apps you can run (i.e. generally you can run any apps with any WM if you have all the necessary libs installed). I personally run KDE on one box and Windowmaker on another one, but there's literally a tuckload of WMs to choose from and, as people say, "beauty is in the eye of the beholder" :lol:

Check freshmeat.net for different WMs available, try a couple, see which one you like more...

-- Warri0r

AnimalMachine · Posted: Sun Jan 05, 2003 6:10 pm Post subject:

Well, most applications aren't limited to a WM. You can run Konq inside metacity (gnome) or fluxbox without problems as long as all the libraries needed are installed; you'll just notice longer load times (though maybe not after prelinking ... :?:

).

That said, its just down to personal preference. Looking at your system spec, I'd say you shouldn't be all that worried about any resource usage in KDE as you definatly got plenty to spread around. If apps seem to be slightly unresponsive try compiling your kernel with preemption support (gentoo-sources has this included).

If you find yourself using KOffice and other QT/KDE apps a lot, you may want to just hang with KDE for consistency.

Fluxbox loads faster than Bill Gates can say "Monopoly". It's not the most configurable wm in the bunch (compared to Enlightenment, etc.), but it can still look fairly sharp.

As for Gnome2, I really like the overall look to it, and I like the way Gtk2 apps feel. However, the desktop doesn't seem to be as plentiful as KDE.

If you have the time, emerge all of them and give each a spin for a few days to see what you like, then just unmerge the ones you don't want to keep around (updating kde when you dont use it sucks).

taskara · Posted: Mon Jan 06, 2003 1:01 am Post subject:

After I install gentoo, the first thing I do is compile fluxbox.

it is a great little wm, I love it.

Because it's small compiling time is not very long (except for X that is). and that gets u up into a gui, and then you can continue to compile from there.. mozilla (so you can then browse) IM software etc, and kde and the rest.. then you can use your pc while you compile kde for the next 15 hours

Seriously tho, I love the feel of fluxbox, small, responsive, simple and effective

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Carlos · Posted: Mon Jan 06, 2003 2:16 am Post subject:

Yeah, you'll be able to do all of the things you want to do with any window manager. If you want to compare what different desktops can look like, you'll want to look at this ridiculously long thread. Many of the screenshots posted at the beginnign of the thread are no longer up, so you might want to start closer to the end.
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Man must shape his tools lest they shape him.

scocou · Posted: Mon Jan 06, 2003 8:42 am Post subject:

I remember once reading that it was good to avoid getting tied to any one interface. After having fallen prey to this in the past, mainly with Kde and Windowmaker, I now find Waimea to be the cat's meow. There's nothing to get tied to, you know... all that flashy cruft that creates friction with your productivity. It is SO trim and lean, mmm... Waimea! It doesn't have backgrounds unless you install eterm though (easy enough), but it looks classy and has a simple menu system and sensible config file. Oh sure, it's pretty immature and still beta, but it's totally usable. It docks Gnustep/Windowmaker/whatever applets as well for your convenience. I find version 0.4.0 to be much improved over 0.3.3 (and stable to boot), but it's masked still to my knowledge.
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"A paranoid is someone who knows a little of what's going on." -William S. Burroughs

Carlos · Posted: Mon Jan 06, 2003 10:24 am Post subject:

puddpunk · l33t Joined: 20 Jul 2002 Posts: 681 Location: New Zealand

pablored · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 01 May 2002 Posts: 96

If i install kde, i always keep the *box handy for when i want to return.

shm · Posted: Mon Jan 06, 2003 6:10 pm Post subject:

waimea or openbox

I prefer these newer blackbox derivatives to fluxbox

xlyz · Veteran Joined: 27 Oct 2002 Posts: 1470 Location: Italy

zaftro · Posted: Thu Jan 16, 2003 12:04 pm Post subject:

Hi,

My personal favourite is Xfce. As they say on their website it is a light-weight window manager (the source are <5MB), and so doesn't use nearly as much memory as kde 3 or gnome 2 do. Admittedly its probably not the fanciest or easily configurable wm, but after a while it's completely cool.

Some of the good features:
- GUI samba viewer
- Nice file tree viewer
- Easy access to KDE and Gnome menus (only a left click)
- Small download
- Has a nice pager
- Less than 30min compile time

So here is the website, and here are some screenshots.

Hope that helps,

zaftro