if xubuntu is so great why doesnt everyone use it? [Archive]

faraz_k86

January 21st, 2009, 06:45 PM

k so ive been reading up on xubuntu and thought id give it a try, im downloading it right now.

i deleted my kubuntu installation and repartitioned my ext3 drive to 1.5 gb

so what ive been reading i found out that xubuntu is the same as ubuntu and has the same features and everything else is the same. but xubuntu is lighter and smaller and requirws less space

im sure im missing out something here as if that was the case then xubuntu must have been on top instead of ubuntu.

Tibuda

January 21st, 2009, 06:49 PM

i deleted my kubuntu installation and repartitioned my ext3 drive to 1.5 gb
There was no need to do that. You just had to install xubuntu-desktop package with your package manager.

snowpine

January 21st, 2009, 06:52 PM

The short answer, in my opinion, is that Gnome has always been the default desktop for Ubuntu, and Ubuntu is based on Debian, which also uses Gnome as the default. So most people use Gnome. If Xfce had come first, maybe it would be on top, who knows...

For the record, one reason Xubuntu is lighter than Ubuntu is that it excludes many applications, such as Openoffice. If you start with Xubuntu and then install all the missing applications, it wouldn't be much different than Ubuntu. :)

scragar

January 21st, 2009, 06:57 PM

snowpine

January 21st, 2009, 07:02 PM

XFCE is much more customisable and, if you ignore the huge bloated version Xubuntu ships with, much more lightweight in terms of CPU usage and ram.

I agree; I think of Xubuntu as "Xfce for people who like Gnome" rather than "Xfce for people who like Xfce." Which I think is Canonical's goal; I'm not disagreeing with their decision...

I just tested out the Xfce version of Sidux, now that's a speedy (and non-Gnome-y) distro!

lukjad

January 21st, 2009, 07:02 PM

I just prefer GNOME. It's a personal choice, though I am sure that Xubuntu is great, I just like the way GNOME handles itself.

2hot6ft2

January 21st, 2009, 07:20 PM

Polygon

January 21st, 2009, 07:32 PM

XFCE is much more customisable and, if you ignore the huge bloated version Xubuntu ships with, much more lightweight in terms of CPU usage and ram.

i laughed at that statement.

if anything, xfce is LESS customizable then gnome. it is lighter weight, at the cost of features which is xfce annoys the hell out of me.

Npl

January 21st, 2009, 07:33 PM

I gotta agree with snowpine, X/Kubuntu seems like an aftertought, not really getting anywhere as much polish and time as Ubuntu.

scragar

January 21st, 2009, 07:43 PM

i laughed at that statement.

if anything, xfce is LESS customizable then gnome. it is lighter weight, at the cost of features which is xfce annoys the hell out of me.

Huh? XFCE let's you change the background on intervals, WITHOUT needing to install anything else, XFCE gives you much more control over the panels and workspaces. XFCE let's you change what right click and middle click do on the desktop(Which gnome will let you do if you want to patch it).

Gnome has more features available, but they are all plugins and applets, gnome doesn't offer the features on it's own.

Sealbhach

January 21st, 2009, 07:47 PM

I think Thunar has got less features than Nautilus, which is a big reason I prefer Gnome. I have 2GB of RAM so I'm happy using Gnome.

.

Eisenwinter

January 21st, 2009, 07:51 PM

if xubuntu is so great why doesnt everone use it?

Uhm... because not everybody wants to use Xubuntu? The answer should be obvious.

BDNiner

January 21st, 2009, 08:05 PM

I personally like xfce just don't use it much. I did when i had an older Dell laptop a year or so ago. Now that i have the power I see no reason to go back. Maybe i will try and complie it from scratch instead of using the xubuntu-package.

Pogeymanz

January 21st, 2009, 08:38 PM

I find XFCE to be very customizable. It will even have a real menu editor in the next version (it's about time). And I find XFWM to be much nicer than Metacity.

It's true that Thunar is not as powerful as Nautilus, but in pretty much every other way, XFCE is just as customizable as Gnome. However, there doesn't seem to be as many panel plugins as there are for Gnome, even though it can run Gnome-panel plugins these days.

lukjad

January 21st, 2009, 08:52 PM

Basically, it's all about preference and/or need. If I can't do anything in Ubuntu because GNOME is too heavy, then I would use Xubuntu. If I could run Ubuntu and Xubuntu, then I would choose based on my preference.

RiceMonster

January 21st, 2009, 09:11 PM

I agree; I think of Xubuntu as "Xfce for people who like Gnome" rather than "Xfce for people who like Xfce." Which I think is Canonical's goal; I'm not disagreeing with their decision...

Yeah I agree with that. I an Xfce user, and I love it. I used Xubuntu for a week, and the default install kinda bugged me because it was set up to be like GNOME.

i laughed at that statement.

if anything, xfce is LESS customizable then gnome. it is lighter weight, at the cost of features which is xfce annoys the hell out of me.

Well I don't know. Xfce is more modular and lets me shut off all the things that annoy me. GNOME doesn't really give me much options without going through regedit.exe (or gconf-editor, as most people call it). That's really just my own experience though, and I'd rather not get into it (even though I sort of did).

Only thing that kindof sucks with Xfce is the menu editor. The only way to edit the automatically generated menu is to edit the .desktop files in /usr/share/applications, which is a little annoying. Especially when I add NoDisplay=true and then that gets written over when the package gets updated.

bigbrovar

January 21st, 2009, 09:41 PM

one thing i find about ubuntu is that it often shapes your perception of different desktop environments. for example i used to think kde suck after trying kubuntu till i installed mandriva which changed my perception of kde. same for xubuntu.. tried using it but it just lacked most things i needed.(like a tool for setting a global proxy for gtk apps.) then i tried linux mint's xfce which to me is the best implementation of xfce i have ever seen.. its very polished and has a config tool called mint-xfce from where u can set everything about ur computer including (activating compiz and adding it to startup session, seting a global proxy, etc) another reason why i prefer xfce to gnome is thunar which is not only lighter than nautilus but also faster and less annoying. i run xfce on a decent hardware (dell xps m1330 with 4gb ram, 320gb 7200rpm drive, 2.2 ghz core 2 duo) in all xfce gives me a relatively light desktop that gets out of my way allowing me to do what i really need with my pc.

Vince4Amy

January 21st, 2009, 10:32 PM

GNOME doesn't really give me much options without going through regedit.exe

hehe I have to agree with that as I've had to use that so many times to tweak some of the simplest of settings, for example not having every additional drive show on the desktop.

XFCE is good but I wouldn't say Xubuntu is the best implementation of it, though it is quite a good one it's not the best. Similar can be said about OpenSUSE's implementation in my opinion.

Slackware is my favourite distro for anything XFCE.

Erik Trybom

January 21st, 2009, 10:42 PM

A good way of trying out different desktop environments and window managers is through Debian. Installation is easy with apt-get and the packages are mostly vanilla, i.e. no distro-specific customizations. Debian + XFCE is a really nice experience.

I actually prefer XFCE to Gnome and KDE not only because it's fast and responsive but also because of its simple style without unnecessary eyecandy. The applications are of course much more basic than those of Gnome and KDE, but it's very easy installing whatever app you like anyway.

waapwoop1

January 21st, 2009, 11:12 PM

Xubuntu is great if your RAM is limited, what I mean is it takes less RAM so it is well suited for older slower computers. But as for why everyone doesn't use it that all comes down to personal preference in many cases.

Just like a car they both get you from point A to point B they just feel a little different while getting there so everyone doesn't want the same car.

I installed both on two identical laptops. Xubuntu started 5 seconds faster and used EXACLTY the same amount of RAM as the Ubuntu laptop. both 8.04

so that is just a false statement that gets bandied about a lot.

meborc

January 22nd, 2009, 12:02 AM

I installed both on two identical laptops. Xubuntu started 5 seconds faster and used EXACLTY the same amount of RAM as the Ubuntu laptop. both 8.04

so that is just a false statement that gets bandied about a lot.

back when i was stuck with a lesser desktop i used to use Xubuntu heavily (can't remember the year, probably breezy or dapper) and it was quick as lightning... but then things changed in Xubuntu development and more and more "ubuntu" influences leaked in... applications that depend on gnome libs etc etc (who is interested, check out xubuntu devel mailinglist)

now it is nothing like it used to be, but the new head of xubuntu development is trying to live up to the expectation of xubuntu being fast and light... things might change in the future again

snowpine

January 22nd, 2009, 01:03 AM

Personally I hope Canonical adds a new Ubuntu "flavor" that uses Openbox or Fluxbox and is much lighter than Xubuntu... kind of like an official Fluxbuntu.

Polygon

January 22nd, 2009, 02:53 AM

Huh? XFCE let's you change the background on intervals, WITHOUT needing to install anything else, XFCE gives you much more control over the panels and workspaces. XFCE let's you change what right click and middle click do on the desktop(Which gnome will let you do if you want to patch it).

Gnome has more features available, but they are all plugins and applets, gnome doesn't offer the features on it's own.

xfce:

cannot drag select on desktop
place panel applets/shortcuts anywhere on the panel, either very left or very right, or some weird hack with 'spacers'
menu editor sucks TERRIBLY
xfce's various applets are inferior to the respective gnome ones, most of them with less features (like volume, etc)

etc.

but some of those problems are so infuriating that it puts me off using xfce until it is fixed. Have a lot of icons on your desktop that you just downloaded? have fun shift+clicking them all! or taking the unncessary step of opening the 'desktop' folder in thunar.

pt123

January 22nd, 2009, 03:14 AM

xfce is good on low spec computers, but a lot of that has to with it's limited features.
Really there is no need to install it on a decent spec computer, unless you are a minimalist.

cardinals_fan

January 22nd, 2009, 03:16 AM

I just prefer GNOME. It's a personal choice, though I am sure that Xubuntu is great, I just like the way GNOME handles itself.
That's why I like ratpoison. I prefer to handle my window manager, not have it handle itself.

I installed both on two identical laptops. Xubuntu started 5 seconds faster and used EXACLTY the same amount of RAM as the Ubuntu laptop. both 8.04

so that is just a false statement that gets bandied about a lot.
Xubuntu is a weird GNOME-Xfce hybrid and shouldn't be used to judge the DE.

cannot drag select on desktop
This has been added in 4.6.

menu editor sucks TERRIBLY
The menu editor is just fine. It's been implemented rather poorly (you can't edit the entries dynamically added from /usr/share/applications), but this has also been fixed with 4.6.

etnlIcarus

January 22nd, 2009, 04:16 AM

Xfce is more modular and lets me shut off all the things that annoy me. GNOME doesn't really give me much options without going through regedit.exe (or gconf-editor, as most people call it)Hate to break this to you but Xfce 4.6 has moved to Xfconf - basically gconf but with an, "xf", in the name.

Only thing that kindof sucks with Xfce is the menu editor. The only way to edit the automatically generated menu is to edit the .desktop files in /usr/share/applications, which is a little annoying. Especially when I add NoDisplay=true and then that gets written over when the package gets updated.

You really shouldn't be editing the .desktop files in /usr/share/applications unless copying the .desktop files to ~/.local/share/applications and editing them there is causing sluggishness.

That said, I don't exactly practice what I preach. >.>

handy

January 22nd, 2009, 04:37 AM

I have Xfce set up on Arch, it replaced Openbox a few months ago. I find it almost as fast as Openbox was, much easier to configure. The fiddling around to get the Xfce/Settings/Menu Editor to do the right thing really isn't very hard or time consuming once you decide to just do it.

I by far prefer the light simplicity & configurability of Xfce over Gnome & KDE or KDEmod by miles. The system I have now I could live with, with no changes made to it forever.

Hopefully the Xfce dev's don't get a bright idea in the future that makes Xfce another over-engineered & cumbersome DE.

By the way, I don't use Thunar at all, I use Worker, as I can configure it to do what I want.

jrusso2

January 22nd, 2009, 04:41 AM

kaldor

January 22nd, 2009, 05:03 AM

etnlIcarus

January 22nd, 2009, 05:06 AM

I adored Xubuntu at first. Two days later I was disgusted.

Random crashes.
Random freezes.
Refusing to boot up (would freeze 50% of the time I booted it up)

Those are my top 3 reasons. I hate Xubuntu in it's current state. It could be much better.

...I'd be willing to bet more than half of those problems weren't related to Xfce at all.

On the other hand, KDE4.0 and 4.1 on my Xubuntu install are about the only things which have managed to lock up my system. 4.2 beta is better but it's still happened a couple of times in the few hours I used it.

scragar

January 22nd, 2009, 05:21 AM

xfce:

cannot drag select on desktopThat's a thunar thing, you can use nautilus if you need that feature(personaly I find it better this way, I rarely want my icons highlighted if I drag over them, more often than not I highlight them by accident)

place panel applets/shortcuts anywhere on the panel, either very left or very right, or some weird hack with 'spacers'
But the panels can be positioned anywhere you want, and nothing stops you editing the config files to make spaces any size you want.

menu editor sucks TERRIBLYI agree, but I also have to say that being able to have multiple menu's for the different things more than makes up for it.
xfce's various applets are inferior to the respective gnome ones, most of them with less features (like volume, etc)

Then run the gnome panels, you can mix the two you know.

etc.

but some of those problems are so infuriating that it puts me off using xfce until it is fixed. Have a lot of icons on your desktop that you just downloaded? have fun shift+clicking them all! or taking the unncessary step of opening the 'desktop' folder in thunar.

What? Why download things to your desktop if you want to do mass things with them? Personally I say keep a minimal Desktop, if I want to do something on tons of files at once I will use folders.

cardinals_fan

January 22nd, 2009, 05:24 AM

...I'd be willing to bet more than half of those problems weren't related to Xfce at all.

On the other hand, KDE4.0 and 4.1 on my Xubuntu install are about the only things which have managed to lock up my system. 4.2 beta is better but it's still happened a couple of times in the few hours I used it.
I don't think kaldor said that Xfce was the culprit...

etnlIcarus

January 22nd, 2009, 05:27 AM

I don't think kaldor said that Xfce was the culprit...

It was implied, however. Aside from the DE packages, xubuntu and ubuntu are identical.

cardinals_fan

January 22nd, 2009, 05:31 AM

It was implied, however. Aside from the DE packages, xubuntu and ubuntu are identical.
Yes, which is exactly why Xubuntu is such a bad Xfce distro. It is essentially a Xfce/GNOME hybrid, with the worst of both worlds.

etnlIcarus

January 22nd, 2009, 05:32 AM

K, that was a non-sequitur. >.>

cardinals_fan

January 22nd, 2009, 05:49 AM

That's a thunar thing, you can use nautilus if you need that feature(personaly I find it better this way, I rarely want my icons highlighted if I drag over them, more often than not I highlight them by accident)

By the way, this isn't correct. Xfce has thus far avoided the blatantly stupid concept of using the file manager to handle the desktop. Desktop icons are provided by Xfdesktop4.

K, that was a non-sequitur. >.>
Once could argue that this is true of my whole life, but I don't really see how my comment was illogical. Xubuntu is almost identical to Ubuntu in that it includes a bucket full of GNOME libraries and services. This makes good sense when GNOME is the chosen DE, but on a Xfce system it is madness.

etnlIcarus

January 22nd, 2009, 05:58 AM

If was a non-sequitur as you took my response and used it to launch an attack on xubuntu, which was not what we were discussing.

Xubuntu is almost identical to Ubuntu in that it includes a bucket full of GNOME libraries and servicesBucket full is an overstatement. Uninstall gnome-system-tools and GDM and you're left with a pretty much standard ubuntu commandline install + x.org + xfce.

As for Gnome libs, in most instances you're going to end up with them anyway, depending on the apps you use.

Seriously, I've tried the ubuntu minimal + Xfce thing. It's made almost no difference to the amount of bloat going on. You're just left with a less capable DE because you want to be wanky about Gnome components.

cardinals_fan

January 22nd, 2009, 06:05 AM

If was a non-sequitur as you took my response and used it to launch an attack on xubuntu, which was not what we were discussing.
To trace the reasoning: Xubuntu is bad (kaldor) -> Xfce not at fault (you) -> kaldor never blamed Xfce (me) -> blame implied, since Xubuntu is identical to Ubuntu w/Xfce (you) -> that's why Xubuntu is at fault rather than Xfce (me)

Bucket full is an overstatement. Uninstall gnome-system-tools and GDM and you're left with a pretty much standard ubuntu commandline install + x.org + xfce.

As for Gnome libs, in most instances you're going to end up with them anyway, depending on the apps you use.

Seriously, I've tried the ubuntu minimal + Xfce thing. It's made almost no difference to the amount of bloat going on. You're just left with a less capable DE because you want to be wanky about Gnome components.
http://packages.ubuntu.com/intrepid/xubuntu-desktop

File-roller instead of Xarchiver or Squeeze, gnome-power-manager, network-manager-gnome, etc. I'd like to see more emphasis on lightweight tools.

RiceMonster

January 22nd, 2009, 06:13 AM

Hate to break this to you but Xfce 4.6 has moved to Xfconf - basically gconf but with an, "xf", in the name.

Really? Why oh why :(.

xfce:

cannot drag select on desktop
place panel applets/shortcuts anywhere on the panel, either very left or very right, or some weird hack with 'spacers'
menu editor sucks TERRIBLY
xfce's various applets are inferior to the respective gnome ones, most of them with less features (like volume, etc)

etc.

but some of those problems are so infuriating that it puts me off using xfce until it is fixed. Have a lot of icons on your desktop that you just downloaded? have fun shift+clicking them all! or taking the unncessary step of opening the 'desktop' folder in thunar.

I can see why those bother you, but the only one that really effects me is the menu editor. I HATE desktop icons, so I just shut them off, and use the right-click desktop menu (way better for me). Also, the only "applet" I use for my panel is a battery monitor which works just fine. Other than that, I just use a menu, pager, tasklist, systray and clock.

In Xfce, I can make custom keyboard shortcuts. As far as I know, GNOME only gives you a bunch of preset options.

etnlIcarus

January 22nd, 2009, 06:41 AM

To trace the reasoning: Xubuntu is bad (kaldor) -> Xfce not at fault (you) -> kaldor never blamed Xfce (me) -> blame implied, since Xubuntu is identical to Ubuntu w/Xfce (you) -> that's why Xubuntu is at fault rather than Xfce (me)You haven't explained what your tirade against Gnome components has to do with kaldor's technical problems*. The only argument against having included Gnome components is memory usage and general bloat which, as I've said, is basically a non-issue.

*which are mostly likely the product of hardware incompatibility/bad auto-detection at the kernel and xserver level.

http://packages.ubuntu.com/intrepid/xubuntu-desktop

File-roller instead of Xarchiver or Squeeze, gnome-power-manager, network-manager-gnome, etc. I'd like to see more emphasis on lightweight tools.File-roller and network-manager aren't services. If you want to discuss the application set that is again another subject.

Really? Why oh why .If it's any consolation, it's considerably simpler than gconf (the xml format is dead-simple for manual editing) and things like panel configuration will be less troublesome. Not sure how it's impacted modularity at this point.

RiceMonster

January 22nd, 2009, 06:54 AM

If it's any consolation, it's considerably simpler than gconf (the xml format is dead-simple for manual editing) and things like panel configuration will be less troublesome. Not sure how it's impacted modularity at this point.

Well, I'll keep an open mind to it at this point and I'll decide once 4.6 is final. As long as there aren't options hidden inside it, and it doesn't take away from modularity it should be fine.

etnlIcarus

January 22nd, 2009, 07:00 AM

Inevitably there will be options only available through the editor; aside from it being a practical shortcut for revealing functionality, Xfce holds the, "light", mantra to be gospel. It will probably become the perfect excuse to avoid having to make the config dialogue windows more 'bloated'.

Pretty sure I've already found a couple but then again, I'm also certain that until recently, changing stuff like DPI forced you to edit one of Xfce4.4's config files anyway.

cardinals_fan

January 22nd, 2009, 07:32 AM

You haven't explained what your tirade against Gnome components has to do with kaldor's technical problems*. The only argument against having included Gnome components is memory usage and general bloat which, as I've said, is basically a non-issue.

*which are mostly likely the product of hardware incompatibility/bad auto-detection at the kernel and xserver level.
I apologize for the confusion. In my current deranged state (mostly from lack of sleep), I referred to kaldor's post when I meant waapwoop1's in my mind. In that case, I think my original arguments do stand - but it's a moot point now. *smacks self*

I will now retire to bed, respecting the earlier-disregarded rule "never post when exhausted" ;)

File-roller and network-manager aren't services. If you want to discuss the application set that is again another subject.

A mental typo in my earlier post. I should have specified that I meant all included software.

etnlIcarus

January 22nd, 2009, 07:37 AM

I apologize for the confusion. In my current deranged state (mostly from lack of sleep), I referred to kaldor's post when I meant waapwoop1's in my mind. In that case, I think my original arguments do stand - but it's a moot point now. *smacks self*

I will now retire to bed, respecting the earlier-disregarded rule "never post when exhausted" ;)

A mental typo in my earlier post. I should have specified that I meant all included software.

Thankyou. Between this and the, "Now that Qt is LGPL...", thread, I was starting to suspect that I'd somehow ended up in a parallel universe where I spoke the same language as everyone but logic itself was a complete 180. I was expecting gravity to randomly invert at any moment and send my corpse hurdling into space. :p

faraz_k86

January 22nd, 2009, 11:14 AM

I love this community. :)

k so i downloaded xubuntu and seperated 1.5GB for it as its minimum requirements, but during installation i got the error that there is not enough space on the partition and i should have atleast 1.8GB free.

k so i repartitioned. and installed

so far im liking xubuntu, im liking the fact that it could be installed on 1.8 GB, as i was running low on space. but it would have been better to have it as 1.5GB :)

scragar

January 22nd, 2009, 02:17 PM

By the way, this isn't correct. Xfce has thus far avoided the blatantly stupid concept of using the file manager to handle the desktop. Desktop icons are provided by Xfdesktop4.

Just tried it, you can force XFCE to use naut, although it involves editing a few conf files and a graphical restart. You are right that it is not easy though.

psyBSD

January 23rd, 2009, 02:48 PM

etnlIcarus

January 23rd, 2009, 02:55 PM

I'm still using the first beta as I CBFed building from source. Do the later two betas introduce a new menu editor?

Vadi

January 23rd, 2009, 06:14 PM

I consider it great, for old and weak computers. Since mine isn't anything remotely like that, I don't use it ;)

thoughtcriminal

January 23rd, 2009, 06:36 PM

It may just be my experience, but I'm finding XFCE to be a bit more quirky than I remember Gnome being. I've had some trouble with losing panels, system tray icons etc.

And I find that XFCE offers more customization options, especially in the panels. Personally, I love this. But some real new users might find it daunting, especially if they don't like the default setup

However, despite its shortcomings XFCE is the best DE I have used (YMMV). Its lightweight, fast, and customizable. And if the Xubuntu version is said to be slow, I'm really looking forward to my eventual planned OS: Gentoo+XFCE

I consider it great, for old and weak computers. Since mine isn't anything remotely like that, I don't use it ;)

While my notebook isn't brand new, it is hardly "old and weak". I don't think the tag its gotten as the DE for worn out PCs is really fair. I've seen people with hardware far more powerful then mine running blackbox.
I used to be a gnome fanboy. Now I see it as dead weight. Besides, more free CPU cycles = higher FPS :D

All in all, it comes down to personal preference.

Paqman

January 23rd, 2009, 07:12 PM

I think Thunar has got less features than Nautilus, which is a big reason I prefer Gnome.

Completely agree. Nautilus is a much, much more powerful app than Thunar.

XFCE is nice enough, i've used it on occasion. But I did find that a lot of things that were easy in Gnome were a bit of a pain in XFCE.