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Specialsauce
January 6th, 2006, 01:33 AM
whats the difference?
23meg
January 6th, 2006, 01:45 AM
Check out this thread (http://www.ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=87276).
ishtvan222
January 6th, 2006, 01:46 AM
Desktop managers are an entire set of software to use. KDE and GNOME are good examples. They have other software to help manage your computer. Windows managers only manage windows, KDE's window manager is KWIN and GNOME's window manager is Metacity.
Specialsauce
January 6th, 2006, 01:53 AM
so, lemme get this straight... you can NOT have a window manager without a desktop environment? because i was considering trying LFS to make a simple distro with just afterstep... thats impossible if i understand correctly...
bonzodog
January 6th, 2006, 01:57 AM
no, it's not. the line between Wm's and DE's is blurred. i just use WindowMaker on it's own. it has it's own menus, and themes etc. But it does not have a panel, nor default 'built-in' apps. It has apps which extend its usability, like dockapps, that afterstep can use as well.
I use xfe as a file browser for example. if you install afterstep off the repos, you will see what i mean. GDM will let you choose it for a session.
23meg
January 6th, 2006, 02:07 AM
For a detailed guide to window managers for X, see this site:

http://www.plig.org/xwinman/
poofyhairguy
January 6th, 2006, 02:35 AM
so, lemme get this straight... you can NOT have a window manager without a desktop environment?

No, you can.

YOu can even use Gnome's window manager (metacity) without Gnome.
super
January 6th, 2006, 03:22 AM
so, lemme get this straight... you can NOT have a window manager without a desktop environment? because i was considering trying LFS to make a simple distro with just afterstep... thats impossible if i understand correctly...

other way around.
you cannot have a desktop environment without a window manager. but you can have a window manager without a desktop environment.

btw, i remember afterstep from back in the day. it was kinda cool! :KS
IYY
January 6th, 2006, 04:43 AM
IceWM with some KDE or Gnome components is very cool. For example, Kicker, KDesktop and Konqueror give you pretty much everything that you want from a KDE desktop, but with the speed of IceWM.