Alternative Window Managers

[brentoboy]

OK, I want to try out "all" the Window Managers, and form my own opinion, but I want to know the roots of each of them. Which one is based on which other one, and why the broke off rather than building on top of the next.

So, let me know your favorite(s) and why. And, if you know, where did it come from. Lets do some WM-Geneology - we can even build a tree of existing WMs.

I started by going to Synaptic and looking for WMs but I got back so much stuff, and most of it looked like "work in progress" "dont use this for real" type of stuff.


Ive used KDE, Gnome, Xfce4, and icewm.
Gnome is the only one I have used enough to know anything about.

[KingBahamut]

windowmaker - http://windowmaker.org
GNUstep - http://www.gnustep.org/
Afterstep - http://www.afterstep.org/
E17 - http://www.enlightenment.org/
Fluxbox - http://fluxbox.sourceforge.net/
blackbox - http://blackboxwm.sourceforge.net/
Mezzo - http://www.symphonyos.com/mezzo.html
XPde - http://www.xpde.com/

and a few others.

XPde is probably the hardest to compile.
windowmaker my favorite out of them for simplicity.

[Stormy Eyes]

Check this out. (http://xwinman.org/)

[-Rick-]

Not a WM but an DE: http://ede.sourceforge.net/page/home

[majikstreet]

Check this out. (http://xwinman.org/)
Good stuff :P

I personally use fluxbox http://fluxbox.sourceforge.net
It comes from blackbox.

[Brunellus]

KB is a well-known flux hater, but I, too, like fluxbox. I even experimented (briefly) with running fluxbox as gnome 2.10's default wm, and, while I liked having windowtabbing in GNOME, I found that blackbox played with gnome much more nicely.

[Stormy Eyes]

Good stuff :P

I personally use fluxbox http://fluxbox.sourceforge.net
It comes from blackbox.

I use Openbox myself. As far as I know, Fluxbox doesn't comply with the EWMH spec, and I prefer a window manager that is interoperable with GNOME and KDE should I choose to use them.

[KingBahamut]

KB is a well-known flux hater, but I, too, like fluxbox. I even experimented (briefly) with running fluxbox as gnome 2.10's default wm, and, while I liked having windowtabbing in GNOME, I found that blackbox played with gnome much more nicely.


Now now Brun. I dont hate Fluxbox....just dont prefer it. If your going to use flux, might as well up to XFCE...thats my windowmanager.

[Brunellus]

Now now Brun. I dont hate Fluxbox....just dont prefer it. If your going to use flux, might as well up to XFCE...thats my windowmanager.

Flux is a shade less minimalistic than openbox (which is what I MEANT when I said blackbox, uyy.) and cleaner & leander than Fluxbox, for me.

My littlebro (sixteen years old but not yet a regular ubuntu user), actually thinks fluxbox is cool because it's so brutally businesslike compared to my GNOME and XFCE setups.

[xequence]

Fluxbox is great on its own, though wikipedia says it is slow on ubuntu and red hat for some utf thingy reason. It does take a little while to load from GDM, while openbox is instant.

Openbox is so minimalistic but not customizable! And the parts that are, I have to edit XML or some thing I dont know about.

I used apt-get to download afterstep and to my suprise, I couldent even log into it from GDM. When I use apt-get, I expect it to download AND install it for me e.e Now I am mad.

[poofyhairguy]

fluxbox scares me- its way too minimal. When I logged in and all I got was a black desktop with nothing on it I was restarting my xserver before you can say Gnome Display Manager.

My favorite window manager is kwin, KDE's.

My second fav is the two enlightenments. I have a cool Enlighted Gnome guide here on the forum to tell about E16. I would still use it but I feel guilty using software so old. E17 is amazing- the best eye candy in the world- but they got rid of my favorite theme by far (slate) and it does not have a good task switcher (IMHO).

So I use Metacity and Gnome. Metacity is an ugly slug, but it works the best with Xcompmgr. So....

[majikstreet]

fluxbox scares me- its way too minimal. When I logged in and all I got was a black desktop with nothing on it I was restarting my xserver before you can say Gnome Display Manager.

My favorite window manager is kwin, KDE's.

My second fav is the two enlightenments. I have a cool Enlighted Gnome guide here on the forum to tell about E16. I would still use it but I feel guilty using software so old. E17 is amazing- the best eye candy in the world- but they got rid of my favorite theme by far (slate) and it does not have a good task switcher (IMHO).

So I use Metacity and Gnome. Metacity is an ugly slug, but it works the best with Xcompmgr. So....
You just don't know how to configure it correctly :)
See my screenshot in the oct. screenshots thread.

#fluxbox knows everything.

[Ampersand]

I'm currently using E17 with a few gdesklets (although they don't seem to like each other much at the moment...) The CVS of enlightenment seems to have become slightly more stable recently, it's still got problems but at least it's not segfaulting every time I log out or run something.

[Brunellus]

You just don't know how to configure it correctly :)
See my screenshot in the oct. screenshots thread.

#fluxbox knows everything.
#fluxbox can also be full of pillocks. It's definitely not ubuntu--there are a fair number of guys who hang out in there who will do everything but spit on you if you try and tell them you're using gdm instead of startx to start the X session.

The fluxbox documentation on the site though--great. and I hate to say this on the ubuntu forum, but the gentoo wiki's configuring fluxbox page is the single most useful fluxbox resource on the 'net.

[Stormy Eyes]

Openbox is so minimalistic but not customizable! And the parts that are, I have to edit XML or some thing I dont know about.

Well, what part of Openbox are you looking to customize? I can help, you know. I've been using Openbox since the first alpha release of Openbox 3.

[majikstreet]

#fluxbox can also be full of pillocks. It's definitely not ubuntu--there are a fair number of guys who hang out in there who will do everything but spit on you if you try and tell them you're using gdm instead of startx to start the X session.

The fluxbox documentation on the site though--great. and I hate to say this on the ubuntu forum, but the gentoo wiki's configuring fluxbox page is the single most useful fluxbox resource on the 'net.
Link?

The people in #fluxbox can help, depending on who is online at the time ;)

They helped me with GDM and fluxbox.

-m

[WildTangent]

Who here is using the Ubuntu defaults? *puts up hand* Ya, I can't be bothered to change, especially since I really don't know what I'm doing, and because the default setup works for me, so why change it. I might experiment with different WM's when I get my testbox back up and running.

-Wild

[TravisNewman]

Hey Brunellus, when it comes to pure, plain and simple information, gentoo's forums, wiki, website, et als, are all amazing. Arguably the best out there I think.

[Parkaboy]

I like XFCE it is very simple, does not missuse resources yet you can do a lot with it. Enlightenment is great too because of its visual effects

[Riverside]

Blackbox is excellent. I have been using it as my default home and work window manager since mid-2003. The latest version, 0.70, brings a subtle but noticeable improvement in look and feel over the previous version. 0.70 is available via apt-get for Breezy.

I have tried Fluxbox, but prefer Blackbox. Not a usual point of view I believe, but I am very comfortable with Blackbox, customising it to do exactly what I want, etc.

[xequence]

Well, what part of Openbox are you looking to customize? I can help, you know. I've been using Openbox since the first alpha release of Openbox 3.

That would be great :)

One thing doesnt have much to do with openbox, but I need a good panel. Pypanel I tried but I couldent change it in any way. The text was too small to see.

To the accual openbox, id love to (when I find a good panel) get the panel to automatically start up. Now, I have to type it in the terminal and when I close the terminal it goes away. It said how to do this on a site I found but I didnt understand it.

And, you know when you right click? Id love to customize what I see there. Like putting links to programs and stuff :) All there is now is Firefox (I dont use it) Terminal (I do use it :P), obconf (I like it :)) and a couple other things.

[Stormy Eyes]

That would be great :)

One thing doesnt have much to do with openbox, but I need a good panel. Pypanel I tried but I couldent change it in any way. The text was too small to see.

OK. Configuring pypanel and creating custom X sessions requires detailed instructions that I can't give at the office. In the meantime, please read this howto (http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=75471); I provide an introduction to Openbox in it, including config file and menu hacking.

[xequence]

I am on blackbox right now... It is odd, since you dont have a minimize button on the windows o.o And again, the only way to bring up applications is the terminal.



OK. Configuring pypanel and creating custom X sessions requires detailed instructions that I can't give at the office. In the meantime, please read this howto (http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=75471); I provide an introduction to Openbox in it, including config file and menu hacking.

Ok, ill read it =)

[egon spengler]

You wouldn't think it from looking at the official pages (http://fvwm-themes.sourceforge.net/screenshots/) but fvwm can look amazing. Check some of the screen shots here (http://fvwm.lair.be/viewforum.php?f=39&sid=17ed7f3ced0172da6c3e6f78a85c8511)

[Riverside]

I am on blackbox right now... It is odd, since you dont have a minimize button on the windows o.o And again, the only way to bring up applications is the terminal.The minimize button is the button on the far left of the title bar of each window. This iconifies the window in question. Icons are a little different in Blackbox since they are not visible on the desktop; iconified applications can be viewed by centre mouse button clicking to bring up the Workspaces menu, then scrolling down to the Icons section, hovering the cursor over that and a list of iconified applications will then appear. Restore any inconified application by clicking on its name in the list.

Applications can also be brought up from the main menu, accessed by right clicking anywhere in the root window ("the desktop background"). Of course, the main menu needs to exist and be correctly set up to do this. One can be quite creative in creating application menu items too, for instance:

[exec] (Cribbage) {xterm -fg white -bg black -geometry 80x40 -e cribbage}

...brings up BSD cribbage (providing the application is installed) in an xterm window, black background and white lettering, 80x40 in size.

The default location for the menu configuration file in Blackbox 0.65 is /usr/share/blackbox/menu, and in 0.70 as packaged in Breezy /etc/X11/blackbox/blackbox-menu.

Some details concerning Blackbox Menus and their configuration is available at:

http://blackboxwm.sourceforge.net/BlackboxDocumentation/BlackboxMenus

[cactus]

you might try pekWM too.