Lubuntu just got worse

[guiverc]

While I expect it is possible to have shortcuts to programs you use regularly there does not seem to be any obvious way to do that. My overriding feeling is that Lubuntu is not at all aimed at beginners

LXQt/Lubuntu 20.04 provides a Quick Launch facility, covered in the manual

https://manual.lubuntu.me/stable/5/5...quick%20launch

I would expect beginners to find things like the Lubuntu Manual handy.

My understanding is that Lubuntu is moving away from running on old hardware ( though I am running the latest version and it seems very responsive on my old hardware)

Yes Lubuntu documented a New Direction but what really qualifies as old hardware? The last Lubuntu I could boot on a 2003-2005 pentium M/4 laptop/desktop was Lubuntu 19.04, but few people are using those old computers anyway (though some still do!, including myself). Lubuntu 19.04 is EOL, however Lubuntu 18.04 LTS is still supported, so I'm running Lubuntu 18.04 LTS on my old IBM Thinkpad t43 from 2005.

The desktop I'm typing this reply into is my main desktop, and it's a more modern 2009 dell desktop and it runs Lubuntu groovy (what will be 20.10 rather soon). Maybe this box is old, but it's what I've got, and it's great with Lubuntu.

dell [optiplex] 960 (c2q-q9400, 8gb, amd/ati cedar radeon hd 5000/6000/7350/8350)

It turns out most Lubuntu users are using 3-4 year old boxes though, however yes there are still some using older boxes like myself. Whilst Lubuntu may not cater much longer for my really old pentium M laptops (I still use IBM r50p, t42p & the t43 I already mentioned), those boxes really are struggling with modern linux (older pentium Ms don't seem to like the 5.4 kernel and it's not just limited to Lubuntu; it's all OSes).

Why use Lubuntu?

- Lubuntu is light on resources.

This is rather obvious and badly shown in some vids as booting up the desktop and looking at how much RAM is used. However in real life you don't use the desktop itself, but run programs on the desktop, and those programs use libraries/toolkits/frameworks that use resources. LXQt uses the Qt5 toolkit which is far lighter than GTK3, and is lighter than KDE (which also uses Qt5 but with KF5 that adds weight). Use GTK3 apps on Lubuntu and you'll lose some of the lightness though (esp. if you've limited RAM), just like using Qt apps on a GTK desktop will waste resources (esp. RAM). Even despite this Lubuntu is light on resources (cpu & RAM). This matters to me as I use old hardware!

I liked MATE, however it became heavier as it moved from GTK2 to GTK3 so used Xubuntu & XFCE more. Xubuntu likewise became heavier as it ported from GTK2 to GTK3. I expected the same when Lubuntu moved from LXDE (GTK2) to LXQt (Qt5), but no that's far lighter than GTK3.

I like my GTK3 apps, having grown attached to them decades ago in GNOME2 days, but with 8GB on my primary desktop I don't worry (I do select apps carefully when using 1GB or 2GB of RAM, even somewhat carefully on 4GB)

- desktop configuration; can get it to how I like it

I have a normal looking panel top & bottom of monitors, and on the side of monitors I have a Unity-7 like Quick-Launch dock like panel that's usually hidden but allows me to quickly launch apps. Docks achieve this too, but use way more resources than the desktop doing it itself (without additional program). LXQt isn't the only DE that can achieve this, my current setup is a clone of my XFCE setup anyway. I've been happy on KDE, was happy on GNOME2, alas struggle with GNOME3 .. but here I'd be happy on a number of DEs.

Why not use it?

- taste

We all have tastes, and like different flavors of ice-cream, and different user interfaces. LXQt is designed to be light & efficient (resource wise) and only adding features where the (resource) cost is minimal. If you've got a good enough machine, plenty of resources for your apps & can afford to use a heavier base desktop, go for it if it's more to your taste.

- app chioce

If you love your GTK apps, a Qt desktop may not be more efficient for you anyway. It's the reason each desktop provides their own editor (`mousepad` for XFCE, `pluma` for MATE, `leafpad` for LXDE, `featherpad` for LXQt, `gedit` for GNOME etc) when all those apps really do the same thing, but achieve the result using different libraries/toolkits and are most efficient because they can use libs/toolkits already in RAM because the desktop itself uses it too. Choosing a desktop that matches your apps is resource efficient.

Lubuntu is the lightest of the Ubuntu flavors anyway, for my oldish hardware.

[wilfy100]

Thanks guiverc for a well considered and informative reply. I will hold my hands up and say I did not look at the documentation. Since I only have to unplug the data cable on the hard drive with Elementary installed and connect another drive to the Sata/power pass through cables it would be easy to install Lubuntu and give it a more considered try. I would like to do this, as a learning process as much as anything. Although dual boot normally works well, I would prefer the second drive way. I wonder if you would mind commenting on the pre-installed programs in Lubuntu. Do you make much use of these and do you leave them there or uninstall them. I suppose apart from taking a small amount of hard drive space (not really a problem) they could be left in place and explored at leisure. I will put some time and effort into this and report back in the future with hopefully a balanced and considered assessment. I have a small form factor single core pentium 2Ghz pc that would be a good candidate to put Lubuntu on but its being rather recalcitrant at the moment so its become a project to sort it out.

[wilfy100]

Despite my optimism in my previous post, I have just spent the last 3 1/2 hours trying to get to grips with Lubuntu. It has not been fun. I installed the Cairo dock which is very much what I am used to from other Linux distro's. Unfortunately this locks up regularly and has a thick black background stripe to it that is related to the compositor I think. I could not work around this at all. I tried to install Lubuntu tweaks but I could not do it from Discover and the terminal commands failed with a can't find it error. Other programs also failed to install as well. I admit I am at the level of google the commands and copy and paste them into the terminal in sequence. I have Lubuntu installed to a mechanical hard drive and it boots very slowly now, I know an ssd is quicker but launch is 6 times slower from the spinning rust. Discover seems rather basic compared to other program installers. While it is simple to change to another desktop background Lubuntu only seems to have one by default. All this is to say I will go back to elementary on the main drive while installing Pop os on the external one. Full disclosure is that Pop did suffer from some random reboots on this particular pc but I will give it another try. All this is just my personal choice but I don't think Lubuntu is for me.

[guiverc]

[QUOTE=wilfy100;13990040]I installed the Cairo dock which is very much what I am used to from other Linux distro's./QUOTE]

Cairo dock is a strange choice for LXQt. Did you consider how it works before adding? ie. if you look at

https://packages.ubuntu.com/focal/cairo-dock

you'll note it's very tied into GNOME and GTK3, meaning it's great on a GNOME, MATE, XFCE, Cinnamon etc type base (where GNOME services and GTK3 are being used), but... don't forget LXQt is Qt5 based

https://packages.ubuntu.com/focal/latte-dock

Latte dock makes more sense, as it's Qt5 based, however that'll still introduce KF5 (K frameworks of KDE 5) and add weight, but would be my choice if I absolutely needed to use a dock.

I use the default panels to create my 'dock' saving resources.

I mentioned I created my setup in XFCE, and my LXQt setup is just a clone (or of that setup); my box still has XFCE/Xubuntu installed, along with GNOME, so if I logout of Lubuntu/LXQt, I can login to Xubuntu/XFCE and have mostly the same look & feel. My box is also the 2009 box, so I'm not going to waste resources on cairo-dock, or even latte-dock

I mentioned toolkits & libraries in my prior post; consider the tools and programs you consider essential, and if `cairo-dock` is something you consider essential, LXQt is likely not your best DEsktop. This has nothing to do with Lubuntu, but the desktop & application choice doesn't match (ie. you'd have the same issue with debian, opensuse, fedora..)

(I test Lubuntu and do comparisons on issues with Debian sid firstly (but even on sid it's generally behind Lubuntu, Fedora is ahead of Debian sid, but Fedora is not usually ahead of Lubuntu (Lubuntu's LXQt coming from Github and not upstream Debian), and finally OpenSUSE tumbleweed which is rather often ahead of Ubuntu testing. Other than differences caused by software stack age, plus the use of openbox|xfwm|.., differences are non-existent. Distribution make little difference in my opinion; the four mentioned here being the systems I have here that I use)

Lubuntu tweaks? Sorry I don't know what you mean here. There is no Lubuntu tweaks. I did a `apt-cache search lubuntu` to look for what you could mean and there is no tweaks in the results. There is LXQt settings, but that still won't contain everything, as Lubuntu uses `openbox` as it's WM (window manager) however LXQt doesn't have a set WM thus no WM settings are wired into LXQt settings.

A number of wallpapers are included; 7 maybe (I forget; one winner of the competition didn't provide their HD image so it was not included), they are found in

/usr/share/lubuntu/wallpapers/

though that is not the directory automatically opened by LXQt wallpaper changer (this was changed with an update, but I forget when that was done), which is why you probably didn't see them.

Lubuntu booting can be made faster by disabling the snap daemon, you are comparing to non-Ubuntu's (Ubuntu derivatives) that have done that. Lubuntu though being a Ubuntu flavor has it enabled by default.

Not the distribution for you? Not a problem, and understandable given the details you provide do imply a GTK+ environment/desktop sure sounds like it is more what you're used to and will be best with.