Fluxbox, Gnome, KDE Which One!

kberg209 · n00b Joined: 07 Dec 2003 Posts: 28

I'm new to gentoo, infact I just got it working for the first time. I've heard good and bad thigns about all sorts of window managers or whatever they are technically called. Anyhow a friend suggested FluxBox. IS this good? I've herd it's minimalistic as far as a gui goes. Any suggestions? is Fluxbox the way to go or should I use another for my first time?

angryelephant · n00b Joined: 13 Oct 2003 Posts: 23 Location: san diego

Myself, and many other people here, are partial to XFCE-4. Its good if you want a minimalist desktop. Otherwise KDE and Gnome are pretty solid.

cgibreak · n00b Joined: 12 Oct 2003 Posts: 20

My personal choice is kahakai because it is _very_ configureable if you know a little python. Flux and XFCE4 are both nice. Gnome and KDE are too bloated for me.

try 'em out

BiggJ · Posted: Tue Dec 09, 2003 6:35 pm Post subject:

Hmmm ... are you trying to start a war?

I have used WMaker and Fluxbox for slower machines and Gnome and KDE for faster machines.

I have settled on Fluxbox and KDE with KDE being the preference. It has a ton of usful apps that are will integrated with the environment.

That being said, it's really just personal preference, you may have to try them all before settling on one.

--Josh

secondsun72 · n00b Joined: 11 Nov 2002 Posts: 15

Usually I do not get into these kinds of flame wars and give the advice, I use KDE. It works, I don't have to learn everything new and it is very attractive. Konqueror's transparent networking features make my life bearable, kdevelop is a great ide, quata is a good html editor, kmail and knode are respectable email and newsgroup programs which are getting better in 3.2.
KDE has all of the apps more or less stable, included and integrated.

Now for my rant part, I use Gnome for one week every year as my primary desktop system. I have played with it on and off since Enlightenment was its WM. I do not like it. It seems slow, buggy and gtk is just ugly. This is only my opinion, but I htink it is a damn good one.

Mr. Atoz · Posted: Tue Dec 09, 2003 9:54 pm Post subject:

XFCE4 is clean. modern. lightweight and stable.

After trying and using Gnome, KDE, *box, wmaker, E16 (my 2nd choice), I have found XFCE4 to fit my needs the best.

As biggj said, try them all and see what works well for you.
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monotux · Posted: Tue Dec 09, 2003 10:06 pm Post subject:

OpenBox3 is really nice, although gnome, xfce4 and fluxbox-dev kicks ass :-)

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BiggJ · Posted: Tue Dec 09, 2003 10:44 pm Post subject:

kberg209 -- you might want to open a poll on this ... and choose the top 2 or 3 to try. I would include:

gnome, kde, wmaker, (black|flux)box, OpenBox3, and XFCE4

Pardon me if I missed any commenly used ones. These are the ones on this post.

ikaro · Advocate Joined: 14 Jul 2003 Posts: 2527 Location: Denmark

Since you are new to gentoo, and Since you ask for which window manager i suppose you are new to linux as well, So I recommend either Gnome or KDE.
If i had to choose one of those I would go with Gnome. KDE its just too much bloat and will get you confused.

Once you have used gnome for some time, explore the other window managers until you find one you like, that is, if you thing Gnome its too much for you, then go with the minimalistic window managers like fluxbox, openbox, kahahai , xfce or similar.

Maybe going for "hard to setup" window manager on your first ride, will prolly scare you away, and you dont have the chance to see how good they are.

Asking whats best, is wrong, of course everyone will answer that the window manager they are using is the best. Belive me ive seen it before.

It can even happen that once you use gnome, and find some of the many cool themes around, you wil stick to it and wont need anything else.. I've seen that happen, just ask any Gnome user, they will tell you the same thing.

I Hope you make a wise decision and good luck with your Gentoo and your window manager.
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Cerement · Guru Joined: 14 Jun 2003 Posts: 404

Absolutely nothing stopping you from trying them all (aside from disk space of course

)

follow the desktop guide and try out KDE for awhile
then try out the next section on Gnome for awhile
that covers the big boys

out of the next tier, the popular choices (currently) include:
fluxbox, XFCE, kahakai/waimea, and pekwm

<edit>
for eye-candy,
Enlightenment pretty much wins out
</edit>

minimalist choices include:
ion, ratpoison, and screen

or for a simple minimal alternative, don't install any window manager
and you'll default to twm ... I hear it's very ... um ... "functional" ...

Fissile · Guru Joined: 23 Nov 2003 Posts: 470

Hey kberg, i am new to gentoo aswell as a matter of fact i am new to the whole linux thing.. but i like gnome a lot... it has really nice and elegantly integrated features and eventhough i was a bit confused at first.. i am beginning to like it more and more..
ps: i am thinking of trying kde aswell so as just to broden the experience...

ciao..
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nsahoo · l33t Joined: 17 Jul 2003 Posts: 618

i am sure you are more confused now. Let me help you out. try kde.

i use that and like it a lot. It's BIG and you know .. the bigger the better

a lot of apps and all are well integrated.

ksenos · Posted: Wed Dec 10, 2003 1:50 pm Post subject:

Greetings ... I am new to linux and gentoo too. I first used gnome 2.4 and recently switched to xfce4. Gnome has a lot of good aps (nautilus and file-roller being my favorite

) and a customizable desktop environment. XFCE is minimal and beautiful. The common thing between these two is the GTK2 which I like a lot.I have both of them installed on my pc.

Fissile · Guru Joined: 23 Nov 2003 Posts: 470

Hey all a comment:

just my opinion... KDE sucks.. it keeps on crashing for no freaking reason, on help menu and especially on kword... i was immensly disappointed.. in retrorespect Gnome is awesome and so much more customizable in terms of themes...

ciao...
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hook · Posted: Sat Dec 13, 2003 12:19 pm Post subject:

well, i've used KDE from it's 1.x day on and i love it.
the next best thing for me is blackbox/fluxbox (fluxbox, lately, since blackbox's dead)
after that come wm, fvwm and icewm

what's good for you depends on what you want.

if you want a whole desktop i'd suggest KDE or Gnome (KDE being MY favourite)
if you want a win*-like lightweight wm i'd recomend ICEwm (or even XPde, if you're a xp fanatic and want a whole desktop)
if you want something small and inovative wm (window maker), fvwm and especially fluxbox are the thing i'd suggest. also you might want to try out Enlightenment.

i have to add, that my winxp addicted brother was (and probably still is, but won't admit it) a sucker for blackbox and WM

now something about the difference between de's and wm's:
wm = Window Manager ...manages windows, that's it, no needless parts like GUI settings or integrated mail clients, games, browsers etc. ...usually takes up a few KB or MB of space; easy on the resources
de = Desktop Enviroment ...it's a complete desktop, together with proggies like mail clients, games, and so on and so on. - takes up usually around 100MB (or more) and is filled with all the goodies you'd like; takes up more recources then wm (but still less then winxp!)

p.p.s. yes, i did try Enlightenment and Gnome a couple of times, but it just didn't work out.
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Cossins · Posted: Sat Dec 13, 2003 12:31 pm Post subject:

Fissile · Guru Joined: 23 Nov 2003 Posts: 470

hey first of all.. i am not being stupid.. maybe a little melodramatic... second of all it was only my "opinion"... and thirdly it was ment as a warning to the author of this post so as to imply that if it happens to me.. it could happen to u...

and i still think gnome is best...
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hook · Posted: Sun Dec 14, 2003 8:24 am Post subject:

configurability & kde-vs-gnome:
yea, in my experience i also agree that KDE/qt is more (and simpler) to configure then Gnome/gtk
but one thing i really liked on Gnome/gtk is that in gtk you can rip a menu into docked submenus (click-drag the <-------> separator in a menu) and bind the keys on the fly - just have your cursor on the menu entry and press a key(combo) you'd like to use to access that option.
although i have to say that KDE's options to bind keys is more then satisfying
...it's just the matter of taste; not bad or good taste, but flavours

if you don't have gnome installed, try the keybinding on the fly in the GIMP or Xmms - they're probably the most popular gtk-powered apps around.
_________________
tea+free software+law=hook

(deep inside i'm still a tux's little helper)

hook · Posted: Sun Dec 14, 2003 8:30 am Post subject:

Mr. Hahn · Apprentice Joined: 05 Apr 2003 Posts: 250

I like fluxbox and xfce4. I am leaning more to xfce4 lately though, just because it is easier to configure stuff (ex: I don't feeling getting into a command shell just to adjust my mouse acceleration). Only thing I miss from flux actually is the tabs, but xfce4's taskbar doesn't suck, so that makes up for it. Anyways, I like the 2 because they are minimalistic, while still very functional and aesthetically pleasing. But yeah, I would take windows xp over kde anyday of the week, I dunno about gnome though, I heard the latest ones are really nice. But yeah, kde, gross, windows would be my preference, not to mention I could be use visual studio .NET

.

hook · Posted: Sun Dec 14, 2003 11:29 am Post subject:

winXP addicts? try XPde - http://xpde.linuxring.hu

.NET? try Mono and dotGNU ...here's some info about them - http://www.linuxdevices.com/news/NS3620562054.html
_________________
tea+free software+law=hook

(deep inside i'm still a tux's little helper)

dreambox · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 09 Mar 2003 Posts: 137

Did anyone try ROX desktop http://rox.sourceforge.net/phpwiki ?

It looks nice
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