“In recent times, the desktop Linux world has been enriched beyond recognition by the KDE & GNOME projects, but window managers are still at the heart of these environments, as well being used widely on their own. I’ll delve into this exciting world and look at the development and the state of the art of some of the most significant and most popular window managers.” Read the article at FreshMeat.
Introduction to Popular Window Managers
About The Author
Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSAlert.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
Follow me on Twitter @EugeniaLoli
Window Maker kicks a*s. Thank you.
Why do you steal news and comments from other pages ? Nothing own to post ?
http://www.dailyrotation.com
some people like these things
btw, fluxbox is rockin’
I must say, I really enjoy fluxbox, it’s small, looks nice, and have many nice features like tabbing windows.
Try it: fluxbox.sourceforge.net
Screenshot: utelsystems.dyndns.org/pics/netbsd1.jpg
i’d have to say that the author most definetly uses FVWM as his primary window manager. i read 2 reviews in that one article. the first review covered 4 popular window managers, and the second review was strictly about FVWM, it’s modules, and inner workings. get sidetracked a little?
this article wasn’t very objective and missed some of the most popular window managers like blackbox, fluxbox, waimea, and enlightenment. what about the endliess list of up and coming window managers? i think if you locked 50 monkeys in a room you’d get a better article :]
-mute
But the best part is the name of the author. This guy is incredible. He’s serving a very important need of us Linux users. I won’t even start to thank him, as this would be totally redundant. I just hope he continues in the “business” forever.
Now, on his page it’s easy to spot the following:
– wmx: great wm, very simple and cool: you change virtual desktops jusk like in a TV set.
– flwm: this is the best IMO — I appreciate vertical titlebars, because they’re less intrusive, and they don’t get confused with the tab-close icon in Mozilla or Opera (I sometimes close the program when trying to close a tab).
– EDE: a desktop environment that looks very promising, albeit just beginning and a little too Windowish.
– ROX: this is another amzing thing. I cannot describe the sensation of using this desktop environment without being gross. It simply is a killer.
– xd640: (from http://www.oksid.ch ). This is another very minimal DE, by someone who really understand computers must be tools to help and not to adore. Somewhat beginning, but already impressive. I don’t know if Chapman’s site has this one.
BTW, I think titlebars have very reduced utility. Whenever I can I get rid of them. 80% of time it is possible to tell the window from its contents — exceptions being when you must have 2 copies of the same thing (like when editing pictures with Gimp). They eat a lot of screen space or, when made small, simply are unreadable or difficult to point at. Sawfish is interesting in that you can have different decorations for different windows, but I found it to be too featureful.
This would be a great article is more managers were covered – it could be a real introduction to the wide world of them. I’ve only used Window Maker because it gives me warm feelings of NeXT. Somebody who is familiar with a good number of them – that would be an article I’d read!
A good site on window managers that is worth bookmarking
http://www.plig.org/xwinman/
That site is the one referenced in the article. It just changed name to http://www.xwinman.org .
If you like the NeXt interface, try AfterStep, too.
There’s also GnuStep, but I don’t know its present status. It seems though, once it’s ready, it will be NeXT born again.
My suggestion is that you go to the site the article indicates and try some wms on your own. Nothing substitutes personal experience. I myself could never adapt to WindowMaker (and, yes, I know it’s gorgeous).
That’s hilarious. A site on alternative operating systems with alternative window managers doesn’t display at all in Opera. I just get a blank screen with a navigate bar at the bottom.
Interesting… This author describes the wonders of Sawfish, Metacity, WM, FVWM, and IceWM. Sounds like a default install of Mandrake 9.
Where’s blackbox/fluxbox? Where’s enlightenment? Where’s 9wm, or its many clones? Where’s ratpoison?
Very bad choice of WMs.
Sorry, dont have teh URL on hand, but I find PWM does everthing prefectly. Minimalist screen space wise, program groups (the mother of tabs) and great keyboard support.
I think I’ll stick to my pretty Mac OS X interface.
Actually you can get the same at http://www.xwinman.org
Well before you call this site useless for stealing news, take this thought into consideration. Would you have found/read that article if the link was posted here?
Now shut your mouth, Eugenia has done a great job with this site.
….it didn’t mention window managers like KWin and XFce (yeah, it is partly a window manager), stuff that commands a large share.
It works fine on Opera 6.x and 7.0 Beta.