window managers

This summer (just to make you happy ) I will experiment with other window managers and desktop environments

I'm taking a break from kde to give other window managers a fair shot

so far on my list are

know of any more? please share (and suggest) them ... (although I won't compile one ... just ones with packages for mint (debian packages))

also not ... I'm not going to test things like openbox and fluxbox ... I allready know how those work (and they are all about the same)


XFCE
GNOME3
GNOME Classic
UNITY
RAZOR-QT
CINNAMON


...

After using these for ... webbrowsing ... themeing ... comic drawing ... and xonotic mapping ... I will report my findings and mercilessly rate them...

... and find out if anything is REALLY better that KDE ...


[/color]
Cinnamon----------------------------------------------------
purtyness ||||||||-- 8/10

LIKE

-- Effects are well thought out ... looks nice
-- uses good old metacity (I think) and cmpiz ( I think) I'll need to look into that
-- Hot corner (uper left) shows all desktops ... and all apps on the desktops -- very useful
-- its clean and screen space saving
-- I like its start menu (equivalent thing)

MEH

effects are slow (low framerate) ... might be ati's fault though
extensions system seems promising

BLAUH

-- panel is restricted to top - bottom - or both ... no side panel
-- has same crashing issue as gnome3 ... crashes --- revives itself --- and messes up the z order of the 20 gimp windows I had open atm
-- EFFECT CHECKBOX LIES -- it just disables some of the effects ... desktop compositioning (how do I spell that?) is still on ... meaning windowed games on my system run at 30 fps or less ... and effects are not truly off




Unity --------------------------------------------

purtyness |||||||||| 10/10

LIKE

-- saves lots of vertical screen space
-- saves on all screen space
-- plops the window buttons in the top bar when maximized ... very innovative ...
--chrome looks awesome in unity

MEH
BLAUH

-- like gnome 3 ... not customize-able
-- the title bar is at the top like a mac ... It normally wouldn't be an issue ... however IT BREAKS RADIANT ... randant has 2 title bars ... the main one ... and the textures one (for refreshing shaders and such) the texture one does not appear ... thus rendering radiant (mostly) unusable


Gnome Classic (no-effects)----------------------------------

purtyness |||||||-- (can be made more purty with special themes...)

LIKE
-- nice and fast
MEH
BLAUH
--no full screen for individual windows (metacity's fault) ... and with the unconstumizability of gnome three the top 64+ and bottom 32+ pixels are wasted while playing minecraft....

Gnome 3 -----------------------------------

purtyness |||||||||| 10/10

LIKE
-- kde apps are purty too (theme is recognized)
-- has aero snap

MEH
-- run command keystroke disabled by default
-- kde apps loses prettyness when running in root
-- gnome terminal wasn't installed with the rest of the apps ... used konsole (which I already had)

BLAUH

-- the shell crashes often ! (it restarts itself ... but still...)
-- synaptic will not ask for root privileges and start in windowshopping mode
-- top bar is ON TOP of rightclick menus sometimes clipping off the top option (chrome spell check)
-- effects can not be turned off (useless for windowed games (minecraft))

Enlightenment 17. I wouldn't recommend installing just from the package manager as the default theme looks terrible. Try is as part of the Bodhi Linux distribution which is hands down the best in its class. This one is definitely different from the rest. Its looks can deceive by the way, this has been around long before GNOME Shell and Unity. I might have used this as my default if integration with GTK+/Qt programs was better. Yes, I know that's distro-specific but it really is somewhat poor in this respect. Infinitely customisable, and very nice-looking, as well as being ridiculously lightweight (especially for its fancy effects). I would highly recommend this. Oh, the biggest problem is actually the bugs. After 10 years, it's still in beta and it's no wonder with that many bugs. Don't let this scare you off though, it's worth at least taking it for a spin.

KDE is my favourite too (with Xfce a close second, I never liked GNOME2 BTW). But another up-and-coming name is the Cinnamon desktop environment, which is the default in Linux Mint... and only Linux Mint. But this is big, just as Linux Mint is. Check it out.

Razor-qt is pretty unique, you could say, because it exists precisely to fill the niche for a lightweight Qt window manager (though it's turning into more of a DE now). This is not tied to KDE whatsoever, just plain old Qt. It's surprising how KDE actually takes perhaps the fastest of all GUI frameworks and bloats it into something greater than an elephant. It's far from complete, but you can't have a complete look at WMs without looking at this.
My favourite aspect of KDE is actually the programs which are all-around fantastic, from Amarok to Dolphin to KRenamer. It's just a bit too heavy for a hardcore gamer. That's why I'm so stoked about Razor-qt. Unfortunately, you have to try it through Arch or Gentoo or something because no distributions ship with it, and I'd doubt any of them have it in their repositories either.

Also, these are not window managers you listed but desktop environments. So I listed both.

If it's really WM's that you're talking about and not DE's, give wmii or awesomewm a try! It's super unsettling (maybe you'll be repulsed, even) as they are tiling WMs.

I personally use and love DWM but it might be a little tricky for you as a first tiling WM experience. I can't imagine ever going back to point-and-click, desktop-icons, fancy-menu, look-at-the-size-of-my-dock environments; they're such a pain for me to use and they waste so much screen estate, it's crazy.

EDIT: also, don't go on a quest to prove that KDE is the best, you'll be biased from the start and you'll never be objective. Just be curious, weigh the pros and cons, make it an enlightening experience for you rather than a challenge for KDE.

I like openbox because false window tiling, whiles still being able to fall back on floating functionality. But right now I'm just using XFCE with it's new "Aero-Snap" key/edge mappings and I am content. I'd like E17 if it wasn't such a pain in the arse to set up

fvwm...blackbox...fluxbox... all of those use gradients for their components. Enlightenment DR16 (completely different from E17) is extremely lightweight and pretty spiffy, but it lacks a bit of functionality, and compiz doesn't support it if you use that. It's also not quite as configurable as fvwm.

I'd recommend trying Enlightenment and Razor/Antico, but those were already recommended. I remember I was a big fan of Enlightenment around 2004 but it lacked at least the simple tools integration (like a file manager, duh :-P ), and then KDE4 came out and I never looked back ;-).

Why can't we do worst DE ever? That's much easier:


Sometimes I find myself getting a hankering for Windows 3.x Program Manager for some strange reason. That actually had a very useful tile function if you so wanted it. Those were also the days when files were copied (F8) and moved (F7) not all this modern 'copy and paste'.

Microsoft Bob was great... For 7 year olds!

Don't forget Trinity Desktop http://www.trinitydesktop.org/ , you'll find us in #trinity-desktop on irc.freenode.net.

oh yes... I guess I was meaning desktop environments ....

OH GOD ... Not tiling envorinements ..... :O (hutty hides in corner)

no I'm not "really" biased towards kde ... I'm actually kinda liking gnome3 atm ... (but thats just cause its purty)

I actually did give BOB a serious try back when I used vista ... ... ... never doing that again ...

and yes ... I will give in depth reviews ad comparisons of various de (and wm)




.... .... yes I will go more in depth than "its purty"


I will update top post with findings

Have you ever tried tiling WMs?

Oh well, I'm not going to force you into that.

I have tried the kwin (kdes) tiling ... I didn't like it so much ... Its not that I'm totally against tiling (I use aero snap ALL THE TIME) its just Auto tiling doesn't work out for me so well (and those of us with small screen resolutions (yes ... I consider 1600x900 small))


I think I read about awsomewm once ... was that the one where you have to recompile it to change settings?

That's unusual... Tiling saves me a LOT of screen estate. Maybe KDE's way keeps window decorations and such. Then it just serves to prove that these things eat up way too much space.

DWM has to be recompiled to change settings. Not Awesome, it uses lua-formatted configs.

Yes, KDE tiling mode keeps the window deco. It's effectively just arranging windows in a way that tiling wm's do (spiral and such), and you can get a similar and better effect at the same time by just using the snap to border function in normal non-tiling mode.

Hutty, you can adjust the panels in Gnome 2 (aka Gnome Classic) as you like and even remove them. Just right-click on it and you´ll see the options...

... ok maybe I wans't thinking of awesome wm ..


I don't like tilers so much cuase I like to alt-tab though my windows ... not split the screen for them ... window decorations in kde can be made so small its not an issue (removed entirely if wanted)

GNOME 2 ... you can change the panels though right click

GNOME Classic the right-click on menus disabled to match gnome 3 (i'll see if I can turn it on...)

I like having my windows in fullscreen most of the time, so I make extensive use of workspaces. That said, tiling is always welcome when I need two windows on the screen at the same time.

To each their own

Tip: awesomewm - great dynamic tiling window manager :-)

I already suggested that!

Sorry

Gave cinnamon a go today ... results in first post ...

overall its nice ... but seeing as effects are stuck on ... useless (to me)

fellow mappers ... be ware of unity ... it has a major design flaw that breaks radaint

Don't forget Trinity Desktop http://www.trinitydesktop.org/ , you'll find us in #trinity-desktop on irc.freenode.net.

What is the major difference between kde4 and Trinity? (except that trinity is kde3 forked)

What is the major difference between kde4 and Trinity? (except that trinity is kde3 forked)

Pretty much the same as the difference between KDE3 and KDE4. Trinity is proposing moving to Qt4 but keeping the KDE3 interface look and feel. Right now it is mostly a polished, tweaked, rebranded KDE3.

Difficult to see what kind of future it may have. KDE4 hating abated as the point releases progressed, issues were fixed, features reimplemented and people got used to it. Trinity seems to be keeping up a roughly yearly release program which is very valid and serves a purpose as a replacement for KDE 3.5.9.

fellow mappers ... be ware of unity ... it has a major design flaw that breaks radaint

Care to elaborate?