On Mon, Jul 01, 2002 at 02:02:45PM +0100, Derek Fountain wrote:
I really would like to move from KDE. As the bloat in there continues to grow it just gets slower and slower. Those who keep their machines up to date probably don't notice it so much, but I don't do anything which requires 2ghz, so why should I upgrade my machine just so I can run an *environment* at decent speed?
I was thinking GNOME2 might be the answer, but not after reading that review. It looks like they've finally dragged themselves into the world of decent looking anti-aliased fonts, but still can't write a bit of code which implements a good quality, standard file dialog box. :sigh: I thought Sun were looking at usability issues for GNOME?
People talk about Backbox, IceWm, etc., but those aren't real environments (or are they? Is my knowledge here outdated?) I want to be able to click on a link in my news reader and have my browser open. I want to be able to drag the URL to the desktop and see a link icon appear on the desktop. I want faultless drag and drop across apps, I want a CD player to pop up when I put an audio disk in the drive. It's obviously a lot to ask. Microsoft remain the only one's who've got close as yet.
You are right about Blackbox and Icewm not being "environments". They are window managers with a few extra bells and whistles. However, depending on what you want, sometimes less is more. For example, with Icewm, you don't get desktop icons (gmc or nautilus can create these if you want them). However, have you noticed that the new Windows XP desktop comes with few if any icons? MS said they are moving away from desktop icons and in most cases, I prefer NOT to have desktop icons. Once again, this is a personal choice. Some people love to have 100 icons scattered across their desktop. The environment that Icewm gives you is like an enhanced Windows 95. You have a main program start button, taskbar, quick launch buttons, a few tray icons, desktop switch buttons, integrated clock, CPU and network monitors. You can configure the mouse buttons to give you various menus when you click on the desktop, etc. But the main thing you get is consistent, stable behaviour and speed, speed, speed. It takes seconds to start Icewm and seconds to shutdown. Programs start fast and run fast. The menus are easy to understand and customize (compared to the complex maze that is Gnome or KDE). There are some nice GUI tools for customization (icepref and iceme). I might go back to KDE after another point release or two. Konqueror is very, very nice. But for now, I am enjoying the raw speed of a lean setup. Best Regards, Keith -- LPIC-2, MCSE, N+ Right behind you, I see the millions Got spam? Get spastic http://spastic.sourceforge.net