On 11 December 09, David C. Rankin wrote:
Listmates,
This is an excerpt from another post I wrote recently in an offlist discussion, but I thought I would pass along the general parts concerning the desktop evaluations just in case anyone else may want a little summary of what all the alternative desktops for openSuSE are and a sentence or two about each. Gnome and KDE will always be the titans of the Linux desktop, but don't overlook enlightenment, the "BoxTops" or iceWM, they are really really good desktops. Simple, but good. And since you already have your kde or gnome apps installed, just fire them up in the desktop of your choice. (Yes, VirtualBox works fine in all of them as well). The only caveat is that you will need to use yast to set up your network to use traditional ifup so you don't have to mess with starting your network in each of the desktops each time you login. Simple enough.
I have probably spent more time in enlightenment lately that I have in either gnome or KDE. (Not that I'm dissing either). The waltz though the other desktops was largely prompted by wanting to find a good looking 'light-weight' desktop that worked well through vnc or nx. It just so happens that enlightenment, openbox and a couple of others are are so good that they are worth serious consideration as your daily driver when you are in the mood for a change (or need to work on your kde4 settings without kde4 running). So without more, here goes:
* blackbox (openbox with more tools [panels, runner app, etc..]
* E-16 (absolutely love it -- I'd probably have to call this my favorite - it's been stable since 2000) I think I've passed a screenshot along before, but if not, here it is. I really like this desktop! Out of the 100's of themes available, just make sure you pull '23ozGlass', 'DarkOne', and 'Ganymede' themes. (you'll dig them) By far, the Ganymede theme is the most thorough, but below I'm using the DarkOne theme:
http://www.3111skyline.com/download/ss/e/e16/e16-my-favorite-setup.jpg (it's 279k, but worth the extra 20 seconds of download)
Make sure you get all the epplets AND the keyeditor for assigning shortcuts and you can make this desktop 'sing.'
* E-17 (absolutely love it too. Both e16 and e17 are great dt's. e17 requires restart every now and then, but it is a gorgeous dt that is really coming together) Just make sure you get the 'A-SBlack-Esp1' theme. (you'll like it)
* fluxbox - another good desktop. It uses a 'slit' (hidden task/icon bar) that works pretty well.
* gnome - (never thought I would say it, but I really like it too. Talk about phenomenal 'dark themes' wow. Combine 'Neon' with 'Sonar' decorations and I don't think I've seen a better window layout) Not to mention all gtk apps are automatically themed correctly.
* icewm - still a favorite over vnc. The UFO and microGUI themes are really nice.
* you know kde/kde4 - enough said
* lxde (blackbox, fluxbox, icewm and openbox + some nice tools for dynamic menus (scans gnome, kde & other apps and then is smart enough cache the results so the latest apps are always available in the menu if you have menu cache installed. (must have) I really like lxde too. All of this class of dt are incredibly solid dt's (bb, fb, icewm, ob, etc..) they just lack a bit of the creature comforts provided by enlightenment, kde and gnome) The only drawback I've found in this class is the absence or patchy disk cache/memory cache routines. I don't know why kdebase just doesn't take care of it when you open konqueror and expand /usr/share or something similar, but you can definitely tell a difference in the cache area. That does NOT mean they are unusable at all. What that means is that I had to look real hard to find any notable difference in desktop performance, and that is all I could come up with.
* openbox - the best of class for this class of desktops. You have as many of the creature comforts as you are going to get with openbox. (make sure you have obmenu, obconf and wallmenu-0.3.py installed for you configuration editor, menu editor and dynamic wallpaper changing. It too has good support for dynamic menus & wallpaper changing, etc.. The only shortfall is the alt-f2 run command. Here you just have to grab either 'bbrun' from blackbox or 'fbrun' from flux and you are good to go.
You are also in luck on themes. I know everone has a different taste, but I just got done summarizing a few of my favorite themes for openbox as well. (there are hundreds to choose from). Here is the collection you want to make sure are installed in /usr/share/themes:
<short list>
Artwiz-boxed Chaos2 Cyclism Carbon Mikachu Mire_v2_blue Onyx Spiffish
<the "don't overlook" list>
AbsE Bamboo BBstyle Curdled Dyne Gelb Isawagorilla Jolly Light-industry Mars Misted MOnst4-sky Nova-Blue Nova-Gold Onyx-black Onyx-Citrus Onyx-dcr Operation Peptide Simple Spiffe Spoff Wblue
** A few of the themes need a few 'tweaks', but other than that, they look great.
This is pretty much the summary of my desktop eval. They all install easily with just a few config changes needed to setup the wallpaper changes, etc. Also, this isn't meant as a 'one dt is better than the other' post, so nobody start throwing rocks. I like them all. I know there are more benefits for each of the desktops that I haven't run across yet, so if you have a point or two to add, please help me out.
All of the desktops above are available through yast/zypper. I would suggest loading a few additional repositories if you want to install them. The primary OBS window manager repository is:
http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/X11:/windowmanagers/
where you will find newer but stable versions of the desktops plus all the tools (obmenu, obconf, etc...) You can also add the individual WM repositories if you want to install the latest svn build such as:
http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/X11:/Enlightenment/
These are all great desktops and they have have their particular niche. If you have thought about taking them on a test-drive, I highly recommend it. Enjoy!
Wow! Great writeup, David! I'm leaving the whole thing in my reply because it's worth it, IMO. Thanks for all your work on this! -- The Second Amendment is in place in case the politicians ignore the others. -- To unsubscribe, e-mail: opensuse+unsubscribe@opensuse.org For additional commands, e-mail: opensuse+help@opensuse.org