#Better window manager alternatives mac os
#Better window manager alternatives full

It’s just a window manager with a lot of features to help you take control over your desktop. Fluxbox is not a window manager for casual computer users - it’s a window manager for users who want to have fine-grained control over their desktop and are willing to spend the time to set it up.įluxbox doesn’t come with its own file manager, dock, etc.

#Better window manager alternatives mac os

If you’ve come up using Windows or Mac OS X, or even GNOME or KDE, Fluxbox may take a bit of getting used to. They’ve tested LXDE on everything from a Pentium II with 192MB of RAM to an Atom-based machine with 512MB with good results - so if you’re still using a fairly old machine or a lightweight netbook, LXDE is a really good choice. If you look at the about page on the LXDE site, they give a description of all the comonents you get from the LXDE Project and system requirements. If you already have a favorite Linux distribution most of the distros ship LXDE packages as well. It’s not the only distro to standardize on LXDE, of course, but a good choice for new users. It’s the default desktop for the Knoppix live CD, and you can get an LXDE-based Ubuntu variant called Lubuntu if you want to go for a distro designed around LXDE. You may have used LXDE and not even known it. It even has its own default music player based on XMMS2, called LXMusic. (This is also true of other desktop environments, for varying values of “easily.”) It’s a nice, workhorse, desktop environment that runs very well on lightweight computers. It’s modular, and you can easily swap out components if you want to use a different panel, file manager, etc.

#Better window manager alternatives full

Like Xfce it uses GTK+ and has a full set of applications you’d expect from a desktop environment - PCManFM file manager, theme support, text editor (Leafpad), terminal (LXTerminal), and uses Openbox as its window manager. LXDE is another lightweight, but familiar, desktop. You should be able to find current packages for most Linux distros, and some (like Xubuntu) specialize in Xfce. If you’re looking for an alternative to GNOME or KDE, but still want a very full featured desktop, check out Xfce. It also has better support for multi-head (two or more monitors) support, and the Xfce menu is now compliant - so you can edit the application menu using Alacarte or another menu editor that supports the standard. It brings some new goodies, like support for remote fileshares in Thunar (its file manager) and a totally rewritten panel. The most recent release, Xfce 4.8, was released just a few weeks ago. By default, anyway: Xfce is very customizable, so you could easily clutter it up if you really wanted to. The project moved away from the CDE look and feel long ago, and Xfce now has a nice, clean, simple look and feel. The ugly duckling days are long over for Xfce, though. It was initially a clone of the Common Desktop Environment (CDE), which was a staple on UNIX workstations.

Xfce uses the same toolkit (GTK) as GNOME, but is more minimalist than GNOME and has a different flavor. It’s fast, lightweight, but still packs plenty of features in. Xfce is one of my longtime favorite desktop environments. Whatever the reasons, in no particular order, I’ve got five of the best window managers for you to choose from. Maybe you just want something old school because it’s fun. Maybe you want something a bit more configurable, or more minimalistic. Sometimes you want something that’s more lightweight than KDE or GNOME. GNOME and KDE, for example, have default window managers (Metacity and KWin, respectively) but also provide a lot of features and applications that you won’t find with something like, say, FVWM or twm.Įven though KDE and GNOME get most of the attention, though, it doesn’t mean they’re always the best choice. Window managers do just that - manage placement and handling of “windows” in X.

What’s the difference between a desktop environment and a window manager? I’m glad you asked. For the purposes of this round-up, I’m looking at the best desktop environment/window managers for Linux. I’m using the term “window manager” a bit loosely in the headline because, well, it’s a headline. If you’re ready to shake things up on the desktop, we’ve got five of the best alternatives for you to choose from. GNOME and KDE are the most popular desktop environments for Linux by a mile, but they’re not the only games in town.