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jernst

Member

From: Silicon Valley

Registered: 2014-03-04

Posts: 307

Solved: Minimal X11 configuration for "thin client"?

I have an old laptop I'd like to pull back into active duty running just a couple of xterms, and occasionally being the destination DISPLAY while the real app runs somewhere else.

It's too slow to run run gnome or KDE.

Any recommendations for a setup? I noticed that twm still exists -- but I didn't like it even back then when it was supposedly modern. Any recommendations for display / window managers and/or general setup?

Thanks.

Last edited by jernst (2015-08-17 04:44:12)

ewaller

Administrator

From: Pasadena, CA

Registered: 2009-07-13

Posts: 20,721

Re: Solved: Minimal X11 configuration for "thin client"?

openbox, i3wm, dwm.

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karol

Archivist

Registered: 2009-05-06

Posts: 25,440

Re: Solved: Minimal X11 configuration for "thin client"?

Post the hardware specs of this old laptop.

Trilby

Inspector Parrot

Registered: 2011-11-29

Posts: 30,543

Website

Re: Solved: Minimal X11 configuration for "thin client"?

I don't know why people think TWM is a lightweight WM, have you every looked at the code?  It's larger than a lot of archer-made WMs, and half the size of openbox.

If you want a lightweight WM just to manage windows, use TinyWM, a fully functional stacking WM with ~50 lines of C:
http://incise.org/tinywm.html
http://crunchbang.org/forums/viewtopic. … 66#p205966

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2ManyDogs

Forum Fellow

Registered: 2012-01-15

Posts: 4,648

Re: Solved: Minimal X11 configuration for "thin client"?

evilwm and cwm are almost as light as tinywm, and have a few more configuration options.

Also consider using urxvt or aterm instead of xterm.

jernst

Member

From: Silicon Valley

Registered: 2014-03-04

Posts: 307

Re: Solved: Minimal X11 configuration for "thin client"?

It's a Dell Inspiron 8200 with a mobile Pentium 4M at 1.2GHz, and a surprisingly-large 512 MB of RAM. Circa 2002.

I tried openbox and dwm so far, both work, except that I need to figure out how to configure trackpad and eraser, right now they are sending gibberish.

2ManyDogs

Forum Fellow

Registered: 2012-01-15

Posts: 4,648

Re: Solved: Minimal X11 configuration for "thin client"?

I tried openbox and dwm so far, both work, except that I need to figure out how to configure trackpad and eraser, right now they are sending gibberish.

Those are separate issues from "what wm should I use" ; more information might help.

jernst

Member

From: Silicon Valley

Registered: 2014-03-04

Posts: 307

Re: Solved: Minimal X11 configuration for "thin client"?

Created separate thread for trackpad buttons configuration: https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?pid=1549458

2ManyDogs

Forum Fellow

Registered: 2012-01-15

Posts: 4,648

Re: Solved: Minimal X11 configuration for "thin client"?

So can you mark this topic [solved] now?

jernst

Member

From: Silicon Valley

Registered: 2014-03-04

Posts: 307

Re: Solved: Minimal X11 configuration for "thin client"?

I'd like to get my buttons to work, try out the various options presented on this thread for a bit, and then close it with a comment saying what I chose and why. That way I can make it more useful for others ...

jernst

Member

From: Silicon Valley

Registered: 2014-03-04

Posts: 307

Re: Solved: Minimal X11 configuration for "thin client"?

Based on the recommendations here and some others, I tried:

• openbox

• i3wm

• dwm

• twm

• wmii

• fvwm

I didn't try some others because they apparently aren't in the main repositories.

All of them work on the hardware, but some have a "strange" (to me, who isn't used to it) enough feeling to it that I and them aren't getting along. I'm writing this on fvwm, which I recall from way back when and which provides the usual "have window, let me move it around" behavior. Alternatively, for a tiled wm, I would probably be using wmii.

P.S. I'm writing this with an external mouse, as sadly, I have failed to come up with a way to get the internal mouse buttons to spit out anything comprehensible.