October 2011 Screenshots

mythus · 2011-10-11 16:49:14

Greetings!

October has turned out to be a month of experimentation for me. When for more than a year I had been contempt with the desktop I had submitted earlier this month (the first one I submitted this month, and indeed in a long while). Well afterwards, I flirted with GNOME 3.2, but quickly grew tired of her controlling ways. Then, inspired by a light weight qt desktop project posted on these very forums, I did my own experimentation using pekwm, qtfm, and qtpanel. It was lightweight indeed. But I guess in truth my heart lies with KDE.

So I went to KDE, and got the crazy idea that I'll try to use activities instead of virtual desktops. So, I removed all my virtual desktops and set up three activities to cover my typical computer usage, each being indeed separate activities with only one desktop, not merely virtual desktops. I've been using this setup for a couple days now and am liking it, so I figured I'd share it with you guys.

Activity 1: Internet Activity: Faking Busy

Simply running chromium and (since I am in an experimentation mood) the kde-telepathy client.
This is on my first activity, the aptly named Internet activity, where I do all my internet related stuff.
Plasma theme is a customized Aya, that has some other plasma theme parts in it.
Plasmoids visible are Lancelot, ICON task manager, System/Ram/Network activity managers, and digital clock.

Activity 1: Internet Activity: Faking Lazy

Here you see the same activity, with three separate comic viewers for my procrastinating enjoyment and the awesome CWP weather plasmoid.

Activity 1: Internet Activity: Showing the hidden panels

Here I am simply showing the two hidden panels (set to autohide), both at the bottom. The bottom left is the activity switcher, since I can't yet set a hot corner for that or whatever. The bottom right is my systray panel, an idea I got from GNOME shell back in 3.0, that I loved and still love.

Activity 1: Internet Activity: Showing the Dashboard

Here I am showing off the use of the dashboard. I am showing it in the Internet Activity, just to give the general idea. Imagine, I am working on something, or in this case, browsing the web, when I wonder what the temperature is. Instead of checking my phone, minimizing the browser, or opening a tab, I just throw my mouse cursor up to the top right corner and *poof* my widgets that are on my desktop are nicely over-layed on top. Now I can see the temperature (or use whatever widget I was wanting to use). I think that this is an awesome little kde feature (no doubt exists elsewhere as well).

Activity 2: Book Activity

Here I am now in activity 2, my so-named "Book Activity". This is my main working activity, where I am working on my edition 2 book for my RPG. I have the desktop set up with four separate folder-view widgets to quickly access different documents and such on the fly. And, of course, dolphin is always there when needed.

Activity 3: General Activity

This is my General Activity. Basically I'd use this activity for anything not related to internet or document work, which actually makes this the least used of my three activities. I have it set as a Search & Launch activity, which works nice for what I'd use this activity for, ie, changing system settings, system updating/command line work, playing games, etc...

Final Thoughts
I am liking this setup and am starting to realize some value in the activities idea. There are some things that aggrivate me though...

1.) Chromium doesn't adhere to this 'activities' thing well. When I have it open, if I switch to book activity for example, it's open there as well. Unlike other programs Chromium doesn't open in only the internet activity, and I can't seem to find out how to make it do so. Note: I haven't yet tested other browsers to see if they give similar results, but KDE-Telepathy client, LibreOffice, Kate, for example stay in their activities.

2.) I really hope that they implement the separate-panel for separate activity wish.

3.) I'd love to see a "Activity Grid" like the desktop grid, where I can via hot spot zoom out and see the various activities and do mass manipulation. As I recall, this was the default manner of working with activities, but due to performance reasons, it was canned. Yet oddly enough the desktop grid effect works fine...

4.) I like how with every program I have used - except for chromium - that they have opened in only their activity that I opened them in. This gives activities a big leg up on simple virtual desktops. I can pause an activity if I need to, can't do that with virtual desktops, and when I resume the activity, it resumes where I left off. This saves immensely on resources, if I need the resources for something else in another activity, and it seems to me that resource use is better than when simply using virtual desktops with all that I have going on now in them instead. This seems better resource-wise than setting up virtual desktops as mock activities. But of course, YMMV.

5.) I don't like to simply show off my desktop for the hope of internet-cool-factor. Quite frankly, I could care less what anyone else thinks about my setup, I like it, it works for me, so that is enough for me. However, there may be those who don't know about some of the things that I and others show in their screenshots, that they may find useful. So I make my screenshot posts as detailed as I can to provide information for those seeking it.

ninjaaron · 2011-10-11 17:37:27

I read your book. Prolly gonna stick with scrotwm.

sam87 · 2011-10-11 20:03:09

soundprank's captivated...it has me captivated! still wmfs

iv597 · 2011-10-11 23:44:27

Clean

Busy-ish

I'll share configs with anyone who wants them. This isn't *quite* done, so I'll probably be posting again come November with an updated look.
Also, since I forgot to show off Archey in this screenie...

               +                
               #                
              ###               OS: Arch Linux x86_64
             #####              Hostname: Desktop
             ######             Kernel Release: 3.0-ck
            ; #####;            Uptime: 4 days, 21:46
           +##.#####            WM: DWM
          +##########           Packages: 551
         #############;         RAM: 559 MB / 1505 MB
        ###############+        Processor: Intel(R) Pentium(R) 4 CPU 3.20GHz
       #######   #######        $EDITOR: vim
     .######;     ;###;`".      Root: 4.5G / 20G (22%) (ext4)
    .#######;     ;#####.       Mnt: 233G / 347G (67%) (ext3)
    #########.   .########`     Songs in MPD database: 1473
   ######'           '######    Artists in MPD database: 33
  ;####                 ####;   Albums in MPD database: 118
  ##'                     '##    
 #'                         `#

Last edited by iv597 (2011-10-11 23:45:44)

nexus7 · 2011-10-12 01:06:16

@ mythus: Well, I can not imagine at all living without virtual desktops. -- But you can definitely share your wallpapers, if you don't mind!

mythus · 2011-10-12 11:35:17

nexus7 wrote:

@ mythus: Well, I can not imagine at all living without virtual desktops. -- But you can definitely share your wallpapers, if you don't mind!

Activity 1 wallpaper:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/pizzabythe … 100055327/

Activity 2 wallpaper is simply a background supplied with the distro-generic steampunk kdm.

Activity 3 wallpaper:
http://ericpoulton.blogspot.com/search/ … tar%20wars

About the first part of your comment, neither could I! Activities is like virtual desktops x 2 almost, so it's all good. If you use KDe and haven't tried working with activities, you owe it to yourself to try for a day or so. If it works for you, awesome! If not, awesome anyways because you at least tried and you have that freedom of choice not to have to use activities or whatever. That goes as well to the ninjaaron, that is awesome because you have that freedom! While tilers aren't my thing, it is great it exists for those who prefer tilers!

ivoarch · 2011-10-12 15:49:55

Still DWM

Clean

Dirty

nnoell · 2011-10-12 16:01:53

Still Xmonad, but this time with more black colors and with clickable layout switcher. Credits goes to count-corrupt for sharing his xmonad setup.

Clean:

Busy:

And here, my xmonad.hs

jbritton · 2011-10-12 18:26:41

So after using dwm for a couple months, I decided that a tiling wm really is impractical for most of my uses. So after not getting PekWM to do what I wanted I'm back to Openbox again.

Paul-S · 2011-10-12 19:36:09

Nice desk nnoell, can you post the status bar scripts.

Cheers
Paul-S

nxarmada · 2011-10-12 20:31:30

My XFCE Desktop

Style (GTK): Zuckitwo-Dark
Icons: Faenza
Style (xfwm): Atolm-Squared
Conky: Reloj
Wallpaper: Calming (nebula)

livinglifeback · 2011-10-12 20:35:00

nnoell can you post your xdefaults?

Rasi · 2011-10-12 20:37:44

mythus wrote:

Unlike other programs Chromium doesn't open in only the internet activity, and I can't seem to find out how to make it do so. Note: I haven't yet tested other browsers to see if they give similar results, but KDE-Telepathy client, LibreOffice, Kate, for example stay in their activities.

alt+f3 -> advanced window settings

nexus7 · 2011-10-12 21:06:41

@mythus: thanks mate!

keenerd · 2011-10-12 22:45:49

Four screenshots using ScrotWM, yay! None with verbose_layout enabled, boo.

nnoell · 2011-10-12 23:47:12

Paul-S wrote:

Nice desk nnoell, can you post the status bar scripts.
Cheers
Paul-S

topstatusbar.sh
bottomstatusbar.sh
conkyrc

livinglifeback wrote:

nnoell can you post your xdefaults?

Xdefaults

Enjoy!

enzzzy · 2011-10-13 07:49:16

jbritton,
What task manager are you running ?

Last edited by enzzzy (2011-10-13 07:50:37)

mythus · 2011-10-13 08:34:06

Rasi wrote:

mythus wrote:
Unlike other programs Chromium doesn't open in only the internet activity, and I can't seem to find out how to make it do so. Note: I haven't yet tested other browsers to see if they give similar results, but KDE-Telepathy client, LibreOffice, Kate, for example stay in their activities.
alt+f3 -> advanced window settings

Thanks for that! I had totally forgotten that hot-key.

motorbreath · 2011-10-13 09:25:13

Unia wrote:

Still Compiz standalone with tint2. Very pleased with this set up!
http://ompldr.org/tYWx2Yw
http://ompldr.org/tYWx2Yg

Looks great! What's that menu showing applications?

kyla · 2011-10-13 15:06:23

Unia · 2011-10-13 16:02:57

motorbreath wrote:

Unia wrote:
Still Compiz standalone with tint2. Very pleased with this set up!
http://ompldr.org/tYWx2Yw
http://ompldr.org/tYWx2Yg
Looks great! What's that menu showing applications?

It's Slingshot

moetunes · 2011-10-13 21:34:39

Still playing with my light tiler

Cheers

MrCode · 2011-10-14 13:06:30

I didn't post screenies of my desktop before because I didn't figure there was much point, but I'm bored, so here goes:

Clean:

Desktop apps:

Internet apps:

Programming (yes, it's my Mandelbrot thing again; new and improved so that it doesn't constantly take 100% CPU time! ):

Yeah, I definitely go for consistency.

toketin · 2011-10-14 16:02:55

na12 wrote:

toketin wrote:
na12 wrote:
No
Ok thanks but there isn't it in repo or aur right?
It is in AUR as dockbarx.

Hi, sorry but how do you use dockbarx, it needs gnome-panel or awn to work doens't it?

Doomcide · 2011-10-14 17:35:39

Playing around with dminiwm, runs very stable so far and the option to resize the top stack window is cool.

Arch Linux

#151 2011-10-11 16:49:14

Re: October 2011 Screenshots

#152 2011-10-11 17:37:27

Re: October 2011 Screenshots

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Re: October 2011 Screenshots

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Re: October 2011 Screenshots

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Re: October 2011 Screenshots

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Re: October 2011 Screenshots

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Re: October 2011 Screenshots

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Re: October 2011 Screenshots

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Re: October 2011 Screenshots

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Re: October 2011 Screenshots

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Re: October 2011 Screenshots

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Re: October 2011 Screenshots

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Re: October 2011 Screenshots

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Re: October 2011 Screenshots

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Re: October 2011 Screenshots

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Re: October 2011 Screenshots

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Re: October 2011 Screenshots

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Re: October 2011 Screenshots

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Re: October 2011 Screenshots

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Re: October 2011 Screenshots

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Re: October 2011 Screenshots

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Re: October 2011 Screenshots

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Re: October 2011 Screenshots

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Re: October 2011 Screenshots

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Re: October 2011 Screenshots

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