what custom desktop environment do you use?

Chimera · 2010-04-07 00:47:17

I know one of the reasons I love arch is that you get to build a system from the ground up--you get to build your own desktop environment out of whatever login manager/window manager/file manager/etc you want.

I'm still experimenting with openbox and slim, so I'm just wondering what everyone else is using to make their computer "their" computer. What's your custom desktop environment built from? Maybe this will be a good starting place for other noobs (like myself), who want to be able to replace gnome or kde without losing all the features.

btw, what office tools are you using? I don't really like openoffice, and I really don't like abiword.
thanks for sharing!

tomk · 2010-04-07 00:56:01

Openbox - that's it, really.

btw, is there a difference between "don't really like" and "really don't like"?

Berticus · 2010-04-07 01:30:10

well I don't use a desktop environment, just a window manager. At the moment it's ratpoison, but looking into tritium and possibly making my own.

For office tools, I just use vim+LaTeX. I decided to ditch OOo a long time ago, and didn't even look at abiword. It's been great so far. I just ask that people send pdf's to me if they want to send me a document. If I want to make changes, I just suggest changes and let them do it, if they want to.

Chimera · 2010-04-07 02:09:30

tomk wrote:

btw, is there a difference between "don't really like" and "really don't like"?

There is. I grudgingly use openoffice, but I uninstalled abiword less than ten minutes after installing it.
I also tried google docs but, it seemed a little lacking in features.

btw, when I say desktop environment, I mean what's being used to replace everything gnome/kde had. Does anyone like a certain file manager? I tried thunar but found it ugly, and I liked nautilus, but I'd like more options.

Last edited by Chimera (2010-04-07 02:10:14)

jasonwryan · 2010-04-07 02:48:29

Chimera wrote:

when I say desktop environment, I mean what's being used to replace everything gnome/kde had.

The Light & Fast thread will give you a pretty good steer on what apps people use to build their environment:
http://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=88515

Personally, I use dwm - with tmux, vim, vifm, apvlv, feh, mpd/ncmpcpp, TTytter, uzbl, wicd and Thunderbird for mail (moving to mutt is the next logical step for me)...

Last edited by jasonwryan (2010-04-07 04:06:10)

Meyithi · 2010-04-07 02:56:49

Mouse driven DWM, which is perfectly possible when using carefully selected GTK apps like Sakura as a terminal and Thunar as file manager. Keyboard control isn't for me because it means I have to put my beer/cigarette/cake down before I can do anything

GTK/QT annoys me though, need an independent widget layer IMO because GTK apps keep pulling in stuff like gstreamer and gconf, annoys me to no end.

ShadowKyogre · 2010-04-07 03:54:28

Currently I'm using two window managers (Compiz Stand-alone & PekWM) right now. Both setups are similar:
WM: Compiz/PekWM+Cairo-compmgr
Right-click menu: Apwal/Pekwm's native right-click menu
Panel: Cairo-dock (I'm currently trying find a better way to manage my windows so that way I don't have to use a panel...thingie)
App-launcher: Kupfer/Pekwm's native run command dialog
File Manager: Thunar (or PCmanFM, still wondering which one to pick)
Editor: used to be medit, toying 'round w/bluefish for now
Browser: Firefox
Terminals: roxterm/guake
Stickies: Gnote-lite (AUR), but only b/c Xpad is broken right now
Network managing: Wicd
Monitors: Htop, Conky
Office Suite: Openoffice
Video Player: (gnome-)mplayer
Audio Player: mplayer (for quick listening), Audacious
Image Editor: Gimp, mtpaint (for quick edits)
PDF reader: foxitreader (AUR)
Email: Thunderbird
IMing/IRC: Pidgin
Wallpaper-setting/image-viewing: feh
Changing GTK/QT theme: Qt w/gtk engine on, lxappearance, and gnome-color-chooser
Calculator: Qalculate-gtk, Qtiplot (if anyone knows of a GTK+ app similar to qtiplot, let me know)
Games: Some Popcap games, along with a few gtk+/sdl clones of some games I played when I had KDE (qnetwalk and pysolfc seem to stick out from the rest b/c pysolfc's looks JUST DON'T MESH and the obvious qt app, I couldn't find an sdl/gtk alternative of a similar game)
[EDIT]: Forgot this: Screen-locking/saver: xscreensaver

Last edited by ShadowKyogre (2010-04-07 03:59:14)

Ghost1227 · 2010-04-07 04:00:46

AwesomeWM, using CDM as my login manager.
coreutils for my filemanager (minimalism ftw), vim, vimprobable, netcfg, mirage, mutt... that's about it

lifeafter2am · 2010-04-07 04:04:20

No Login Manager
XMonad WM
Coreutils for Filemanger
Vim
Vimperator
wicd
conky
irssi
mpd/ncmpcpp

Chimera · 2010-04-07 04:05:32

Cool! I'm going to have to try some of this when I have time. I've only breifly heard of tritium and most of these I've never heard of. I might also try writing my own window manager--my friend just finished one, I think it's still under 800 lines.

Peasantoid · 2010-04-07 04:13:52

Light:

coreutils
openbox (with xcompmgr for translucent terminals)
urxvt
bashrun
vim
ssh + mutt/irssi on my remote server
netcfg
mpd + ncmpc
conky
htop, sometimes

Not so light:

firefox + vimperator
openoffice for graphing/presentations (school stuff) and abiword for word processing - I used vim+latex for a time but I didn't particularly like it

Last edited by Peasantoid (2010-04-07 04:21:05)

anonymous_user · 2010-04-07 04:45:15

Meyithi wrote:

GTK apps keep pulling in stuff like gstreamer and gconf, annoys me to no end.

GTK by itself does not pull in stuff like gconf; its usually GNOME that brings it in. Gstreamer is also unrelated to GTK.

Berticus · 2010-04-07 05:07:57

Well I don't really use a file manager. I use the coreutils.

irssi handles aim (via bitlbee), twitter (via tircd), and of course irc.

been looking into bashrun to replace dmenu (for tab completion and globbing).

currently using mocp (svn) for music, but thinking about making my own.

feh is my image viewer, mutt is my email client, htop to monitor system. Basically stuff from the LnF Awards.

Next logical move for me is away from firefox+vimperator to either xxxterm or uzbl.

Netsu · 2010-04-07 09:32:36

The apps I use that I think make up a desktop environment:

Login manager: none
Window manager: Compiz stand-alone
Menu: CompizDeskmenu
Panel: Tint2
Wallpaper: Feh
Terminal emulator: urxvt
File manager: Thunar
Theme Configuration: LXappearance

Last edited by Netsu (2010-04-07 09:37:20)

fcuk112 · 2010-04-07 10:47:07

- slim (login manager)
- lxde + openbox
- pytyle (tiling manager)
- xcompmgr (bit of bling)
- lyx (word processing, it's a nice front-end to LaTeX)

Trindol · 2010-04-07 14:54:33

LXDE/Openbox with a few subs and adds. feh, mpd/sonata, urxvt, slim. I think it's a good middle ground system. A lot of control via mouse or keyboard. I also try to avoid packages with huge dependencies that update multiple times a week, e.g. xulrunner

But a glaring anomaly is Opera, which I have been using for about 10 years so I'm pretty attached.

weakhead · 2010-04-07 15:12:01

Login manager: LXDM-git
Window manager: Compiz
Window decorator: Emerald
Panel: Xfce4-Panel
Menu: compiz-deskmenu
App launcher: dmenu
File manager: Thunar
Internet connection manager: Wicd
GTK theme manager: LXappearance
Text editor: Gedit
Web browser: Firefox
Wallpaper manager: Nitrogen-git
Screensaver: Xscreensaver
Laptop-related tools: acpid, cpufrequtils, pm-utils, lm_sensors
Office suite: OpenOffice.org
System monitor (desktop): Conky
System monitor (tasks): GNOME-System-Monitor
Instant Massager: Pidgin
Microblogging client: Pino (hg)
Music player: MPD (Sonata)
Video Players: SMPlayer, VLC
Disc burner: K3b (from KDEmod3)
Image viewers: Gpicview, GQview
PDF viewer: Evince
Sudo GUI: gksu

brisbin33 · 2010-04-07 15:24:39

xmonad with a conditional startx in bashrc. coreutils for fm, udev rule for handling flashdrives, and i access cd/dvd as /dev/sr0 always.

i spend 80-90% of my time in terminals (irssi, mutt, vim) and the rest in a browser (uzbl). almost all repeated daily activities are bash scripted: disc ripping/burning downloading/tagging music (mpd for playing), etc, etc.

other fringe activities include zathura for pdfs and i do have OOo installed for the rare occasion i have to open something (don't do much documents on my home machine). mirage for normal image viewing and feh for setting the background.

that's all i can think of for now...

Zoole · 2010-04-07 21:38:12

I am a gnome > xfce > lxde-ish > nothing-in-particular convert, so my post will be rather GTK-biased

Panel-wise...I threw together the visibility iconbox/desktop manager thing and two tweaked dzen scripts (power status and time). It's not so much a panel as it is two blocks in the corners and a large gap in the middle where I can middle click.

I use gmrun in lieu of Gnome's alt-F2 run dialog. I found that lxtask was a decent task manager. Seems to be unusually CPU-heavy for a task manager, though. I prefer htop. I use hardinfo for computer specs when I can't be bothered to look up the right commands.

As far as office tools go, I keep Openoffice around for compatibility and those times when vim+latex or geany+latex is overkill. I like gnumeric as a spreadsheet program.

I use alsamixer to control sound and nitrogen for backgrounds. No login manager here. I just xinit in my ~/.bash_profile . I've installed a lot of browsers for testing (I do a bit of web design), but I generally use uzbl, midori when uzbl doesn't work, and firefox when midori doesn't work.

Somewhere up there, jasonwryan mentioned the LnF thread. It might be worth also checking out the Crunchbang distro's applications list. The list is not as, well, light and fast, but it does have quite a few not-heavy desktop environment-independent apps.
http://crunchbanglinux.org/wiki/applications

PS If thunar isn't working for you, perhaps you might like pcmanfm better?

Spacenick · 2010-04-07 21:59:48

LaTeX is awesome for writing stuff normal people would use Office software for but it's so much more intelligent

arinlares · 2010-04-07 23:27:34

I'm using Fluxbox and Awesome, SLiM, xcompmgr (running in both sessions), and the following apps:
Feh = sets wallpapers for fbsetbg and awsetbg
urxvt = Terminal
pcmanfm = File Manager
leafpad = graphical text editor
lxappearance = GTK theme manager
lxtask = task manager
Abiword = Word processing
Audacious = media player
Firefox/Chromium = browsers
GIMP = Graphics editing needs

And then, a few games and extra tools.

delcake · 2010-04-07 23:44:38

As of today, 2wm has free run of my laptop, at least for the time being. I've still got dwm running on my desktop though.

Chimera · 2010-04-08 00:07:29

jasonwryan wrote:

The Light & Fast thread will give you a pretty good steer on what apps people use to build their environment:
http://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=88515

omg that's EXACTLY what I need!
leafpad and latex are both cool, but lyx...

I was going to install lyx, but it was like 450 mb. I'm not exactly on a hardware restriction, but why is it so big? I checked boost and it's only about 100 mb. I'll probably install it anyways, though...

Also want to try out cdm and compiz/fluxbox/dwm/that thing my friend wrote

One last thing though: I've seen a bit of openoffice and a bit of abiword. abiword though doesn't have slideshows though, and I want to move away from openoffice (I actually just had to do a slideshow for school). Are there any replacements for that part of Openoffice?

*edit: The crunchbang applications list is also awesome. Just forgot to quote it.

Last edited by Chimera (2010-04-08 00:10:15)

Caedmon · 2010-04-08 08:53:52

If you like LaTeX, you could look into the Beamer class (latex-beamer.sourceforge.net)
or similar classes. I've been meaning to learn it myself soon(TM), but I don't do many
presentations.

orphius1970 · 2010-04-08 10:06:05

Not sure if you are interested. But I use a file manager called "linm" from aur. It is consoled based, powerful and
in my opinion perfect. That is just my prefernce though. It is small and lightweight. Only problem I had with it is,
it uses the F12 key for its menu. So I had to remap my quake like urxvt to use meta-space instead

Arch Linux

#1 2010-04-07 00:47:17

what custom desktop environment do you use?

#2 2010-04-07 00:56:01

Re: what custom desktop environment do you use?

#3 2010-04-07 01:30:10

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