Desktop environments Archive

The second release candidate for Ion3 has been released. "This is the second 'rc' release, and contains primarily bug fixes and other minor improvements." Get it from the download page.

"After a very productive series of preview releases, Openbox 3.4 is here! If you haven't yet, we'd really like to recommend that you read through the 'Upgrading to 3.4 guide', which is on the Openbox web site, here. The number of changes since 3.3.1, as you'll know if you've been following the preview releases, can be a little overwhelming. The upgrading to 3.4 guide talks about most of them, along with pretty pictures to show many of the new features."

A new release of dwn is available. "dwm is a dynamic window manager for X. It manages windows in tiled and floating layouts. Either layout can be applied dynamically, optimizing the environment for the application in use and the task performed. It is the little brother of wmii."

Dwm 4.1 has been released. "dwm is a dynamic window manager for X. It manages windows in tiled and floating layouts. Either layout can be applied dynamically, optimizing the environment for the application in use and the task performed. It is the little brother of wmii."

"A while ago Thomas Leonard wrote about Ubuntu integration and asked the question 'Can we get rid of ROX-Session?'. This inspired me to attempt to replace it with the Xfce session manager and it turns out that it is both easy to do and works very well."

E17 is maturing, and the TODO that needs to be completed for its release is shrinking. Desktop icons are now working in E17 cvs, and you can use drag and drop between the file manager and the desktop. "Icons on the desktop. A work in progress. you will need ~/Desktop to exist with stuff in it. i suggest copying some of the favorites files over (home.desktop etc.)." There's even a screenshot.

E16 version 0.16.8.7 and epplets version 0.10 are now available for download. "Add option to show windows on all desks in focus list. The CM now renders to the composite overlay window. Fix various updates when external background changes." Many more fixes are in the changelog.

AfterStep 2.2.5 has been released. The AfterStep team released the following changelog: "Everything got touched. It's all good." You can get the latest release from the download page; if you have 2.1.0 or later already installed you can use a smaller upgrade package.

This article details how to make Ubuntu use the ROX Desktop without using ROX Session. "Can we get rid of ROX-Session? It should be possible to integrate ROX with your existing session manager. In this experiment, I configure a fresh Ubuntu installation to run ROX, without using ROX-Session."

"IceWM is perfect for Windows' 'immigrants' especially for users with older computers. IceWM will be suitable for advanced users who are looking for a lightweight and simple window manager." More here.

"The performance of desktop computers increases year by year. This gives the programmers great opportunities to further improve the desktop experience of the users. However, what should you do when you have an old computer that is not capable of running the latest and hottest software? How can you benefit from the great software that is X.org when you can't run a desktop that takes advantage of its best features? No need for upgrading your PC, when you can have a usable alternative with the current one. Let me introduce you to Enlightenment E17 - the window manager with minimal hardware requirements that may amaze you."

Various parts and applications of the ROX Desktop have been updated recently. Firstly, ROX-All 1.1 (a single archive containing launchers for most of the ROX applications) has been released; the main improvement is that it's now compatible with Ubuntu Edgy. Also, ROX-Filer 2.6 (the file manager at the core of the ROX desktop) has been released. Filer can be updated via the built-in update tool. Lastly, various important panel applets have been updated.

What is wrong with KDE 3.x? What is wrong with GNOME 2.8+? These seem to be the two questions arising from the recent revival of Linus vs. GNOME spat. We all know the history; Linus called the GNOME guys 'interface nazis' and advised Linux users to use KDE, which resulted in the longest comment thread on OSNews ever. That kind of fizzled out, only to be brought to light again by Linus submitting a few patches to make GNOME behave more like he wants it to behave.

"The ROX Desktop is a lightweight alternative to GNOME or KDE built around the ROX-Filer file manager. The project's name is an abbreviation of 'RISC OS on X'. The ROX Desktop's performance is reminiscent of IceWM, and it's noticeably faster opening programs than GNOME or KDE. However, its speed comes at the expense of a needlessly redundant default configuration, and some users may balk at some of the assumptions its design makes about how they prefer to work."