Using FLUXBOX as a Window Manager

[vrkalak]

I am an avid Fluxbox WM user ...

The Fluxbox Window Manager is closely based on Blackbox WM.

Fluxbox WM and Openbox WM - can use the xorg-system-core, with NO desktop environment.  Much like what Crunchbang and Archbang have done.

Fluxbox is still closely based on Blackbox.  Some say that, Fluxbox is the natural progression of Blackbox.  Fluxbox is a basic Blackbox; with a few more things added for user-friendliness.  Not to take anything away from the base-Blackbox build ... the BB-Devs did an awesome job.  I use many of the BB scripts, themes/styles and apps with Fluxbox -- they seems to be pretty much forward and backward compatible.

Openbox, was also, based on Blackbox but has grown more separate from the BB-base, with using and building it's own configs and apps.  Although, Openbox seems to be growing in popularity, with more Linux OS-distro systems using Openbox - as the default Window Manager.

There are advantages, pros and cons, to using either Openbox and/or Fluxbox.

Fluxbox has:
A self-updating 'right-click' Menu
It's own Fb-panel/taskbar (no need for tint2)
A built-in Composer
Does not use a GUI or .xml files but everything is a simple Script
Easy to use and Configure.
There are already hundreds of fb-styles (themes) available.
As light-weight on resources (or lighter) than using Openbox.

[vrkalak]

Fluxbox Resources:

Fluxbox:  http://fluxbox.org
Fb-Wiki:  http://fluxbox-wiki.org
How-To:  http://fluxbox-wiki.org/index.php?title=Category:Howtos
FAQ:  http://fluxbox-wiki.org/index.php?title=Faqs

http://LostintheBox.com (Forum)
http://box-look.org  (themes and more)
http://tenr.de/  (themes/styles)
https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Fluxbox
http://wiki.debian.org/FluxBox

[jedi]

Hey thanks for this vrkalak!  Will check some of those links out for sure...

[Sector11]

I must say, I've tried FluxBox and it's - - - not OpenBox.  Just kidding ...

I did find it very interesting and as you said "A self-updating 'right-click' Menu" is a nice feature.

If I recall it has "icon support" in the menus as well.

And it had one feature that OpenBox doesn't have and that's transparency in the menus, but 'compton' added that to OB.  It isn't 'native' to OB though so it can't be controlled like it can in FluxBox.

I too am going to check out those links .. and just maybe take FB for another test drive.

One Distro 3 sessions: XFOBFB   

[dizzie]

Fluxbox and gkrellm what was i was using in my "early years", and its still a solid and sturdy wm, with very much less bloat around
Sure you can use conky, i mean conky runs everywhere, even in command line but.... gkrellm is sexy, it can even monitor other hosts (yes your server too, if you have one)
Anyway, thanks for reminding me vrkalak

[VastOne]

Early thoughts and questions on flux

I want to run everything from ~/.fluxbox/menu, and as I followed the instructions to modify ~/.fluxbox/init and add:

Code Select Expand

session.menuFile: ~/.fluxbox/menu

I found it was already there..  but it did not seem to work until I did a Reconfigure and looking at it this morning, it seems to have a limit as to how long the menu can be? Not sure, will have to check on that more... I was removing an [end] that was cutting off the bottom

I do not understand how or where to make compositing work, everything I read said it was using xcompmgr for compositing which is not used in VSIDO... Since we already have Compton, I just slid that in in the startup and it works perfectly

I need to know how to turn off the panel, not just hide it... It is controlling the systray items and will not let another systray app (tint2) work because it appears to still be on ... anyone know how to turn that off completely?

Thanks for this thread and those links vrkalak, I am having a blast and am definitely not bored anymore   

[VastOne]

Regarding the systemtray and the toolbar..

I had to remove systemtray from the list of items in in ~/.fluxbox/init on the line session.screen0.toolbar.tools, then set session.screen0.toolbar.visible to false. Now the tint2 systray is working

[VastOne]

@Sector11 - Regarding icons in the menu, it is done the same way you can put icons in the OB menu but  just like icons in the OB menu, I think they look crappy and have removed them

[jst_joe]

gkrellm is sexy, it can even monitor other hosts (yes your server too, if you have one)

Interesting! 
I'll be taking a look at this later today.
Thanks.

[VastOne]

I used gkrellm before I discovered conky more than 7 years ago now... It did do what I wanted at the time, but conky proved to be much more robust with so many more options

I may have to look at gkrellm again, let me know your thoughts about it if you test it jst_joe

[Sector11]

I used gkrellm for a few weeks before discovering conky.  I thought, during that time, "This is great!"

Not hard to see which direction I went after that.   

[VastOne]

^ Agreed.. It was me searching for something that gkrellem could not do and I needed done that led me to Conky

[jst_joe]

I may have to look at gkrellm again, let me know your thoughts about it if you test it jst_joe

After reading up on it I don't really see the advantage of running it on my web server (considering it's here in the same room).
If it were in a remote location I could see some advantages, but as it stands I can't justify opening up an extra port.

[VastOne]

After figuring out the transparency of Fluxbox, I was able to turn off Compton...

Booting now with the Liquorix 3.7.0-9 kernel and Fluxbox, I am down to an eve 100 MiB on boot and now claim Fluxbox as my default WM

Now onto figuring out the Slit mess, if I am reading it correctly it is somewhat akin to Conky

[Sector11]

WOW!!!  You're saying "Bye bye" to Xfce4. 

You are impressed.

EDIT:  Just installed the latest - looked at FluxBox ... I'm still using OB