Re: Window Managers
Re: Window Managers
- Subject: Re: Window Managers
- From: Gary Tate <email@hidden>
- Date: Sun, 23 Feb 2003 18:24:38 -0800
Nick Zitzmann wrote:
On Friday, February 21, 2003, at 06:54 AM, Lee Moffitt wrote:
Could someone explain the difference between Window Managers (ala
WindowMaker and quartz-wm)
Window managers handle the drawing of windows on the screen. If you run
an X server and don't load a window manager, then every "window" that
gets drawn on screen is just a big box that you might be able to
interact with, but you can't move it around, you can't click on a close
button to close the window (since there is no close button), you can't
minimize it, etc...
and Desktop Environments (ala GNOME and KDE)?
Desktop environments go beyond window managers by including integrated
applications, toolbars, GUI widgets, online help, and other things you'd
expect from a modern graphical working environment...
The X Window System itself ships with very minimal "default" GUI
widgets, e.g. scroll bars, buttons, text views, etc. That's where
libraries like Qt (used by KDE) and GTK+ (used by GNOME) come in - they
extend X by adding better & more functional widgets.
When we install X11/quartz-wm, does include a Desktop Environment?
No. Apple X11 only includes the quartz-wm window manager, a basic X11R6
base installation, the XFree86 window server (version 4.2.1 I think)
with OpenGL support, some scripts to run X11 stuff from Terminal, and
that's about it.
You may need to install GTK+ and/or the GNOME libraries to use some
popular X11 programs. Gimp, for example, uses GTK+. You can get stuff
like this by installing Fink: <http://fink.sourceforge.net/>
Is it worthwhile to install GNOME or KDE on top of quartz-wm?
That's up to you. But if I was to use GNOME or KDE, I'd use their window
managers and not quartz-wm.
One thing to keep in mind is Apple X11 currently doesn't support running
in "rooted" mode, so if you install KDE or GNOME or something, you won't
be able to see its desktop. If you need rooted mode, then you'll have to
use XDarwin instead.
This is true, but if you want to get round it you can run Codetek
Virtual Desktop.
On one workspace I open a gnome-session which is bound to this
workspace. I then use the gnome 2 desktop and metacity windows manager.
I have the full gnome desktop (backgrounds trash can etc.) and I have
4 workspaces within the desktop.
(this is something that is allowed using the setting in codetek
workspace manager). Thought you might be interested
Nick Zitzmann
AIM/iChat: dragonsdontsleep
Check out my software page: http://dreamless.home.attbi.com/
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