Most of you probably know, that I'm x11-wm/fvwm2-devel user for years.
Yesterday I decided to see what is so awesome in x11-wm/awesome.
Frankly I think I'm amazed with potential, that this window manager can offer (thanks to lua) scripting language.
Right now I don't understand why virtual desktops are called tags in awesome, but that's alight.... What I totally love is layouts.
Layouts are so useful, especially when you're working with terminals (coding for example). I work with terminals probably 70% of my time (coding in vim, managing servers, reading mail in mutt, manage files, etc....), the rest is browsing web (probably some 20%), and using other apps.
in Fvwm, I was using FvwmRearrange module. This allowed me to put apps on my screen so that they don't overlap. Since I discovered this module it was essential part of my desktop. If I should compare FvwmRearrange module to awesome layouts... it's like comparing Windows to FreeBSD.
The fact that awesome can be extended with lua language, makes me want to learn it alone. I already imagine what kind of fancy functionality I could program with lua.
On fvwm I was using conky to display time (that's why I was using conky at all. I know, I know I can use fvwm widgets [or whatever they are called], but programming these is quite hard to learn, and I never bothered.... [mastering fvwm alone takes great amount of time]), and trayer to have system tray....
Well on awesome I don't need that, there widgets for that (not the kind of widgets you see on KDE4)
Awesome memory usage is very acceptable (around 100MB ram).
I was quite surprised to see, that many of my key bindings on my fvwm, matched awesome default bindings. However awesome gives some functions, that I just can't imagine how to configure in fvwm (unless maybe write custom fvwm module).
I totally love the way you can switch between apps on desktop using keyboard only (MOD4+J, MOD4+K)
Also MOD+Tab is essential for any programmer using unix tools, it lets you switch between current and previous app on current tag (desktop).
All in all, I think I will spend time to adopt this awesome window manager, and possibly say goodbye to fvwm (Ye, I wasn't expecting that myself)
On the scale of 0 to fvwm I would rate awesome as fvwm++ (on scale 0 to 10, I would give 8 to fvwm, and 10 to awesome), at least after first day of using awesome.
P.S.
All this of course is my own opinion, and you should try awesome your self. Not ever tool is good for everyone
Yesterday I decided to see what is so awesome in x11-wm/awesome.
Frankly I think I'm amazed with potential, that this window manager can offer (thanks to lua) scripting language.
Right now I don't understand why virtual desktops are called tags in awesome, but that's alight.... What I totally love is layouts.
Layouts are so useful, especially when you're working with terminals (coding for example). I work with terminals probably 70% of my time (coding in vim, managing servers, reading mail in mutt, manage files, etc....), the rest is browsing web (probably some 20%), and using other apps.
in Fvwm, I was using FvwmRearrange module. This allowed me to put apps on my screen so that they don't overlap. Since I discovered this module it was essential part of my desktop. If I should compare FvwmRearrange module to awesome layouts... it's like comparing Windows to FreeBSD.
The fact that awesome can be extended with lua language, makes me want to learn it alone. I already imagine what kind of fancy functionality I could program with lua.
On fvwm I was using conky to display time (that's why I was using conky at all. I know, I know I can use fvwm widgets [or whatever they are called], but programming these is quite hard to learn, and I never bothered.... [mastering fvwm alone takes great amount of time]), and trayer to have system tray....
Well on awesome I don't need that, there widgets for that (not the kind of widgets you see on KDE4)
Awesome memory usage is very acceptable (around 100MB ram).
I was quite surprised to see, that many of my key bindings on my fvwm, matched awesome default bindings. However awesome gives some functions, that I just can't imagine how to configure in fvwm (unless maybe write custom fvwm module).
I totally love the way you can switch between apps on desktop using keyboard only (MOD4+J, MOD4+K)
Also MOD+Tab is essential for any programmer using unix tools, it lets you switch between current and previous app on current tag (desktop).
All in all, I think I will spend time to adopt this awesome window manager, and possibly say goodbye to fvwm (Ye, I wasn't expecting that myself)
On the scale of 0 to fvwm I would rate awesome as fvwm++ (on scale 0 to 10, I would give 8 to fvwm, and 10 to awesome), at least after first day of using awesome.
P.S.
All this of course is my own opinion, and you should try awesome your self. Not ever tool is good for everyone