fluxbox vs openbox

i chose fluxbox because i dont need to install any panel, it has built in panel, wallpaper and tabbing :) for me openbox more basic than fluxbox.
 
Isn't one based on the other...or were they both based on blackbox? I've been playing with dwm and xmonad - the former seems to suite me more than the latter, but they're minimal - albeit a different take on things.
 
estrabd said:
Isn't one based on the other...or were they both based on blackbox? I've been playing with dwm and xmonad - the former seems to suite me more than the latter, but they're minimal - albeit a different take on things.
Click to expand...

Yes, they are based on Blackbox but Openbox has been rewritten from the scratch in pure C unlike Fluxbox which is written in C++.That should be a deal breaker for any serious user. I used Openbox for a long time before switch to CWM (calm window manager) which is rewritten more or less from scratch by OpenBSD people.It is the part of OpenBSD base installation since OpenBSD 4.2. Original CWM (which can be found in FreeBSD ports) is very buggy and I would not recommend it over Openbox. Somebody
on this forum actually ported OpenBSD version of cwm to FreeBSD
but I didn't notice that it was committed.


If you like tiling Window managers I strongly recommend you looking at the scrotwm coming from OpenBSD kitchen. You can find
extensive discussion of scrotwm on the recent edition of OpenBSD journal http://undeadly.org/cgi?action=article&sid=20090218125342

I did experiment a lot with dwm and there were couple of very odd an annoying interactions with applications.
Xmonad as somebody stated on undeadly is just crippled by not being written in C.

I also like JWM which has built in panel, task bar and all other goodies. It uses only one X library so it is in memory footprint
just slightly bigger than dwm which is king of minimality.
JWM is part of Damn Small Linux and those people really know how to cherry pick good minimalistic application.


Going back to the issue of the panel for Openbox. There is one
specially written for it. You can find the link to it on Openbox website. One thing that I really dislike about Openbox is that
license has been changed to GPL. Original Blackbox and Fluxbox
have MIT license.
Lots of people complain about configuration files of Openbox being xml files. However crating menu is trivial using menu maker (no I didn't make mistake menu maker does it better than Obmenu). Also hand editing is trivial but I speak 6-7 mark up languages so I might be wrong about it.
 
the problem is i am so picky with desktop or window manager. i've tried gnome2.22, gnome2.24, xfce and KDE. those desktop managers quite heavy for my old machine. i am looking for something that can replace those window managers and finding some good applications(file browser, web browser, music player, etc)

so i decided to choose between fluxbox or openbox.

anyway i have a lot of questions to this community:
1) is openbox and fluxbox still in active development ?
2) is JWM theme based Window manager ?
3) is there any window manager that can support plugin or applet ?
4) is there any good file browser that doesnt have a lot of dependencies(note: i like ROX filer) ?
5) is there any text editor like GEdit that doesnt have a lot of dependencies ?

i am still in learning mode. so i want learn and try everything from beginning. i already reformatted and installed FreeBSD more than 20+ times :D
 
alie said:
so i decided to choose between fluxbox or openbox.

anyway i have a lot of questions to this community:
1) is openbox and fluxbox still in active development ?
2) is JWM theme based Window manager ?
3) is there any window manager that can support plugin or applet ?
4) is there any good file browser that doesnt have a lot of dependencies(note: i like ROX filer) ?
5) is there any text editor like GEdit that doesnt have a lot of dependencies ?
Click to expand...

I think you made a good choice. Both Fluxbox and Openbox are in very active development and have a very large user base. They might be in too active development because they are slowly getting bloated. In my bias opinion Openbox is better;) What kind of answer could you expect from somebody who used Openbox for a very long time. Joking aside the big thing for Openbox is the fact that is coded in pure C. If you like to have panel, task bar and those things Fluxbox is probably better choice.
All those things can be added to Openbox but then you end up
installing another thing or two. For instance Openbox+Xfce panel is a killer combo for people who like more or less full desktop
environment.


Let me answer the rest of your questions

@2 JWM is not based on anything. It is written from the scratch.
It is really very, very good for people who like to have built in
task bar, pager, and the launching bar. It is incredible that all that is just little bit bigger than dwm which has 2000 lines of C code.

@3 What do you mean by that?

@4 Rox is not a browser. It is a file manager. There are three principle types of file managers.


i) Orthodox file managers (Norton commander type) Examples are
Deco, OFM, Midnight Commander,vifm (VI file manager) (console/xterm based) and Norther Commander, Worker, emelfm2, krusader and similar if you want to GUI.

ii) Navigational file managers (or explorer type) typical example is konqueror web-browser, xfm (X File Explorer).

iii) Spatial file managers. Examples include Xfm, Rox, PCmanFM, Desktop File Manager DFM, Nautilus file manager, Thunar, Xfiler the part of Siag suite and similar.

Then you have file managers that really could not be categorized easily like XTree file manager, Clex, pfm, (personal file manager), vfu, TkDesk.

I probably left out some interesting examples but you got the idea. The least bloated file manager is command line + commands
(ls, du, rm, mv, cp) and few filters. If you have to have a spatial file manager I really like ROX. For a Ortodox file managers I really like deco but it is not in active development and it is useless in console as it can not adjust the screen. OFM is very good code base for somebody who wants to write a good non bloated console based ortodox file manager.
Be aware that it is GPL so you will have to write everything from scratch if you prefer BSD license like me.




@5 Learn ed and vi pronto or you will regret very soon. I do NOT like VIM for me vi is nvi that comes with the base or Heirloom vi.

Emacs sucks IMHO and I have used it seriously. I even learned the Lisp because of it.
 
I sometimes go through switching back and forth between them, but for my needs, fluxbox is preferable. Basically, what I want from a window manager is the ability to open anything I want from keystrokes and be able to move windows around. I don't use tabs, or the slit. I also do like a taskbar, and while I realize Openbox was trying to do the Right Thing(TM) by getting rid of it, it seems that so many people wind up using a 3rd party one that it might not have been said Right Thing(TM). :)

As I'm not a programmer, I don't really care whether it was written in C or C++ nor what the language is. As I'm reasonably paid to run Unix systems, I think I can still consider myself a serious user, though I like to make jokes. :)

I also like a wee bit of eye candy, which is why I don't use weewm or evilwm, both of which fill my other needs.
At any rate for example, to move a window 50 pixels down, using the Windows key and j (a shortcut taken from the vi editor--as Oko says, learn it, especially if you plan to continue with Unix or Unixlike systems)

In fluxbox

Mod4 j :MoveDown 50

In openbox


<keybind key="W-j">
<action name="MoveRelative">
<y>50</y>
</action></keybind>

So, for me, with my preferences and needs, fluxbox is a better choice. You can easily try both and see which one strikes your fancy.
 
Last edited:
thanks oko for ur gr8 and long reply, i really appreciate that. i am trying to use those applications
 
alie said:
4) is there any good file browser that doesnt have a lot of dependencies(note: i like ROX filer) ?
5) is there any text editor like GEdit that doesnt have a lot of dependencies ?
Click to expand...

I used fluxbox for about 4 years as my window manager. About 3 years ago I switched to Openbox exclusively. I find Openbox to be faster and I think it looks better.

For reasons, i can't recall now I never liked fluxbox's panel and always used pypanel and I use that with Openbox now. Fbpanel is also another popular panel to use with Openbox. LXpanel is also light.

There is a Desktop called LXDE which uses Openbox as the window manager and attempts to be very light but have all the functions of a Desktop.

As for you questions:
4) I like Thunar, from the XFCE project. PCManFM is very light, but I've personally had problem with it crashing too much.

5) geany is pretty good.
 
Roddie's being modest and not mentioning that he supplied a nice little patch for pypanel.

The one that Oko mentioned, however (I'm guessing he's referring to tint) is quite nice and unobtrusive.
 
Thanks for the plug, scottro! Haven't seen you in awhile.

My server is down right now due to mobo overheating so I didn't want to mention the patch...also not sure how many people actually use it.

I'm looking for a free or dirt cheap webhosting to mirror my site to. I re-wrote my website in python so that makes it a bit tougher to find one.
 
roddierod said:
I used fluxbox for about 4 years as my window manager. About 3 years ago I switched to Openbox exclusively. I find Openbox to be faster and I think it looks better.

For reasons, i can't recall now I never liked fluxbox's panel and always used pypanel and I use that with Openbox now. Fbpanel is also another popular panel to use with Openbox. LXpanel is also light.

There is a Desktop called LXDE which uses Openbox as the window manager and attempts to be very light but have all the functions of a Desktop.

As for you questions:
4) I like Thunar, from the XFCE project. PCManFM is very light, but I've personally had problem with it crashing too much.

5) geany is pretty good.
Click to expand...

I use dwm a lot these days, but sometimes when i need a change, always go back to fluxbox. And yes you are right about the default Fluxbox panel. Before I started theming fluxbox, I always used to think that the panel is one huge abomination! But after having some experience in theming, I always go back to Fluxbox when i need a change. I have used openbox a lot as well, but i still prefer fluxbox.

For anyone interested, you can find a few fluxbox screen of mine in Fluxbox Screenshots thread. I have also linked my latest fluxbox theme there!
 
Speaking of themes, one thing that I hate are the Openbox .obt themes. They seem to be Linux specific. When I download one from box-look.org I always get some error about invalid tar switches.
 
how about web browser guys ? i tried dillo.. its very bad... doesnt support CSS :(

i'm trying JWM now.. its nice and better than fluxbox :D
 
There is a native version:

/ports/www/opera

and a linux version

/ports/www/linux-opera

I use the bleeding edge /ports/www/opera-devel.
 
I tried to use fluxbox before openbox was forked, but for some reason I didn't like it at all (it was probably the fact that it had tabbed windows support or something silly like that). So back to blackbox it was at that time. After openbox forked I started to use it and have been ever since (there have been a few short jumps to WindowMaker, gnome/kde/sawfish/metacity/kwm).
Openbox's XML based configuration is very unfortunate, but it's not an issue anymore - I haven't touched the configuration much last couple of years (only minor menu changes).
 
cpcnw said:
I musing twm with wbar and xfe for file manager (it has image viewer and editor!)

Screenshot :-

http://81.174.174.115/twm/2009-03-07-1280x1024.png
Click to expand...

I second alie! Can you please post your .conkyrc and .twmrc please?

Edit: I didn't realize you were Graham! My bad! I visit your twm page quite often, its great for people like me who like twm, but never bothered to configure it! So it would be great to have your .conkyrc! and by the way nice to see another big fan of Groovesalad! its one of the best groove channels that's out there. i even have a somafm tshirt! have you listened to groovera by the way? i love Jet-City Lounge from groovera. But they are very strict when it comes to streamripping, thats my only gripe!
 
Just curious if anyone else has seen a difference in RAM usage between Fluxbox and Openbox. I've tried checking how much memory is being used with conky and when I'm running Fluxbox it seems like I'm not using as much as when I'm running Openbox (with no accessories like tint panel, etc). Found that a little surprising since Fluxbox appears to have a bit more functionality (built in panel). I found Openbox's menu easier to navigate (using a keyboard) than Fluxbox. I also noticed, last time I installed Fluxbox that redrawing the background, especially after a menu displayed, didn't look great all the time unless I had a program like feh installed. Don't think I had that issue with Openbox.
 
I just wanted to report that I installed and tried both openbox and scrotwm. I like openbox a lot. I also like scrotwm a lot, but it seems to not really scratch the itch I have.

I think what I am looking for is a kind-of-tiling manager that blurs the lines between something like openbox/fluxbox, but easily allows me to enter into/out-of a tiling mode when so moved.

Does this make sense? I guess what makes me say this is that I use a tiling WM for a day or 2 (xmonad, dwm, now scrotwm), and inevitably I can't shake the feeling of being restricted - though I like not having to use the dang old mouse.

That said, I find it pleasing to work in a fully maximized screen session for hours on end - is the answer (for me, anyway) - a screen like approach?

Thanks for reading my ramblings :)
 
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