Solved How to use a DE togheter a WM

F1R3-R4H

F1R3-R4H

Recently I have installed Freebsd 11.2 amd64.
But I have beeing troubles wit Xorg: I doesn't run ANY DE nor WM.
My idea is to have a graphic environment with both, obviously having fuctioning X.
For the momment I'll try to install Xorg and Xfce. Nothing else.
If I have problems, I'll be posting the errors.
 
All DE's have a WM because without that, there is no way to manage the windows. If you install a DE (KDE, Gnome, Xfce4), you will also be using whatever WM each of those uses.
 
Sevendogsbsd said:
All DE's have a WM because without that, there is no way to manage the windows. If you install a DE (KDE, Gnome, Xfce4), you will also be using whatever WM each of those uses.
Click to expand...
I already knew that. The WM of KDE is Kwin, and the WM of Gnome is GDM.
I mean to say IWM, Awesome, I3, Icewm, etc.
 
You wouldn't use any of those with a DE, not really possible and there would be no reason to, unless you replaced the one the DE provides. GDM is not the window manager of Gnome, it's the login manager of Gnome. I have no idea what window manager Gnome uses but someone else may chime in. Not many Gnome users here.
 
F1R3-R4H said:
For the moment I'll try to install Xorg and Xfce. Nothing else.
Click to expand...
This is a good easy choice.
pkg install xorg xfce4 is pretty simple.
You do need to consider a xf86-video driver. For instance for intels use xf86-video-intel.
Reading up on your video card would help here.

Login Managers like Slim , XDM, GDM ect.. add a layer of complexities.
I would suggest you stick with a command line login and
startxfce4 is the command to start your desktop. You can shorten that as well.
You will need to add dbus to /etc/rc.conf or onestart it the first time you start Xfce.
service dbus onestart then startxfce4
This generates some sort of unique machine id code for xauth.
dbus is needed for other software (Xfce4 shutdown menu) so it don't hurt to just add it to /etc/rc.conf.

I manipulate the taskbar, drag to bottom and ditch the floating bar. Xfce is pretty configurable.
Openbox is good to experiment with when you gain some experience. It is a blank slate.
Lots of docs because it's old and sturdy.
Plenty of choices out there for minimal desktops.
twm is the most basic and is included in our base xorg package.
X -retro is pretty fun to mess with as well to learn windowing basics.
 
Well, all I can say is good luck. I am not able to offer any advice on this because I have never replaced, nor had the desire to replace, the stacking window manager on a DE with a tiling window manager. 2 of the WM's you listed are tiling, x11-wm/icewm is stacking and I have never heard of IWM so can't speak to it.

I say this because DE's are about the "desktop" and present a desk metaphor to the user. Tiling window managers do not do this - there is no "desktop" per se so not sure what would happen, or if you even could replace say "kwin" with x11-wm/i3. The desktop that KDE presents would no longer be available.

Of course you are certainly welcome to try! Personally, I would take Phishfry's advice.
 
Agree - there are many instances out there of folks swapping out one WM for another, but normally of the same variety: stacking. Once you introduce a tiling WM in the mix, the desktop becomes pointless.
 
Hum...I'm a lot of mutant. I may stay fix in a opinnion about something, but could I change or vary of using something. Specially respecting to any thing relationated with PC and/or software of it.
 
I think I'll stay with Xfce. And for the moment, use the effects of the video. Thanks!
If I can go more deep and install a WM and use it simultaneously, I'll be posting it.
Now, I think I'll mark this as solved.
 
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