This is part of The Pile, a partial archive of some open source mailing lists and newsgroups.
From: Ben Russo <Ben.Russo@GlobalOne.net> Date: Tue, 09 Feb 1999 17:02:36 -0500 Subject: Re: what's the difference between desktop/window-manager Newsgroups: comp.os.linux.misc Chetan Ahuja wrote: > > for the desktop but I have been getting confusing messages about what > exactly is the relationship/differences between a "Desktop" like KDE > and a "windows manager" like windowmaker. In particular, Is it possible Imagine an X monitor with just a mouse cursor and an Xterm open in it. The window manager just "decorates" X applications with a title bar, and might give you buttons on the title bar that let you resize the X app or close it, iconize it or de-iconize it, and move it. This is a window-manager. There is actually a specific set of things that an X window manager has to be able to do. These are specified in the X11R<x> (release number) specs. An X-server is just a video card driver and mouse cursor controller that has an X api for X applications to communicate with. It is possible to set up an X-server and an X-app with NO-WINDOW-MANAGER at all. This has extremely little functionality, because you have no way to move/resize/(de)iconize/open/close your X-apps unless they have that function built in (for example you type "exit" at the shell in an Xterm and it will close). But it does come in handy, for example I have set up WWW "appliances" that just have an open Netscape window maximized. If you close Netscape it just restarts it ==endless loop==. No command line makes this WWW appliance rather secure. A "desktop" (AFAIK) doesn't really have a technical definition like a window-manager does. Usually desktops have "extra" features that make using a window manager easier. An icon based launcher bar like windowmaker has is an example of the extra feature. A pager (allowing you to switch between different "desktops") is another example. Like Win95 KDE allows you to create icons on the desktop that can launch applications, or be links to files. KDE allows you to associate file types (like *.html or *.gif) with applications like netscape or gimp. KDE has a built in File Manager (Very nice) that can launch a "helper" app based on the type of file you are looking at. KDE also has a "START" bar like Win95 and allows multiple desktops like NORTON-Desktop-Commander for Windows or CDE for UN*X. Desktop managers are beginning to support Drag-n-Drop and may someday have a CORBA engine that handles OLE-like functionality for applications that conform to the particular Desktop Manager engine. > to run windowmaker ON TOP OF KDE ( if such a thing makes any sense). > If yes, what are the advantages/drawbacks to such an approach.... > Pointers to web pages which explain this in fair detail will also be appreciated. KDE actually consists of many parts a Window Manager with special extensions is one of those parts. You would not want to run WindowMaker on top of KDE. If you want to try KDE all you have to do is install a few binary rpms. (there are lots of different ones, but you only *have* to have the basic ones.) kdebase kdelibs kdeadmin kdesupport And the qt lib: qt These have version numbers after the name like most rpms, but they are changing frequently right now there is KDE-1.0 and KDE-1.1 I think the latest qt libs are 1.42. Try www.kde.org After you install these RPMs with "rpm -Uvh" then look through the "startx" script and the /etc/X11/xinit/* stuff and any /home/<your-name>/.[xX] files to see how your X-windows system is initializing itself. If you are a programmer this should be pretty easy for you. You can then modify those config files and scripts to call: /opt/kde/bin/startkde Try it, if you don't like it go back to Window-Maker. I tried Gnome a few months ago, and maybe things have changed a lot, but Gnome was completely unstable. I used WindowMaker for a while, but I *REALLY* like KDE! -Ben. ===