Salix Xfce 14.0

[jayseye]

As a satisfied Salix 13.37 Fluxbox user, I'm curious about exactly which "default user configurations" would be missing, if I were to install Fluxbox under Salix 14 XFCE? Custom wallpaper is the main thing I can think of, off the top of my head. What else?

[Atip]

As a satisfied Salix 13.37 Fluxbox user, I'm curious about exactly which "default user configurations" would be missing, if I were to install Fluxbox under Salix 14 XFCE? Custom wallpaper is the main thing I can think of, off the top of my head. What else?

I am running Fluxbox with mate-panel all flawlessles. No problem with wallpaper with fbsetbg and lastwallpaper for opening, later rclock changes background every hour on the hour.

[mimosa]

@jayseye

Look at fluxbox-user-settings (or whatever) for 13.37, and also perhaps zzz-fluxbox-settings or the like. I'm basing what I say entirely on Ratpoison, but the various areas that could be relevant are preferrred apps and their config (such as a way to launch things; many simpler WM's use dmenu or similar); login (Salix Ratpoison just boots into runlevel 3); and God knows what else. But if you don't want to create a Salix FLuxbox edition (reinventing the wheel), it might be reasonably straightforward. In paticular, those packages for Fluxbox 13.37 would make a very good starting-point. For example, I have Salix 14.0 Xfce installed (currently the only non-beta option) with XMonad installed too. (just like you, my favoured WM isn't ready yet.) By putting xmonad.desktop in the right place (or do I mean xsession.xmonad?) it becomes possible to select it on login, and also to make it the automatic choice. Edit one or two more configuration files (substituting fluxbox for xmonad), and you're away. I'm sorry I'm not being specific, but the point is, it's doable, though the setup of the actual Fluxbox edition will be state of the art, once it is ready ("when it's ready"). I'd be glad to help, but I suspect you know more than me about this stuff. And it's all good fun anyway.

[jayseye]

Thanks mimosa; indeed is looks as though very few changes would be needed to adapt the package user-settings-fluxbox-13.37-noarch-2vc For Salix 14. The zzz package appears to be the kind of voodoo best avoided by muggles

Rather than defaulting to a graphical login screen, I still prefer to type xwmconfig when needed, and startx (or whatever), even with carpal tunnel syndrome / RSI.

What I actually plan though, is to create a Fluxbox version of Slackel. Initial tests have been mixed at best, though I do have specific workarounds ready to test.

[mimosa]

plan to create a Fluxbox version of Slackel

that sounds like a plan worth documenting!

What I did in one setup is edit lilo.conf to make xfce 14 boot into runlevel 3. Then I either type 'xfce' (a script that quickly returns to the kosher route) or 'monad' (which replaces .xinitrc with one of my own devising and calls startx, or that xsession file ... can't remember but you get the picture).

xwmconfig looks like a tidier approach

[submax]

salixos 14.0 is very good!!!

thank you for all hard work

I have compiled the new thunar 1.6.1 and i think that it is better than old

[jayseye]

Yes mimosa, I am carefully documenting the process of replacing KDE with Fluxbox in Slackel, using both jEdit and Zim.

The latter is a great little Python-based note-taking app, which I stumbled upon while exploring the XFCE menu in an early Salix 14 beta. I hope that Zim is still included in the releases; have yet to check in either Salix or Slackel.

While I do create lots of bash scripts as needed, my roots in Slackware run deep, so I tend to use Pat's dialog-based scripts when applicable, such as xwmconfig and pkgtool. I do like the fact that the default boot script starts up X via ssh-agent, so will be sure to keep that intact as I migrate from stock Salix Fluxbox 13.37 to whatever I end up with

Have done a lot of customizing lilo.conf in the past, though current experiments are leaning toward booting live from USB drives. Some variation of grub and/or syslinux may work better for that.

[mimosa]

And in any case, the right way to do what I was talking about is to edit /etc/inittab (change 4 to 3). I'm very much a beginner and tend to make things up as I go along; if you want to put a more positive spin on it, call it initiative xwmconfig was completely new to me, and simply does what I was doing better. Think for yourself, sure, but why reinvent the wheel (and probably put a kink in it while you're about it)?

[jayseye]

Actually I prefer to customize at the highest possible level, leaving things such as inittab in their stock, unmodified state as much as practical. So I do like your idea, mimosa, of choosing the runlevel in lilo.conf and, IIRC, changes like that are even easier to make when using grub.

When I tried, years ago, to reinvent the xwmconfig wheel, there turned out to be some voodoo in there. Though some of the logic looked unnecessary or superfluous, it was actually required for proper, or at least for consistent, operation. After some thought about getting to the bottom of that, I decided that I had higher priorities. Decided, instead, to learn to love Pat's red and blue dialog color scheme.

[posixru]

multiload-nandhp - A port of the GNOME multiload applet to the Xfce4 and LXDE panels. It supports Xfce 4.6 and lxpanel 0.5.5 and above.