advice
Gentlemen, I use xfce, it's fine, but I want something lighter. All I really want is the xfwm part of it, and even that window manager has its defects. I have dual monitors, and I can't drag anything between monitors. I hate trying to configure things using those stupid pop up dialogue boxes. I'd like text configuration files that I can edit, save, backup and restore. Awesome seems well spoken of. What can you guys tell me? I can't think what to specifically ask. It would be nice if it worked sensibly out of the box. I don't need fancy effects. I want windows on screens that I can resize, maximize, minimize, etc. Nice if they snap to borders to avoid wasted space. Xfce gives normally six or so desktops than you can change to, that's good. The mouse has to work. I need custom keyboard shortcuts. Basically nothing strange. I don't want to have to spend six months learning Lua. I want a simple, predictable, configurable WM that is usable but doesn't bother me with bells and whistles. Advice?
Re: advice
Not sure what you want to hear. If you've expecting to hear a sales pitch on awesome, I don't think there is a need, you're installing a free wm, not buying a car, just test it in virtualbox first if you're worried. If you're asking about specific features of a modern wm, they're all there - some not through vm itself (for example I installed awesome on top of xfce and use thunar file manager, and several xfce widgets). It's been a while since I installed awesome, I didn't like the idea of tiling wms at first, but now got so used to it I installed hammerspoon on my OSX to emulate it. Awesome works fine out of the box, I don't remember if I had to do anything to get my dual-monitors working but xrandr drives that and I mapped windows+P to switch between display setups via bash script. One thing to note is that keyboard shortcuts weren't intuitive to me right away so I switched some around. The default theme is also pretty ugly, but replacing it with one of preset ones from github is pretty easy ( https://github.com/copycat-killer/awesome-copycats). It also doesn't come with a compositor at first (so no shadows or transparent windows you may be used to), but that's a good thing since it gives you more flexibility. I use compton as my compositor and really like it. Unless you plan to customize your look and feel, you don't really need much lua. There are available widgets like volume, networking, etc. you can plug in (and will need to do if your theme doesn't already come with them). My only pet peeve with awesome is it's name, try googling for anything regarding awesome and see how often the first page contains a relevant result. On Tue, Sep 8, 2015 at 1:58 PM, Ray Andrews wrote: > Gentlemen, > > I use xfce, it's fine, but I want something lighter. All I really want is > the xfwm part of it, and even that window manager has its defects. I have > dual monitors, and I can't drag anything between monitors. I hate trying > to configure things using those stupid pop up dialogue boxes. I'd like > text configuration files that I can edit, save, backup and restore. > > Awesome seems well spoken of. What can you guys tell me? I can't think > what to specifically ask. It would be nice if it worked sensibly out of > the box. I don't need fancy effects. I want windows on screens that I > can resize, maximize, minimize, etc. Nice if they snap to borders to > avoid wasted space. Xfce gives normally six or so desktops than you can > change to, that's good. The mouse has to work. I need custom keyboard > shortcuts. Basically nothing strange. I don't want to have to spend six > months learning Lua. I want a simple, predictable, configurable WM that > is usable but doesn't bother me with bells and whistles. > > Advice? >
Re: advice
@ray I like the configurations that get installed with Manjaro Awesome respin (https://github.com/Culinax/manjaro-awesome-respin). The initial configuration may be too minimal. I don't know if you need to install packages besides awesome to use this config. use the virtual machine first. @alexander try searching for "awesome wm" instead of just "awesome" Cumprimentos, Bruno Ferreira 2015-09-08 19:14 GMT+01:00 Alexander Tsepkov : > Not sure what you want to hear. If you've expecting to hear a sales pitch > on awesome, I don't think there is a need, you're installing a free wm, not > buying a car, just test it in virtualbox first if you're worried. If you're > asking about specific features of a modern wm, they're all there - some not > through vm itself (for example I installed awesome on top of xfce and use > thunar file manager, and several xfce widgets). It's been a while since I > installed awesome, I didn't like the idea of tiling wms at first, but now > got so used to it I installed hammerspoon on my OSX to emulate it. > > Awesome works fine out of the box, I don't remember if I had to do > anything to get my dual-monitors working but xrandr drives that and I > mapped windows+P to switch between display setups via bash script. One > thing to note is that keyboard shortcuts weren't intuitive to me right away > so I switched some around. The default theme is also pretty ugly, but > replacing it with one of preset ones from github is pretty easy ( > https://github.com/copycat-killer/awesome-copycats). It also doesn't come > with a compositor at first (so no shadows or transparent windows you may be > used to), but that's a good thing since it gives you more flexibility. I > use compton as my compositor and really like it. Unless you plan to > customize your look and feel, you don't really need much lua. There are > available widgets like volume, networking, etc. you can plug in (and will > need to do if your theme doesn't already come with them). My only pet peeve > with awesome is it's name, try googling for anything regarding awesome and > see how often the first page contains a relevant result. > > On Tue, Sep 8, 2015 at 1:58 PM, Ray Andrews > wrote: > >> Gentlemen, >> >> I use xfce, it's fine, but I want something lighter. All I really want >> is the xfwm part of it, and even that window manager has its defects. I >> have dual monitors, and I can't drag anything between monitors. I hate >> trying to configure things using those stupid pop up dialogue boxes. >> I'd like text configuration files that I can edit, save, backup and >> restore. >> >> Awesome seems well spoken of. What can you guys tell me? I can't think >> what to specifically ask. It would be nice if it worked sensibly out of >> the box. I don't need fancy effects. I want windows on screens that I >> can resize, maximize, minimize, etc. Nice if they snap to borders to >> avoid wasted space. Xfce gives normally six or so desktops than you can >> change to, that's good. The mouse has to work. I need custom keyboard >> shortcuts. Basically nothing strange. I don't want to have to spend >> six months learning Lua. I want a simple, predictable, configurable WM >> that is usable but doesn't bother me with bells and whistles. >> >> Advice? >> > >
Re: advice
Alex mentioned compositors, which reminded me of a question I should have asked ages ago: The last time I tried enabling compositing (to get transparent terminals so I can see my wallpapers), I found that using compton led to the terminal text not refreshing fast enough (e.g. while scrolling in ranger or newsbeuter), so I had to disable it. I notice that I can enable transparency in the awesome wm interface itself without problems (using rgba), so I'm not sure exactly what went wrong. Is there currently a solution to this, or has anyone else even had this problem? On Tue, Sep 8, 2015 at 1:22 PM, Bruno Ferreira wrote: > @ray I like the configurations that get installed with Manjaro Awesome > respin (https://github.com/Culinax/manjaro-awesome-respin). The initial > configuration may be too minimal. I don't know if you need to install > packages besides awesome to use this config. use the virtual machine first. > > @alexander try searching for "awesome wm" instead of just "awesome" > > Cumprimentos, > Bruno Ferreira > > 2015-09-08 19:14 GMT+01:00 Alexander Tsepkov : > >> Not sure what you want to hear. If you've expecting to hear a sales pitch >> on awesome, I don't think there is a need, you're installing a free wm, not >> buying a car, just test it in virtualbox first if you're worried. If you're >> asking about specific features of a modern wm, they're all there - some not >> through vm itself (for example I installed awesome on top of xfce and use >> thunar file manager, and several xfce widgets). It's been a while since I >> installed awesome, I didn't like the idea of tiling wms at first, but now >> got so used to it I installed hammerspoon on my OSX to emulate it. >> >> Awesome works fine out of the box, I don't remember if I had to do >> anything to get my dual-monitors working but xrandr drives that and I >> mapped windows+P to switch between display setups via bash script. One >> thing to note is that keyboard shortcuts weren't intuitive to me right away >> so I switched some around. The default theme is also pretty ugly, but >> replacing it with one of preset ones from github is pretty easy ( >> https://github.com/copycat-killer/awesome-copycats). It also doesn't >> come with a compositor at first (so no shadows or transparent windows you >> may be used to), but that's a good thing since it gives you more >> flexibility. I use compton as my compositor and really like it. Unless you >> plan to customize your look and feel, you don't really need much lua. There >> are available widgets like volume, networking, etc. you can plug in (and >> will need to do if your theme doesn't already come with them). My only pet >> peeve with awesome is it's name, try googling for anything regarding >> awesome and see how often the first page contains a relevant result. >> >> On Tue, Sep 8, 2015 at 1:58 PM, Ray Andrews >> wrote: >> >>> Gentlemen, >>> >>> I use xfce, it's fine, but I want something lighter. All I really want >>> is the xfwm part of it, and even that window manager has its defects. I >>> have dual monitors, and I can't drag anything between monitors. I hate >>> trying to configure things using those stupid pop up dialogue boxes. >>> I'd like text configuration files that I can edit, save, backup and >>> restore. >>> >>> Awesome seems well spoken of. What can you guys tell me? I can't >>> think what to specifically ask. It would be nice if it worked sensibly >>> out of the box. I don't need fancy effects. I want windows on screens >>> that I can resize, maximize, minimize, etc. Nice if they snap to >>> borders to avoid wasted space. Xfce gives normally six or so desktops >>> than you can change to, that's good. The mouse has to work. I need >>> custom keyboard shortcuts. Basically nothing strange. I don't want to >>> have to spend six months learning Lua. I want a simple, predictable, >>> configurable WM that is usable but doesn't bother me with bells and >>> whistles. >>> >>> Advice? >>> >> >> >
Re: advice
you can plug in (and >> will need to do if your theme doesn't already come with them). My only pet >> peeve with awesome is it's name, try googling for anything regarding >> awesome and see how often the first page contains a relevant result. >> >> On Tue, Sep 8, 2015 at 1:58 PM, Ray Andrews >> wrote: >> >>> Gentlemen, >>> >>> I use xfce, it's fine, but I want something lighter. All I really want >>> is the xfwm part of it, and even that window manager has its defects. I >>> have dual monitors, and I can't drag anything between monitors. I hate >>> trying to configure things using those stupid pop up dialogue boxes. >>> I'd like text configuration files that I can edit, save, backup and >>> restore. >>> >>> Awesome seems well spoken of. What can you guys tell me? I can't >>> think what to specifically ask. It would be nice if it worked sensibly >>> out of the box. I don't need fancy effects. I want windows on screens >>> that I can resize, maximize, minimize, etc. Nice if they snap to >>> borders to avoid wasted space. Xfce gives normally six or so desktops >>> than you can change to, that's good. The mouse has to work. I need >>> custom keyboard shortcuts. Basically nothing strange. I don't want to >>> have to spend six months learning Lua. I want a simple, predictable, >>> configurable WM that is usable but doesn't bother me with bells and >>> whistles. >>> >>> Advice? >>> >> >> >
Re: advice
As Alexander said above, just go and try it, really. There is no risk involved. Personally I can say that Awesome is one of two best things that happened to me in the Un*x world in last years (the second one is mastering Vim). But I was immediately hooked to the idea of tiling WM, and just tried all of those that were available five years ago - I stayed with Awesome as it was best in handling multiple monitors at that time. If awesome won't appeal to you, you can give i3 a try - I remember that I liked it really a lot - in some aspects more than awesome. Paweł 2015-09-08 19:58 GMT+02:00 Ray Andrews : > Gentlemen, > > I use xfce, it's fine, but I want something lighter. All I really want is > the xfwm part of it, and even that window manager has its defects. I have > dual monitors, and I can't drag anything between monitors. I hate trying to > configure things using those stupid pop up dialogue boxes. I'd like text > configuration files that I can edit, save, backup and restore. > > Awesome seems well spoken of. What can you guys tell me? I can't think > what to specifically ask. It would be nice if it worked sensibly out of the > box. I don't need fancy effects. I want windows on screens that I can > resize, maximize, minimize, etc. Nice if they snap to borders to avoid > wasted space. Xfce gives normally six or so desktops than you can change > to, that's good. The mouse has to work. I need custom keyboard shortcuts. > Basically nothing strange. I don't want to have to spend six months > learning Lua. I want a simple, predictable, configurable WM that is usable > but doesn't bother me with bells and whistles. > > Advice? -- To unsubscribe, send mail to awesome-unsubscr...@naquadah.org.
Re: advice
Thanks for the replies all. It is also good to know there's a helpful community attached to awesome. On 09/08/2015 01:08 PM, Kristoffer Ryhl-Johansen wrote: ... /The mouse has to work./ The mouse moves around when you move your physical mouse around, and clicks on things when you press the physical button on the mouse. I'm not sure what kind of answer you're expecting here. Just that I can resize by grabbing edges, and drag windows around with the mouse ... all the things I'm used to ... unless of course there are now better ways. /I need custom keyboard shortcuts./ In the configuration file you have a list of keyboard commands, so you can just add your own. They can perform arbitrary lua code. Can they call external programs? I expect so. I wrote something in C for jumping my mouse pointer around, it's very simple but it works and there's nothing like it in xfce, mind I expect that awesome will be able to do the same sort of thing natively.
Re: advice
2015-09-08 23:06 GMT+02:00 Ray Andrews : > The mouse has to work. >> The mouse moves around when you move your physical mouse around, and clicks >> on things when you press the physical button on the mouse. I'm not sure what >> kind of answer you're expecting here. > > Just that I can resize by grabbing edges, and drag windows around with the > mouse ... all the things I'm used to ... unless of course there are now > better ways. The first one is possible with use of the modifier key, the latter is difficult and very rarely used. I think you will benefit a lot from this reading: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiling_window_manager -- To unsubscribe, send mail to awesome-unsubscr...@naquadah.org.
Re: advice
The window resizing is slightly different and better imo than regular wm. By default mouse can only interact with the contents of the window, but holding windows key (mod4) makes mouse interact with the window itself. If you hold windows and left-click, you will drag the window around. If you hold windows and right-click, awesome will grab the closest corner of the window to mouse location and let you resize the window via that corner. You can call whichever external programs you create shortcuts for. There are two types of spawning, spawn the program directly (most gui programs will fall into this category) or spawn a terminal and then spawn a command inside of it (this is your scripts and vim and stuff). I also have kupfer mapped to windows+space and I use that as my spawn manager. By default awesome uses windows+space to cycle between tiling layouts (and windows+shift+space to cycle backwards), which I changed to windows+pgup and windows+pgdn, respectively. On Tue, Sep 8, 2015 at 5:12 PM, Paweł Rumian wrote: > 2015-09-08 23:06 GMT+02:00 Ray Andrews : > > The mouse has to work. > >> The mouse moves around when you move your physical mouse around, and > clicks > >> on things when you press the physical button on the mouse. I'm not sure > what > >> kind of answer you're expecting here. > > > > Just that I can resize by grabbing edges, and drag windows around with > the > > mouse ... all the things I'm used to ... unless of course there are now > > better ways. > > The first one is possible with use of the modifier key, the latter is > difficult and very rarely used. > I think you will benefit a lot from this reading: > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiling_window_manager > > -- > To unsubscribe, send mail to awesome-unsubscr...@naquadah.org. >
Re: advice
Paweł, can you please explain again what refer to as being difficult? I think there might be some misunderstanding between you two. Dragging windows using the mouse is intuitive : You can drag a window across the screen and it jumps into the position which is the closest to the cursor within the tiling scheme you're using. Resizing is also easy, you can drag borders between the tiled windows around with the mouse. I drag windows but I think most users prefer moving them around using keyboard shortcuts. Floating windows can be dragged and resize just like in a non-tiling window manager. On 09/08/15 23:12, Paweł Rumian wrote: 2015-09-08 23:06 GMT+02:00 Ray Andrews : The mouse has to work. The mouse moves around when you move your physical mouse around, and clicks on things when you press the physical button on the mouse. I'm not sure what kind of answer you're expecting here. Just that I can resize by grabbing edges, and drag windows around with the mouse ... all the things I'm used to ... unless of course there are now better ways. The first one is possible with use of the modifier key, the latter is difficult and very rarely used. I think you will benefit a lot from this reading: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiling_window_manager -- To unsubscribe, send mail to awesome-unsubscr...@naquadah.org.
Re: advice
On 09/08/2015 02:02 PM, Paweł Rumian wrote: If awesome won't appeal to you, you can give i3 a try - I remember that I liked it really a lot - in some aspects more than awesome. Paweł That's the other one I'm thinking of trying. From what I hear, it's 'easier' but less powerful. How would you rate them side by side? They say the docs are better and it's plain text config. But they will not have such a helpful community ;-) -- To unsubscribe, send mail to awesome-unsubscr...@naquadah.org.
Re: advice
Since i3 is not programmable there will naturally be things you can't do with i3. Out of the box I'd say that i3 is prettier than awesome. Awesome and i3 both have plain text configs, remember that lua code is written in plain text :). I don't know of the i3 community, but I know that the awesome community is really nice. The largest difference, which probably is the difference which should make you choose between the window managers is that one has manual tiling and the other dynamic tiling. Awesome has dynamic tiling. This means that you set a layout, and the windows are tiled according to the layout. For example there's a layout that places one window to the left filling up the entire left of the screen, and the rest of the windows are stacked to the right. i3 has manual tiling, this means that you simply move the windows around in a grid you change to your liking. Manual tiling sounds nice, but personally there's always a layout which places the windows the way I want, and when you use a layout, it's faster than manual placement. Note that one of the layout rules in awesome is floating which makes every single window a floating window, which many find useful. This is not possible in i3. ons. 9. sep. 2015 kl. 04.50 skrev Ray Andrews : > On 09/08/2015 02:02 PM, Paweł Rumian wrote: > > If awesome won't appeal to you, you can give i3 a try - I remember > > that I liked it really a lot - in some aspects more than awesome. > Paweł > > That's the other one I'm thinking of trying. From what I hear, it's > 'easier' but less powerful. How would you rate them side by side? They > say the docs are better and it's plain text config. But they will not > have such a helpful community ;-) > > > -- > To unsubscribe, send mail to awesome-unsubscr...@naquadah.org. >
RE: advice
G'Day Ray, As a point of introduction, I use awesome for pretty much all the reasons you note and most have been answered, but I'd like to add that you need not be put off if you are NOT looking for a tiling window manager. I don't often use the advance features - I usually just use "Floating" most of the time with one app per tag Thanks to the lua config I have some applications that automatically maximize to a "tag" which I then use just like it was on its own "desktop" PS: For multiple monitors I played a bit and ended up with a really simply xorg.conf - Two monitors with a "virtual" desktop of the total area [and you can even place floating windows so they overlap both screens (not that you'd really want to) Regards Dave _ From: Ray Andrews [mailto:rayandr...@eastlink.ca] Sent: Wednesday, 9 September 2015 3:59 AM To: awesome@naquadah.org Subject: advice Gentlemen, I use xfce, it's fine, but I want something lighter.B All I really want is the xfwm part of it, and even that window manager has its defects. I have dual monitors, and I can't drag anything between monitors.B I hate trying to configure things using those stupid pop up dialogue boxes.B I'd like text configuration files that I can edit, save, backup and restore. Awesome seems well spoken of.B What can you guys tell me?B I can't think what to specifically ask.B It would be nice if it worked sensibly out of the box.B I don't need fancy effects.B I want windows on screens that I can resize, maximize, minimize, etc.B Nice if they snap to borders to avoid wasted space.B Xfce gives normally six or so desktops than you can change to, that's good.B The mouse has to work.B I need custom keyboard shortcuts.B Basically nothing strange.B I don't want to have to spend six months learning Lua.B I want a simple, predictable, configurable WM that is usable but doesn't bother me with bells and whistles. Advice?
Re: advice
On 09/08/2015 11:29 PM, Kristoffer Ryhl-Johansen wrote: Awesome and i3 both have plain text configs, remember that lua code is written in plain text :). True! Even 'plain text' config must have syntax. As long as lua isn't too horrible, like Java :-( I'm fluent in C. I don't know of the i3 community, but I know that the awesome community is really nice. Yes, I've had so much help already, and I'm not even a user yet. I will get my sh** together, and give it a go. -- To unsubscribe, send mail to awesome-unsubscr...@naquadah.org.
Re: advice
Honestly, I hate lua. I love python, but lua isn't that similar to python. With that said, I've learned enough lua to customize my config and most of the harder logic I typically outsource to python or bash. As mentioned earlier, awesome's ability to spawn a script as if it's run from terminal is very handy. I often have lua trigger a python/bash script (which does the actual work) and then process its output to display via naughty (awesome's notification system) or the systray. I do this for temperature widget, volume control, google calendar sync widget, as well as a few others. With that said, there are a number of widgets already written in lua you can just use for these common tasks: http://awesome.naquadah.org/wiki/User_Contributed_Widgets On Wed, Sep 9, 2015 at 10:55 AM, Ray Andrews wrote: > On 09/08/2015 11:29 PM, Kristoffer Ryhl-Johansen wrote: > >> >> Awesome and i3 both have plain text configs, remember that lua code is >> written in plain text :). >> > True! Even 'plain text' config must have syntax. As long as lua isn't > too horrible, like Java :-( > I'm fluent in C. > > I don't know of the i3 community, but I know that the awesome community is >> really nice. >> > > Yes, I've had so much help already, and I'm not even a user yet. I will > get my sh** together, and give it a go. > > > > -- > To unsubscribe, send mail to awesome-unsubscr...@naquadah.org. >
Re: advice
I'm not convinced that java is a terrible language, it has a really good standard library, and with lambdas in the newer versions it really is becoming more useful. The problem is simply that it has a lot of boilerplate, but this simply means it's more designed for larger projects. Anyway if you're fluent in C, you should grasp the concepts of programming and as long as you can keep track of the 1 based indexing you shouldn't have a problem. You could of course always ask the mailing list if you're having issues with your configuration. - Kristoffer Ryhl-Johansen Email: kristof...@ryhl.dk Tlf: +45 23 70 75 12 2015-09-09 16:55 GMT+02:00 Ray Andrews : > On 09/08/2015 11:29 PM, Kristoffer Ryhl-Johansen wrote: > >> >> Awesome and i3 both have plain text configs, remember that lua code is >> written in plain text :). >> > True! Even 'plain text' config must have syntax. As long as lua isn't > too horrible, like Java :-( > I'm fluent in C. > > I don't know of the i3 community, but I know that the awesome community is >> really nice. >> > > Yes, I've had so much help already, and I'm not even a user yet. I will > get my sh** together, and give it a go. > > > > -- > To unsubscribe, send mail to awesome-unsubscr...@naquadah.org. >