Mature GUI's ?

[D-Termind]

Is there any distro with a GUI that looks like it was done by someone at least in their 30's? I like Mandrake so far but it doesn't make me feel very secure when the graphics remind me of rebellious youth.

(Credit given to young people, no slam intended. Honest!...I was there at one time. http://www.linuxnewbie.org/ubb/smile.gif )

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D-Termind
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Win-DUHs

[mohenly]

Originally posted by D-Termind:
Is there any distro with a GUI that looks like it was done by someone at least in their 30's? I like Mandrake so far but it doesn't make me feel very secure when the graphics remind me of rebellious youth.

(Credit given to young people, no slam intended. Honest!...I was there at one time. http://www.linuxnewbie.org/ubb/smile.gif )



What the GUI looks like is not really a function of what distro you're using. It's more a function of the window manager and "theme". Themes are customizations of various aspects of the UI: i.e., "widgets" (buttons, scroll bars, title bars, etc.) and desktop images.

A good place to start is by looking at http://www.themes.org which organizes themes by desktop environment and window manager. This'll give you some idea of what's available.

For what it's worth, I also find Mandrake far too graphically cute for my taste. (If I see one more penguin, I'm gonna puke.) Fortunately, Mandrake offers lots of tools for customization.

[D-Termind]

Originally posted by mohenly:

For what it's worth, I also find Mandrake far too graphically cute for my taste. (If I see one more penguin, I'm gonna puke.) Fortunately, Mandrake offers lots of tools for customization.

Exactly...I am just tired of seeing Penguins and such. Graphics are nice but there comes a point where it distracts from learning and usefullness.

I'll check out themes.org but I just know it's going to be full of themes originating from 16 yr. old minds...

I mean Britney Spears is OK, as well as great tasting Seafood. However, one can get weary of Blackened Swordfish and just get a hunger for Pinto Beans and Cornbread.

Besides...BS wouldn't have anything more to do with me than she would with her grandfather. http://www.linuxnewbie.org/ubb/smile.gif




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D-Termind
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Win-DUHs

[milanuk]

For a GUI w/ slightly less eye-candy and still pretty functional, you could try IceWM, as long as you aren't one of those who go postal at the sight of a Windows-like interface. For that matter, you could try one of the golden oldy window managers, fvwm or fvwm95, which used to be the only real game in town for Linux 5 years ago. Another choice that I'd highly recommend is XFCE. I believe it is GNOME compliant, and maybe partially KDE compliant. In any event, it is purposely designed to look an awful lot like the old commercial *nix standard, CDE, and it does a damn good job of it. When we still had the HP-UX workstation out here for System Control/Patch (electric utility), we were working on making a 'trainer' out of an old PC running XFCE so operators could get used to doing things on a non-production *nix box.

Monte

[Gweedo]

XFCE is a great desktop. It works with KDE apps as well as Gnome apps. It leans more towards gnome because gnome and XFCE have a Gtk base.

Infact I use XFCE and then use Gnome's control center to change the themes.

Plus it is lightweight and quite swift.
www.xfce.org (http://www.xfce.org)

Have fun, give all a run http://www.linuxnewbie.org/ubb/biggrin.gif That is what I did until I found the desktop/window manager that suited me the best.

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Dubbie..Dubbie..Do..
Watch out.. or the Penguin will get You ;)

[ColdPack]

Quite simply, I use either windowmaker or blackbox.
They're both pretty clean interfaces with no fluff.
Just function.
I can't say enough about either one of them.

[Unruly]

I know eactly how you mean. Poeple use lots of bright greens, or pipes extending way beyond a window, and while, this looks pretty in it's own right, it's not fuctional at all.

I tend to stick with smaller and more conservitave (see: clean, smooth, or brushed) themes for my windows. Nothing frilly, nothing way over the top.

I don't mean to rant on MK, 'cause he's a cool guy. But it just seems to me he likes busy and bright backgrounds which, to me, seem a little too over done.

If I can help it, I make my UI as simple as possible, with as many features I can without cluttering it up (liberal use of drawers or menu items).

BeOS is a prime example of this. They made a clean cut and smooth look to the GUI, without over flowing with hundreds of little buttons or widgets. This is why something like the gimp works for me (small little toolbox window, right click menus... genius!)

So, again, no offense MK, your a genius compared to me (I'm not a hardware person :P), but I have to say, your desktops could give me headaches with the combination of 3d backgrounds and theme colors, to me, the embodiment of chaos, to you, a fully functional and cool looking desktop.

D-Termind, yeah, mandrake really assulted me with too many cheezy looking, non professionally put together graphics. If anything, I got rid of it because it was way too much, for a person who needs way less. Debian (with some tweaking of prefrences) afforded me a better, cleaner look, I'm sure the same could be said of slackware.

Simplicity, functionality (embodies stablity as well), grace, and speed. All requirements of a good GUI.

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Nathan
Q: How many existentialists does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
A: Two. One to screw it in and one to observe how the lightbulb itself symbolizes a single incandescent beacon of subjective reality in a netherworld of endless absurdity reaching out toward a maudlin cosmos of nothingness.

[Unruly]

Originally posted by ColdPack:
Quite simply, I use either windowmaker or blackbox.
They're both pretty clean interfaces with no fluff.
Just function.
I can't say enough about either one of them.

I tried and liked Window Maker a lot, but it still didn't meet my needs, and blackbox just confused the hell out of me, I could'nt figger out how to do anything, let alone use it efficently.

That's where helixcode came in http://www.linuxnewbie.org/ubb/smile.gif it's fairly fast, and looks great.

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Nathan
Q: How many existentialists does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
A: Two. One to screw it in and one to observe how the lightbulb itself symbolizes a single incandescent beacon of subjective reality in a netherworld of endless absurdity reaching out toward a maudlin cosmos of nothingness.

[ColdPack]

It's simply a matter of right-clicking anywhere on the desktop and the main menu pops up.
From there I choose what I need.
Most things are an "Application" so going to that will get you most everything you have without there having to be a cute little icon somewhere on your desktop.
When you minimize some window and want to get back to it, right click again, go to "Workspace" and you'll find that minimized app in there.
I've grown very used to it in a short amount of time by simply messing around with it. I navigate with blackbox faster than any other window manager.
(I do like helix too. http://www.linuxnewbie.org/ubb/smile.gif But only when I'm in that type of mood.)
But this discussion just shows one of the many reasons why I love linux. CHOICES and FLEXIBILITY!

http://www.infocom.cqu.edu.au/Units/aut98/85321/Old_Stuff/1997_Website/Study_Material/Resource_Materials/Linux_Logos/linux-ms-anim2.gif



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"What do people mean when they say the computer went down on them?"
---Marilyn Pittman

[tminos]

Enlightenment is pretty cool, but it can be a resource hog sometimes. Cool-clean and Tigert are both themes that appear to be reasonable. Some go waaay overboard with it all, but those two seem good.

Myself, I use HelixGnome + sawfish and the "iron" theme. The buttons for it all REAL small, but I prefer to have those done by keybindings instead.