Light, fast Windows manager for Red Hat

[osmocot404]

Hello,
I have a computer that has 266 mhz and 48 megs of ram with Red Hat Linux on it. My GUI, Gnome, is very, very slow, and I was wondering what everyone thinks should be my windows manager. Afterstep? TWM? Blackbox? XFce? It's like choosing a distro all over again...

Remember, I would love a fast one.

I think I may be confused about this, do you have to have a desktop environment to run a windows manager? Won't it make it slower? Or do I get rid of the desktop environment?

[The Ennead IX]

Any of the boxes really, flux, black, open, they all have speed whilst remaining highly functional and nice to look at.

[Tigger]

Why not take a look at Vector Linux.

http://www.vectorlinux.com

It has current packages but is meant for older hardware like yours. Based on Slackware.

[yosarian]

As The Ennead IX said, the *boxes are nice. I've personally used Blackbox and Openbox and I like Openbox better b/c it has anti-aliased fonts and comes with it's own key binding called epist. (No need for bbkeys). I've also played around with Enlightenment which seems nice if you like eye candy.

As far as your other question, no you don't have to run a de to run a wm. The wm can run standalone.

The best way to find out what you like is to see which, if any, wm's are included on your redhat cd's and install a couple.

[ferreter]

My life for fluxbox! (when I need a speedy and way cool wm). you can't beat the tab feature.

[osmocot404]

Okay,
I have the Openbox tar.gz on a floppy disk, how do I install it? When I double-click Floppy on the desktop, it comes out blank. It's not scanning the floppy drive and I keep pressing refresh.

[linux12414]

Is your floppy drive mounted?

[hiker_42]

To osmocot404:

type mount dev/fd0
this will mount the floppy to the /mnt/floppy directory
copy the tar.gz file to a directory

gunzip Openbox.tar
tar -xf Openbox.tar

cd into the Openbox directory and follow install instructions.......

[osmocot404]

After I put ./configure,
It says:
configure: error: no acceptable C compiler found in $PATH
See "config.log" for more details

What should I do now?

[hiker_42]

You'll have to install the C libraries from the distro CD....

[hiker_42]

You can just boot off the CD's and do an "upgrade installation" and select the packages under "software development" or something similar to that.....

[osmocot404]

Only the first CD boots up, but it asks me to install Red Hat. The other two don't boot up. Which CD has the C libraries?

[osmocot404]

Does this contain the C libraries? http://at.rpmfind.net/opsys/linux/RPM/libanl.so.1.html

Which do I download, the i386 or i586? What do I do with the rpm once I've downloaded it?

[hiker_42]

That RPM should work. Download the i386 one for now. Once you have it downloaded type (as root):

rpm -ivh glibc-2.2.93-5.i386

[osmocot404]

When I typed the phrase in into the console it said no such file or directory, and when i did it in KDE it says it was already installed. It says the same thing it said last time when I tried ./configure, what could be wrong? It says no for:

gcc
cc
cc
cl

It says cc twice.

[osmocot404]

Here is what it says in the console when I try to ./configure:



checking for a BSD-compatible install... /usr/bin/install -c
checking whether build environment is sane... yes
/home/admin/Fluxbox/fluxbox-0.1.14/missing: Unknown `--run' option
Try `/home/admin/Fluxbox/fluxbox-0.1.14/missing --help' for more information
configure: WARNING: `missing' script is too old or missing
checking for gawk... gawk
checking whether make sets ${MAKE}... yes
checking for gcc... no
checking for cc... no
checking for cc... no
checking for cl... no
configure: error: no acceptable C compiler found in $PATH



Did I place the Fluxbox in a bad directory?

[hiker_42]

It really shouldn't matter where you have the fluxbox install file. The ./configure, make, and make install steps should place it in the appropriate directory. Are you executing all of these commands as root?

I don't have a linux box here at work. I'll have to wait till I get home around 6:00pm CST. I'll look at it then, I'm currently running fluxbox at home as well......

[osmocot404]

Do I have to log into root? I just did su - and typed in my password. When I entered 'make', it said make: *** No targets specified and no makefile found. Stop.

and 'make install' says:
make: *** No rule to make target `install'. Stop.

[sharth]

osmoct, you have literally no idea how many times this has been asked. please search atleast a little. you are missing the development stuff from the red-hat cds... install gcc...

[hiker_42]

In Gnome or KDE go to "System Settings" then "packages"

In the "Add or Remove packages" window checkmark the "Development Tools" box Under "Development"

Then click the "update" button.

It should prompt you for which CD to insert........

[osmocot404]

Is there another way to do this? It freezes up when its checking the status of all the packages stored on the computer. After it says Processing Headings, the dialog freezes up. That is why I am switching to Fluxbox, KDE is too slow for this computer.

[sharth]

go search your cds for the rpm's. and install that way.

[osmocot404]

Okay, it worked, but now it requires something else:

configure: error: Fluxbox requires the X Window System libraries and headers.


I am going to get this from the packages menu, too.

[sharth]

(3rd time in 2 days I've answered this one :rolleyes: ) Xwhatever-devel I believe. reploace the whatever with like xsystem or Xserver or something like that.

[osmocot404]

I have done make install, now how am I supposed to get fluxbox to be an option when I click 'Session'? Are you supposed to edit the etc/X11/Session/ dir? and make a new one called Fluxbox? I believe fluxbox is located in my usr/local/bin/ dir.

[hiker_42]

OK....first go to the /etc/X11/gdm/Sessions directory.
create a new file named fluxbox...
the file should look like this:


#!/bin/bash
exec /etc/X11/xdm/Xsession fluxbox

close this file and type chmod 777 fluxbox


Then go to the /etc/X11/xdm directory and edit the Xsession file.

You will see entries for the other window managers. Add this:

fluxbox)
exec fluxbox
;;

Logout and fluxbox should now be operational.......

[osmocot404]

Thanks, my fluxbox is up and running, I just have to customize it.

[hiker_42]

Cool.....I think you'll like it. Attached is a screenshot of my current fluxbox screen. It's not too fancy, but that's kind of the idea......