openSUSE :: Fluxbox

Fluxbox is a highly-configurable window manager for the X Window System that was based on the Blackbox 0.61.1 code. It has full of features to make an easy, and extremely fast, desktop experience.

Fluxbox requires less time for booting and uses considerably fewer system resources than, for example, KDE or GNOME. This suited for situations where system resources, especially memory, are very limited. I use Fluxbox on my ASUS EeePC 701: 900 MHz CPU, 512 Mb RAM and yes – only 4 Gb HDD

Installation openSUSE

If you want to have/install a new openSUSE with Fluxbox only, hit the “Other” button at the “Desktop Selection” screen and choose either Minimal X Window. It will install the base system, plus the X Window server with basic desktop environment – TWM.

Of course, If you want more control, then take the second text-mode option. In this case you will have to know exactly which packages do you need.

In my case I chose Minimal X Window and after installation I got TWM with the default X Window System display manager XDM. Now I have about 600 installed packages and all takes about 1.3 GB on HDD.
Now we can easily run XTerm, where is necessary to make still to steam of steps before we will enjoy stable and fast work Fluxbox. By the way, for configure your XTerm, just create a new file ~/XTerm with the settings.
For example, this is my ~/XTerm:

XTerm*foreground: darkgreen
XTerm*cursorColor: darkgreen
XTerm*background: black
XTerm*scrollBar: True
XTerm*saveLines: 1000
XTerm*font: 9x15

Be green!
🙂

Installation Fluxbox

For installation Fluxbox we need to add a new repo:

> sudo zypper ar -f \
http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/X11:/windowmanagers/openSUSE_11.4 \
WindowManagers
> sudo zypper in fluxbox

And if you want to use another display-/login-manager, for example, slim:

> sudo zypper ar -f \
http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/X11:/lxde/openSUSE_11.4 \
lxde
> sudo zypper in slim slim-themes

After that set/change your default window manager and display-/login-manager (if you want to)

# yast2 sysconfig set DEFAULT_WM=fluxbox
# yast2 sysconfig set DISPLAYMANAGER=slim

Or just change:
DEFAULT_WM=”twm” to DEFAULT_WM=”fluxbox” in file /etc/sysconfig/windowmanager
DISPLAYMANAGER=”xdm” to DISPLAYMANAGER=”slim” in file /etc/sysconfig/displaymanager.
Now restart the X session by logging out.

What’s next?

Fluxbox’s user interface has only a toolbar and menu, which is accessible by a right click on the work space. Its menu and configuration is done by simple files located in the user directory under the name ~/.fluxbox.
See the wiki page to get more information about Fluxbox’s configuration (wallpaper, menu, styles/themes, etc…)

Slim has “openSUSE” as a default theme (from suse repo), but I like more Lake. If you want to change default theme, just edit /etc/slim.conf:

#current_theme              openSUSE
current_theme              lake

There is also one thing that you maybe will be needed to care about. In config file /etc/slim.conf you should check 36th string (there is shell-script that will be run after login). Problem that you could be meet is variable WINDOWMANAGER. If your slim will not run fluxbox, change this script: WINDOWMANAGER=fluxbox (instead of WINDOWMANAGER=%session).