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Fluxbox-1.0 released!

fluxbox.sourceforge.net — Finally after almost four and a half years with 0.9.x release we got to 1.0.0! This release includes a lot of bugfixes, new styles

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  • Daisuke, on 10/10/2007, -1/+11Changelog available here:
    http://fluxbox.sourceforge.net/version-0.9.php
    • DiggLive, on 10/10/2007, -15/+2It takes them almost 5 years to make minor tweaks to a window manager? And the FSF cult complains that Microsoft spent 5 years making a huge overhaul of an entire operating system from XP to Vista... Gotta love the fanboys following open source, free software, floss for teeth, whatever they want to call themselves these days.

      But oh wait.. it's free, you're not allowed to complain, right?
      • polyGone, on 10/10/2007, -0/+5Nobody likes an *****.......
      • Treatment, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3http://digg.com/users/DiggLive/history/comments
        Good GOD, you are such a jerk.
        • andycr512, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2Quite the troll, isn't he?
          • kidd3ckz, on 10/10/2007, -1/+1Honesty owns. Ur both gay.
          • andycr512, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1Honesty, ey? If it's honesty, then prove my comment above wrong.
      • Jonjonr6, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2No, you're NOT allowed to complain. You ARE allowed to bitch and then go elsewhere.
      • andycr512, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1"It takes them almost 5 years to make minor tweaks to a window manager? And the FSF cult complains that Microsoft spent 5 years making a huge overhaul of an entire operating system from XP to Vista..."

        Almost -nobody- works on the fluxbox project. How long would it take Microsoft to make the equivalent with about 4 active developers? Keep in mind Microsoft programmers each averaged 3 lines of code A DAY on Vista.

        "Gotta love the fanboys following open source, free software, floss for teeth, whatever they want to call themselves these days."

        Right, as opposed to the fanboy with the Vista logo as his avatar?

        "But oh wait.. it's free, you're not allowed to complain, right?"

        You're free to complain, but we prefer you shut up and contribute code that fixes the issue you have. If you cannot code, then someone else will see your bug report/feature request and, if it is wanted enough, implement it.

        At any rate, I think your avatar and the massive collection of diggs you are receiving should tell you all you need to know.
      • sleepwalkers, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2Except here's the thing - 1.0 doesn't mean it was unusable before... Far from it, actually FluxBox has been my favorite window manager for a while now.
  • corevette, on 10/10/2007, -4/+21http://fluxbuntu.org
    • NJank, on 10/10/2007, -4/+17Nice... but how about 1 line explaining what the heck this is? It's not like FluxBox is an overly descriptive name on its own.
      from the site:
      Fluxbox © is yet another windowmanager for X. It's based on the Blackbox 0.61.1 code. Fluxbox looks like blackbox and handles styles, colors, window placement and similar thing exactly like blackbox (100% theme/style compability).
      • GMorgan, on 10/10/2007, -0/+6Fluxbox is a window manager with some nice features. The most distinctive thing about it is the way you can merge windows together with a tabbed title bar, I think that feature is unique though I may be wrong.

        It has a dock called the Slit which will run WindowMaker applets. It also has the standard stuff like multiple desktops, menus and such. It does miss some things though, while it has a dock there are no applets running as default and you have to manually add stuff like a file browser and all the default software (i.e. it is a window manager).

        Right now, this is what I'm using on my Debian Lenny install. I've got it set up with iDesk and Conky and I'm using the KMix applet (you can run normal applets as well) to handle volume. Works nicely, loads very quick and doesn't waste too many resources.
    • Dhalgren, on 10/10/2007, -3/+1It's like xubuntu but using fluxbox instead of xfce...
      • GMorgan, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2It's much, much lighter than XFCE. It isn't a DE environment for one and later XFCE releases seem slow to me (compared to where they were).
    • rittap, on 10/10/2007, -2/+3Too bad it's migrating atm...
    • bardamuclichy, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1Needs more devs. Get on the ball, coders!
    • skyshock1, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1Why not just sudo apt-get install flux? I have it as a window manager on my standard ubuntu install. Then you can log into it in a separate session if you want when you bring up the desktop. Do you really need a separate distro just to use a different window manager?
      • djGentoo, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1Artwork. ;) Not to mention a *way* lighter desktop (without all of Ubuntu's services running in the BG).
  • merithium, on 10/11/2007, -5/+5woohoo :D
  • ZaNkY, on 10/10/2007, -0/+36Congratulations to the Fluxbox dev team!

    It's great to see the project still kicking, and I wish Fluxbox another successful 5 years (hopefully forever :p)
  • ghindo, on 10/10/2007, -5/+20Fluxbuntu's gonna be awesome.
    • arcticblue, on 10/10/2007, -1/+7I personally think "Fubuntu" sounds better.
    • technoredneck, on 10/10/2007, -1/+7Seriously. I think Fluxbuntu will help give Fluxbox some much-needed developer attention.

      I got my mom's laptop set up running Debian Etch, Fluxbox, and the Fluxbox desktop icons thinger. Opera and AbiWord are pretty much the only applications she needs. Damn setup is extremely responsive, especially considering it's running on a 233 MHz Pentium II with 96 megs of RAM.
    • bardamuclichy, on 10/10/2007, -1/+1Looking forward to a usable release!
      • c130commnav, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1It was already very useable. I used it years ago, was a great window manager.
  • pcore, on 10/10/2007, -6/+24"Fluxbox © is yet another windowmanager for X."

    Can someone explain this for me?
    • geminitojanus, on 10/22/2007, -1/+105Window Managers are programs that Manage Windows. Unlike Windows or Mac OS X, the Window Manager in an X environment is typically a separate piece of software from the GUI toolkit. When you minimize or maximize windows (and most of the time, Workspaces/Virtual Desktops), you're instructing the WM to hide or show windows. When you press alt-tab, you're instructing the Window Manager to switch the windows order, etc.

      Fluxbox is a very lightweight WM compared to most others, it's based of an older WM that was also very minimalist in design. Unlike other WMs, it also incorporates some code to draw its own menubar and has integrated program launching (which makes it emulate an extremely stripped-down desktop environment, which is why people often get confused between the distinction). Lots of long-term Linux users/hackers end up using one of the *box window managers because of the extremely stripped-down nature of its code (and it's extremely responsive likewise).

      There are a bunch of other WMs too. Compiz, the one with wobbly windows everyone's used to around here, is just a Window Manager with a built-in window compositor (and a lot of special OpenGL plugins that allow it to be very configurable and adds eye-candy galore). Metacity is the default WM on GNOME, Kwin on KDE. And then of course you've got my all-time favorite, WindowMaker (a knock-off of NeXT's window manager that's very Mac OS X-in-the-90s, dock and all. It's a real shame it's not very actively developed anymore). WMs are one of the more beautiful parts of alternative OSes, they can really define how you use your machine and can completely change the experience you have, and yet they're so innocuous and transparent you hardly can tell they are there.
      • arjie, on 10/10/2007, -0/+5In fact, its parent Blackbox inspired a Windows-shell replacement called bb4win, though I've heard that no one develops for that any more.
        • meez, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1But it's still far better than explorer.

          (BBClean user! =))
        • fak3r, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1I'm running bblean 116 - don't think I could stand windows without it! while development for all the bb*win apps have slowed to a crawl, they're still completely usable and less buggy than explorer! combine this with Xming and launchy, and you have my default Windows setup (it's as close to Linux as I can get...at this job)
    • bmartin, on 10/10/2007, -1/+7Fluxbox is a minimalist program for showing the contents of your programs. It's designed to be very configurable, responsive, and lightweight, compared to other window managers like Metacity (GNOME), Kwin (KDE), and XFwm (Xfce).

      Most of the configuration is done by text files; it's not for users who need a GUI to configure everything. It has powerful built-in support for keyboard shortcuts (accessible from a text file).

      If you don't need graphical configuration tools to hold your hand, and high performance and control over your computer are your goals, Fluxbox comes highly recommended. It dramatically increases the performance many computers, especially older ones. I use my laptop for development; Fluxbox is the only thing I run, except when I'm testing on a GNOME or KDE setup.
      • fak3r, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3note that the menu (the part that the windows 'start' button or the Gnome 'foot') is brought up with a simple right click anywhere, so all the functionality is just hidden until you do that. config is dead simple, but if you can't stand commandline there is flux conf: http://devaux.fabien.free.fr/flux/ avail within all Debian / Ubuntu installs I've seen. Hell, add conky to it and you can have all the live data you'd normally put on the gnome-taskbar...fluxbox was, is and will be, a perfect power user setup.
      • GMorgan, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1The shortcut config is ace it's so straight forward. Keyboard shortcuts are the way of things, better than GUI's. Of course you need to configure your short cuts and that is beyond some people who can't type, see or speak English.
    • winmac96, on 10/12/2007, -3/+1Exactly... ......detects sarcasm ^^ ;)
  • nextsux, on 10/10/2007, -8/+0Infuc*ingcredible ... finally ;)
  • wisie, on 10/10/2007, -9/+1Here I was thinking this was a thin version of torrentflux.. oops
  • dibblethewrecke, on 10/10/2007, -18/+1Too little, too late. There were better WM 4 and a half years ago. Not that that will stop the haxor fan boys voting it best WM for the third year in a row...
    • tehmoth, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1i notice you do not name them.
      • thelastknowngod, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1i think openbox and icewm are both better than fluxbox. i like fluxbox but its far from the best WM.
  • digitallysick, on 10/11/2007, -0/+7screen shots? the page has only shots of 0.9 trying to see if their is a major difference
  • priegog, on 10/10/2007, -0/+9Woohoo!
    I have to confess, this brings a little hope with it. Who knows what'll happen next? Maybe someday we will see wine 1.0.
  • xagoln, on 10/10/2007, -6/+3e17 is faster and prettier, and stable enough for me (it occasionally restarts itself when network-manager crashes but no data loss and your other programs carry on running).

    In fact every time I show a fluxbox user e17 they can't believe you can have all that bling and still be much faster than fluxbox.
    • clouder, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3working with e17 is very unfamiliar. You can't really just sit down and start using it like most window managers. That aside, all your bling goes away once you use an app that doesn't make use of edk, which is practically everything not made by e17 themselves.
    • irCuBiC, on 10/10/2007, -0/+7Obviously you have never tried to run them both on a Pentium 1 era computer. Fluxbox is much, much smoother. (at least, on MY Pentium 1 era computer =)
      "Well obviously," you say, "but on newer computers it doesn't matter!"
      Yes, but it's on these types of computers it matters the most. On newer computers it hardly matters if your WM sucks up more resources than certain 3D games, because they can take that beating without even sweating.

      Though personally, the main reason I (and many others I know) use fluxbox is to get AWAY from all the bling and fanciness of modern WMs/DEs, not because it's so much faster than everything else, so your point is moot anyway.
      • GMorgan, on 10/10/2007, -0/+5I run Fluxbox on my Core 2 Duo laptop. I like it better than the DE's in the end.

        I don't think I'm missing anything by doing so.
  • ShyGuy91284, on 10/10/2007, -0/+5I've always liked these mimilaist WM's (Fluxbox in particular). The UI responsiveness is immediately noticable when compared to Gnome and KDE. I settle on XFce after a while though myself since it is like a leaner version of Gnome.
    • digitallysick, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1I run xfce myself, gives me the feel of gnome but with a faster interface.
    • pooptaster, on 10/10/2007, -0/+0How to tell you are a wm junkie: You no longer classify fluxbox as a light window manager.
  • hassmaschine, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2Congrats to the team, fluxbox has been my window manager of choice for the last 2.5 years, and for those that use *nix and haven't tried, give it a shot, it's well worth it.
  • tommasz, on 10/10/2007, -1/+5For those who love to play with window managers, this is great. For those who a) don't know what a "window manager" is, b) use whatever default window manager came with their distribution, or c) would like to "try out that Linux thing" but are overwhelmed by the number of choices that confront them at ever turn this either doesn't matter or just makes things worse.
    • GMorgan, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2Depends. Personally I've had Fluxbox done up to the stage where it isn't missing any functionality. It's still a hell of a lot faster than the DE's, if someone made a DE based on Fluxbox the lighter options for things like desktop then it would be brilliant.
  • bigfloppydonkey, on 10/10/2007, -0/+5Personally I've liked fluxbox better than the other WM's, even on faster machines.

    Glad to see it's still alive and kicking.
  • KevMacLeod, on 10/10/2007, -18/+3Is this a joke? That is one of the ugliest pieces of ***** I've ever seen on a modern operating system. Windows 98 looks better than that crap.
    • mccord, on 10/10/2007, -0/+12nice in-depth review, would read again A++++++++
    • EbilPhish, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3Its not designed for looks, its designed to be fast and lite.

      All the applications appearance is dependant on the under the hood libraries anyway, for instance GTK for gnome programs or QT for KDE, the only thing that Fluxbox draws is the borders, background (You can swap with another bg program), taskbar and the menu.
      • GMorgan, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1That's one thing I've found. For some reason GTK using a fugly theme in Fluxbox, even if it's setup to use Clearlooks in Gnome. You have to alter that and find a nice theme for it, there's no reason for Fluxbox to be ugly though some of the defaults are scary.
        • mccord, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1easily fixed by loading gnome-settings-daemon on fluxbox startup ;)
        • pooptaster, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1or set up a gtkrc like everyone else.
          (nothing too wrong with gnome-settings-daemon, but it weighs more than just a file)
    • Dhalgren, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1KnoppMyth uses Fluxbox because it's nice and lightweight. It doesn't matter what the windows environment looks like if it's hidden behind a shiny interface, but you still need one...
  • sequethin, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1whoa! I thought after I saw 1.0RCsomething that 1.0 would be soon to follow. That was um... a year ago? wow. I'm glad to see it's still being developed! I wonder if blackbox will ever get to 1.0 ?
  • EbilPhish, on 10/10/2007, -1/+1I still want to see a version that works with compiz :/
    • mccord, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3both fluxbox & compiz are windowmanagers, so i doubt that'll ever happen
      you could add some eyecandy with xcompmgr though
      • SocialPoison, on 10/10/2007, -1/+1I thought compiz-fusion sat on top of GNOME and KDE to do all its shiny crap. It's a stand alone WM?
        • GMorgan, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3Yes, you could run just Compiz but I wouldn't recommend it because it lacks some basic functionality. WM's like Fluxbox are designed to be usable in isolation from all the other little things that make up a DE, Compiz isn't.
        • sancho, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1GNOME and KDE are desktop environments that come with a default Window Manger (in GNOME's case, the default Window Manager is Metacity.) You can replace Metacity with Compiz for the useless wobbly windows. Since Fluxbox is also a Window Manager, you really can't run Compiz and Fluxbox at the same time, in the same X session.
        • pooptaster, on 10/10/2007, -1/+0Yep, I run compiz with pypanel sometimes. Then I use xbindkeys to launch all the programs I need.
  • digitallysick, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2I wonder if this version allows you to change the desktop image without having to type manual commands in the terminal
    • GMorgan, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3Get a desktop tool that handles backgrounds and has a config GUI. Then add it to ~/.fluxbox/startup. Problem solved.
      • digitallysick, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1Nice, i figured they had something out that would do that, thanks, im going to try it
  • Sunnz, on 10/10/2007, -10/+1Who cares?
  • diecastbeatdown, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3HOT!!! best WM ever.
  • Krhis, on 10/10/2007, -0/+5Fluxbox is just nifty on a 27" monitor. It’s like "Hellloooo, screenspace!" :D
  • MaHaGoN, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3Congratulations to the Fluxbox team. Its been a long road up until now and everything looks real solid.
  • ps3udov3ctor, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2Fluxbox is the only wm I use and I love it. It's very fast and not bloated. Hopefully 1.0 will be the same.
  • RoboDonut, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2Fluxbox is what a GUI should be. It does what you need it to, and stays out of your way. No animations. No widgets. Just a lightweight program that manages your windows.
    • starvo, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1Exactly. For my simple junking around at home machine, this is the perfect WM. Just build the right menus, and everything simply pops up and is so very clean and usable. And the low system overhead certainly doesn't hurt wither.
  • stahlsau, on 10/10/2007, -1/+1great!
  • johnny222, on 10/10/2007, -7/+2wtf is fluxbox?
  • jsuther, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1Been using fluxbox for the last few years on gentoo. Love the minimalist WM. Was using Afterstep before that.
  • fluxion, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1first thing i do on any new install is switch to my beloved fluxbox and bring over all my keymappings from another machine. such a fast/solid/productive window manager.

    kudus to the fluxbox team for keeping up the good work.
  • psychick, on 10/10/2007, -1/+2Sorry to ask, but I'm new to this "Fluxbox" but can it run on Windows XP?
    • digitallysick, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1since your new i won't laugh, but nope, this runs on linux only. You can run it from a live cd without installing anything , http://fluxbuntu.org/?q=node/3
      right now its down while they upgrade to gutsy gibbon, you can download the iso, burn it to a cd, and then try it from the cd (no install needed)
    • pooptaster, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1There are, however *box-like wms that will run on windows. There is a blackbox for windows.
      http://www.bb4win.org/news.php
      It's not fluxbox but it's close enough; especially if you don't know what fluxbox is anyway.
  • Jack9, on 10/10/2007, -2/+1Try not to include creative backgrounds in the damn screenshots.

    Your WM cant show off without them???
    Oh yeah. without them, it's obvious that flux is a bunch of plugins I can get for gnome. Buried for being lame.
    • fluxion, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1plugins? for what? fluxbox is a light-weight minimalistic window manager meant to REPLACE a bloated environment like gnome. that's why people use it.

      there's no gnome plugin that makes all your ***** magically run as fast as fluxbox, as such, no...your analysis is wrong and any items you think are available as plugins are probably various apps other people were running ON TOP of fluxbox, because fluxbox literally does not give you any fancy features other than a very basic and fast window manager, and that's all any long-term fluxbox user wants from it, else they would've moved on to something shinier and prettier.
  • omnirusa, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1anything even remotely like this for windows? :(
  • swchen, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1Hmm, I hope the debian binary is updated...
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  •  

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