In the best tradition of "KISS". You have a choice of "Home" - "Year" - "Tech"
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Here is a list of my computers
My main work-station is a 2007 Dell
I was given this PC as it was considered to old and obsolete over 10 years ago. I removed the fancy graphic card Radeon HD 2600XT as it required non-free blobs. TBH I'm not sure if that's still the case. All I can say is it's still running fine. Certainly fast enough and no issues with video though I avoid H265 where I can
System:
Kernel: 5.15.161 arch: x86_64 bits
Desktop: catwm
Distro: Slackware 15.0
Machine: Dell Inspiron 530
CPU:dual core model: Intel Core2 Duo E6550 bits: 64
Memory: total: 3 GiB
My main Laptop is a 2012 MacBookPro
I have a love hate relationship with it. I love it was free. But hate how locked down it is and wouldn't ever buy an "Apple". Everything about it is hard work by design unless you install MacOS and I'd rather use a pen and paper and the MBP as the paper weight.
The specs are good as far as I'm concerned. It's easily the highest spec computer I own.
Spec below but 8GB ram and i7-cpu it has the dodgy dual gpu board which means that the external display isn't working
System:Kernel: 5.15.161 arch: x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: gcc v: 2.37-slack15
Desktop: catwm vt: 1 dm: startx
Distro: Slackware 15.0
Machine:Type: Laptop System: Apple product: MacBookPro8,2 date: 01/24/12
Battery:ID-1: BAT0 charge: 69.9 Wh (96.4%) condition: 72.5/75.2 Wh (96.4%)
CPU:Info: quad core model: Intel Core i7-2720QM
Graphics:Device-1: Intel 2nd Generation Core Processor Family Integrated Graphics
Monitor-1: LVDS-1 model: Apple Color LCD res: 1440x900 hz: 60 dpi: 111
Memory: total: 8 GiB
I like window managers. I like light weight and effecient window managers. catwm is very light, very efficent and very easy to use. Using it has made me think more about how I can do more by doing less
Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away. ― Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
I chose catwm after reading the thread in the arch forum. I realised that a chunk of the code was actually GPL'd quite early on (20100630 was the earliest reference I came across) after moetunes and milomouse hacked on it. moetunes then went on the make dminiwm (basically a very close catwm fork) and snapwm a much more feature rich version.Though he reverted to a lax license.
There were a lot of derivatives built from catwm. monsterwm frankenwm etc that have since lost momentum. Mostly as ricers seem to have moved to sucklesses dwm. dwm and dmenu are not my thing though I did like how wmii functioned ootb.
The moetunes gpl'd fork was kept alive here:
viyoriya's fork is the version I compiled from. There are only 2 issues I'd call bugs I've come across in catwm. 1:the odd ghost window which I noticed moetunes fixed in dminiwm. 2:A bit of a chore getting the window size correct with dual screens. To be honest I wouldn't recomend it if you want to run dual screens. It's just not what it's built for. NotionWM is great for that and that's what I switch to if I need the output to another screen or projector.
There was a bug noted somewhere about disabling cycling anti-clockwise but I found a fix in the arch thread and it's been fine cycling both cycling both clockwise and anti-clockwise for me. That said as I rarely have more than two windows open on a workspace I just cycle clockwise, one less keybind to recall.
Niggles: Not having dbus means that normal notifiers that expect it won't work. A workspace number notifier would be nice. I know the solution is possible with mkfifo but I failed to make it work with herbe. I tend to know whats where and if I do open something on an occupied workspace I just tab it through until it maximizes, in short I gave up and learnt a better system until I didn't need it. That system I call "The bedroom" as opposed to the "Desktop". In short I put things where they're meant to go just like in the bedroom. Socks in the sock draw, coats in the wardrobe, baffies (slippers) under the bed or on my feet etc. I don't have draws or wardrobes on my PCs but I do have workspaces
After over 2 years of catwm being my main window manager I can up-date on what "That system is" I have all GUI (Graphical User Interface) applications from workspace 1 up and terminal application from workspace 0 down. The only hard and fast rule I have is file managers on workspace 1 and browsers on workspace 2. the rest get filled as I use them. intermediat windows are opened where ever I am and either closed after using them or sent down the stack or sent to the appropreate workspace
Gone on the desktop is fittstool and herbe. I do keep it on the laptop but really it's only for a bit of bling.
fittstool only works at the top of the screen in the panel area as the open windows covers the activation area. It's a minor inconvenence as I just put my top 15 or so most commonly required action at the top and if I'm going to launch something it usually goes on an empty workspace where it's not an issue anyway. iirc dminiwm fixes this. Interesingly enough xdotool works fine as a fittstool replacement in this regard but it expects some things that don't exist in catwm.
Update. As I've become more keyboard driven I am finding I only have fittstool on my laptop. It really is an exelent tool but I don't use it at all on my Desktop and like wallpaper find I use it for a bit of bling
catwm is not and does not try to be fully EWMH or freedesktop complient.
herbe intigration can be buggy. I don't require it but it's usefull while learning new setting and I have to admit the "bling" is fun. I've been using fittstool for years and it's very solid and I know what's in the hotspots. I'm not a fast typer and it's as quick for me to mouse-down in the top right corner to launch pinix to access my system info than try and recal a keybind.
mc (and hence mcedit), xterm, pinit, htop, wavmon, weather (wttr), ncdu, xtrlock, zzz, can all setup in fittstool should it be desired and it's very light
In short I have a good .bashrc with well configured aliases and see no need for a panel.
My main keybinds are:
There are more but I never/rarely use them. I did configure alt+letter (a to z) as application launchers but found I didn't use it so disabled it.
I'm no geek so no coder but I love window managers and hate bloat and I've tried around 40. I have a very nice twm setup but it's needs set up for each and every machine to display correctly also it can be a bit prone to an odd freeze. I very much doubt many are smaller and as usable as window managers as catwm ootb.
At the end of the day I'm a copy-left freetard. I accept that I have to use open-source but prefer free-software so start from that position, copy-left > lax > permissive. I try and stay in the copy-left & lax zones. It's my main worry about Hyperbola moving to Hyperbola-BSD.
Catwm video
Catwm video no panel
Page update 2020509
I like dillo. But dillo.org has been squatted. Bastards.
As of December 2023, the host dillo.org is no longer under control of Dillo developers.
One of the best thing about dillo is no friggin java script. The next best thing is it's html checker or bug meter
. Bottom right of the window lists all the web-page errors.
Well this is ment to be preformated text we'll see if it keeps it's formating should be 3 lines... it works \o/ says the celebrating drowning man
mc (Midnight commander) also includes the mcedit editor. xterm, pinit, htop, wavmon, weather (wttr), ncdu, xtrlock, zzz, can all setup in fittstool should it be desired and it's very light
I use Firefox as one of my "Big" browsers
There are a lot of things I dislike about the direction firefox is going but it's still miles better than running Googles spyware offering. I use the LTR or stable release. The first thig I do is disable pockets and remove everything that displays on the home page. Then I set a master password, and all cookies to be cleared on close. I set startpage as the default search engine though swap between it and duckduckgo I also have my home page in firefox go to disroot search page which uses an instance of searx an indipendent search engine scraper
Here is a quote from GNU's website
What is GNU?
GNU is an operating system that is free software—that is, it respects users' freedom. The GNU operating system consists of GNU packages (programs specifically released by the GNU Project) as well as free software released by third parties. The development of GNU made it possible to use a computer without software that would trample your freedom.
The four essential freedoms
A program is free software if the program's users have the four essential freedoms: [1] The freedom to run the program as you wish, for any purpose (freedom 0). The freedom to study how the program works, and change it so it does your computing as you wish (freedom 1). Access to the source code is a precondition for this. The freedom to redistribute copies so you can help others (freedom 2). The freedom to distribute copies of your modified versions to others (freedom 3). By doing this you can give the whole community a chance to benefit from your changes. Access to the source code is a precondition for this.
In short free and with liberty. The freedom to make choices and not be controled by third parties like Google, microsoft, Apple and the like
I love how GNU thanks to Richard Stallman used copy-right to protect copy-left. In short "You can have this software for free for any purpose" but if you release the code your modifications must also be shared under the same copy-left licence.
Most people take the easy road, no matter where it leads. We see this with the environment. Everyone is so protective of their children but seem quite happy to be slowly killing them by sysamatically distroying the very thing that gives them life. Bonkers by any logic. There is a sort of calmness a kind of spirituality in running ethical software and not worrying about converting the masses. The year of the Linux desktop
and the like only lets the hoards of poluters in to piss in the water. Those that want a Floss experiance will find a way
Words can be like X-rays, if you use them properly—they’ll go through anything. You read and you’re pierced.
—Aldous Huxley, Brave New World
hyperbola is an indipendent distro that has a hardline on non-free software and hardware. Maintaining user freedom is key aspect of running Hyperbola-gnu/linux/BSD. I like their approach, where if it's slaveware or user subjigating software it get's removed.
This page is my thoughts and experiances of using Slackware. I'll try not to duplicate links here and add most external links on the home page under Slackware
I've been using Slackware for several years now or the liberated version with all non-free software stripped out free-nix . Slackware is the oldest and probably the most Unix like of all the Gnu/Linux distros. It's conservative and pragmatic, easy to use and very solid. I'd say much more so than Debian which I used for 12 years until they switched to systemd.
Slackware is very community lead rather than corporate lead and a great way to see that in action is following the "current threads" on the linux-questions forum. Slackware current is the development version rather like "Debian sid". It seems more stable than "Sid". Possibly because Slackware has a smaller set of packages that make up the distro.
distrowatch slackware pageCarl Svensson, I'm a computer nerd and this is a place for collecting my creative output and forcing it onto the world.
Here is a quote from seamonkey project:
About SeaMonkey "The SeaMonkey project is a community effort to develop the SeaMonkey all-in-one internet application suite. Such a software suite was previously made popular by Netscape and Mozilla, and the SeaMonkey project continues to develop and deliver high-quality updates as well as new features and improvements to this concept. Containing an Internet browser, email & newsgroup client, HTML editor, IRC chat and web development tools, SeaMonkey is sure to appeal to advanced users, web developers and corporate users. SeaMonkey is built on the open source Mozilla Gecko engine, the same code which underlies the highly successful Thunderbird and is the base for the Firefox browser. SeaMonkey benefits from the cross-fertilization with these other projects, by gaining (and contributing) new features and the ongoing security updates which are a modern necessity. The SeaMonkey Association provides legal backing for the SeaMonkey Project."
I really like Seamonkey. Lighter, more features like the editor, mail, irc, calendar and feed support. Where it struggles is poor sites only working with either Firefox and Google chrome. It's highly extendable via xpi addons. ublock origin, and the "little monkey" theme being the main ones I add. You might need to change the seamonkey version on little monkey.
you can either unpack and edit the xpi or use addon converter
to edit it for later versions of Seamonkey
Ublock origin the one addon you really need if you're using a modern browser with javascript turned on
Especially during covid I had to do my NHS appointments on line. I couldn't use seamonkey without this addom. It's a toolbar button for SeaMonkey to override the missing WebRTC permissions dialog and allow media capture automatically. Please read the site for info on this plugin as it must not be left on when not being used unless you want to give someone access to your webcam and mic!
Cookie exterminator. Lets you set up some rules for cookies. It can accept them and then delete them once you're in the site. You can also white list.
I like light weight window managers. I've tried over 40! I currently use catwm with ocassional dallies back in to Notionwm and blackbox. Icewm is very good but I've moved on and now appreciate simpler systems as my work flow has improved. If I was on a sinking ship and had to choose one to save for my life on a desert island it would be Notionwm
Icewm is a fantastic window manager that cam be very litght on resorces if setup correctly
Blackbox is a very old and stable window manager with very good mouse support. In fact it's one of my go-to WM's if I whant a change from typing!
Very easy to setup and simple text file configeration. The man page basically tell it all man blackbox in any terminal and you should be good to go
Notionwm is a very good manual tiling window manager
NotionWMIt is the best Out-off-the-box (ootb) experiance I've ever had with a window manager. I had to change one keybind to stop it "clobbering" MC (midnight commander) and one for Xterm. Then I changed the theme. Not really neccesary but that was it.
It supports multple desktops but I can use it with one 95% of the time.
notion is highly configurable via the lua programming language if you want more features. I never needed them.
notion is a fork, call Notion (Not-ion), after the original developer put a nameing clause in the source code say noy to use ion as the name
Notion is a rewrite of ion one othe the first tiling window managers. A tabbed tilling window manager ion
Anything that entraps the user. Mostly it refers to propriaty software and software systems the control what the user can do.
Anything is possible when you don't know what your talking about