Great to hear that someones still interested in using fvwm.
I'll try to summarize and describe my experiences with this wm. In the first place fvwm tries to stay as simple and minimalistic as possible, so most users are dissapointed when they install it and all they see is a blank screen. It works though, but you can configure to shape it to your needs :-). And it's very impressive how much it can fit to your work behaviour/habits. Here are some facts I figured out. I'll describe them below:
- no typical desktop
- no compositing
- expandable through modules (taskbar, buttons)
- create shortcuts (keyboard + mouse)
- (almost) everything is configurable
- main navigation with menus
- desktops & pages
- good documentation
1. no typical desktop
I was a little bit baffled as I saw that I could'nt drag files on my desktop. Fvwm use it to store running applications. So you can "minimize" an app and it stays on the desktop. This method is inherited from twm. Without configuration you can only see an icon and a text of the title of the application (as best as I can remember). Later you can display the content of the minimized window on the desktop. These minimized applications have all the same width and height.
I rarely use it, though it's good for stuff you don't need to see, but it has to stay open.
2. no compositing
Simple as I said. If you want compositing use xcompmgr.
I like this very much. There are no shades of my mouse or my windows and no fading of menus and so one. On Ubuntu (unity) you got something like a fading menu with flashy items where you can search some app-like store and your pc. Terrible.
3. expandable through modules (taskbar, buttons)
Really great. Best modules are the built in taskbar, where you can create a classic bar (just like in windows), the pager, where you can show your pages and desks and a button module, where you can draw your own buttons. I have to admit that I underestimated the FvwmButtons module. With this thing and some creativity you can create i.e. a dock where you can store applications or links. A place to show some info on selected files etc. (it's not just plain buttons).
You are also able to program your own modules in perl for example. (It's well documentated on the homepage.)
4. create shortcuts (keyboard + mouse)
Yes. You are able to bind actions to keys and mouse buttons. The best is it's window aware. That means you can bind CTRL-W to closing the window, when you focus the window as it. After that you could also bind CTRL-W for minimizing (iconifying) the window when the title bar is focused. I really like this behaviour and I got already about 10 shortcuts. 5 For window actions and another 5 for running applications.
5. (almost) everything is configurable
Almost. That's the keyword. Though I did not manage to spot anything that can't be configured. Here, another list:
- font (size, style)
- color of everything
- titlebar
- titlebuttons
- menus (behaviour, spacing, style)
- all margins/paddings
- window focus
- where windows open
- etc...
Another great thing is that the focus follow the mouse. So if you want to activate a window you just have to point to it. If you want to push it in the foreground you have to click it. That way it's very easy to write notes in a window but still stay on the main window in the front to continue your stuff. (Can also be switched off.)
6. main navigation with menus
In fvwm you navigate with menus. Just like in Windows you navigate over your start menu or on OS X you navigate mostly over your dock (or whatever it's called). So here you can create your own menus and bind them to buttons (taskbar startbutton, button on title bar), shortcuts (right click on desktop) or on other actions (submenus). These menus can display images, can be made transparent and also can take dynamic content like directories. Surely they can display simple entries like applications or shell commands.
7. desks and pages
Thats a common way of organizing your running programs. Multiple desktops!
Fvwm has two of them (kind of) you can expand you virtual desktop in 2 dimensions. Desks are vertical and pages are horizontal. Ah I forgot to mention that you can bind keys to switch pages and desks also.
I never dared to try fvwm with multiple monitors. The pager module isn't aware of it, says the maintainer of mvwm. He'll try to fix it.
8. good documentation
It's really good. Up to 99% what you want to do can be found
there.
As you can see fvwm is indeed very complex, but it makes fun to configure it. I never got pi**ed about something not working or wondering why it even works (or not). And that's the point what I like most in this wm. You know exactly how it works.
hth
