I have a computer that I'm currently using to run a VM for the house that controls MySQL, nfs, and DNS. So it's headless 90% of the time; I'm usually going to SSH in to do anything.

But there are cases where using the GUI is easier than commandline. For example, exiting the VM's settings via Virt-Manager. Currently, the host is running KDE 5 as it used to be the guest computer before I pressed it into this new service. That's clearly wasting lots of RAM without reason.

So I'm thinking of changing to FluxBox or OpenBox. But am I still going to be connecting to the network/bridging without the KDE Network Manager GUI loading? Last time I used any of the *box distros was before NM was a big thing, so I'm not sure how it'll work.

Thanks!

So, on my laptop I already had Fluxbox installed and then installed Openbox. When I log into Flubox I'm left without internet. But with Openbox I get connected to the Wifi. Ideas?

What are you using for networking? networkmanager, wicd, interfaces file (pretty sure this isn't it since it wouldn't have the issue you describe), other? I'm assuming since you mention nm you're using that, but that's the first thing. Find out what you're using.

If you are using nm, and you wish to continue using it, then you could install the gnome applet and use it, or the nmcli I think it's called.

Or, if you don't need to connect to multiple networks that's not going to be carried around, just get rid of all the fancy-smancy network management and configure your network with dhcp via whatever file/files control your card (/etc/network/interfaces in debian), then not worry about what WM/DE you have because networking will be handled automatically before X even starts (this of course assumes you also use a cable, not wifi, although you can do the same for wifi with just a few extra steps as long as you have no need to be able to add networks regularly).

I'm using nm - at this point I'm just curious why it worked with Openbox and not Fluxbox? For the desktop that originated the question, I could probably do the interfaces thing, but I think Fedora will overwrite that the first time nm ever appears again - say if I went back to KDE for a day for something.

Not if you get rid of NM. I use KDE on all my systems, but only the Mageia installation uses nm.