Blackbox vs. Openbox vs. fluxbox
 

I am very interested in trying blackbox,fluxbox, or openbox.I have read up on the features of each.

I was wondering which one linux users prefer and why.

Moved: This thread is more suitable in Linux - Software and has been moved accordingly to help your thread/question get the exposure it deserves.

i believe fluxbox is the most popular.

i've tried blackbox but found it didn't have the keyboard commands i like and bgset didn't work with my LFS distro. so went with windowmaker. just installed fluxbox but just haven't had time to set it up yet :( now openbox have to check it out. got a link :)

Fluxbox rocks your socks off!

I prefer Fluxbox, latest development release. If I were on a much older system (e.g. less than ~200mhz/64mb), I'd go with Fluxbox stable. Blackbox is just too limited to go back to it.

What about Waimea?

Never heard of it so it must suck. Haha...just kidding. Waimea doesn't nearly have the flexibility that fluxbox has.

I prefer Fluxbox which is under current and vast development. I use the CVS for my version, I update my version weekly.
But, the new dev of waimea are make vast changes and it is in current development I think? They started changes 3 months ago. They are using XML for menu and style configs. This may have some promise because it is on freedesktop.org

Walt

I'm currently using Openbox 3, a standards-compliant window manager. It's still young, but looks quite promising. It's config files are already in XML, and allows Emacs-style (chainable) keybindings. It looks pretty good as well. Anti-aliasing is on by default. If you're a keyboard-person like me, OB3 is a good choice, and it doesn't take much screen estate. Titlebar button (close, maximize, etc...) positions are also customizable. I also like its window snapping feature. One thing I'd like to see is transparency. But as I said, it's pretty young.

In the past I used Fluxbox stable, which is quite good. The tabs are a nifty feature but in the long run I didn't find them to be as effective as I thought they would be. I tried Fluxbox devel but found it not as responsive as I would like, even on my Athlon XP 1800+ box. I also had several window focus issues that, although minor, annoyed the hell out of me.

I haven't tried Blackbox.

I have used them all a lot, and for some time now I have been holding on to OpenBox. I am really fond of the easy XML config files and the simplicity of it all.

Oh, and believe me - it's quick. Really quick. Starts in a fraction of a second on my laptop (obligatory screenshot).


Håkan

Re: Blackbox vs. Openbox vs. fluxbox
 

I was in the same position some time ago, switching from KDE, and I've found that fluxbox fits all my needs very well. It's highly configurable and very fast. There is a wide range of styles available on www.freshmeat.net and you can configure every aspect of the window manager, and add custom keyboard commands.