Quick question for those who know more of Debian than myself.

Is there a "default" or preferred Desktop Environment for Debian?

I've recently got Sarge installed from the new installer (except for it borking when it tried to install Grub, I told it to try Lilo, and everything's good) It seemed to go fine. I've got the 2.6 kernel, and all of my file systems are Reiser.

Before I spend too much time tweaking the desktop (I think both of the defaults of Gnome and KDE are unflattering) I was wondering if one was "better supported", more attuned to the "Debian way", or otherwise officially recommended as the default desktop environment.

Not trying to start a flame war or anything, but being new to Debian, I thought I would ask.

Thank for any advice or pointers to where I can find out.

someone247356

Debian is not primarily developed for desktop use, so it hasn't got any "official" or "default" X environment. It's all up to your personal preference. I personally don't use gnome or kde -- I prefer to use Window Maker.

When you use the new sarge installer and run tasksel to select the "desktop" group of packages, it automatically installs both Gnome and KDE I believe. So it seems that Debain is "officially" neutral.

The default install uses GDM, so that may mean more Gnome-centric, but that can easily be rectified with "apt-get install kdm".

On my desktop, Window-Maker all the way. It is a very good compromise between the bloated desktops like KDE, and the more minimal ie. Fluxbox, and is very easy to customise to how you just like it.

On an old Toshiba Tecra laptop I have just resurrected, I went for Fluxbox, and despite the lack of system resources, it works great.

Debian is all about choice

I like several - IceWM, Fluxbox, Window Maker, fvwm, etc. Currently I'm using IceWM. Though I never know when I'm going to switch

Nothing is written on stone.

I use icewm, fluxbox, and windowmaker, on my wife's old laptop: xfce4 (very impressive, light and fast), you can't go wrong with any of these. The bigger the desktop environment, the more complex, the more bugs, the more problems. If you check around the forums, you will find KDE and GNOME, are very slow and problematic. I follow the KISS protocol, Keep It Simple, Stupid.