Just FTR, although I don't use Mate I do sometimes check out Xfce and Fluxbox (both installed by default in Full Slackware install) but they don't use substantially less resources than Slackware's default setup with KDE. If you deny auto load of any services you find you don't need (easy with KDE System Settings) it is pretty easy to match even Fluxbox. Fluxbox does feel somewhat snappier for me because I enable compositing on KDE and Fluxbox is a Window Manager (w/o compositing) while KDE is a full Desktop Environment.

TLDR You are not likely to have performance problems with KDE but you can always just choose Xfce or Fluxbox by default.

Welcome to Slackware! You're in for a treat.

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@ enorbet: Thanks !

I am still trying to learn to "think Slackware"- I am not used to distros that offer me immediate and constant access to a wide range of GUIs without much post-installation work. I can just test them. Had not occurred to me - probably on some unconscious assumption it would be cumbersome.

I am starting tomorrow with the full install. Read and watched videos on packages under this week-end .

Will wait a while before marking this as solved if it is OK -(i.e if I don't get any tips to mark it now)

You're welcome and yes, Slackware does install by default several WM/DEs. I suggest keeping the default boot to Runlevel 3 (Multi-User Command Line) at least for starters where you can login however you like but I like to login first as Root because I use Runlevel 3 for deeplevel work where I don't want to "bang heads" with X. Many just issue a command like "startkde" "startxfce4" or if they've settled on a main one with "xwmconfig", just login as User and run "startx". I prefer running "sddm" for 2 reasons 1) it's easy to back out if for any reason graphics acts funny, and 2) sddm brings up a login/chooser where you can choose which WM/DE you want to try this time and login as User from there.

I'd also suggest enjoying the utter lack of need for many packages not included by default. A lot of people trying, especially just thinking about trying, Slackware assume dependencies are going to be painful and time-consumimg. Simply put, they are not. You may even get bored with how little maintenance is required.

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I have Slackware current running since June 19, with that day's version.

Haven´t done anything other than reading and trying to organize all the information I have gathered in some coherent, sequential way that I can use as a guide to all that must be done.

At this point I have a question: If i succeed in installing the daw_base package will I be exempted from following the instructions in https://alien.slackbook.org/blog/con...-use-as-a-daw/ ?

I get the impression, from https://slackware.nl/people/alien/sl...ild/README.1st that that is true, at least in part.

Exempted? Not quite in that "Yes, your DAW will still work" but "No, it could perform better". For example, using a stock Slackware kernel will not prevent any DAW from working at all, but there will be higher latency than with a custom built low-latency kernel. You can do what you like but if you do a lot of audio recording/editing you will like it better if you optimize.

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You might have found out already, but yes,Mate works fine on -current and has been my DE for the last five years.
You'll find the "Mate for Slackware" repo at slackware.uk/msb

Kudos to Willy SR for keeping the msb files up to date.

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I have finally managed to install Slackware current, then add AlienBob's Daw base package, and compile several o the programs I wanted. Some I could not compile and then installed from binaries.

I am using audacity, rosegarden, musescore, pianoteQ, QSynth and I am now looking forwards to dedicate less time to installing software and more time to studying music.

I guess that now that I have found Slackware I will also spend less time experimenting distros.

Thanks for all help and support.

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Welcome! There's lots of clever people here, and a few of us do audio stuff. Alien Bob's got a great tutorial on how to set up Slackware for realtime audio and setting up jack. (I wish I had it back when I was learning!) If you're already using his DAW offshoot, I don't think you'd need it? It's still good documentation. (Also, I know I bag on Arch Linux all the time, but their documentation is solid.)

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Thanks !
I have gone through Alien Bob's tutorial, but there is still too much for me to learn before I can follow it in a meaningful way. But I hope I am on my way and that sometime I will be able to to configure DAW myself and maybe even compile my own kernel. I did it a couple times when I was trying Gentoo, on a mac G3, 256 MB, but they never worked.

I will soon come back to this forum with a new thread on updating Slackware-current.

Hello again fredmyra

You may find this useful https://blog.paranoidpenguin.net/201...ackware-linux/

This is a bit dated (2.6x kernels) but has some valuable guidance regarding timing and latency kernel options to look for. https://docs.slackware.com/howtos:sl...kernelbuilding

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