Thread for ICEWM lovers (ICEWM tips)

amittp

I don't remember the number of times I have changed my desktop but always came back to icewm. Somehow it really doesn't come between the way, and it has feeling of completness to it. The most decent and "non-crashing" toolbar/taskbar I have ever seen. It supports Icons for quick launching. Super_L key that brings up menu, ppp0/eth0 and process monitoring devices set nicely by deafult. Now it also has a gaim tray.. wowie..

. Started this thread so that we can share tips to make it more loveable.
(btw i forgot to mention that it also has a decent application switcher menu/ whatever u call it.. its funny most window managers lack it)
Things I like to share are,
It lacked nice icons for the toolbar. Grab a copy from link below: and untar it in ~/.icewm/icons

http://themes.freshmeat.net/redir/iceicons/35147/url_tgz/iceicons-default-0.9.4.tar.gz

here is how ~/.icewm/toolbar looks

amittp · Posted: Sat Nov 29, 2003 2:08 pm Post subject:

has anyone trued icewmcp?
nice control panel program,
i cant make sound manager work though, anyone has ideas about it?
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amittp · Posted: Sun Dec 07, 2003 3:12 am Post subject:

seems no one uses ICEWM anymore

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charlieg · Posted: Sun Dec 07, 2003 7:15 am Post subject:

Haha evidently not! :twisted:

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choco · n00b Joined: 10 Jun 2003 Posts: 49 Location: Jackson, MI

I use IceWM, so there must be at least two of us! If someone's been maintaining the ebuilds, then there's probably someone else too...at least three of us then

.

Seriously, I know the feeling amittp describes. I try out other DE/WM, but I return to IceWM because it fits my concept of the ideal window manager. Puny resource use for its feature set. Themes but not an insane amount of unneeded theming. Keyboard control. Configuration by simple text file. I want a WM that performs the functions of a WM well, but then gets out of my way.

No need to ALT-TAB through a long list. Press the right windows key and then the first letter of the window to switch to. Watch it snap right there, no delay. Every window full sized. Do a left windows key plus spacebar, type in the program, and it launches.

I don't know about a Gaim tray icon built in, but anything can be given a tray icon by clicking 'Tray icon' in the window menu. This isn't all that useful unless it has a good icon assigned. I opt for a left-windows-key+letter keyboard shortcut to launch programs rather than icons in the bar. Just add entries to the 'keys' file. I haven't experimented with the sounds.

The most annoying thing about IceWM for me is having to restart it to make configuration changes take effect (but since the user doesn't need to stop X or log out, all programs stay open and unaffected by the restart). My current theme is the darxx theme from version 1.1 of the axxrom theme collection, from themes.freshmeat.net .
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amittp · Posted: Tue Dec 09, 2003 4:05 pm Post subject:

Phew .. finally a post. Good to see Icewm user; lol.
Well at the moment I just want to add two things to icewm...
1> A sound manager for events
2> Finding way to start gnome-apps like epiphany and nautilus fater..

any idea?
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garn · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 09 Sep 2003 Posts: 131

I use ice on my desktop but flux on my laptop.

in your ~/.icewm/winoptions

jago25_98 · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 23 Aug 2002 Posts: 143

IceWM can do something most other window managers can't:

- try setting F11 to `tile windows vertically`
- and ctrl+F11 to `tile windows horzontally`

- F12 to maximise / unmaximise window

- alt+c to close window
- alt+x to execute program bar
- alt+tab window cycle
- alt+arrow keys cycle desktops

With those shortcuts there's little need for a mouse.

hook · Posted: Sat Dec 13, 2003 12:24 am Post subject:

icewm is nice ...not my favourite, but nice ...i run it on an old celeron on our faculties PC - it's there to be a interenet/gimp/OOo point

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beandog · Posted: Sun Dec 14, 2003 5:12 pm Post subject:

Ah sweet, yet another thread to watch ... I'm an IceWM devotee too ... it's great, so much better than KDE and minus the bloat. Starts up super fast too, and does everything I want it too. It's the best DE I've ever used.

Coming from Windows, I got used to having a lot of my apps in the system tray. Thank goodness IceWM makes it easy. Here's a great way to stick XMMS where it belongs:

in your .icewm/winoptions file, add this:

amittp · Posted: Mon Dec 15, 2003 8:51 am Post subject:

I just wonder where will the ICEWM development go from here.
Everything seems to be in place, although it could do with themes with better fonts.
BTW, I didn't know about that run command.. umm and I used to associate grun with alt+f4

Btw, question still remains.. how to get sound for icewm events?
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jago25_98 · Tux's lil' helper Joined: 23 Aug 2002 Posts: 143

hmm, sounds... should be easy to add.

There's probably a dirty hack round this with config files...

beandog · Posted: Mon Dec 15, 2003 1:36 pm Post subject:

amittp · Posted: Fri Dec 19, 2003 12:47 am Post subject:

icesndcfg is not working for me.
Do we need to run esd or some other sound daemon before hand?
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beandog · Posted: Mon Dec 22, 2003 11:13 pm Post subject:

Actually, I'm not sure ... I never use sound events anyway.

What are you using for audio right now? I don't think it's really depdent on esound. I would figure it uses whatever sound system you've got set.

Personally, I'm using OSS. Works great for me.

If you are using esound though, make sure the daemon is started on boot: rc-update add esound default
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Dracnor · Guru Joined: 08 Jun 2003 Posts: 397 Location: Pennsylvania

beandog · Posted: Sat Jan 10, 2004 4:20 pm Post subject:

Not really a tip, but related -- has anyone found another place for a bunch of IceWM icons other than the one on freshmeat?

I really can't stand searching for icons ... Maybe we should work on getting a bonus package created or something.
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amittp · Posted: Wed Jan 14, 2004 1:28 pm Post subject:

oh you mean special icewm-icon packages? wish I had some graphic skills ..!
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beandog · Posted: Wed Jan 14, 2004 2:34 pm Post subject:

No, I just mean adding to it some icons from gone / kde / other packages that aren't in there. Personally, I hate hunting for icons.

locate application | grep xpm
locate application | grep png
locate application | grep gif

etc.

Then I check to see if the rpm has one that comes with it. It's a tedious process.
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Hackeron · Guru Joined: 01 Nov 2002 Posts: 306

beandog · Posted: Tue Jan 27, 2004 9:14 am Post subject:

I think you have to edit ~/.icewm/keys

It's a lot easier using the Keys Editor in icecc though.

emerge icewm-tools
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Chewi · Posted: Tue Feb 03, 2004 10:42 am Post subject:

I usually use XFCE but I'm having to use IceWM for my little Toshiba Libretto 70CT (Pentium 120 MMX, 32MB...) and I'm even having to run it through freedesktop.org's X server because XFree86 was waaay too slow. I can't say I like it as much as XFCE but I haven't had much of a chance to get to know it yet so there's still time. Questions.

Can you tell IceWM to use a terminal other than xterm? freedesktop.org actually doesn't have xterm so I guess I could just symlink to Eterm but I'm just curious to know if there's another way to do it.

I turned on TaskbarDoubleHeight to give me the command line thing but it looks a bit silly. I was expecting it to appear below the regular taskbar. Can you change that?

braindead0 · Posted: Fri Feb 06, 2004 11:31 am Post subject:

I just started using IcwWM on my laptop under a VMWare session (needs Windoze for work)... Harkens back to the good old days, I don't remember the last time I had to edit menu config files ;-)

. Or use mmaker for that matter.

Anybody have any problems when logging out? If I <ctrl><alt><backspace> i get a shell with "icewm-session: <pid>" over and over and over and over. If I use the menu logout I don't...odd..

kinda a hassle <alt>Fx into a new shell and killing it...

Chewi · Posted: Fri Feb 06, 2004 11:48 am Post subject:

I've got a similar but different problem. It doesn't seem to like freedesktop.org when it comes to logging out. IceWM shuts down but I just get brought back to a blank X screen. I have a solution for you though! The preferences file allows you to specify the command used to logout. Heh gotta admit, I was very impressed by that. I've used killall Xvesa. You'd use something different but I'll let you figure that out.

Oh wait sorry, that's only if you kill it directly. Hmmm guess that wouldn't work then. Oh well. Errm oh I know what you could do! Put killall icewm-session at the end of your .xinit or /etc/X11/Sessions/icewm file.

braindead0 · Posted: Fri Feb 06, 2004 12:25 pm Post subject: