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Back in the day, I used to distro hop, window manager hop and try to find the ever eluding "perfect" setup. This lasted maybe 15 years. There was a sense of va

Back in the day, I used to distro hop, window manager hop and try to find the ever eluding "perfect" setup. This lasted maybe 15 years. There was a sense of vanity in trying to be different yet spectacular. Today I would tell my younger self that use what makes you productive. Even if it is the standard Windows or Mac OS environments. R/unixporn is the nerds equivalent of shirtless beach dudes.

necrotic_comp 6y ago
I agree with this. I'd been struggling with using Xmonad et. al. on the desktop for years, figuring that there was something wrong with how I was doing it, hacking on the config to get it just right. Then the pandemic happened, and I had to work from home. So I went to ICEWM, have my terminal with Tmux in the center screen and my web browsers on my left and right monitors and that's good enough for me to be productive and get my job done. So yeah, the perfect setup is not the one that's the coolest, it's the one that lets you get things done efficiently. Unfortunately for me, tiling window managers don't seem to do that.
- joombaga 6y ago
  > So yeah, the perfect setup is not the one that's the coolest, it's the one that lets you get things done efficiently. My ADD makes these the same. Having a cool desktop setup is the only way I can stay interested enough to get any work done.
- onli 6y ago
  To be fair, IceWM is pretty cool. No, really. It's the center of my custom linux desktop. You can run a similar setup like described in the article with it, it replaces dwm just fine. Its preferences and winoptions are powerful enough.
  - necrotic_comp 6y ago
    oh! That's good to know. I just plopped it in there because I needed to get work done, and the start menu/desktop metaphor was enough to get me moving. I haven't even changed the defaults.
    - onli 6y ago
      I think my very first FOSS project was a config program for icewm, written in bash and with xdialog. https://sourceforge.net/projects/ice-prefer/ https://sourceforge.net/projects/ice-prefer/. Horrible code of course (edit: Looking at it - not as horrible as I expected). But they might even still work, though I didn't use them in ages. ice-prefer for the settings, ice-win for the winoptions. Turns out that once my desktop was configured I didn't have much need for them. That was of course way before the current icewm fork that has a preferences menu in the start menu. The winoptions I still recommend looking into, especially pinning apps to one workspace is very useful. That's not too far into the "configure everything" category. The concept of ice-win (clicking on a window, then having all options visible and configurable) would still be useful for that.
j4yav 6y ago
I found a pretty perfect setup with i3 and Xfce which is minimal but not too minimal, and perfect for my tastes. It took some hopping around to find it but now I have my dotfiles all checked in and I can get a fresh machine configured in literally under 3 minutes. Once up, Xfce and i3 stay out of my way and I can just get to work.
tarruda 6y ago
I also used to distro hop for many years, and ended up settling on Debian a few years ago. I don't consider Debian to be the "best distro" (some distros like NixOS seem much more elegant), but I find it to be very stable during the 2 years where a major release is supported, and that leaves me more time to being productive on things that interest me more. Still, distro hopping and spending endless hours customizing and searching for the "perfect" setup can be a good hobbie.
macspoofing 6y ago
>R/unixporn is the nerds equivalent of shirtless beach dudes. r/unixporn is a subreddit for sharing your desktop wallpaper.
ozim 6y ago
When I was a studying I also thought there is value in "finding perfect setup". That I will find that one job and I will be able to master one thing and one setup. Then workplace reality came in... One year I have to use MacBook other Windows then mix up project with a lot of linuxy stuff. One thing I learned well is to learn quick and get accustomed to different interface, different keyboard, different language. Maybe I am not writing above 80WPM but give me any keyboard and in 15-30 mins I am going to be comfortable with it. The same with cars, get in, first 10-15 minutes of driving and after that I use important controls intuitively. I don't see value in mastering specific make of a car, it is just a tool.
blauditore 6y ago
My problem is that I was pretty productive with Ubuntu + Unity, significantly more than with Windows or MacOS, or other Linux DEs. This was great because Unity was the default DE for one of the most common Linux distros, so it was well-supported and easy to find information about tweaks and settings online. But then it got killed off due to a vocal minority constantly complaining about it, and now I'm trying to find an alternative that uses similar UI principles but nothing actually seems to get it right. For example, I often hear people (computer power users) praise OS X. When I see them use it, they're mostly operating it in a "casual" point-and-click fashion like the average casual user. What made the difference for me in Ubuntu/Unity were power user features, like extensive keyboard navigation, or dragging/resizing a window with the middle/right mouse button while holding Alt, or searching the window menu simply by pressing Alt.
- ognarb 6y ago
  Disclaimer: KDE dev Did you try Plasma? You can drag a window while holding the Win key, there are tons of keyboard navigation, and your last point can be achieved by this extension: https://github.com/Zren/plasma-hud https://github.com/Zren/plasma-hud. There is even some global themes with the look of Unity.
  - Avamander 6y ago
    I'm not the person you replied to, but yes, KDE seems to be the closest equivalent. However I still miss a nicely working global menu.
    - heavyset_go 6y ago
      There are several global menu options for Plasma, some of which I think are better than the global menu on macOS.
  - blauditore 6y ago
    I tried KDE for a while a few years back and found its look quite pleasant. A problem for me was the often different paradigms from more common environments, e.g. that single-clicking a file in Dolphin opens it (as opposed to just selecting it). Another thing I remember was that just hitting the Meta/Win key did not open the launcher menu. Perhaps my expectations are a bit special since I often switch between Windows and Linux, so well-aligned usage patterns help me. FWIW, the drag while holding a key is actually quite common in Linux DEs, I just miss it in the Big Two.
enriquto 6y ago
> R/unixporn is the nerds equivalent of shirtless beach dudes. Wait, what kind of savage goes to the beach in a shirt?
- carapace 6y ago
  For some of us it's just a public service. If I go to the beach on a sunny day and take my shirt off the glare from my belly could blind people. In low-flying planes. Disrupt migratory patterns of seafowl. Interfere with satellites, etc...
  - LargoLasskhyfv 6y ago
    Consider using dark sunscreen in non-dazzling patterns, you lethal weapon! :) /me giggles
t0astbread 6y ago
I agree, if you're trying to get something to be productive you should go with whatever gives you a good environment out of the box. But it sounds to me like 15 years ago (or whenever that was) you didn't really care about productivity but rather you just wanted to tinker with stuff for the sake of tinkering with stuff. And I think that's also valuable - there's a lot to be learned about how things work.
DyslexicAtheist 6y ago
why not just version with git in a dotfiles directory that can be provisioned with 2-3 commands? automating this is really no overhead. (unless you change your color scheme every 2 days?).
LargoLasskhyfv 6y ago
What's wrong with being shirtless on the beach? I always thought that's what they are for?

necrotic_comp 6y ago

I agree with this. I'd been struggling with using Xmonad et. al. on the desktop for years, figuring that there was something wrong with how I was doing it, hacking on the config to get it just right. Then the pandemic happened, and I had to work from home. So I went to ICEWM, have my terminal with Tmux in the center screen and my web browsers on my left and right monitors and that's good enough for me to be productive and get my job done. So yeah, the perfect setup is not the one that's the coolest, it's the one that lets you get things done efficiently. Unfortunately for me, tiling window managers don't seem to do that.

joombaga 6y ago
> So yeah, the perfect setup is not the one that's the coolest, it's the one that lets you get things done efficiently. My ADD makes these the same. Having a cool desktop setup is the only way I can stay interested enough to get any work done.
onli 6y ago
To be fair, IceWM is pretty cool. No, really. It's the center of my custom linux desktop. You can run a similar setup like described in the article with it, it replaces dwm just fine. Its preferences and winoptions are powerful enough.
- necrotic_comp 6y ago
  oh! That's good to know. I just plopped it in there because I needed to get work done, and the start menu/desktop metaphor was enough to get me moving. I haven't even changed the defaults.
  - onli 6y ago
    I think my very first FOSS project was a config program for icewm, written in bash and with xdialog. https://sourceforge.net/projects/ice-prefer/ https://sourceforge.net/projects/ice-prefer/. Horrible code of course (edit: Looking at it - not as horrible as I expected). But they might even still work, though I didn't use them in ages. ice-prefer for the settings, ice-win for the winoptions. Turns out that once my desktop was configured I didn't have much need for them. That was of course way before the current icewm fork that has a preferences menu in the start menu. The winoptions I still recommend looking into, especially pinning apps to one workspace is very useful. That's not too far into the "configure everything" category. The concept of ice-win (clicking on a window, then having all options visible and configurable) would still be useful for that.

j4yav 6y ago

I found a pretty perfect setup with i3 and Xfce which is minimal but not too minimal, and perfect for my tastes. It took some hopping around to find it but now I have my dotfiles all checked in and I can get a fresh machine configured in literally under 3 minutes. Once up, Xfce and i3 stay out of my way and I can just get to work.

tarruda 6y ago

I also used to distro hop for many years, and ended up settling on Debian a few years ago. I don't consider Debian to be the "best distro" (some distros like NixOS seem much more elegant), but I find it to be very stable during the 2 years where a major release is supported, and that leaves me more time to being productive on things that interest me more. Still, distro hopping and spending endless hours customizing and searching for the "perfect" setup can be a good hobbie.

macspoofing 6y ago

>R/unixporn is the nerds equivalent of shirtless beach dudes. r/unixporn is a subreddit for sharing your desktop wallpaper.

ozim 6y ago

When I was a studying I also thought there is value in "finding perfect setup". That I will find that one job and I will be able to master one thing and one setup. Then workplace reality came in... One year I have to use MacBook other Windows then mix up project with a lot of linuxy stuff. One thing I learned well is to learn quick and get accustomed to different interface, different keyboard, different language. Maybe I am not writing above 80WPM but give me any keyboard and in 15-30 mins I am going to be comfortable with it. The same with cars, get in, first 10-15 minutes of driving and after that I use important controls intuitively. I don't see value in mastering specific make of a car, it is just a tool.

blauditore 6y ago

My problem is that I was pretty productive with Ubuntu + Unity, significantly more than with Windows or MacOS, or other Linux DEs. This was great because Unity was the default DE for one of the most common Linux distros, so it was well-supported and easy to find information about tweaks and settings online. But then it got killed off due to a vocal minority constantly complaining about it, and now I'm trying to find an alternative that uses similar UI principles but nothing actually seems to get it right. For example, I often hear people (computer power users) praise OS X. When I see them use it, they're mostly operating it in a "casual" point-and-click fashion like the average casual user. What made the difference for me in Ubuntu/Unity were power user features, like extensive keyboard navigation, or dragging/resizing a window with the middle/right mouse button while holding Alt, or searching the window menu simply by pressing Alt.

ognarb 6y ago
Disclaimer: KDE dev Did you try Plasma? You can drag a window while holding the Win key, there are tons of keyboard navigation, and your last point can be achieved by this extension: https://github.com/Zren/plasma-hud https://github.com/Zren/plasma-hud. There is even some global themes with the look of Unity.
- Avamander 6y ago
  I'm not the person you replied to, but yes, KDE seems to be the closest equivalent. However I still miss a nicely working global menu.
  - heavyset_go 6y ago
    There are several global menu options for Plasma, some of which I think are better than the global menu on macOS.
- blauditore 6y ago
  I tried KDE for a while a few years back and found its look quite pleasant. A problem for me was the often different paradigms from more common environments, e.g. that single-clicking a file in Dolphin opens it (as opposed to just selecting it). Another thing I remember was that just hitting the Meta/Win key did not open the launcher menu. Perhaps my expectations are a bit special since I often switch between Windows and Linux, so well-aligned usage patterns help me. FWIW, the drag while holding a key is actually quite common in Linux DEs, I just miss it in the Big Two.

enriquto 6y ago

> R/unixporn is the nerds equivalent of shirtless beach dudes. Wait, what kind of savage goes to the beach in a shirt?

carapace 6y ago
For some of us it's just a public service. If I go to the beach on a sunny day and take my shirt off the glare from my belly could blind people. In low-flying planes. Disrupt migratory patterns of seafowl. Interfere with satellites, etc...
- LargoLasskhyfv 6y ago
  Consider using dark sunscreen in non-dazzling patterns, you lethal weapon! :) /me giggles

t0astbread 6y ago

I agree, if you're trying to get something to be productive you should go with whatever gives you a good environment out of the box. But it sounds to me like 15 years ago (or whenever that was) you didn't really care about productivity but rather you just wanted to tinker with stuff for the sake of tinkering with stuff. And I think that's also valuable - there's a lot to be learned about how things work.

DyslexicAtheist 6y ago

why not just version with git in a dotfiles directory that can be provisioned with 2-3 commands? automating this is really no overhead. (unless you change your color scheme every 2 days?).

LargoLasskhyfv 6y ago

What's wrong with being shirtless on the beach? I always thought that's what they are for?