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My macbook died recently and I switched back to ubuntu for the week, first thing I did was install xmonad, its a really awesome environment to work within. I d

My macbook died recently and I switched back to ubuntu for the week, first thing I did was install xmonad, its a really awesome environment to work within. I do wish it played nicer with other window environment, some applications just dont work inside a modal interface and when they dont I just want my normal windows with title bar and buttons back I havent installed it on my mac now its repaired, the fact I dont be able to use my normal mac apps kinda put me off, but I may give it another shot, if there was a way to have xmonad like behaviour with mac applications while preserving floating windows I would be in heaven (divvy etc most certainly do not count) Its probably worth mentioning that despite following several tutorials, getting xmonad installed on 11.04 was a nightmare that left plain ubuntu pretty broken, I would like to see that process improved as well

pyre 15y ago
> just want my normal windows with title bar and > buttons back There are contrib packages that allow you to add small title bars to the windows. You could configure XMonad with a 'floating' workspace, and enable title bars on all of the windows in that workspace. Then just setup rules to automatically send all of the programs that have issues to that workspace.
- phillmv 15y ago
  I love how a "customizable tiling window manager" somehow requires the user to learn an unusual programming language and a dozen of inscrutable keyboard shortcuts. It made my 24inch screen at the time far more manageable but it was supremely frustrating if I sometimes wanted a certain window to remain in a certain position without being disturbed.
  - dons 15y ago
    > "customizable tiling window manager" somehow requires the user to learn an unusual programming language and a dozen of inscrutable keyboard shortcuts Languages are our best tool for expressivity. And a well-designed language is better than an ad hoc configuration language any day of the week (see e.g. vimscript for how not to do configuration). By choosing to use a full language for configuration, we have made possible an enormous ecosystem of user-contributed components -- because the configuration language was rich enough to support them.
    - phillmv 15y ago
      Horseshit! That's what APIs are for :P. You could have accomplished all of this just fine but left the config in yaml and I would have personally been a happier person for it.
      - dons 15y ago
        YAML configuration is possible, if you want. Just load the YAML file in your xmonad.hs config, and translate it (using the regular config language) into the Config data type xmonad actually uses. You could implement all sorts of funky config formats, by translating them down to the underlying (richer) format. Go nuts!
        phillmv 15y ago
        I know it's possible, but goddamnit I didn't want to learn Haskell in the first place! That is my bone of contention. Yes, yes, it might make me a better person but I want to try XMonad more than I want to fuck around with Haskell.
        Locke1689 15y ago
        Personally I believe that optimizing for the technical user is much more important than user-friendliness in developer tools, especially window managers and text editors. Most people don't have the desire or the motivation to write full-featured developer tool extensions, but those who do should have the full power of a language like Haskell at their fingertips. I think the fact that no one has bothered to write a limited configuration format is telling. It seems to indicate that people who have learned Haskell don't see any benefit in it and appreciate the flexibility offered to them.
        pyre 15y ago
        > I think the fact that no one has bothered to write a > limited configuration format is telling. Specious reasoning. There are a lot of people that just know enough Haskell to fiddle with their XMonad config and/or copy-paste bits from other people's XMonad configs. I'd say the ratio of XMonad users who would build a easy-config system to total XMonad users is small. You're trying to claim that total XMonad users = X, and since X people are using it without creating the 'new system,' it means that no one sees the utility in it.
  - pyre 15y ago
    love how a "customizable tiling window manager" somehow requires the user to learn an unusual programming language and a dozen of inscrutable keyboard shortcuts. It doesn't require that, but up until now the only people that cared about "customizable tiling window managers" were people that wanted to do so. Most of these window managers are created by programmers/terminal junkies that would prefer that most things be a text interface. Just look at ratpoison and stumpwm. They're made to have an Emacs-like interface to the window manager. How accessible is an Emacs interface to a non-technical user?
    - phillmv 15y ago
      Dude, what non technical users? We're talking about Linux window managers. I'm a technical user. I program for a living. I don't care to learn Haskell in order to use a window manager :P. This is all I'm saying.
      - tikhonj 15y ago
        Eh, you should learn Haskell even if you're not going to be using the window manager ;)
  - mixu 15y ago
    > "customizable tiling window manager" somehow requires the user to learn an unusual programming language and a dozen of inscrutable keyboard shortcuts You might be interested in the tiling window manager I wrote with Node.js (mixu/nwm on github). It's very much inspired by xmonad and dwm, but the engine is Javascript running in Node.js with a native extension for X11 operations/events. All layouting decisions are made in JS - in fact, the C++ binding doesn't even know the position of the windows or the dimension of the monitors; it's all tracked in JS. It should be easier to customize, though definitely not as battle-tested as xmonad.
    - adambyrtek 15y ago
      How does it differ from existing tiling window managers, except the JavaScript spin? It sounds interesting, but it always makes me think twice if the only motivation for a new project is to do the same in a different language.
davidcuddeback 15y ago
I just installed xmonad on 11.10 last week. It was very straightforward---didn't even need a tutorial. It's just "sudo apt-get install xmonad". The hard part was trying to customize xmonad without knowing Haskell.

pyre 15y ago

> just want my normal windows with title bar and > buttons back There are contrib packages that allow you to add small title bars to the windows. You could configure XMonad with a 'floating' workspace, and enable title bars on all of the windows in that workspace. Then just setup rules to automatically send all of the programs that have issues to that workspace.

phillmv 15y ago
I love how a "customizable tiling window manager" somehow requires the user to learn an unusual programming language and a dozen of inscrutable keyboard shortcuts. It made my 24inch screen at the time far more manageable but it was supremely frustrating if I sometimes wanted a certain window to remain in a certain position without being disturbed.
- dons 15y ago
  > "customizable tiling window manager" somehow requires the user to learn an unusual programming language and a dozen of inscrutable keyboard shortcuts Languages are our best tool for expressivity. And a well-designed language is better than an ad hoc configuration language any day of the week (see e.g. vimscript for how not to do configuration). By choosing to use a full language for configuration, we have made possible an enormous ecosystem of user-contributed components -- because the configuration language was rich enough to support them.
  - phillmv 15y ago
    Horseshit! That's what APIs are for :P. You could have accomplished all of this just fine but left the config in yaml and I would have personally been a happier person for it.
    - dons 15y ago
      YAML configuration is possible, if you want. Just load the YAML file in your xmonad.hs config, and translate it (using the regular config language) into the Config data type xmonad actually uses. You could implement all sorts of funky config formats, by translating them down to the underlying (richer) format. Go nuts!
      - phillmv 15y ago
        I know it's possible, but goddamnit I didn't want to learn Haskell in the first place! That is my bone of contention. Yes, yes, it might make me a better person but I want to try XMonad more than I want to fuck around with Haskell.
        Locke1689 15y ago
        Personally I believe that optimizing for the technical user is much more important than user-friendliness in developer tools, especially window managers and text editors. Most people don't have the desire or the motivation to write full-featured developer tool extensions, but those who do should have the full power of a language like Haskell at their fingertips. I think the fact that no one has bothered to write a limited configuration format is telling. It seems to indicate that people who have learned Haskell don't see any benefit in it and appreciate the flexibility offered to them.
        pyre 15y ago
        > I think the fact that no one has bothered to write a > limited configuration format is telling. Specious reasoning. There are a lot of people that just know enough Haskell to fiddle with their XMonad config and/or copy-paste bits from other people's XMonad configs. I'd say the ratio of XMonad users who would build a easy-config system to total XMonad users is small. You're trying to claim that total XMonad users = X, and since X people are using it without creating the 'new system,' it means that no one sees the utility in it.
- pyre 15y ago
  love how a "customizable tiling window manager" somehow requires the user to learn an unusual programming language and a dozen of inscrutable keyboard shortcuts. It doesn't require that, but up until now the only people that cared about "customizable tiling window managers" were people that wanted to do so. Most of these window managers are created by programmers/terminal junkies that would prefer that most things be a text interface. Just look at ratpoison and stumpwm. They're made to have an Emacs-like interface to the window manager. How accessible is an Emacs interface to a non-technical user?
  - phillmv 15y ago
    Dude, what non technical users? We're talking about Linux window managers. I'm a technical user. I program for a living. I don't care to learn Haskell in order to use a window manager :P. This is all I'm saying.
    - tikhonj 15y ago
      Eh, you should learn Haskell even if you're not going to be using the window manager ;)
- mixu 15y ago
  > "customizable tiling window manager" somehow requires the user to learn an unusual programming language and a dozen of inscrutable keyboard shortcuts You might be interested in the tiling window manager I wrote with Node.js (mixu/nwm on github). It's very much inspired by xmonad and dwm, but the engine is Javascript running in Node.js with a native extension for X11 operations/events. All layouting decisions are made in JS - in fact, the C++ binding doesn't even know the position of the windows or the dimension of the monitors; it's all tracked in JS. It should be easier to customize, though definitely not as battle-tested as xmonad.
  - adambyrtek 15y ago
    How does it differ from existing tiling window managers, except the JavaScript spin? It sounds interesting, but it always makes me think twice if the only motivation for a new project is to do the same in a different language.

davidcuddeback 15y ago

I just installed xmonad on 11.10 last week. It was very straightforward---didn't even need a tutorial. It's just "sudo apt-get install xmonad". The hard part was trying to customize xmonad without knowing Haskell.