On Fri, 30 Oct 1998, Eugene Leitl wrote:
> wolfkin@phonetech.com writes:
>
> > There are several, but almost all are some version or another of
> > "X Windows". This comes with nearly all distributions of Linux,
> > so you needn't worry about having to go out and find it. :)
>
> This is not quite correct. Virtually all GUIs make use of X Window
> facilties, but they are not X Window. Most widespread are
> http://www.kde.org and http://www.gnome.org . Despite that KDE
> currently offers more features, Gnome's concept is imo more powerful
> (apps not limited to just C++) and proven (it's based on the same
> toolkit as The Gimp), and it does not suffer from legal problems
> due to TrollTechs proprietary (despite available as source, you
> are not allowed to modify it) Qt library as KDE does.
>
> Personally I use FVWM, and, occasionally, KDE. I'll switch over to
> Gnome once its beyond beta.
I have yet to see a Window Manager that does not use X for Linux. However, there is a project to create one called Berlin (www.debian.org/berlin) Personally, I use a WM called Afterstep(loosely based on FVWM2) with has a very stylish look reminiscent of NeXT. I plan to switch to WindowMaker soon, and then Berlin when it is usable. Enlightenment looks great, but apparently it is slow on the average machine.
I recommend Linux to anyone who is frustrated with Window's crashing. I have a dual-boot system... my Windows crashes daily, my Linux has not crashed once since I installed it a year ago; however, I do not recommend Linux for anyone that wants to be able to point and click to do everything. Linux is not quite there yet, but it will be within the next couple years.
For some nice screeshots of what your Linux GUI could look like, check out www.themes.org.
Geoff Smith