Elive is another interesting distribution that has just released an unstable development release you can download and try without installing it on a hard drive. If you are interested in trying Enlightenment without installing it, this is a natural choice for you.
Elive is based on Debian. Its minimal requirements are very minimal: a 100 Mhz CPU and 64 MB of RAM. To be honest, the minimum recommended hardware is 300 Mhz and 128 Mb of RAM. Still, nothing fancy is needed for running Elive.
TinyMe 2008.1 Beta Release
TinyMe is a lightweight remaster of PCLinuxOS. The project has just released a beta version of the forthcoming stable release 2008.1. Now you have a great chance to help building a lightweight Linux distribution that is extremely well suited for old computers. See the release announcement for more information.
An Enlightened Experience: E17
It's been some time since I've used Enlightenment on a regular basis. I used some months E16 as my main desktop and was very happy with it. For some reason I cannot anymore remember I moved to some other desktop or some window manager in my continuing search for the perfect desktop experience.
For the first time I installed E17 that still is in development. But what an experience it is! It looks nicer than ever, the eye candy is not disturbing but adds value to the user experience. I even like the way Enlightenment is configured when first run. After I learned how to turn off the desktop icons I was extremely happy with Enlightenment.
One of the features I like is the way users can download and install new themes and wallpapers. Even the animated wallpapers don't disturb me, the just look great. At the moment Enlightenment seems to be the prettiest desktop available. Furthermore, it is usable and it's got all the functionality I want my desktop environment to have. And it is lightweight enough for my 1.99 GHz CPU.
If you like KDE4's looks but otherwise it is not up to your standards, you might like this one. It is still prerelease, but it seems to be a lot more stable and usable than KDE4 is at the moment. Of course window managers like Openbox can be tweaked to look great, too, but Enlightenment looks perfect out of the box. You don't need to spend hours looking for pretty themes and installing third party panels and other plugins to make a lightweight window manager as usable as Enlightenment is.
It's good to be back!
For the first time I installed E17 that still is in development. But what an experience it is! It looks nicer than ever, the eye candy is not disturbing but adds value to the user experience. I even like the way Enlightenment is configured when first run. After I learned how to turn off the desktop icons I was extremely happy with Enlightenment.
One of the features I like is the way users can download and install new themes and wallpapers. Even the animated wallpapers don't disturb me, the just look great. At the moment Enlightenment seems to be the prettiest desktop available. Furthermore, it is usable and it's got all the functionality I want my desktop environment to have. And it is lightweight enough for my 1.99 GHz CPU.
If you like KDE4's looks but otherwise it is not up to your standards, you might like this one. It is still prerelease, but it seems to be a lot more stable and usable than KDE4 is at the moment. Of course window managers like Openbox can be tweaked to look great, too, but Enlightenment looks perfect out of the box. You don't need to spend hours looking for pretty themes and installing third party panels and other plugins to make a lightweight window manager as usable as Enlightenment is.
It's good to be back!
About Blogging
I started this blog in the early summer 2008. I have not been able to post anything worth reading every day, not even every week. I suppose it happens to most bloggers who blog as a hobby, not as professional authors. In addition, my studies of economics and business are even more time consuming I imagined.
During the last week, I have noticed I can move most of my short notices about interesting new distributions or sites to Delicious. It certainly is a better platform for this kind of short notes. I warmly recommend you to subscribe my notes in Delicious, if you are a registered user. You'll find the necessary links in the column to the right.
Now that I decided to post in this blog, I might as well remind you of another blog worth reading if you are interested in using Linux on old computers: Linux Distribution testing - on old computers.
During the last week, I have noticed I can move most of my short notices about interesting new distributions or sites to Delicious. It certainly is a better platform for this kind of short notes. I warmly recommend you to subscribe my notes in Delicious, if you are a registered user. You'll find the necessary links in the column to the right.
Now that I decided to post in this blog, I might as well remind you of another blog worth reading if you are interested in using Linux on old computers: Linux Distribution testing - on old computers.
New Puppy Release
Puppy Linux 4.1.1 has been released. It is a bugfix release of 4.1 See the release notes for more information regarding this distro that fits under a 95 MB file.
Lightweight Linux in Delicious
I decided to start blogging my links in Delicious. My latest additions to Delicious can be found in the column to the right. You might like to add me to your network if you are interested in lightweight Linux distributions, lightweight applications or using Linux with old computers.
Openbox is a Lightweight Window Manager
Openbox is one of the more popular lightweight window managers. It can be used as a standalone solution or as a component of the LXDE, the Lightweight X11 Desktop Environment. The default look of Openbox is rather minimalistic, but it is a good basis for building a custom desktop.
The default look of openSUSE's openbox
Fortunately, the internet is full of resources and tutorials for customizing the look and feel of Openbox. Here are some of the more informative pages I've found:
- Openbox documentation
- Openbox FAQ
- Urukrama's Openbox guide
- Openbox in Ubuntu Wiki
- HOW-TO: Install, Customize, and Configure Openbox (lots of options)
- Configuring Openbox V2
- Kmandla's Feisty Openbox on 1Ghz Pentium III, start to finish
Themes for Openbox can of course be found in the usual sources. See, for example, the following:
- Boxlook's Openbox themes
- And more links can be found in the official documentation
Can you recommend some other sites?
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