I was looking for a lightweight windows manager with focus on doing things by keyboard. Most of the lightweight desktop environment such as XFCE or window manager such as Fluxbox, etc., doesn't allow quick access to your applications. I really loved the way it is done in Unity or Gnome Shell, all you have to do is type few letters of application/folder in dash. As far I remember, XFCE doesn't even allow you to navigate through app menu using first letters of the group/app and you have to either use arrow keys or mouse!
However, Unity, Gnome Shell, etc., are memory hogs. Not that I'm too hard pressed for resource with a 2.4 GHz Core2Duo and 4 GB RAM, but if you run a few memory intensive apps like GIMP or Darktable, you really feel the need to release resources from window manager.
So, the requirements are:
- Lightweight window manager. Ability to quickly launch applications by typing their name.
- A decent panel to display network, battery, date, etc. and minimized applications like Jupiter, qbittorrent, autokey, etc.
- Ease of setup so that one doesn't have to spend eternity editing the text files.
- Some graphic eyecandy would be a plus, but not necessary.
Please suggest some lightweight window manager + panel/docs, etc. that can fullfil the above requirement.
I tried xmonad with suckless tools and xmobarrc with the help of following tutorials - http://www.howtogeek.com/114728/how-to-use-xmonad-a-tiling-window-manager-for-linux/
It gives me a lightweight window manager but still leaves yearning for more ease.
openboxa try. Here is a nice guide for configuring openbox and also contains a list of applications to use with openbox – RanRag Jul 29 '12 at 19:37