LXDE-Common 0.99.0 for Slackware-Current

On 24th October an update for the lxde-common package was released by the project, a significant update with a long list of bug fixes and improvements. Notably improvements to logout and screenlock functions (i.e. "Fixed missing install of lxde-logout.desktop file"), new translations added and better integration with the file manager pcmanfm. Interestingly, a further blog post clarifies that, despite LXQT making progress, LXDE is here to stay and even recieved some patches for Gtk+3 recently.

Slackbuilds.org still offers an older lxde-common (20141008_8877e46) for 14.1. I took it upon myself to adapt the build script and see whether 0.99.0 would compile on Slackware-Current. Voila, you're welcome to download this package and try it out. It's only i486 for now as I'm not using any x64 installations at the moment due to gaming needs and some communications software but may offer 64-bit packages at a later date. I'm also looking into offering more packages for Slackware in the future and how to host this, if from an FTP server at home or another way.

Siduction 'Paintitblack' LXQt Dev Release: Screenshots

Earlier this month the Siduction team, which regularly updates snapshots based on Debian Unstable/Sid, released a development build showcasing the new LXQt desktop, the future of both the LXDE and the Razor-qt environments. Siduction have a bit of history here as they featured Razor-qt as a desktop early on and were probably the only distribution to ship a dedicated iso as part of their line-up throughout 2012 and 2013. Besides using KDE 4 for the main image Siduction have shown a great commitment to medium light and lower resource desktops.

LXpup – More Than Just Puppy Linux With LXDE

In case it wasn’t evident from the name, LXpup is a custom distribution spin made from Puppy Linux with the LXDE user interface. I should say by default, because the developer also distributes modules of several other popular desktop environments, but more about that later. Just remember that the user can substantially change the look and functionality of the desktop, so even if LXDE is not your thing this spin might still be for you. Read the full story over at Muktware.com.

Adding LXDE to Slackware 13.37

Slackware does not come with LXDE on the CD/DVD so how do you get it? The hard way is to go to Slackbuilds.org and do a search. This will come up with a package list that needs to be built in a particular order. Nothing too dramatic as it is a relatively small number of packages, and dependencies are well documented on every page.

From ArchBang to SlackBang

If you looked at the ArchBang website over the last few days you would have read that founder WillXtreme is retiring from the project leadership due to changes in real life and other pursuits. A few people also involved in the development and who were quite active in the forum for example and with tips on their own blogs, like pablokal, will continue the project.

Porteus, The Portable Community Linux

Porteus grew out of the fan project that gave us the Slax Community Remix, a continuation of Slax 6.1.2, the last official Slax release for quite a while, dating back to August 2009.
As the team grew more adept they put their own stamp on their interpretation of what a Slackware based Live system should be like and slowly moved away from the old Slax base and from some of its design principles.

Inspecting the Gentoo 12.0 Live DVD

Following a recent request I downloaded the Gentoo 12.0 Live DVD for a test drive. I tried Gentoo many years ago but gave up after a few hours due to the time involved, and my knowledge back then was a lot more rudimentary than today. Gentoo is a source distribution that is supposed to be configured and compiled from stage 2 or stage 3 tarballs, although images are available that allow you to cheat and skip the early part of kernel compilation etc. via minimal install images.

Three Spins You May Not Have Heard Of

Always on the lookout for something interesting I found three more esoteric spins of major distributions and set out to give them a quick test run.
This was helped by a streak of bad luck recently which resulted in me suddenly having two partitions available.

KNOPPIX 6.7 and ADRIANE Audio Desktop Review

Once upon a time the daddy of this distribution, Klaus Knopper, started a trend with his pioneering Knoppix live CD as rescue and repair tool. It was known for incorporating extensive hardware detection that required minimal to no configuration at boot to arrive at a fully working desktop.

Prettyfying Your LXDE

LXDE, the Lightweight X11 desktop environment, has gained quite a following over recent years seemingly coming from nowhere, and many distribution spins are now using it for their user interface. This is really a follow-up to my previous post about beautyfying Xfce. Because both are using gtk+ the same themes will work and the same engines are needed to make them look as intended.

Installing LXDE on Slackware & Salix 13.37

Slackware 13.37 is out. So what do you do if you need or want a light weight desktop environment for an old machine and LXDE is your favorite? You could wait for Salix to catch up and release their own spin as they always do because they are fully compatible and you could just pull it in with slapt-get from their repos. You could build it yourself using the scripts at SlackBuilds.org, but they need a bit additional work and you need to figure out the build sequence.

Sabayon 5.3 Xfce & LXDE - a few impressions

First of all let me say this is not intended to be a full review of Sabayon Linux. Sabayon is well known and had its fair share of reviews already, the most recent one I am aware of being very thorough and can be read here. This is more like a quick look and impressions of how the light weight desktop environments do on Sabayon SpinBase.