Welcome to my guide to window managers and desktop environments for The X Window System, as used mainly by Linux and UNIX operating systems.

After getting a lot of feedback from the crowd regarding window managers I’ve decided to try a few out.

This post describes how to install and use xmonad, its keyboard shortcuts, basic terminology involved with tiling window managers. And a little bit info on other available tiling window managers.

Window Maker is a window manager that, while having elements of a desktop environment, does keep very strongly to the principles of a basic, light weight window manager. It has an extremely simple, mouse driven interface and in some ways operates in the old NextStep blueprint of functionality.

One of the best ways to speed up your Linux desktop is to utilize an ultra-lightweight window manager. To all speed-conscious techies, minimalist lovers, and to those who are still hoping to revive their ageing computer hardware, let me introduce you to the 20 most nimble and simple X window managers for Linux.

A lot people read and enjoyed our previous article, "From the archives: the best distros of 2000", so we had a hunt around in the dark, damp cellar where old copies of Linux Format magazine live, and dug up another gem, this time from issue 2: a group test of the best window managers, complete with screenshots.

One of the thing's that's been picking at my brains lately is the mess surrounding KDE4. Now I'm not here to scream at the developers and say how much of a fool they were to have released KDE4 so early, and so broken like others are apt to. I'm here instead to attack this issue from another angle. That angle is the dilemma we have with the wide array of existing Linux (and BSD) window managers.

Continuing with our introduction to old-school Linux window managers, I would like to bring to you Window Maker. The Window Maker window manager was designed to look and feel like the old NeXT GUI.

"For the past few months I've been checking out Stumpwm. I always have got a joy out of working with any minimalistic window managers especially, tiling window managers. [...] With me being a Lisp Fanboi, I decided to take Stumpwm, out for a test cruise a few months ago.