Another Newbie Question

[Jeremy Fowler]

You can defiantly run X on older systems. I've heard of many people successfully
running X on 486s without any problems. I think your getting confused about
something here, X itself isn't all that resource intensive. Its the desktop
environments and window managers that run on top of X that consume massive
amounts of memory and precious processor cycles. So yes, you probably will have
a hell of a time running a full featured X Desktop Environment like Gnome or KDE
on a slow machine, as they take up too many resources. However, there are other
light-weight window managers out there that you can use by themselves. I hear
Blackbox is a popular minimalist window manager that is good on slow PCs, but
there are many others as well. Depending on which one you choose, your probably
not going to have the nice desktop icons, menu bar, or sound that your used to,
but you can run any X based program you need. As for choosing one, do some
research here: http://www.plig.org/xwinman/index.html

Then download and install the ones your interested in. Then share your results
with the list.

You should also look into DirectFB (http://www.directfb.org) which is a library
that lays on top the Linux FrameBuffer. Basically you can compile your kernel to
access your graphics hardware directly thru a well-defined interface. It's built
for embedded systems, so it's very light-weight.

http://www.tldp.org/HOWTO/Framebuffer-HOWTO.html

> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-kclug at marauder.illiana.net
> [mailto:owner-kclug at marauder.illiana.net]On Behalf Of Seth Dimbert
> Sent: Tuesday, October 29, 2002 10:57 AM
> To: KCLUG List
> Subject: Another Newbie Question
>
>
> This may seem silly, but here goes:
>
> In my mind, a linux install can work 2 ways. Either I buy a "modern" machine
> and install a GUI, or I recycle and older machine and install linux without
> the GUI (ie, KDE, Gnome, etc). If I've installed a GUI, then I can use the
> machine instead of a Windows or MacOS machine, with access to open source
> office apps, graphics apps, communications apps, etc. Or, if I've installed
> a GUI-less system, I can run server apps, like httpd, ftpd, telnetd, etc.
>
> In other words, in my experience, a GUI-less Linux install leads to a
> server, not a workstation.
>
> Now, my financial situation precludes me installing a GUI; I'm using free
> hardware and none of it can support one. So, for example, at home, I've got
> an old Mac clone running Yellow Dog Linux and it's a web server.
>
> But, what I really want is a workstation. Now, I could take old hardware and
> create a DOS workstation, and have access to word processors, email apps,
> etc. But I don't know how to do that with my Linux installs.
>
> So, can anyone recommend any useful applications that will run on my
> text-only Linux boxes?
>
> Thanks!
>
> -SD
>
>
>