wmii: my new favorite minimal, geeky, futuristic window manager

14May09

I like slick modern technology. I like linux. As a mac user, linux doesn’t normally hold a candle to the Mac OS with regards to user experience. Even to this day with compiz and its wobbly windows is nothing but eye candy on a linux box. I want something that is functional yet elegant so I can just work. Enter the world of dynamic tiling window managers. On first blush, they look quite intimidating. They are usually text only (which means watch out for uber geekness) as the screenshot below:

But I like my web browsing dynamic like the tiling windows, and occationally to use the mouse. Wmii seems to have everything that I need. It’s geeky enough to have the satisfaction of something to customize but makes things more simpler. Say I want tons of information as in the above shot, then one could do that. Alternately, one could simplify and have two columns:

I also like how it uses workspaces. At the bottom, you can name work spaces on the fly or just use the default numbering scheme. So I start out with 1, press the modifier key (which I use CMD since that is rarely used in linux) and a number and it switches me to that workspace. In Mac, I never used Apple’s version of workspaces. Ironic as it may be, I felt the spaces were not very helpful (included the other linux window managers utilization of workspaces).

In Mac OS, I became addicted to using Quicksilver to launch applications in a flash of a second. Two or three key strokes and bam, there I am at the application I want. No clicking and scrolling for it. They say, once you go Quicksilver, you never go back. Well, wmii has a program launcher that scans all the installed programs on my computer. So it is as if I never left my dear Quicksilver. This is what has sold me with wmii as others don’t have this. I could install gnome-do which is linux’s version of QS, but why?

So that is the quick version. Maybe I will write more about wmii another time, but here are a couple more screenies. The first one is with no windows open and just showing the desktop with conky my system monitor. The next one shows a bit more window column use and a distraction free workspace. Oh if you want to see my config file it is here (helpful for mac users to bind the apple key to something useful in linux). Have fun and good luck.