Xfce Configuration Guide

Xfce Configuration Guide

1. Introduction

Xfce desktop environment

Xfce is a fast and lightweight desktop environment on Unix-like operating systems. It is designed for productivity, is well configurable, and complies with freedesktop specifications.

Unlike the bloated desktop environments such as gnome and KDE, xfce consumes much less system resources. In addition, it has better scalability and less dependencies; it will occupy less disk space and less installation time.

This guide will not only show you how to install and configure a minimal xfce environment, but also explore some available solutions to create a fully functional desktop environment, consistent with the xfce Design Philosophy: lightweight, fast, and modular.

2. Install xfce

Basic

First, make sure that you have installed Xorg according to how to configure the X server.

Then, check the use mark in the/etc/make. conf file. You may want to at least use = "-gnome-KDE-qt3-qt4 x javashal startup-Notification xscreensaver ".

Now, let's start to install xfce.

Code 2.1: Install xfce

# emerge -avt xfce4

Then, add general users on your system to the plugdev, CDROM, cdrw, and USB groups, in this way, they can use Hal to mount and use devices such as cameras, optical drives, and USB disks.

Code 2.2: Add a user to a hardware Group

(Replace username with your real user name) # For X in plugdev CDROM cdrw USB; do gpasswd-a username $ X; done

Next, update your environment variables:

Code 2.3: Update Environment Variables

# env-update && source /etc/profile

Now start Hald and add it to the default running level:

Code 2.4: Start Hald

# /etc/init.d/hald start # rc-update add hald default

3. Configure xfce

Start xfce

Now that xfce has been installed, we will set it as our default desktop environment. Once we execute startx, We can enter. Log off your root user and Log On As a normal user.

Code 3.1: Set xfce as the default desktop environment

$ echo "exec startxfce4" > ~/.xinitrc

Now, press startx to start your graphic environment:

Code 3.2: Start xfce

$ startx

Congratulations! Welcome to the xfce desktop environment. Let's take a look and extend it a bit further. The next section will teach you how to configure xfce according to your requirements.

Program startup

You may notice that right-clicking on the desktop will bring up a menu with all your applications on it. This is very useful, but once you open multiple windows, your desktop will easily be completely hidden, making it inconvenient to start a new program. Therefore, the first thing you want is to add a convenient application menu on your panel. Right-click the Panel and select "Add new item ". Scroll to the list of options and select "xfce menu ". You can specify its position on the panel. When you click it, it will display the application/selection menu, which provides a good classification list, including the programs you have installed.

Sessions & startup

If you have (or intend) installed some popular gnome or KDE software, such as k3b, Nautilus, kmail, and evolution, make sure that xfce starts the corresponding services for these programs at startup. Choose menu --> Settings --> sessions & startup. In the "advanced" tab, select the check box. This may slightly increase the xfce startup time, but will reduce the loading time of KDE and gnome applications.

Xfce can save the settings and run programs for each session, depending on the settings on the "General" tab in the sessions & Startup menu. When you log out, you can enable the xfce to automatically save or enable the xfce to prompt you whether to save each time. This feature is especially useful when you want to cancel incorrect settings. What should I do if the Panel is accidentally closed? If you select no when asked whether to save the current session, your original desktop will return the next time you start xfce. Do you want to automatically load your browser, terminal, and email client upon next login? You only need to save your session when you exit.

You have installed and configured a basic working environment. But if you are still interested in doing more, please proceed!

4. Additional applications

Panel plug-in

In this section, we will discuss some useful plug-ins and application software that are used every day in xfce.

There are already many available panel plug-ins in the portage. You can use emerge -- search xfce to check the plug-ins by yourself. Although most of these plug-ins have self-explanatory meanings, some plug-ins are worth noting because they are very useful. To use them, simply use emerge. When you right-click the panel, you can see that they have been added to the "available items" list in the "Add new item" menu.

• The xfce4-mount allows you to easily get a list of mounted devices in/etc/fstab by clicking the mouse.
• Xfce4-battery is perfect for notebook users. It can display the battery usage, remaining time, power supply (AC or battery), Fan Status, warning, and even be configured to execute commands at a certain power level. This function enables the notebook to sleep when the battery is quickly exhausted.
• Verve is a small command line embedded on the panel. When you want to run a command, it is faster than opening another terminal.
• The xfce4-mixer is the volume controller. It can control ALSA and OSS sound programs.

If you cannot find what you want in these plug-ins customized for xfce, try searching in the list of GNOME panel plug-ins! Yes, first install the xfce4-xfapplet, then you can install and run the plug-in gnome.

Useful programs

Xfce binds some useful applications, including thunar, terminal, orage, and mousepad. Note: If you use the use Mark minimal when installing xfce4, the last three programs will not be installed. However, these are very small but very good programs, and they are worth a try.

Orage is an easy-to-use calendar. Mousepad is a simplified text editor that can be started very quickly. Terminal is far better than xterm. It supports Unicode text and pseudo-transparency, and uses the xfce built-in color mixing tool to speed up transparency and achieve out-of-the-box and out-of-the-box transparency. Just make sure that the terminal initiator on your panel runs the/usr/bin/terminal command by default instead of the xterm command. Right-click the terminal initiator and select "properties" to change its command.

Thunar is a graphical file manager built in xfce. It is faster but more powerful, and more functions can be achieved through plug-ins; you only need to install it through emerge. Let's take a look:

• Thunar-archive allows you to create and uncompress archive files by right-clicking the menu. It is easier to use if combined with xarchiver. Xarchiver is a graphical archiving tool just developed for xfce.
• Thunar-media-tags allows you to intelligently rename multiple media files at a time, and allows you to edit the tags (TAGS) of these files, such as ID3 tags.
• Thunar-thumbnailers allows you to preview some types of files, such as images and fonts in thunar.
• Thunar-volman automatically manages out-of-the-box media devices and drives.

Next, we added some useful lightweight desktop applications to stay consistent with the xfce design philosophy.

Although the mousepad is already quite good, it is a very quick text editor, but if you need a fully functional text processor without a bloated OpenOffice, install abiword to try. Abiword is a lightweight text processing tool that is fully interconnected with industry-standard document types. It can also further expand more features by installing abiword-plugins.

Code 4.1: Add a document Processor

# emerge -avt abiword

If you want a good email client/news broadcaster, but you do not need to be like Mozilla-Thunderbird or evolution, what is the best solution? Install claws-mail.

In terms of online chat, irssi is an excellent IRC client, which runs on the terminal and has excellent configuration. If you prefer a client that contains all the chat protocols, you may want emerge pidgin.

If you need a movie or music player, it is no better than mplayer and audacious. Multimedia files in almost all formats can be played well. They also have many ready-made Plug-ins that can be used to expand more functions.

Finally, you need a web browser. Almost all graphical web browsers occupy more resources than most of your desktop applications. However, Mozilla-Firefox (or Mozilla-Firefox-bin) is still a good choice. In addition, you may find that opera is quite fast. However, opera is not applicable to so many architectures as mozilla-Firefox, and it has more dependencies unless you ignore them with the Use mark.

Code 4.2: Add a web browser

(Install Mozilla Firefox) # Emerge mozilla-Firefox (Install opera) # Echo "www-Client/opera QT-static">/etc/portage/package. Use # Emerge Opera

Here, we have made some good suggestions to enrich your desktop applications. Next, let's see what else we can do to improve your xfce experience.

Gui Logon

Remember to add startxfce4 ~ /. Xinitrc file? To access your desktop, you need to enter startx after logging on. This method is good if you like to start and log on completely based on text. Otherwise, let's use a display manager, which will automatically start xfce after your system boot (so that you can log on to the graphic interface ).

First, let's make sure that xfce is loaded after the system is started:

Code 4.3: Add xdm to default running level

# rc-update add xdm default

This is far from over. We also need to select a Display Manager and set some appropriate variables. Although there are several display managers to choose from in the portage, in this Guide, we will stick to the SLIM-simple logon manager.

Slim is fast and lightweight, requiring only a few dependencies. It is perfect for xfce!

Code 4.4: Install slim

# emerge -avt slim

Then, edit the displaymanager variable in/etc/CONF. d/xdm:

Code 4.5: edit/etc/CONF. d/xdm

DISPLAYMANAGER="slim"

Add xsession = "xfce4" to the/etc/rc. conf file, so that Slim can automatically start your xfce.

Beautify your desktop

It is of great benefit to slightly set the desktop appearance. Xfce has all the setting options you want from the modern desktop system, font anti-sawtooth settings, color templates, a large number of form decorations, themes, and so on. If this is not enough, it is easy to install third-party themes, Icon Sets, mouse and cursor themes, and wallpapers.

Gentoo website has collected a batch of beautiful Gentoo wallpapers containing various resolutions. If you are looking for an icon set and a complete xfce topic, go to xfce-Look. There are many things on it. Another important thing to remember is that for any third-party beautification package you download, you usually need to decompress the package and install it in the appropriate directory. If you want all users on your system to use these themes and icons, install the icon set to/usr/share/icons /, install theme on/usr/share/themes /. If it is only for use by the current user, install the topic and Icon set ~ /. Themes/and ~ /. Icons /.

If you have installed slim as your Display Manager, there are many things in the SLIM-themes package in the portage. For more topics, see the topic package. Creating your own slim topic is also quite easy. Read how to create a theme.

Finally, xfce also has its own built-in color mixing tool to manage window transparency. You can find this option in menu --> Settings --> window manager. To achieve the best effect, you need to make your video card use a driver that supports hardware accelerated rendering. Make sure you have added the xcompositeuse tag when installing xfwm4. Next, you need to enable the color mixing switch in/etc/X11/Xorg. conf and add the following part:

Code 4.6: Enable the mixed color switch in Xorg. conf.

Section "Extensions" Option "Composite" "Enable" EndSection

This is only the minimum configuration required by xfce and Xorg-X11. However, the setting of hardware acceleration depends on your own video card, which is beyond the scope of this article. Read Other guides in the resource list of the desktop documentation to learn how to configure and enable hardware acceleration for your video card.

5. Summary

Congratulations! You have been so far! You have installed and configured a quick desktop environment and a reliable application suite for your computing needs.

Resources

Do you need other help for configuring and using xfce? Do you still want more suggestions for lightweight applications? Try here:

• The Gentoo forums
• # Xfce channel on irc.freenode.net
• /Usr/share/xfce4/doc/C/index.html here provides the xfce installation help document and other documents. Aim your browser here to start reading. There are even many details of configuration options "hidden" in these help documents.
• Xfce's home page