Running
without a restart.

Ice -The Fast, Speedy, Window Manager

If you are running Linux as a server, you'll get the most performance if you run in command line mode, but let's be honest, that's no fun! But the problem with running a window manager is they hoard system resources. Gnome and KDE use memory and cpu cycles that can be better spent serving pages.

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The Ice Window Manager was designed from the ground up for speed and a small memory footprint. When I saw an rpm for the 1.0.1 release at LinuxPPC, I downloaded and installed it.

Install Ice as root with the command:

rpm -i icewm-1.0.1-1.ppc.rpm

In your home directory, create the following .XClient file:

# run profile to set $PATH and other env vars correctly
. $HOME/.bash_profile

# setup background
xsetroot -solid '#056'

# setup mouse acceleration
xset m 3 2

# run initial programs
xterm &

# start icewm, and run xterm if it crashes (just to be safe)
exec icewm || exec xterm -fg red

This sets up Ice with a few default settings and launches a terminal.

Next, it would be nice to add Ice to the list of available window managers in the kdm login popup list. This way, you can easily switch between the managers, selecting the appropriate one for the job.

Here is how to add a Window Manger to kdm. (if you're using xdm or gdm, here is how to switch). From the KDE hierarchical menu, select Settings->Applications->Login Manager.

Select the Sessions tab as shown below.

At the bottom, in the New Type box, type icewm. Press the Add button and it will be added to the list. Click Apply and close the window.

Log out of KDE and you will notice that the Login Manager has icewm in the popup list. Select it to test out your speedy new window manager.

Visit the Ice Home Page, or read the online documentation.

Ice, while not as full featured as KDE or gnome, is the lean mean fighting machine that can put less of a drain on your server.