[Lias] LTSP and XFCE4

[Craig Ringer]

> Whilst getting some help here for issues with my LTSP server a number of people
> mentioned 

I thought it was just me, actually...

> that what I wanted was easy with XFce rather than Gnome or KDE.

Indeed. It's certainly easier to configure globally - say, if you want 
all users to have the same panel contents, etc. I understand that the 
facilities for configuring GNOME and KDE globablly for all users are 
improving, but last time I tried I had very little success.

> Remembering that I am a complete dunce with these things:
> 1. Is this a replacement for Gnome or KDE or does it need a complete install of Linux?

While you won't need the full GNOME or KDE environments, you'll still 
need a lot of the libraries for them in order to run other programs. 
Generally your package manager will tell you what you need, though, so 
you shouldn't have to worry about it too much.

> 3. How hard would it be to convert my system to use it?

Setting it up is very easy, but you will need to do some configuration 
work. I found it pretty trivial. The main issue you'll find is that 
while XFCE4 has a built-in file manager, it is (IMHO) very bad. I use 
ROX-Filer on my LTSP setup here, and that does well - you could use 
Nautlius or Konqueror (the standard file managers for GNOME2 and KDE3, 
respectively) if you wished instead.

> I have looked at the website and it looks to be a normal install from source,

It is, though packages are also available for common distros. I'm using 
the packaged Red Hat 8 version here.

> so
> could I do that and then have it as a 'session' option in the login for me to test
> it?

Absolutely. I think the RPMs install an appropriate file for GDM by default.

> If so are there any instructions anywhere to do that - or is that what the
> website documentation calls " here is a script that starts an Xnest session with
> xfce4:"

That's one way to do it. Alternately, you can log into it using GDM or 
whatever your display manager is, if it's been configured to see XFCE4. 
As I said, the RPMs do this for you for GDM:

$ rpm -qif /etc/X11/gdm/Sessions/XFce4
Name        : xfce-utils                   Relocations: (not relocateable)
Version     : 4.0.0                             Vendor: (none)
Release     : 1                             Build Date: Wed 24 Sep 2003 
04:33:16 WST
Install date: Fri 26 Sep 2003 13:24:44 WST      Build Host: shuttle
Group       : User Interface/Desktops       Source RPM: 
xfce-utils-4.0.0-1.src.rpm
Size        : 683210                           License: GPL
Signature   : (none)
URL         : http://www.xfce.org/
Summary     : Utilities for the XFce Desktop Environment
Description :
xfce-utils contains utilities for the XFce Desktop Environment

so you'll just get 'XFCE4' as one of the login options. Once it's 
installed, it really 'just works'. To create your defaults, you just 
configure your logged in desktop how you want, log out, then copy 
$HOME/.xfce4/xfce4rc to /etc/xfce4/xfce4rc (or wherever you configued it 
to look, if you didn't use the RPMs). All new users will get the same 
panel settings etc.

I'm talking about an LTSP setup where every user logs in to the same 
central server, but it's similar enough if you're using separate PCs.

Craig Ringer