Xubuntu 11.04 – My impressions

So, after I absolutely hated Ubuntu and Unity with 11.04, I wanted to get something familiar (which means anything from Ubuntu to OpenSuSE to Arch Linux and some in between by this stage), I went to look at the other spins of Ubuntu. Kubuntu is really not for me, especially since there are other distributions that do KDE so much better than Kubuntu in my opinion. Any of the *box’es are out of the question as well, cause they, to me, feel archaic. LXDE might have worked, but after looking in to Xubuntu I decided to have a go at it. And my instinct was not wrong.

XFCE have come along way since I last used, probably around one of the early 3.x release of DreamLinux or there about. There are still some rough edges, or things that could use a bit more polishing, but there are also allot of things that they have done really well. For one, the control panel is absolutely brilliant. I have not fully explored it yet, but using a control panel with “browsing” (you can go back once you select a category) really help when trying to figure out where to go, and what options are where. However, when speaking of settings, “hiding” the time settings away in menu, and not displaying when right clicking the clock is a bit confusing, and it took me a while to figure it out. It was also disappointing that my timezone settings from install did not stick on the installed desktop.

And to my dismay, Compiz does not seem to work properly. For one reason the window borders refuse to appear when I use Compiz as window manager, which basically limits my resolution to 1366×768 (enough for most situations, but I still prefer not having to switch back and forth between resolutions depending on how I use my computer). This I really suspect just is a simple conflict between XFCE native composite and Compiz, and I haven’t really looked in to the issue, yet. But in return the native XFCE composite are good enough that it gives basic effects, like transparent menus, title bars and moving windows. It does not support any window previews, which is nice, but not really necessary. For me, the major annoyance is the lack of Enhanced desktop zoom.

There are also a few other annoyances, like not everything is completely as “fluid” as in GNOME. For example, the calendar plugin for the panel does not drop down when clicked, but rather opens Orage when double clicked. Maybe it is just me being stuck in my ways, but having the calendar dropping down was always something I liked in GNOME. What I found more annoying was the lack of unfocused scrolling (e.g. having an active window above a document, and being able to scroll the document with mouse wheel without activating the window). This is a feature I always get miss when I use Windows at work, and often forget doesn’t exist natively. In Xubuntu it focus the window when you try to scroll, which often isn’t what I want / expect.

But in summary, Xubuntu and XFCE are getting nicely along the way onto my list of favored desktop environments. I have been playing with the thought of switching to another distribution using XFCE (mostly I think about getting back to Arch Linux, but the install takes sooo long), but I always find some excuse to keep Xubuntu (right now it  is due to my CD ROM not being connected), so I think deep down I am falling in love with it, but just takes a while for my brains to come to terms with it…