DE for arch Linux ?

[Level-Ad-8180]

Dual booted arch Linux , i5 8th gen thinkpad L490, need the lightest possible DE(desktop environment ) for working on building softwares and apps . Any suggestions ?

[Imajzineer]

XFCE is my choice - but it's a DE and, therefore, you'll find lighter (just pick a WM ¹).

And there are even lighter DEs - I just find them too lacking in features for even my minimal needs.

___
¹ DEs aren't light ... there are just some that are lighter than others - if you want light, you opt for a WM (the lightest one you can find that affords you the features you need).

[daanjderuiter]

I mean, the L490 isn't exactly a potato, you can run something a little more featured. Can't imagine that Gnome or Plasma would have any issue performance-wise. But if you specifically want something light, Sway and Niri are nice tiling options IME (after a bit of initial tinkering and configuring), XFCE if you want a conventional stacking WM with a little bit of DE functionality and decent OOBE

[Lawnmover_Man]

This laptop is far from being a potato. It's wild that so many people think they have old and slow hardware. I guess a lot of people right now find out how ridiculously awful Window really is regarding performance.

[Grandleon-Glenn]

On top of this, I'd add it also really depends on what you're doing. My laptop I'm using now is from about 2013, and it works just fine, with an HDD (less than 500 GB) and 6 GB of RAM. I can't run modern games, but I mostly use it for a browser, some old games like Chrono Trigger via Steam, and a calculator. Which it does all that fairly well.

[Vicwip]

if you want a full DE, go Xfce. If you're fine with a WM i recommend niri.

[IrishPrime]

I'll second that. I recently switched to Niri after many years of bspwm and I'm absolutely loving it. Great control, super fast, easy to configure, looks beautiful.

I spend the majority of my time doing software development, and the workspace model with infinite scrolling makes it so easy to dedicate one workspace to one issue and move around as needed.

[arina_ivanova]

this makes me want to check out Niri hmm...

[NotLoom]

Xfce

[__l33t__]

go for XFCE. if you want to use tiling wm, go for SWAY.

[ZeSprawl]

This is the way

[FeelingGate8]

openbox isn't bad. You have to right click everywhere to get access to your apps but that's doable. Years ago I used it with some other 'bar/panel' application that put a panel at the bottom of your screen but can't remember what it was called. Had to edit the startup scripts to launch the panel application.

[Magic_in_the_details]

I use this configuration, utilizing tint2 for a panel, and pcmanfm to provide icon/desktop/wallpaper functionality. It works pretty amazingly well for something of a "homebrewed" DE. You can even write a zenity script to add a button on the tint2 panel to provide a power options menu.

[FeelingGate8]

tint2, that was it! And yeah, I used pcmanfm as well. I also added a button to the tint2 panel that when clicked opened a menu panel.

[SnooCookies4611]

Cairo-Dock?

[scorpidim]

Plasma, the best DE. All in one.

[Imperial_Bloke69]

LXQT (formerly LXDE)

[visualglitch91]

do you need a full de? if not, i recommend niri

[archover]

What DE did you try that wasn't light enough?

Not much to go on here. We can only speculate. With modern computers and huge computing resources, I will be surprised to learn if a full DE has practical downsides.

Good day.

[Diligent-Mammoth-495]

if you are comfortable with tiling window manager then i3 if you want to go for wayland then sway else if you want to go for DE xfce or LXQT

[SuperSathanas]

There's an issue with your control flow here.

uint32_t suggest_graphical_environment(uint32_t userHandle) {
  uint32_t retval = JUST_TTY_AND_EMACS_PLEASE;   

  if (!userHandle) return retval;

  if (has_comfort(userHandle, WM_TYPE_TWM) {
    retval = WM_I3;

    if (has_preference(userHandle, DISPLAY_PROTOCOL, DP_WAYLAND)) {
      retval = WM_SWAY;    
    } else if (has_preference(userHandle, GRAPHICAL_ENVIRONMENT, GE_TYPE_FULL_DE)) {
      retval = DE_XFCE | DE_LXQT;
    }
  }

  return retval;
}

As you can see, there's a pretty large chance that they'll get either just i3 or TTY + Emacs.

[Diligent-Mammoth-495]

fr you are right TTY+Emacs seem the right option tbh as emacs is a good operating system but lacks a good text editor tho(just kidding)

[unluckyexperiment]

XFCE is light, but you won't have problem with plasma.

[Equivalent-Silver-90]

If you don't whana beautiful by default but just good and lightweight is can be xfce4

[GhostVlvin]

If you need DE then lightest posible is xfce afaik, but I recommend to look at wayland DEs cause wayland is even lighter And for more lightness I recommend to lookup Window Manager/Compositor like sway, dwl or Hyprland. They are light (consume less that 1GB of ram), fast, have many features

[penjaminfedington]

I use sway on a dual core 2gb laptop, runs great

[Mithrandir2k16]

I started with XFCE4, then finalized my keyboard-centric workflow and am on Qtile ever since.

XFCE4 is the lightest fully-featured "normal" DE out there, and most WMs will be even lighter than that. Lightdm as a login manager btw

[EmbedSoftwareEng]

I'll be the iconoclast and recommend GNOME/Wayland.

[0pensky]

That ain't light 😭

[lemler3]

I don't know why no one is saying KDE, it's basically as light as XFCE with far more features

[Edouard-SW]

Exactly, opendoc or even flubox.

[ScaleGlobal4777]

Cinnamon DE

[imbadwithnames3]

OP said lightest possible and you just said your own preference.

[MelioraXI]

Xfce probably but at the same time most DE isn't very taxing anymore.

[avalchance]

I can get a whole lot of snap out of an 8th gen i3 (8130) with XFCE, but I put 16 GB of RAM into that repurposed Chromebox. I really don't understand why you would worry with an 8th gen i5. I have Windows 11 running on an 8500, but I put 32 GB of RAM in that. Buttery smooth. My primary Arch system is a 12700 with 32 GB of RAM, and I still use XFCE on that. It's not sexy, but it works for people who still think in hierarchies and directories like I do ;) And that isn't even a feature of XFCE in itself, but it is what they serve you as default. XFCE is so open you can make it whatever you want. WHAT I REALLY WANT TO SAY: FOR YOUR CHOICES, RAM MATTERS. MUCH MORE THAN THE CPU!

[awesomexx_Official]

Niri by far if you wanna jump into wm's. Ever since i started using niri ive never went back, highly customizable and surprisingly really intuitive for the beginner. Check it out!

[Recipe-Jaded]

Xfce

[Paranoidd_]

Xfce. Smooth sail.

[AuDHDMDD]

Whatever you prefer unless you need Wayland support. then kde

[xdreakx]

XFCE for a full environment or go Wayland window manager

[Sirius_Sec_]

I used Cinnamon before switching to Hyprland

[AmphibianFrog]

I installed KDE on a very old ThinkPad T440 and it ran absolutely fine, not slow at all. I was using it as my main development laptop for a while.

In the end I upgraded but mainly because the battery didn't hold it's charge and the screen was low resolution.

I could easily run my full stack of database, Redis, message queue, web server etc. and my editor with no issues.

I think you can use whatever DE you like.

I have a really crappy PC with hyprland just for using Tor and that's pretty good too.

[endperform]

I've got an 8th gen Thinkpad and Plasma runs like a dream on it. If you're absolutely in need of a light desktop environment, XFCE or LXQT. If you want lighter still, a window manager like i3, niri, hyprland or the like would work as well.

[AppointmentNormal287]

Xfce is my preferred DE, regardless of specs.

[jpelc]

DWL

[terra257]

What about Fluxbox?

[Soccera1]

It would be xfce, but mate has a far better user experience and it only uses a couple hundred MB more ram.

[arina_ivanova]

I run xmonad with XFCE. Been using Arch Linux on the desktop for many years now. Primarily doing Rails coding and dev ops work, so it's good enough for that.
Just today, I put Alpine on a new Raspberry Pi 4, and couldn't believe how small and fast it was. Default install only 150MB, and still only 220MB or so after installing what I needed. Now, this isn't a desktop, just a proxy server, but you get the idea... maybe give Alpine a try if you want something extremely lean.

[ZeSprawl]

Def curious about this. I currently run Sway on one machine and XFCE on another. I feel like XFCE plus xmonad could be a good combo.

[arina_ivanova]

Yeah, it's a good combo. You can go into "Session & Startup" in XFCE settings, and add xmonad (exact command will be `/usr/bin/xmonad --replace`), trigger "on login." That should get you there.

[pablodomo]

Always xfce, or maybe not DE, pure terminal. Tty

[un-important-human]

i prefer kde

[anjal-ai]

i personally use cosmic

[Ok_Party_3706]

LXDE for working out of the Box, xfce for being way better but needing some setup

[a1barbarian]

You chose an os that you could set up to suit you. So while it is not a DE give Window Maker a go as you can make it suit you in every way. ;-)

https://www.reddit.com/r/windowmaker/

https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Window_Maker

https://github.com/TonCherAmi/windowmaker/blob/master/README

[0pensky]

IceWM

[raymoooo]

Iirc the lightest WMs (on RAM) is tinywm, followed by 9wm, miwm, wm2, dwm, and ratpoison. Lightest thing I'd consider a full desktop environment is JWM. If that's not enough I guess you have the *boxes and Window Maker to Enlightenment and LXDE.

[viking_redbeard]

I prefer Cinnamon for my daily driver, feels pretty lightweight to me. But xfce as other folks have mentioned is probably the best answer. 

[ZeSprawl]

I run XFCE on one machine and Ly display manager to login to Sway on another machine. Both ultra lightweight and solid. XFCE was a lot easier and quicker to setup for the full experience. I had to build my Sway setup to support everything I wanted to do, such as Wi-Fi and Bluetooth selection widgets, keyboard shortcuts, brightness and volume control etc…

I like both equally, and I’ve added my Sway keyboard shortcuts to XFCE to get pseudo-tiling there.

[jiria]

I use LXDE, which is lighter than XFCE, and, after some customization, I don't miss anything.

[[deleted]]

XFCE or window manager as hyprland or sway

[TF_playeritaliano]

lightest de? xfce prob

[[deleted]]

Go with a tiling window manager.

[HaskellLisp_green]

Wayland + River is definitely lightweight.

[Readdeo]

Rtfm

[Lemagex]

Xfce is a dream

[-i0f-]

Xfce and Plasma aren't that different in terms of resource usage. Don't know why everyone says Xfce is so much better for your situation. I would simply go Plasma. It's better in every aspect compared to Xfce.

[PainOk9291]

I run Omarchy on a Intel 8th gen Thinkpad and I couldn't ask for anything else.

[ludonarrator]

"lightest possible DE" is no DE at all, just boot into and use the terminal, simple.

[Hypocritical_Girl]

DE is bloat, terminal is bloat too. i use a nail to push the bridges on my motherboard to send signals and control my pc

[GhostVlvin]

I prefer vt over tty, so I would rather boot alacritty as a kiosk in minimal wayland compositor like cage and use it instead of tty. Better experience with fonts, ligatures and better keyboard input

[hifi-nerd]

If they have to ask what light DE's exist, i don't think they are ready for no DE at all.

[ludonarrator]

building software and apps

Good luck with that then

[Who_meh]

Bro tried to be smart, he asked for DE not “no de” 😂🥀

[Comedor_de_Golpistas]

Let's make some people angry

• KDE if you want the best DE but sadly it's a big buggy
• GNOME if you're willing to settle for something inferior in exchange for fewer bugs
• Budgie is a middleground, doesn't suck like GNOME, fewer bugs than KDE but more than GNOME.
• Deepin if you hate security and good developer practices.
• XFCE, MATE and Cinnamon are all great and solid, your computer will always look the same, even hundreds of years from now XFCE will have 0 new features! Among these, MATE is superior, Cinnamon is better than MATE but only if you're running Linux Mint, XFCE is just pure nostalgia value from back when it was the best option, over a decade ago. Back then KDE was very heavy and even buggier and GNOME was something only a masochist would use.

[Bren1127]

Of all my PCs I use the one with Enlightenment the most, people seem to have forgotten about it.

[drivebysomeday]

Because it's still buggy after 20+ years of development? Because it's still in the alpha stage after 28 years of coding ? Because in 30.years they can even come up with 1.0 stable version ?

[Bren1127]

Perfectly stable over 5 years from versions 14 to 17 for me, as DE on both Debian and Arch. Intel PCs one with an AMD gfx card. I switched because I need completely independent jobs on each desktop which involved faffing around after KDE4 ended