Last couple of months, NsCDE is in the “release candidate” stage of versioning. 1.0rc18 is the latest.
Soon, in a few days maybe, NsCDE 1.0rc20 will be released under releases tab on github. It will contain graphical color modificator for color themes in a Color Style Manager, localization support, Font Style Manager rewritten almost from scratch, floating graphical pager positioning improvements and some fixes.
Not so Common Desktop Environment - NsCDE 1.0rc21 is out.
It can be downloaded on GitHub.
Some major improvements, fixes and documentation update. This should be considered 1.0 (or maybe I will name it 1.1) without “rc”.
It is intended to be used with FVWM 2.6.7 - 2.6.9 or newer from 2.6 major branch of FVWM.
It can be used experimentally with a few glitches also with FVWM3, which is still in development, but once authors make it’s design known for final release, NsCDE will for sure support it and make use of it’s new features.
Here is the changelog:
Thanks a lot!
Nscde looks great on my netbook. Its fast and my fav openTTD feels at home with it.
NsCDE 1.0rc24 is released.
NsCDE 1.0rc24 (pre)release notes
Two and half months after 1.0rc22 prerelease, new release candidate again has
extended functionality of the NsCDE. There will be no more new functionalities
before 1.1 release, just couple of months for fixing and polishing existing
code. NsCDE 1.1 (1.0 was actually long ago), will be released probably in
december, on the day when all started 2 years ago.
Here are the highlights of what has changed and what is added between 1.0rc22
and 1.0rc24
NProcMgr: NsCDE Process Manager: application which shows NsCDE FVWM and
other processes, their pids and running/presence state. Processes can be
started, stopped and restarted. It also has capabilities for rereading
various parts of the configuration: Menus, Functions, Style, Keybindings
etc. NsCDE Process Manager is present by default on the Desktop Settings
submenu (7) of the Front Panel, but it can also be found on the Workspace
Menu NsCDE submenu, as well as from Watch Errors and Fvwm Console contextual
part of the Window Options Menu.
GeometryMgr: Before 1.0rc22, “Save Geometry” option on the Window Options
Menu or Meta+F6 directly called function which saved current window
geometry, so windows will be positioned and sized on exact geometry
coordinates next time when they appear on the page and workspace for the
first time, or with “Reposition Window” option of the Window Options Menu.
Needles to say, this option was easy to catch with mouse by mistake, and
even more with key binding.
New FvwmScript application brings dialog with window class and resource
names, and exact coordinates when Save Geometry is called, plus info about
previous remembered pixel size and position if any. Here, user can inspect,
tune, cancel or confirm that new saving. Clearing all values and choosing
save clears that and any before existing geometry mapping for that screen
resolution.
Custom Front Panel Launchers: from the beginning until now, Front Panel
had fixed number of launchers (big icon or applet plus optional submenu)
on the left and right side of the Workspace Manager. Now, with a usage of
Front Panel Controls menu and it’s “Number of Launchers …” submenu, user
can reduce to 0, or extend to 20 number of launchers. As in CDE, default
is 10 launchers (5 left, and 5 right), which gives 10. This can be doubled
or reduced to 4, 3, 2, 1 or no launchers at all. This allows user to make
configurations with Workspace Manager leftmost or rightmost on the Front
Panel, to make minimal only Workspace Manager plus handlers Front Panel
without launchers, or to make really wide Front Panels with 18, 19 and
with maximum 20 launchers (screen resolution must support such stretching
of the Front Panel). All new custom launchers can be customized to contain
icons or applets, to have or not subpanels.
Wide or Eco Workspace Manager: together with custom launchers on the Front
Panel, Workspace Manager (WSM) now by default has fixed width of workspace
buttons. This means that shrinking workspace to 2 workspaces will shrink
Front Panel, and expanding workspaces to 6 or 8 will expand it. This is
in contrast to fixed WSM on which until now the buttons themselves where
shrinked (6, 8) or expanded (2), but WSM frame remained of the same width.
New behaviour is in sync with visual CDE behaviour and gives a chance for
wider workspace names in 6 or 8 workspaces mode. Old fixed width WSM can
be used if InfoStore variable wsm.eco is defined and set to 1 in
$FVWM_USERDIR/NsCDE.conf
Splash screen: NsCDE has now splash screen on startup. It displays logo,
information about system on which it is running, NsCDE and FVWM version,
licence and such. It lasts some 6 seconds on start, but can be speed up
with Control+C or by clicking on the text.
Show Workspace functionality: called by the Root Menu as “Clean/Restore
Workspace”, by Ctrl + Left click on the root window and with Meta+Alt+W
keybinding. It will iconify all windows on the page or restore them on
subsequent calls. Already iconified windows prior to calling this function,
as well as newly opened windows on the page will not be affected by this
group iconify / deiconify (show desktop) action. During this action, any
animation which may be configured with Window Style Manager for FvwmAnimate
will be temporary disabled to avoid long dance on the screen if there are
many windows on it.
New keybindings:
Dunst support: A nice FVWM-friendly notification daemon dunst(1) is probably
the best choice for custom DE environments and classis Window Managers. It
is now tightly integrated with NsCDE in the same was as stalonetray: it can
be enabled or disabled with InfoStore variable nscde_use_dunst 0/1 in user’s
$FVWM_USERDIR/NsCDE.conf. Configuration is provided and partially managed
(Color Style Manager and Font Style Manager) by the NsCDE as
$FVWM_USERDIR/Dunst.conf
This means that handling of dunst(1) and stalonetray(1) can be removed from
$FVWM_USERDIR/libexec/colormgr.local, because this is now handled
internally.
New Palettes and Backdrops:
Merge of the VUE Palettes and Backdrops: there is no need to install this as
addon. It is merged with other palettes and backdrops, because it is fully
compatible, no matter that this comes from pre-CDE era.
New finder for Audio Volume Control application: gives it’s best to find
working audio mixer app on the subpanel of launcher 9 on the Front Panel.
Installer.ksh: support staged installation (for packaging) with -D
Fix possible indefinite Wait in share/templates/NsCDE-Functions.local sample
Fix WSM truncating WSM.conf bug after initial creation before first restart
Style fixes for Gkrellm, Sysinfo, menus etc …
Removed xscreensaver splash
Iconify Event function fix when PipeRead gets dash(1) shell on Debian, which is
aliased to /bin/sh (called by the system()) users will not have ‘=’ and ‘60’ empty
files in their homedir anymore.
Better error handling for sysinfo.py (Workstation Information)
Python syntax fixes (warnings noticed on Debian)
Major works on higher DPI corrections for font handling
Localization fixes
Fix Splash Screen under fvwm3 (hopefully) on multi display
Fixes for monitor enumeration, preparations for FVWM3 support
Fix default Front Panel Iconified IconBox position not to overlap stalonetray
Stop using FvwmBanner (removed in FVWM3) - we have Splash now
Removed Black.dp, BlackWhite.dp and White.dp obsolete nonworking palettes
Documentation revision and update, new sections and corrections
Consolidated Delete/Close/Destroy Window Options menu actions
Front Panel Controls menu consolidation and help
Add Solaris Earth Watch icon in the icon set, document example how to use it
on the Front Panel as a custom applet.
Init and setup procedure polishing
Also, on the Github wiki page, there is FAQ, link to videos and work in progress to make usefull snippets of advices, solutions and such quick documents for faster problem resolving or start.
NsCDE 1.0rc25 is out
Basically rc24, but with important installer fix.
https://github.com/NsCDE/NsCDE/releases/download/1.0rc25/NsCDE-1.0rc25.tar.gz
Release Notes:
NsCDE 1.0rc25 release
Fix nasty stopper in Installer.ksh which misconfigures NSCDE_ROOT in interactive setup.
Reworked the way “Version” builtin variable is used in FVWM configuration, it will go
away in FVWM3.
Added checks on the basis FVWM_IS_FVWM3 environmnent variable to functions,
Sysinfo and Splash. This is not yet full FVWM3 support.