A comparison of four window managers

Judging from the search engine terms that show up in my WordPress dashboard, a lot of the visitors to this blog are searching for a comparison between either Fluxbox and Openbox, Openbox and Pekwm, or Pekwm and Openbox (search terms such as Pekwm vs. Openbox, or Openbox vs. Fluxbox are rather common).

To satisfy the desires of my dear readers, and to help those who want to know more about some window managers, I have therefore created the following table comparing four very popular window managers (or three very popular ones and one that I happen to like a lot :-)): Icewm, Fluxbox, Openbox and Pekwm.

Icewm, Fluxbox and Openbox have a wide user basis, and a very loyal following. Pekwm is a lesser known window manager that deserves more attention. I mainly use Openbox and Pekwm, and occasionally Icewm.

Please note that this table is not an indication of the most versatile, most developed or ‘best’ window manager. If a window manager lacks a feature, it may have some different strengths. Openbox, for example, does not support pixmap themes, but its theme options are the most complex and elaborate theme options of these four window managers (which makes creating themes for Openbox so much more fun!). Some features may also be primitively implemented: Pekwm supports dockapps, for instance, but its harbour is not very well developed. Nor does this chart provide an exhaustive list of features for these window manager. Icewm, for example, has a number of unique features that are not mentioned in this table (such as an email indicator and some system monitoring tools for the taskbar), and a lot of the basic features of window managers are left out.

I created the table so you could easily find out what each window manager can or cannot do. Choose whichever window manager you like best. Using one over the other doesn’t make you superior. 🙂

There is a reasonable possibility that this table contains some errors. If you find any, please let me know. If I can think of more categories, I’ll add those later.

	Icewm	Fluxbox	Openbox	Pekwm
First release	1997	2001?	2002	200?
Last stable release	1.2.34 (27-12-2007)	1.0.0 (08-10-2007)	3.4.7 (17-04-2008 )	0.1.6 (28-05-2007)
Language	C++	C++	C	C++
Based on	—	Blackbox	originally Blackbox	originally aewm++
EWMH standards	partial	partial	yes	partial
Panel	yes	yes	no	no
Support for dockapps	no	yes (slit)	yes (dock)	yes (harbour)
Native wallpaper support	yes	yes	no	no
Alt-tab dialog	yes (vertically and horizontally!)	no	yes	yes
Command dialog	yes (in taskbar)	yes (fbrun)	no	yes
Xinerama support	yes	yes	yes	yes
Native (fake) transparency	no	yes	no	no
Pixmap themes	yes	yes	no	yes
Multiple workspaces	yes	yes	yes	yes
Viewports	no	no	no	yes
Add/remove workspaces	no	no	yes	no
Usable screen edges	no	no	no (in git version)	yes
Strut support	no	no	yes	no
Right-click desktop menu	yes	yes	yes	yes
Configurable client menus	no	no	no	yes
Keyboard shortcuts in menus	yes	yes	yes	no
Dynamic menus	no	yes	yes (pipe-menus)	yes
Additional custom menus	no	yes	yes	yes
Icons in menus	yes	yes	only in client-list-menus	no (only in client-list-menu of git version)
Grouping/Tabbing of windows	no	yes	no	yes
Opaque moving/resizing	yes	yes	only resizing	yes
Minimize window to tray	yes	no	no	no
Hide windows	yes	no	no	no
Tiling	yes (vertically and horizontally)	no	no (GrowTo… actions)	no (‘MaxFill’ actions)
Per-app settings	yes	only grouping	yes	yes
Configurable key bindings	yes	yes	yes	yes
Chainable keygrabber	no	yes	yes	yes
Configurable mouse behaviour	Some in the preferences file	yes (in keys file)	yes	yes
Session management/ Autostarting applications	yes	yes	yes	yes
Confirm logout	yes	no	yes (3.4.7)	no
Shutdown/reboot control	no	no	yes (3.4.7)	no
Graphical configuration tools	plenty	Fluxconf, Fluxmenu	Obconf, Obmenu	no

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