How to remove the other desktops that I don’t use safely? I tried & failed.

[Member anilkagi]

Hello there,

I just wanted to keep Rox-Icewm & SpaceFM-Icewm, and remove all the others. So I went ahead and removed, JWM, Herbstluftwm, & Fluxbox and other packages under those names with the synaptic and rebooted.

However, after reboot even the Rox-Icewm & SpaceFM-Icewm were not available anymore from the menu.

Then I gave the command;

sudo apt install --reinstall desktop-session-antix

as suggested in this thread.

but again all the other DE-FM combos were installed and are showing on the menu, back again.

How can I remove them properly, without creating problems?

Thanks & Regards.

• This topic was modified 2 years, 9 months ago by anilkagi.

[Member sybok]

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I assume you were able to login.
1) To which desktop?
2) Which desktop, if any, were available in the login menu (switching among them by pressing F1)?

I would try to do the following:
A) List the installed packages:
dpkg -l | grep "<desktop>" | grep '^ii', with <desktop> standing for e.g. jwm, fluxbox etc.
B) Write the command to remove them but do not confirm blindly!
sudo apt remove <packages from step A>
See what it outputs, e.g.
The following packages will be REMOVED:
and make sure (by inspecting it) that some additional stuff related to ‘Icewm’ is not removed as well.
C) If OK, then confirm and proceed with the removal.

I would suppose that some other package(s) was(/were) set to be removed.

• This reply was modified 2 years, 9 months ago by sybok. Reason: fix formatting
• This reply was modified 2 years, 9 months ago by sybok. Reason: fix typo

[Member sybok]

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I assume you were able to login.
1) To which desktop?
2) Which desktop, if any, were available in the login menu (switching among them by pressing F1)?

I would try to do the following:
A) List the installed packages:
dpkg -l | grep "<desktop>" | grep '^ii', with <desktop> standing for e.g. jwm, fluxbox etc.
B) Write the command to remove them but do not confirm blindly!
sudo apt remove <packages from step A>
See what it outputs, e.g.
The following packages will be REMOVED:
and make sure (by inspecting it) that some additional stuff related to ‘Icewm’ is not removed as well.
C) If OK, then confirm and proceed with the removal.

I would suppose that some other package(s) was(/were) set to be removed.

PS: I have posted my reply but it did not appear, this is a re-submit attempt (after a logoff and subsequent re-login).

• This reply was modified 2 years, 9 months ago by sybok. Reason: fix typo and a formatting

[Member anilkagi]

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sybok wrote:

Which desktop, if any, were available in the login menu (switching among them by pressing F1)?

Sybok, after uninstalling and rebooting, I did not select any DE-FM from F1. I just went ahead and logged in, assuming that I will be logged in to Rox-Icewm, which I had chosen prior to uninstalling other packages. However, when I logged in and checked the menu, there were no DE-FM entries showing.

After reading your post I went ahead and checked and tried to ascertain which packages I chose to uninstall. I found that I had chosen these following packages;

fluxbox
desktop-defaults-fluxbox-antix
jwm
desktop-defaults-jwm-antix
herbstluftwm
desktop-defaults-hlwm-antix

I am not sure about these two following packages;

fluxbox-themes-antix
menu-jwm-antix

However, in the synaptic interestingly I found that;

fluxbox
desktop-defaults-fluxbox-antix
jwm
desktop-defaults-jwm-antix
herbstluftwm
desktop-defaults-hlwm-antix

are still uninstalled, even though they are showing in the list of ‘Other desktops’ on the menu.

Now I went ahead to check if those entries are working. I selected each one of them. Every time I selected one of those uninstalled DE-FM combos, I got an error saying something like “Cannot login”, and the system automatically logged out. Only the Rox-Icewm & SpaceFM-Icewm entries are working. The others showing there are just mere non-working entries.

• This reply was modified 2 years, 9 months ago by anilkagi.

[Member sybok]

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I see.
This means that a tool providing the login screen is not updated when the initially pre-instaled desktop sessions are removed.

Still, you can select to login into Rox/SpaceFM-Icewm via presing F1 at the login screen.
In my case, it remembers the last used session across shutdowns and reboots, i.e. once you select it, it remains to be used.

The problem is only with some menus.
I am afraid I cannot help with that anymore, too “complex” for me.

[Member anilkagi]

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Sybok, I was logged in to the Rox-Icewm, which I had chosen prior to uninstalling.

After reading your post I went ahead to see if those packages are still uninstalled or installed again, I found that they have been uninstalled, while still they are showing on the menu.

I went ahead to see if those entries are working. I chose all of them to find that they are not working. When I choose the uninstalled ones I get an error saying something like “failed to login” and system logs off.

So those DE-FM entries showing on the menu are mere blank entries which are not working. Now only the Rox-Icewm & SpaceFM-Icewm combos are working. The others are mere blank entries.

Note: I am posting this repeat post, because I don’t find the one I posted earlier.

• This reply was modified 2 years, 9 months ago by anilkagi.

[Moderator BobC]

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Its not that you cannot remove the ones you don’t use, but the problem is that at that point you are customizing the OS to the point where it has a lot of differences from what the Devs created, and as a result, new problems might pop up as the untested permutations are hit. I bet you don’t save more than 30 mb total, and don’t save any memory at all, and cause at least 1 bug to occur, which takes someone hours to figure out. Who will you ask for help when it runs into problems?

If you want to change things, I suggest trying to figure out ways to change them that work within what the Devs created, so things like updates and fixes work normally.

If you really don’t want to do that, create your own respin, based on antiX, or maybe starting from antiX core, and support the code you created.

BTW, this isn’t meant negatively, but rather to get you to think it all through, and suggest what might be better, having done these things before…

[Member Vincent17]

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create your own respin, based on antiX, or maybe starting from antiX core

antiX Core Plus Just Enough X – a recipe

• This reply was modified 2 years, 9 months ago by Vincent17.

[Moderator BobC]

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Vincent probably meant this link…

https://www.antixforum.com/forums/topic/antix-core-plus-just-enough-x-a-recipe/

[Member Vincent17]

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oops! thanks, BobC

[Anonymous]

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but again all the other DE-FM combos were installed and are showing on the menu, back again.

How can I remove them properly, without creating problems?

sudo geany /etc/slim.conf
(can use any text editing application, launched with elevated permissions)

find the line which begins with “sessions ” e.g.
sessions rox-fluxbox,space-fluxbox,fluxbox,fluxbox-min,rox-icewm,space-icewm,icewm,icewm-min...
and remove the references to any unwanted (and/or any now uninstalled) login menu items.

Save the edited /etc/slim.conf file. Logout.
When you arrive at the login screen, the list of available choices will now reflect your edited list.

[Member anilkagi]

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Skidoo, thank you for the suggestions.

I just re-installed the OS and did as you had suggested earlier;

sybok wrote:

I would try to do the following:
A) List the installed packages:
dpkg -l | grep “<desktop>” | grep ‘^ii’, with <desktop> standing for e.g. jwm, fluxbox etc.
B) Write the command to remove them but do not confirm blindly!
sudo apt remove <packages from step A>
See what it outputs, e.g.
The following packages will be REMOVED:
and make sure (by inspecting it) that some additional stuff related to ‘Icewm’ is not removed as well.
C) If OK, then confirm and proceed with the removal.

However, the same thing happened again. When I removed, everything went off. This time there were no DE-FM to show at all. The last time there were some hotch-potch entries. This time it was clean. I rebooted twice. I could boot into the previously selected Rox-Icewm without problems. But there were no entries on the menu.

Now I again installed the DE-FM with;

sudo apt install --reinstall desktop-session-antix

Again all the entries were back in the menu.

Now after that I checked the /etc/slim.conf file. However, there are no sessions listed there as suggested by you. There is one line, which has been hashed out. Here below is the contents of the file;

# Path, X server and arguments (if needed)
# Note: -xauth $authfile is automatically appended
#
default_path        /usr/local/bin:/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/local/games:/usr/games
default_xserver     /usr/bin/X11/X
xserver_arguments   -nolisten tcp -background none

# Commands for halt, login, etc. on live antiX
halt_cmd            /usr/local/bin/persist-config --shutdown --command halt 
reboot_cmd          /usr/local/bin/persist-config --shutdown --command reboot 
# Commands for halt, login, etc. on installed antiX
#halt_cmd            sudo halt 
#reboot_cmd        sudo reboot 
console_cmd         /usr/bin/urxvt -C -fg white -bg black +sb -T "Console login" -e /bin/sh -c "/bin/cat /etc/issue.net; exec /bin/login"
#suspend_cmd        /usr/sbin/suspend

# Full path to the xauth binary
xauth_path         /usr/bin/X11/xauth

# Xauth file for server
authfile           /var/run/slim.auth

# Activate numlock when slim starts. Valid values: on|off
# numlock             on

# Hide the mouse cursor (note: does not work with some WMs).
# Valid values: true|false
# hidecursor          false

# This command is executed after a succesful login.
# you can place the %session and %theme variables
# to handle launching of specific commands in .xinitrc
# depending of chosen session and slim theme
#
# NOTE: if your system does not have bash you need
# to adjust the command according to your preferred shell,
# i.e. not using desktop-session-antix:
#login_cmd         exec /bin/bash -login /etc/X11/Xsession %session 
#################OLD COMMAND####################
# login_cmd         exec /bin/bash -login ~/.xinitrc %session >~/.xsession-errors$DISPLAY 2>&1
################################################
#LOGIN COMMAND FOR DESKTOP SESSION BELOW#
#############################################################################################
login_cmd   setsid /usr/local/bin/desktop-session %session
#############################################################################################

# login_cmd exec dbus-launch /bin/bash -login ~/.xinitrc %session >~/.xsession-errors 2>&1

# Commands executed when starting and exiting a session.
# They can be used for registering a X11 session with
# sessreg. You can use the %user variable
#
# sessionstart_cmd	some command
# sessionstop_cmd	some command

# Start in daemon mode. Valid values: yes | no
# Note that this can be overriden by the command line
# options "-d" and "-nodaemon"
# daemon	yes

# Available sessions (first one is the default).
# The current chosen session name is replaced in the login_cmd
# above, so your login command can handle different sessions.
# see the xinitrc.sample file shipped with slim sources
#sessions rox-fluxbox,space-fluxbox,fluxbox,rox-icewm,space-icewm,icewm,rox-jwm,space-jwm,jwm,herbstluftwm
sessiondir /usr/share/xsessions

# Executed when pressing F11 (requires scrot)
screenshot_cmd      scrot /root/slim.png

# welcome message. Available variables: %host, %domain
welcome_msg         (Press F1 to toggle sessions)

# Session message. Prepended to the session name when pressing F1
# session_msg         Session: 

# shutdown / reboot messages
shutdown_msg 	The system is shutting down...
reboot_msg 		The system is rebooting...

# Focus the password field on start when #default_user is set
# Set to "yes" to enable this feature
#focus_password      no

# Automatically login the default user (without entering
# the password. Set to "yes" to enable this feature
#auto_login          yes

# default user, leave blank or remove this line
# for avoid pre-loading the username.
#default_user        XX

# current theme, use comma separated list to specify a set to 
# randomly choose from
current_theme 	BlueLines
#current_theme 	BlueLinesLight
#current_theme 	antiXIce
#current_theme 	DarkCity
#current_theme 	PrettyPink
#current_theme 	SunnyDay

# Lock file
lockfile            /var/run/slim.lock

# Log file
logfile             /var/log/slim.log

Thanks for your efforts, Skidoo.

[Anonymous]

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#sessions rox-fluxbox,space-fluxbox,fluxbox,rox-icewm,space-icewm,icewm,rox-jwm,space-jwm,jwm,herbstluftwm
sessiondir /usr/share/xsessions

Sorry, I posted outdated info. I am not using the newest antiX version. I’ll suggest the following:
Browse the contents of the directory /usr/share/xsessions/
If you find multiple files therein, one each for icewm-rox and icewm and space-fluxbox and and fluxbox… delete the files associated with each of the unwanted sessions. If that directory contains only a single (.conf?) file, edit the file to remove references to any unwanted sessions (login menu items).

[Member anilkagi]

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Skidoo, I checked the directory, /usr/share/xsessions/, the files there, are only the ones I chose to keep. There aren’t any other files related to the DE-FM combo that I removed. The ones that can be seen there now are;

icewm.desktop
icewm-session.desktop.distrib
min-icewm.desktop
rox-icewm.desktop
space-icewm.desktop

Here below is the screenshot of the dir /usr/share/xsessions/;

• This reply was modified 2 years, 9 months ago by anilkagi.

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[Moderator BobC]

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So do you see now that every time anticapitalista publishes updates, which generally you should want him to do, and want to install, to be able to keep up to date with the newest features and fixes and security updates, that you will need to go through those updates to make sure they won’t break any of your changes, and that none of your changes will cause problems for the changes, either.

So basically it will be a hassle for you, whenever you install minor updates, and then if there are major updates you will need to put in more effort to reimplement it.

BTW, there probably will be times you will be very grateful to have those other desktops when you make a mistake and the IceWM desktops don’t work as a result, because you can temporarily switch to JWM or FluxBox, get in and fix the IceWM problem, and then switch it back. Obviously, that has happened to me.

I’ll go away and leave you guys to your fun.

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