Latest IceWM 1.8.1 available

[Forum Admin anticapitalista]

For those using testing or sid repos, there is an automatic upgrade the the very latest IceWM version (1.8.1), which is not even in Debian sid yet.

If you want to test this out on buster/stable antiX-19 series, add dev to the antiX sources list and do

sudo apt update && sudo apt dist-upgrade

I have been running it on antiX stable for 3 days without issue. YMMV.

Philosophers have interpreted the world in many ways; the point is to change it.

antiX with runit - leaner and meaner.

[Member Xecure]

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Thanks, anticapitalista.

For anyone curious, these are the changes since 1.6.6

Release icewm-1.7.0
New preference KeyboardLayouts for switching of keyboards layouts.
Fix move menu and layer menu for selections in window list window.
Don’t take away focus from an application when icewm exits.
On startup check _NET_ACTIVE_WINDOW and use it to preserve focus over restarts.
Set _NET_ACTIVE_WINDOW to None when no window has focus.
Better restore focus to window in Above layer when some other window closes.
New winoption ignoreActivationMessages to ignore programmatic focus requests.
Fix for taskBarWidthPercentage in case screen is not at (0, 0).
Use wordexp to avoid a /bin/sh.
Fix #21 “Problem with dosbox and re-maximize the screen”.
Add Maximize Horizontal to window list window.
Refresh frames and buttons after screen resize to prevent artefacts.
Add detailed tracing of systray activity.
Slightly better conformance to XEMBED standard.
Reorder systray operations for better test results.
Only refocus in setWorkspace if workspace really changes.
Reset workspace focused frame if focused frame changes workspace.
Fix for negative geometry positions in winoptions.
Fix icesh runonce.
Fix for icewm –replace.
Fix icewm hint processing and make icewmhint geometry work.
Let icehelp be quiet when parsing html.
Update theme NanoBlue from Nano_Blu-1.3 to evade a bug in Glamor.

Release icewm-1.8.0
Let workspacebutton use the workspace button fonts when drawing text.
Don’t switch focus on a FocusOut event on the root window.
Prevent the pingponging of focus between windows when one window loses focus.
Improved support of applications with transient windows.
In the window list window, improve the Show command to consider work area and screen boundaries.
Give message buttons some padding and a minimum size.
Fix the saving of modified options to preferences.
Fix opacity in titlebar and task buttons when using gradients.
Fix status of logout entry in the logout menu.
New theme option MenuButtonIconVertOffset to adjust the position of the menu button icon in case ShowMenuButtonIcon=1.
Improved ICCCM conformance for restack requests of transient windows.
Several improvements to the CrystalBlue theme.
Update theme NanoBlue.
Change xterm.icon into xterm.XTerm.icon in the default winoptions.
More beautiful MiniIcons show just a large shaped icon if MinimizeToDesktop=1.
Improved positioning of MiniIcons when the work area grows or shrinks.
Enable Arrange Icons in taskbar menu to rearrange all desktop MiniIcons.
Add a tooltip to MiniIcons which reflects the window title.
Enable dragging MiniIcons with the left mouse button.
Ensure icons of irregular sizes are always scaled or loaded.
Fix the –logevents option.
Update the frame status in the move menu and the layer menu before showing them.
Improved Chinese translation by WhiredPlanck.
Rename comments from APM monitor to battery monitor by DieSpinne.
Efficiency improvements to the relocation of frames when the workarea changes.
Better positioning of collapse button to avoid a white line at the bottom of the taskbar.
A completely rewritten icon locator by Eduard Bloch which finds many more icons.
A new option IconThemes by Eduard Bloch to set your icon theme preferences.
Handle more detail in configure request messages.
Avoid focusing a random client when a request to stack a client below is received.
Update _NET_CLIENT_LIST_STACKING on a configure request to restack a window.
Detect when the top side of the title bar border is partially transparent for improved positioning.
More updated translations.
Exclude the collapsed taskbar button from workarea calculations.
Update workspace buttons when workspace names change.
Show a sticky window just once on all PagerShowPreview workspace buttons.
Make button hover work after a click-cancel for issue #448.
Fix for correctly computing the X shape mask of shaped titlebars.
Fix for updating titlebar shape when title changes.
Prevent the delayed focus timer or autoraise timer from interfering when a frame is minimized, iconified or rolled up.
Don’t set the _NET_WM_STATE_FOCUSED flag when mimimized, hidden or rolledup.
Set the WM_ICON_SIZE root window property according to theme icon sizes.
Add sys/resource.h include for FreeBSD for issue #445.
Add definition of ACPIDEV to fix compilation for FreeBSD.

Release icewm-1.8.1
Fix path_lookup strtok_r for non-Glibc BSD systems for #23.
Fix topSideVerticalOffset for fully opaque frame borders for #482.
Fix the FreeBSD case where icewm-session is started in the root directory by the display manager.
Prevent premature workarea changes when collapsing taskbar to avoid repositioning MiniIcons.
Fix the default KeySysArrangeIcons key binding to Alt+Shift+F8.
Only define KeySysArrangeIcons if preference MinimizeToDesktop=1.
Add KeyWinSmartPlace to preferences.
Remove undocumented KeyWinSnapMove.
Portability changes for OpenBSD.
Prevent cyclic dependencies for transient windows.
Also let icesh spy on ClientMessages.

antiX Live system enthusiast.
General Live Boot Parameters for antiX.

[Member ModdIt]

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Thanks anticapitalista,

Looks good, one minor issue to now.

We have right click menu 🙂 in ICEWM (new users Please note)

so I could switch off autohide, function is broken by the update on my install.
Fixed bar at bottom is fine.

My Theme is ThinIce in case that might be part of the issue. Hope not, it wins a bit more
space in applications.

• This reply was modified 2 years, 8 months ago by ModdIt.

[Member oops]

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Thanks anticapitalista,

For those using testing or sid repos, there is an automatic upgrade the the very latest IceWM version (1.8.1), which is not even in Debian sid yet.
If you want to test this out on buster/stable antiX-19 series, add dev to the antiX sources list and do

Fast and good to know to have the category dev , to have this latest icewm version.

[Moderator BobC]

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I will play with it on antiX 19.2, too.

PS: Thanks for making it available. If you want help with anything on it, let me know.

• This reply was modified 2 years, 8 months ago by BobC.

[Member ModdIt]

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Hallo bobc, please see if autohide works for you. Maybe I am missing something,
better to have a second person check before bug submission.

[Moderator BobC]

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Yes, I’ll give it a try today or tomorrow and let you know if I have trouble as well. There were problems with autohide when double height was turned on at one point in the past year or so, so that tells you it isn’t something the testers are using every day.

[Member oops]

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FI: I also have an issue with autohide … then, black TaskBar and I have to click on it to see the icons again.
(antiX19 x32 buster, not runit ver)

[Member ModdIt]

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After messing with Icewm settings I now have black bar same as oops, click and the icons show.

Why autohide is not so often used I will never understand, taskbar always showing is a waste of
screen space.

[Moderator BobC]

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I got resistance to my default autohide setup from the Windows convert newbies, and had to turn it off for them. Many normal people are scared of the unknown until they are used to things, I think. Eventually, I think they will come to the realization that they have effectively lost that screen space as you and I have. The nicest thing is that using it allows me to have all of the icons for things I use a lot right there on the taskbar instead of needing to hunt for them on the menus.

A “nice to have” would be if there was a way the windows manager would remember what menu options were used and have the ability to dynamically add the icons for ones recently used onto the taskbar, and maybe they could also be pinned or locked there. I guess the logic for the 2 pieces for that would be tricky. Luckily its not that hard to maintain anymore, so I guess its less important now.

[Member ModdIt]

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Next Problem.
Plugin a usb stick, automount works but no file manager window opens. Click file manager
it opens with a delay of several seconds along with the missing window showing stick content.
Same goes for some other mass storage devices i have at hand.

After letting Claws update IMAP directories, automount is as expected and rox filer window
comes up as usual. Must be some changes in the startup causing that.

I am considering “upgrading” to the previous version unless a quick fix comes up as enough headeaches
right now without this one.

Startup log shows following:
icewm-session: Warning: Failed to execute icewmbg: No such file or directory
IceWM: Warnung: Deprecated option: sizeMaximized == true
desktop-session: Window manager running or setup forced, setting up desktop @ 27491
desktop-session: Delaying session startup by 2 seconds
desktop-session: run: desktop-session-wallpaper
desktop-session: Destination file is newer than the Source file.

Further down I have this:
Version : 2.2

multiple keyboards found

** (claws-mail:2711): WARNING **: 08:48:45.691: [2020-09-06 08:48:45] IMAP-Fehler auf imap.gmx.net: LOGIN-Fehler

Conky: forked to background, pid is 2817
desktop-session: run: xset +dpms

Conky: desktop window (db) is root window
Conky: window type – desktop
Conky: drawing to created window (0x1800001)
Conky: drawing to double buffer
desktop-session: run: xset s on
automount is :TRUE
FM_USB is : TRUE
FM_OPTICAL is: TRUE
VP_DVD is : TRUE
DVD_COMMAND is : vlc dvd:///dev/sr0
MP_AUDIO is : TRUE
AUDIO_COMMAND is : /usr/bin/vlc cdda:///dev/sr0
OPTION_USB is –exec-on-drive ‘desktop-defaults-run -fm “%d”‘
OPTION_OPTICAL is –exec-on-disc ‘desktop-defaults-run -fm “%d”‘
desktop-session: run: wmctrl -F -r Conky (moddit1) -b add,below
desktop-session: run: xset s expose
desktop-session: run: xset dpms 3600 3600 3600 s 3600 3600

** (claws-mail:2711): WARNING **: 08:48:46.966: [2020-09-06 08:48:46] IMAP-Fehler auf imap.web.de: LOGIN-Fehler

** (claws-mail:2711): WARNING **: 08:48:47.063: [2020-09-06 08:48:47] IMAP-Fehler auf imap.web.de: LOGIN-Fehler

/home/heri/.claws-mail/mimetmp/claws.UNFVQ0: fread: Die Ressource ist zur Zeit nicht verfügbar
/home/heri/.claws-mail/mimetmp/claws.UNFVQ0: fread: Die Ressource ist zur Zeit nicht verfügbar
/usr/local/lib/antiX/antiX-common.sh: Zeile 946: cryptsetup: Kommando nicht gefunden.
desktop-defaults-run -fm –follow
rox-filer
desktop-defaults-run -fm –follow
rox-filer
desktop-defaults-run -fm –follow
rox-filer

At times the earlier version showed popup windows when the mailservers were slow to answer, now no popup
and errors in Logfile.

@ BobC,
on nice to have
I wanted to trim the menu to recently used with a show all button in case needed. i hid a lot of
entrys, that caused user queries.
Now same as you I have a (standard) set of icons in the pop up bar for all.
Some apps autostarting to set desktops with window at predermined size, ready to work.

I stopped pampering users, after a few days with Icewm they are no longer moaning.
The curativ medicine for griping comes when they boot in to win 10 and the computer runs at slug speed.
Even MX with the standard WM feels less responsive on same hardware.

• This reply was modified 2 years, 8 months ago by ModdIt. Reason: Use same post add buggy behaviour

[Moderator BobC]

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LOL, your Win/10 solution for griping. I know what you mean. Even on my fastest machine Win/10 is a 10 minute boot, and just as bad shutting down. It’s utterly obnoxious with all the wait don’t turn it off messages. It makes me crazy every time I boot it. I’ve removed the virus scanner I had added, but that didn’t solve it, either. I suppose their answer would be that I should buy a faster machine, but it is a 3 year old top of the line Dell I7 with 16 gb of high speed ram running from a super fast SSD.

Anyway, back to IceWM 1.8.1, yes, autohide turned on results in a black bar popping up at the bottom when the taskbar should have popped up. Turning on double height results in a double height black bar. This was tested on an Alien I7 laptop running from USB with a fresh remastered antiX 19.2 x64 full, completely up to date via apt, no other changes at all except replacing IceWM via Synaptic.

[Member ModdIt]

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BobC,
thanks for checking, some time ago you wrote in a post that you have contact with Ice dev,
would it be possible for you to notify the issue with taskbar. I would need to register on Git to post
a bug report. I get dizzy already with all the sites i have registered on, its a plague.

3 year old top of the line Dell I7 with 16 gb of high speed ram running from a super fast SSD.

That is irresponsible, Far too old, give it me for immediate disposal, how dare you use junk like that.

More seriously win 7 is sort of ok, Only time I boot windows is to update my Car diagnosis Computer.

[Moderator BobC]

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A few thoughts on the idea of dynamically generated toolbar entries…

If the system would remember each program executed via toolbar icon or menu (app-select would be good, too).

The default could be that all desktop entries would be eligible for toolbar inclusion unless an exclusion were entered (could be on the desktop entry or in a toolbar-exclude config file).

Entries in the toolbar file would be considered as required to include, where you always want the entry to appear.

Icons would appear on the list starting with the required to include entries in sequence as entered, followed by dynamic entries in sequence by frequency of recent use.

The dynamic entry recalculation could be based on an alpha factor weighted average that would give preference to apps with more recent use, and be run automatically after toolbar maintenance, after menu maintenance, via cron daily, or on demand. I don’t think you would want it to rebuild and restart IceWM to display the new toolbar after each program was called because it would slow things too much, but that would be possible if it was just redisplaying the toolbar and not distracting.

The remaining slots could then be allocated to the most commonly used menu entries not already on the toolbar based on icon space left available.

Sorry, I’m not capable of programming this…

• This reply was modified 2 years, 8 months ago by BobC.
• This reply was modified 2 years, 8 months ago by BobC. Reason: simpler more backward compatible logic with toolbar-exclude config file

[Moderator BobC]

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I added an issue for IceWM on Github

https://github.com/bbidulock/icewm/issues/489

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