Replace the existing start-up-menu with Whisker

[Member alnasique]

Hello, has anybody managed to replace the existing Antix start-up-menu,which is totally human-unfreandly, with Whisker? I ran ‘sudo apt install xfce4-whiskermenu-plugin’, it did install, but nothing changed, probably it needs configuring(?)
I followed this manual, but could not find panels shown in the tutorial.

https://www.pragmaticlinux.com/2021/03/install-and-configure-the-whisker-menu-as-your-xfce-start-menu/

[Member Xecure]

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antiX Linux doesn’t use Xfce (I don’t know where you read it does), so you cannot replace the default icewm menu with the whisker menu.
If you want the whisker menu, you either:
A) Install xfce and boot into this desktop, and then install and replace the menu with the whisker menu.
B) Use a different panel (like tint2) and disable the icewm panel, add the panel to startup, link the Menu button of the panel to the whisker menu and use it that way.
There are alternatives to the whisker menu, for example jgmenu, so it is up to you to choose what you want.

• This reply was modified 1 year, 11 months ago by Xecure. Reason: fixing typos

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

[Member alnasique]

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I’ve always thought it was an XFCE desktop, and the advice to replace the menu with whisker came from the The neighboring Mxforum. Anyways, thanks for the advice, to me it’s easier to install an alternative whisker-like menus, which are..?

[Member alnasique]

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I forgot to mention: would be great to find a lightweight menu with Built in search feature

[Member manyroads]

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If you want to use whiskermenu you need to run it from xfce4-panel. If you want something more agnostic, try tint2. You can view that over on MXLinux.

Pax vobiscum,
Mark Rabideau - http://many-roads.com
"For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong." H. L. Mencken
dwm & i3wm ~Reg. Linux User #449130
20 Jan 2021 ~ "End of an Error"

[Member Xecure]

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It seems I was wrong. You can add whisker menu to icewm toolbar. You just need to add a desktop launcher using Icewm Toolbar Icon Manager (Menu > Applications > antiX > Icewm Toolbar Icon Manager) and place it on the left (the launcher for whisker menu should be in /usr/share/xfce4/panel/plugins/whiskermenu.desktop). You can use whatever menu you want. xfce4-appfinder, whiskermenu, jgmenu (search for images of what can be possible with each). Test that the button works.
Then, remove the Menu button editing the preferences file (Control Centre > Edit Icewm settings > Preferences tab). Search for
TaskBarShowStartMenu=1 # 0/1
and make it equal to 0
TaskBarShowStartMenu=0 # 0/1
Restart icewm, or log out and log in, and the menu button will be gone.

Note: The “Windows” key (meta key) will still launch the icewm menu, so you can either change the behavior of the key in ~/,icewm/keys (or maybe in preferences) or leave it as is for when you want to use that menu.

EDIT: This is one of the treads manyroads is talking about: https://forum.mxlinux.org/viewtopic.php?t=51154

• This reply was modified 1 year, 11 months ago by Xecure.

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

[Forum Admin anticapitalista]

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alnasique wrote:

Hello, has anybody managed to replace the existing Antix start-up-menu,which is totally human-unfreandly, with Whisker?

I’ll bite.
In what way is it ‘TOTALLY human-unfriendly’?

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

antiX with runit - leaner and meaner.

[Anonymous]

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https://www.amazon.com/My-Butt-NOISY-Dawn-McMillan/dp/0486847314

[Moderator Brian Masinick]

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@alnasique: Since you made the comment, please answer anticapitalista re the comment:

“Hello, has anybody managed to replace the existing Antix start-up-menu, which is totally human-unfreandly, with Whisker?

What is “totally human-unfriendly” ?

--
Brian Masinick

[Anonymous]

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[Member seaken64]

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I’m partial to the IceWM menu myself. And I’m a human.

Seaken64

[Member ile]

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hello alnasique
Package <exo-utils> for editing menu plug-in in xfce4-panel. (?)

[Moderator Brian Masinick]

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seaken64 wrote:

I’m partial to the IceWM menu myself. And I’m a human.

Seaken64

We have not seen any further explanation for the comments from the original author. Unless the comments are explained in a way that allows the development team to assess whether there is any reason to respond or change anything I suggest that the work proceed as planned.

Several practical suggestions have been made for a somewhat cleaner menu structure; those comments have some merit, but again it’s still a development decision.

--
Brian Masinick

[Member PPC]

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alnasique wrote:

replace the existing Antix start-up-menu,which is totally human-unfreandly

I have to be honest, when I came to antiX, a few years ago, I had moved from Windows XP/7 to Mint and stayed with mint for several years, with my computers aging slowly until I decided I needed something that made better use of my hardware- I tried Xubuntu, Lubuntu, Bodhi (that’s really nice and almost as light as antiX), Stayed with MX for some years, jumped ship to antiX.- I tried some tiny distros like slitaz and puppy too, but they always seems like they don’t provide a full computing experience…

antiX has by far the best performance of any (all porpoise) distro I tested on very old hardware (second place is probably Bodhi) but it was, out of the box, by far, the ugliest! Since I began using antiX it improved a lot, both in making life simpler for the average computer user and also by looking much better- the single point that has remained almost untouched was the “start-up-menu”. In my then newbie eyes it had a bit too much going on, it was organized in a way that looked strange to me and lacked search functionality…

Since those days, antiX got the excellent “app-select” that allow the user to search apps by name or description- and it got into the menu. Yes!
But in my option, it should have been placed right in the very first line of the desktop start menus- it’s the first place a user expects to see a place to search for apps…
IceWM’s menu got changed and now occupy only a single menu line. Yes! Again, an improvement
A much needed feature (recent files) got added to the menu- nice…
But, even now, looking at the current menu with my slightly more experienced Linux eyes… It seems too big, with features I don’t use and most people probably don’t use: like “help” and the “refresh menu” option that I never understood how it got placed there, because, well, it did not fresh the first layer of the menu…
I never understood why there was a separator in the first lines that display the more “important” apps…
I got used to the menu then, a few months after I started using antiX, began experimenting with changing it, making it more suitable to my tastes.
Right now, my customized fluxbox menu, does not look, at all, less impressive to me than any other full blown Desktop Environment- but I took the time to learn how to change the menu, how to change almost anything I wanted in antiX.

Conclusion:
I understand how our default menu may look a bit too geeky- it has no inbuilt search function, no “special” place for the log off button (like on the side, on the top right, etc). And if an user starts with antiX without exploring the manual or how to’s or taking the time to try out stuff on the menu and see what it does… It looks “heavy”, out of the box, and with terms like the “Personal menu”- that may sound weird to a newbie, used to be pampered with more moderns User’s Interface…
But I won’t trade my antiX for any other OS, not if I can help it…

The user may have used an harsh word, but… He/she has the right frame of mind for an antiX user- “How can I mod this and make it work better for me?”

P.

PS- I talked about my menu choices here many times, and I probably even uploaded a few screenshots- just by looking at my desktop, no one will guess that OS I’m using- I have a customized toolbar, a customized fluxbox menu, no desktop icons… but strangely enough, I tend to keep the “lines” wallpaper…- It’s FOSS, we are free do to what we want!

Edit: since the thread got a bit derailed- there are many “start-up-menus” available in Linux- one simply amazed me- it show only apps organized in the main categories in a non searchable way (shows everthing, even cli only tools), but it’s tiny, made in python and it’s written in less than 6KB!- https://forums.bunsenlabs.org/viewtopic.php?pid=35014#p35014
I even found a Windows 10 menu clone somewhere on the internet (but it had to be manually configured to launch apps, not very usable to configure, it’s probably something to put in the Linux box of someone than only wants to run the browser and little more, and does not want to be “scared” by the strange menus…)

Edit2: More according the the subject at hand
I tried to install whisker menu:
sudo apt install xfce4-panel xfce4-popup-whiskermenu

Trying to lunch whiskermenu does not work without running the xfce-panel – and I don’t want to run another panel…

But installing xfce4-appfinder (sudo apt install xfce4-appfinder) and running it works fine! It’s incredibly fast, even on my single core computer- I didn’t see that coming…

P.

• This reply was modified 1 year, 11 months ago by PPC.
• This reply was modified 1 year, 11 months ago by PPC.

[Moderator BobC]

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I don’t get it.

How long will it take you to figure out how to make XFCE menus work and get them configured and working well? Or any other menu system…

Instead, try this: Just go to Applications > antiX > IceWM Toolbar Icon Manager, and add all the apps you have used in the last month to the toolbar. It might take you 10 or 15 minutes to go down the list. If you don’t like the sequence, the quick way to rearrange the lines if by going to Control Centre > Desktop > IceWM Settings > toolbar tab, and just moving the lines around.

Wa La, no menu needed!

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