XFCE Default apps - How is everything so FAST?

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It's time we pushed forwards in our exploration of XFCE, this time, we're going to look at the default applications that this desktop ships, and reflect a little bit on their approach, that is really different from other desktop environments.
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File Manager
Probably the most important app on a desktop is a good file manager. XFCE ships with Thunar, which is probably some kind of old Norse word to say Thor, the god of thunder, since the app's icon is a hammer.
Thunar is simple on the surface, kinda looking like Pantheon's file manager if somebody had grafted a menubar to it. It supports tabs, of course, lets you edit the location directly instead of using a weird keyboard shortcut to do so, and lets you use a breadcrumb style pathbar if you want to. The sidebar is your average fare, listing places, devices, and network, but you can switch that to a tree view if that's what you prefer.
View modes are pretty limited though, as you can only get an icon view, and a list view, or a more compact list view called "compact".
In terms of options, Thunar is pretty complete: you can move to single click, tweak the icon sizes for the side pane, or open new windows in tabs instead, among a lot of other available tweaks.
Thunar also comes with a bulk rename utility, which ships as a separate app instead of being directly implemented in the file manager, and it lets you, well, rename files in bulk. What did you expect?
Terminal
Next is the terminal. XFCE's one is named Terminal, and I can only applaud the lack of custom name.
So, this app supports tabs, and lets you change how copy paste works, with direct copy, or using a dialog to inform you that pasting whatever command any idiot gives you on the internet, inside of your terminal, is a pretty bad idea.
You can change the fonts, the default number of lines and columns, use a transparent background, change the colors, and even select what will be picked up when you double click on something, so you can even tailor what text you're going to select. Pretty cool.
Image viewer
XFCE uses an image viewer called Ristretto.
Ristretto is competent, it's no photo library manager, so it doesn't have editing capabilities, but it will let you open any image blazingly fast, set it as your default wallpaper, although that didn't work in my tests, or set a slideshow.
You also get a sidebar if you opened multiple images, and you can switch from one to the next easily, in short, it's a simple image viewer, nothing too special, and nothing lacking here.
The Utilities
XFCE also ships a bunch of utilities, although some of these might have been added by Fedora instead. I mentioned previously that there was no file search in the menu, and that's because you have a dedicated utility for that, called catfish. It doesn't seem to have a specific keyboard shortcut attributed to it though, but it is lightning fast, although its GTK 3 nature doesn't seem to accord itself too well with the default theme, with menus not reponsing like they should on hover. Yeah, I know, I'm nitpicking.
You also get a basic task manager, with graphs for CPU and RAM usage, and a list of processes that you can kill without mercy.
It has a nice tool to let you identify which process is linked to a certain window, though, and that's pretty cool, I'm not sure I've seen that on other task managers.
Now there is also a really weird thing called XFDashboard, and I don't know if that's something XFCE ships by default or if that's something Fedora added, but it seems to be aiming to copy the GNOME 3 activities view. It feels like it's not ready yet, and I don't really know why XFCE would add that by default, as they have their own desktop metaphor that isn't GNOME, but hey, who am I to judge.
You also get the usual screenshot tool, really simple, a very basic notepad, that looks like, well, microsoft's notepad, a calculator whose name will make you sound like you have the flu, and a dictionary.
Finally, you also get XFBurn, which is a CD/DVD burner, and I won't spend too much time on this, because I don't have any CD or DVD drives that I could use to try that out.

[@gopikrishnanr576]

I tried most of the desktop environment, but XFCE feels like home. No flashy animation, blatantly fast and responsive, yet not that bad looking with proper theming. XFCE in mint and Manjari looks beautiful.

[@StripesInTheYT]

But that screen tearing is horrendous

[@InfinitelyGalactic]

OMG. The camera. The lens. The lighting. The man, the myth, the legend. This looks incredible.

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Thanks a lot, man :) I still have a few issues to correct for it to look really like I’d want it, but I’m pretty happy with it still!

[@DanielBrosman08211986]

@@TheLinuxEXP: I checked out xfce apline and I love it but I looked for a way to look for on how to Upgrade the OS or use the Apps store or anything that Ubuntu 24.04 has which I found out that Ubuntu mostly has everything, but if my answer is no then there must be a way to write them from terminal, What do you have to say?

[@mirage809]

That lighting and camera work is darn near professional looking. Guess those Skillshare sponsorships have really paid off.

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Thank :) Yeah, I’m happy about it!

[@jishnubiswas9399]

Ur lighting looks spectacular now. Theres a stark difference in lighting compared to ur last video . Its great 😀

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Thanks a lot :) I learned how to use my new camera ^^

[@jishnubiswas9399]

@@TheLinuxEXP The setup upgrade was absoulurely worth it. Also i sticked till the end somehow nice outro btw

[@LinuxForEveryone]

What a difference that camera makes. Holy crap!

[@WinstoneSmith]

@@TheLinuxEXP It has competent Cinema mode ;)

[@jishnubiswas9399]

@@LinuxForEveryone wait a sec i know u. I saw ur video on lenovo and linux a yesterday.

[@babyboomertwerkteam5662]

Xfce is stunning. I ran Debian with Xfce on an ancient laptop (IBM ThinkPad G40 with a Pentium 4 and 1GB of RAM) and it worked ridiculously fast. Even other 'lighter' desktop environments like MATE and LXQt were slow in comparison.

[@davidwayne9982]

THANK YOU -- first video I've ever seen that I agree with EVERY point- especially about this being FAST and naming an app what it IS ie. Terminal is terminal - period..

[@sarangbsr]

Your Lighting is different . Looks like skillshare's lighting course is working. Great Lighting. And Yeah, Video is superb and superior as always.

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Thanks a lot :)

[@salmanul_fares]

I see you've got a new camera for KZbin! Looking good mate 🔥 and 5:17

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Thanks a lot :)

[@imhemish]

Another thing to notice: xfce 4.16 has introduced client side decorations like gnome which means that default xfce apps' window decorations are guided by gtk theme and not window manager theme. This means that choosing different gtk and window manager theme may lead to inconsistency of window decorations

[@fredmckinney8933]

Yes, and I HATE it. Xfce used to be my favorite desktop environment about 10 years or so, but that absolutely ruins it for me. I now use MATE on my desktop box. If I need something light, I now use Openbox, although I'll still use some of Xfce's apps in it.

[@bananya6020]

@@fredmckinney8933 actually, in xfce 4.18 they decided to turn it off by default because of this. i believe even in 4.16 if you into xfconf then you can turn it off too.

[@fredmckinney8933]

@@bananya6020 Anymore, I've gotten used to the CSD's. I hate that it came at the expense of the classic pre-installed titlebars that came with Xfce, though. But, then again, we are in a time when Linux as a whole is maturing and growing up.

[@ericleiteperuzzo6532]

Xfce is simply amazing! After using KDE for a long time i came back to it. Using xfce is a one-way trip. Once you get used to its speed, any other DE feels extremelly slow. I really wish that it could.be more coherent (for gtk/qt) and themes. You really need to spend some time to find some good theme that matches with the icons you chose... Despite of that, it is just amazing.

[@tomdillan]

Been using Xfce for years and like the fact that is basic. I can install the stuff I want and not worry about extra items I don’t want to use.

[@idunnoobro]

I usually never comment but I really enjoy your videos. High quality linux content and never boring. Keep up the great work!

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Thanks a lot :)

[@AmandavilleTV]

Thanks for the Bulk Rename tip! I switched to XFCE nearly two years ago and had no idea that feature existed. I could have used it many times before, and I will make good use of it going forward.

[@pikachuchujelly7628]

I almost never use that and instead do bulk rename with a for loop in the terminal. But I'm glad it exists for people who don't want to use the command line all the time.

[@furiousfellow1583]

about the "cohesive desktop experience" I grew to like each app having its own style even if it does not match with the general theme, it kinda gives every program its own personality, but thats the cool thing about linux, you have the CHOICE to use it whatever fit you the best

[@baninabrar98]

I like the attempts at humour in your recent videos. Makes it more fun to watch.

[@noellewastaken]

The GNOME-Like dashboard was added by Fedora, if you install XFCE on Arch it doesn’t include that, it is instead found in the AUR. Also as far as I know, Galculator is a stand-alone calculator program, not a XFCE app.

[@onibon1990]

THANK YOU FOR GIVING A SHOUTOUT TO COLUMN VIEW. After using it on MacOS, I cannot believe it doesn't exist in most Linux distros, it is amazingly useful for productivity. Having the option to create massive nested folders for work and easily accessing them and moving around is such a boon.

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Column view is so good!

[@ThePressurizer]

80s-coloured metaphors are excellent! EDIT: "A terminal isn't an absolute necessity on Linux." Oh, OHH, how could you ...

[@TheLinuxEXP]

I love them !

[@billgross3579]

Must. Have. Terminals!

[@ThePressurizer]

@@billgross3579 The terminal is the way!

[@glowingone1774]

I prefer a teletype

[@cleanclothes]

Agree, WE NEED MORE FILE MANAGERS WITH COLUMN VIEW!!! Now I'm stuck with good old ranger because I don't want to install all the dependencies that come with pantheon FM.

[@atom9885]

ranger is good but lf is better and feels exactly like ranger

[@cleanclothes]

@@atom9885 hi. What do you find better in LF over ranger? I've heard that its more light weight, but I don't really mind the "bloat". I enjoy image preview and use it regularly. I'd be even happier my FM is a graphical application.

[@sounakdas9520]

Compositing was the biggest issue I faced when i used it for 6 months. It is lightning fast indeed, however, the compositing problems got out of hand. The screen tearing was noticeable. Other than that, XFCE was one of the best experiences i had with a desktop environment.

[@_jdfx]

also don't forget the whisker menu, it's super useful when used with the windows key for example. It's there by default on MX Linux

[@gallienus172]

Since I started using Manjaro a few months ago I've been using KDE. Before that I was always an XFCE guy. I always liked the way it looked and felt. The lack of cohesion never really bothered me since I would change the theme and make it look the way I wanted. I'd probably still be using it except for the fact KDE is now on par with XFCE as far as the amount of resources it uses and it has all the old eye candy I liked with Compiz. I may spend the weekend seeing how macOS I can make it appear.

[@CatWAVE-qq1gs]

XFCE is lighter than KDE as of now ... (July 2022).. I tried Kubuntu (KDE) and it hogs 2.2gb ram .. Manjaro XFCE hogs 1.5gb ram..

[@luqmanhamdan9285]

I always use XFCE for desktop environment because it will always fast no matter what theme & icon I used. Also, don't forget it is customisable from the very start heck some distribution ships with Windows 10 theme out of the box.

[@user-in3ue2jy5x]

wow that camera setup and lighting. looks awesome!

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Thanks :)

[@reksie7816]

This video looks incredible, good job on the new lighting and camera

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Thanks :)

[@braelinmichelus]

I agree that more file managers in Linux should include a columns view, like the eOS one.

[@developerpranav]

I really like the new bokeh and colours. The desktop in the background with that blue wallpaper paired with the yellow light is a phenomenal effect. Really like it. Maybe try making the light I bit more yellow-ish or light orange, it would be perfect.

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Yeah, my soft boxes are 5500K, which is a bit too much, I still need to play around with the lighting

[@johncrwarner]

I don't use XFCE but do use Thunar (the Old Saxon name for Thor - Donner in Modern German) because it has an amazing bulk renaming facility that I needed once and have kept in my toolbag ever since.

[@theodoros_1234]

Loved the video! It's obvious that you've been putting in more effort to improve your videos lately and it's paying off.

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Thanks a lot :) I’m glad it’s noticeable :)

[@nicolascossio5961]

amazing video Nick, u sure have gotten so much better with the camera and lightning

[@FursaFarfasha]

XFCE is great, glad you are doing a customization video, I feel like out of box it should be much better looking than what it is.

[@AnzanHoshinRoshi]

Thank you, Nick. Thunar is great. I like Mousepad and often used it in Gnome instead of Gedit. Parole is a very capable video player (though I prefer VLC or Mplayer). I disagree about naming of terminal apps: GNOME-Terminal, Terminator, Terminology, Alacritty, RXVT, Xterm, Konsole etc etc are all quite different from each other. But Xfce Terminal is just fine.

[@danieljongepier7473]

You should check out xfce's keyboard shortcuts capabilities. You could operate it like a Window Manager. The Terminal is not the "old" way, its the current way. Both GUI and Terminal is OK in Linux.

[@enigmaster84]

A few comments on your video(s), from an Xfce daily user: -As you said in your previous video, animations are missing, and they are more than just eye-candy. Luckily, the window manager can be replaced although it's not so straightforward to do. I still use xfwm4 as it's enough for me, but this may change, especially as it suffers from screen tearing much more than other WMs. -Mousepad has quite a few useful options that Windows' Notepad lacks. At least it has line numbers and text highlights for programming languages it knows. Slim but powerful; -Bulk rename is so freaking useful I don't know why there aren't similar apps in other DEs (at least that I know of); -Ristretto lacks a print shortcut, but that's the only complain I have; besides, I'm Italian and here coffee is great ;p -Looks of non native apps can be customised as well, although it may need extra packages. This applies especially to Qt programs with qt4-qtconfig and qt5ct (on Debian, on Fedora they may have different names). For Gnome programs, blame Gnome for their we-know-what's-good-and-you-have-to-like-it attitude. -Xfburn is a bit limited, alas. I haven't checked K3B in a while as it was the most complete burning app I know, but as most people I haven't burnt a disc in a very long time. I hoped this helps. I'm glad you discovered what I feel is the best or at least one of the best, powerful, stable and fast environments available. Surely much more than Gnome. I can't wait for your next video about it!

[@AidanTheCross]

Xfce is truly a great environment, light a fast, as well as intuitive to use as it's one of the few environments that come with a dock.

[@stuartgibson9755]

Linux Mint XFCE has been my goto Linux OS for years. Everything just works.

[@linuxinside6188]

Thanx for covering XFCE .

[@ananon5771]

well i just learned what a ristretto is will keep in mind in the once in a blue moon i go to a cafe, need to test its sub-parness. (Also cool lighting btw)

[@nekoill]

Yeah, if you wanna use a desktop environment, XFCE is probably the best choice. Probably the only reason I chose to switch to a WM is that it was easier to do everything the way I wanted it to look and behave and not have stuff I don't need.

[@krazy1796]

Thank you for keeping linux alive on KZbin ❤️

[@TheLinuxEXP]

You’re welcome :)

[@po6qu7]

La vidéo a vraiment une superbe qualité. Au risque que ça paraisse déplacé, elle fait clairement ressortir tes yeux, tes sourcils et ta barbe et les met bien en valeur 😳 Bon investissement et content de voir les efforts que tu mets dans tes productions 🧐 Continue comme ça Nicolas !

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Merci beaucoup :)

[@MasterGeekMX]

Loving the new humor touch you are giving.

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Thank you :)

[@CassidyJames]

I just came to comment how excellent your camera work looks. One tiny thing I might experiment with is a key light behind you so your hair doesn’t get lost in the similarly colored cabinets, but all in all, this looks SO good and crisp.

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Thanks :) Yeah the goal is to find a small light that shines from the ground up behind me, to get some separation! I’m trying some stuff out, but the new Sony a6600 definitely makes a big difference!

[@Lukes-Tech]

Wow you look so crisps in this video! Great work!

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Thanks :)

[@WebFreak001]

Thunar is my favorite file manager, it's very lightweight, yet fully featured enough for nearly all usage. For other file operations you want you can also extend the right click menu relatively easily.

[@iodreamify]

i only wish it had integrated recursive search. i don't know how other people always rely just on Catfish

[@pikachuchujelly7628]

It does have built-in search now, and it works quite well.

[@ltfringr]

I'm glad I'm not the only one who thought to compliment the camera/lighting! It looks great.

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Thanks :)

[@yoman9446]

great video, waiting for the customization that makes xfce looks better than any gnome installation out there

[@TheLinuxEXP]

It’s coming soon :)

[@jonck2go94]

Really nice piece of content. The new lighting makes the video look much more premium. Gonna watch this channel forever if the Niveau stays or develops like its been until now. Really nice👍👍

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Thanks a lot :) It’s the first video I’m doing with my mirror less camera, so it should only go up from that point :)

[@gr8bkset-524]

I was dreading having to live with a deadend 32-bit Twister OS. Then installed XFCE on top of raspberry pi Bullseye lite, then customized it with a Mac theme. I'm happy again.

[@nokyan]

Damn, the video quality is so high with this one, well done!

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Thanks a lot :)

[@user-vg5zx4lx8m]

I love xfce, it is visually pleasing and easy to use like windows, but isn’t bloated and doesn’t hog up system resources

[@RetosSpace]

Maverick says..the need for speed ,...Maverick also says..she got that loving feeling..hahaha Brilliant ,loved this video ,spot on with XFCE,I'm using Manjaro XFCe and loving it ,Bang on Video Nick !!

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Thanks :)

[@animegamer3336]

The humour of Nick is increasing day by day and I'm f*ing enjoying it :D

[@whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaat]

for real, its a breathe of fresh air compared to other Linux videos

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Thanks a lot guys :)

[@josephdegarmo]

XFCE is if you need something that feels fast with no fancy desktop effects and just wants something that works on all cylinders. If you are looking for a more complete and coherent desktop with a more modern style, then go with KDE Plasma which is cross-compatible with many GTK applications.

[@Keyshooter]

awesome video for sure, when i try to use xfce long time ago, i was a little less of an... explorer? on the linux world? so it didn't call my attention at that time, now watching your videos explaining the details, i feel a really big appreciation in that regard, and even with nitpicks, which i mean, one for me is that there is no wayland version, i can see why is so appealing now

[@perdomot]

One of the reasons I like Manjaro XFCE is that they have access to all the software you could want including very good multimedia apps. BTW, if I may make a recommendation for your customization video, try the Mcmojave theme with the Yaru Extended icons. It will blow your mind with how good it looks. Wish KZbin let you post pics in the comments so I could show you.

[@AbdelaliAbdallah]

Best Linux/FOSS youtuber hands down and funny too

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Thanks a lot :)

[@ArniesTech]

XFCE is my #1 choise for low spec hardware 🙏

[@davepauljoseph5267]

Dolphin has something like column view now. After the last update that is

[@yasagarwal859]

Ur video and lightning quality is the best now

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Thanks! Took some time and some learning but I’m pretty happy with it

[@yasagarwal859]

@@TheLinuxEXP u shot it by a telefone earlier. And u got a nice update its good.

[@Slate245Ivanovo]

Dat recording quality right from the start! Great job, Nick

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Thanks :)

[@pushqrdx]

Why elementary ships with column view? Because elementary was initially a macOS replica so they had to copy one of the most iconic features of Finder

[@drq9886]

Your editing is fire!

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Thanks :)

[@northof-62]

2023 - I had to abandon Plasma due to kwin instability with my browser of choice (Vivaldi). XFCE on Open-SuSE is rock stable. Recommended combo! Thunar now has split panels which I find useful. I also like the tree option in the side panel.

[@newjerseynl]

If I use XFCE it is just a blast from the past. I prefer GNOME for the worflow.

[@OveRaDaMaNt]

People keep claiming (unused ram wasted ram) that more ram usage in gnome (or kde) means they are just using your system more efficiently and just "caching" stuff to help you work faster. And yet every time old apps that don't do that and optimize their ram usage work better and feel more fluid every time.

[@MaryamMaqdisi]

Agreed. Many apps simply use more RAM because of their technology (ex: Electron apps like VS Code, compare that to lite-xl). Not everything is made to use system resources efficiently. And honestly I'd rather "waste RAM" if that means I can later decide to open more tabs on a web browser or launch more Docker containers without my system glitching.

[@PabloVieiraViolao]

I don't recall seeing Xfdashboard as default on any other distro, I think it's a Fedora thing.

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Yeah, might be!

[@katech6020]

I have used Manjaro XFCE recently and it doesn't exist there

[@thatoneguy385]

I use the XFCE apps on Sway, they work completely fine on Wayland. It started with xfce4-terminal, then thunar and now I replaced Shotwell with Ristretto

[@SelfMadeSystem]

I use applications from XFCE (like thunar), from Gnome (like its calendar and calculator), and from KDE (like its entire suite of utils)

[@jongeduard]

7:12 Do not underestimate Mousepad(!), it's a great text editor with more settings than you think. I also like about it that it has a toolbar, statusbar and linenumbers. But you just need to enable these via the menu. And it supports multiple color scemes for code languages. I even believe the application to be more complete than Gnome's editor gedit. And a more technical thing: it's the only editor that I know that comes with the option to automatically add a new line at the end of a text file if it is not there yet when choosing to save the file.

[@ErenSeymen]

I think Xubuntu has better defaults for Xfce. Theme is Greybird in Xubuntu by default. No xfdashboard. Whisker menu is included. This series should have been made with Xubuntu. Nice music in the end of the video.

[@obskyr2810]

Good Video Thanks For Helping With My Choice of WM

[@aniketfuryrocks]

the videos are evolving. loving them.

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Thanks :)

[@amigaworkbench720]

What Xfce team needs to do is - focus on improving Window Manager. Kwin effects (like hot corners), modern animations and tilling. Other then that perfect DE for web design/developemnt.

[@ashishKjr]

I disagree. You can always use other compositor like Compiz to achieve that. I'm not a big fan of "whoosing", "sliding up", "wobbling" windows.

[@amigaworkbench720]

@@ashishKjr I don't care about wobbling and whoosing. I need animations to see where is window minimized and tilling for work.

[@ashishKjr]

@@amigaworkbench720 you can always tile windows 4 by 4 but that's the most that modern DE will offer you. As far as the minimizing goes, you obviously need to set up a panel with a windows button to see it; alternatively, you can always set up the plank dock which is available in most of the modern distributions' repositories.

[@amigaworkbench720]

@@ashishKjr Yes, but I want all of that built into Xfce. I don't want to configure or install whatever...

[@JonathanSteadman2003]

Very good video. Keep up the good work. :)

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Thanks :)

[@harshal259]

2:47 I wish this was added to Nautilus. I had to learn Ctrl + L just because this feature is not implemented. Great video Nick! :)

[@minhaj14d]

Significant difference between the old and new camera setup with better lighting. Looks like your budget is increased after 100k subs and sponsors haha. Carry on!

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Thanks a lot :) I went for a mirrorless camera, but I’m only learning how to use it, so it’s probably going to be a bit weird for a few videos, as I adapt to it!

[@Colnup]

You should try kali default options with xfce, everything is straightforward and get right to the point.

[@tlumme]

your killing me with those jokes 😂

[@TAP7a]

Visual quality upgraaaaade 👍👍👍

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Yep :)

[@raminhonary5499]

I prefer "Whisker Menu" over "Catfish." I just change the panel configuration: I remove default "Application Menu" and drop in "Whisker Menu" instead. I also set my Super-key (a.k.a. "windows" key) to open the Whisker Menu. Boom -- 1 key press away from every app, file, website, and terminal command on my system.

[@tulsatrash]

XFCE has jumped to the top of the list of desktop environments I want to try when I want to move on from cinnamon.

[@RogerioPereiradaSilva77]

Count me among the ones that don't mind minor cosmetic issues when mixing up XFCE with applications intended for other desktop environments because - and hear me out on this - it is IMPOSSIBLE(!!!) to stick with just applications written specifically for a single DE unless your needs are very simple! Sometimes the best app for any given purpose is a GNOME app, sometimes it is a KDE app, sometimes it is a GTK 2/3 app, sometimes is is a Qt app, sometimes it is neither (Firefox, LibreOffice, Blender, etc.) and sometimes it is something completely alien everywhere (think FLTK, Athena, motif/lesstif, etc.). KDE should be commended on this regard for trying to create matching themes for different toolkits and do its best to accommodate all sort of apps in a somewhat cohesive package whereas GNOME goes out of its way to break everything it possibly can for applications not written with GNOME in mind, doesn't do any effort AT ALL to integrate apps written for other DEs, does not follow established cross desktop standards unless they're dragged kicking and screaming to it and for creating stupid stuff like CSD that doesn't fit anywhere else. And XFCE is awesome to breathe a new life to that old laptop you may have stashed somewhere collecting dust because it has a Celeron processor and just 2 GB of RAM or something along these lines and can't even dream of running anything relatively modern. That's what I did: I replaced the old and decrepit HDD with a cheap SSD, installed Xubuntu in it and gave it to my daughters to do their homework and watch their TV shows and movies. And it is running like a champ!

[@beardedgeek973]

Gnome is the most coherent desktops out there, but it comes with a price; not only do virtually all apps not by Gnome look out of place, but it literally does not allow you to change many default apps, like the terminal. Xfce is actually very close to windows in that everything look different (Windows do not care what the applications you install have GUI wise). Coming from Windows the fixation with "coherence" in say Gnome (and also KDE) is almost jarring (tho KDE let you set far more default apps than Gnome).

[@ImplosiveCatt]

I like pushing everything to minimalism and having max control at the same time. I'm not a programmer, so I have to rely on already made monitoring and controlling tools. My experience with Linux is not that long. Maybe a couple of months running as main OS. Gossip say it's highly customizable. You can basically remove or add whatever you wish. But from my non-programmer experience, the hype is achievable only and exclusively when you're like...5-10yr experienced user. Security measures makes it more complicated to make significant changes although you don't even know what can you really change before researching about that. It's exactly what I'm getting on my rooted android phone. I can do everything if I knew what and how. For begginers, the UI is the main hook. You can change the display manager (i forgot the linux term) but it doesn't grant you smooth and seamless experience. It's more likely you're getting into troubles changing that. I was using Mint distro but I never felt I'm having flexible modular system. On contraire, I've had many warnings to not install this and that because it's not compatible with my system. Not to mention non existent hardware support for youtube codec which was major pain in the ass for starters. I still haven't give up on Linux. I just want proper hardware support for youtube videos and that's going to be a very good start. Can you help me with that? I mean, I don't expect you to hold my hand and guide me but I need to know that the stupid codec problem have been solved. Btw. sorry for the comment on your other video (clickbait). It was actually fairly good review,.

[@thu-bu1hf]

Informative and entertaining video, well done :-) As for file search and Catfish, yes it is blazingly fast..... as long as you first click on Settings and tell Catfsh to update the search index, though. The big problem is that it simply uses the sudo updatedb and locate commands in the background, which is great if one is looking for files in the home directory. Plug in some external USB hard drives, though, and things get a little shaky. Updating the search index will not include those external HDs, one needs to alter some updateconf-file or something like that somewhere in the system files. And even if Catfish DOES then index those external HDs, this doesn't mean that it'll find contents on those external HDs after a reboot even when they're plugged in. I'm sidestepping this problem by using Fsearch, which works as intended as is also super quick.

[@jeancorriveau8686]

I used many desktop environments. I settled with Cinnamon. XFCE my second.

[@HarolaDuong]

the surface of the desktop bg feels great

[@larrywilliams8010]

XFCE, like many other DEs, is likely customised as part of the distribution, so Fedora's look snd feel is different from Debian's is different from Xubuntu's is different from Arch, etc. You're not reviewing XFCE, but what Fedora distributes.

New camera? 😁 Kudos for the picture quality.

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Yeah, Sony a6600 :)

[@elhafo6925]

Thanks for sharing, it is an excellent video. I love to use Xfce for long time ago, I would like to recommend compiz+emerald as windows manager/decorator, play with it and find the perfect balance becomes into one of the best experience.

[@FrasSmith]

In your first XFCE video, you complained about the lack of animations. In this video, you enthuse about the speed of the desktop. I suspect that the two may be linked. :-)

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Probably, yeah :)

[@little_forest]

Well, actually I would say, that is the sole and intended purpose of a desktop environment: providing a graphical environment in which you can run any program you want (as long it works with the distro). The DE is just supposed to give you this environment, nothing else. Actually, a DE is just one of the programs you can run on a distro, next to other programs. I see KDE Plasma the same way. Just that KDE is a larger project that uses Qt to build several programs and also, and maybe mainly, a desktop environment. The KDE apps are not "standard" for Plasma or exclusively developed "for" Plasma, but they just happen to integrate very well, since they use Qt.

[@mbarrio]

Thunar batch renamer is the same app as Thunar. You open it up by giving slash B, like "Thunar -B" XFDashboard is a separate app. Not maintained by XFCE team.

[@armynyus9123]

good vid but I realize I'm getting old. "free - as in free beer" became obvisously fashionable and using the Terminal is labelled "the old way of doing things". Both used to be different, in ways.

[@human__________]

personally I really dislike the terminal / CLI's. My display has millions of pixels and can display millions of colours. why do i want to memorize hundreds of commands to run something off of what looks like a 90's calculator. I don't. Give give me the gui where even someone that has no idea what they're doing can intuit there way to what they want to achieve.

[@armynyus9123]

@@human__________ I'm with you - partially. "Removing bloat" often only means: Debloating the RAM of your machine - for the price of added bloat within your brain, having to memorize 1 Million shortcuts. I also agree regarding the pixels but disagree heavily regarding colors. I love the color consistency and configurative freedom the terminal offers - cross app. Check e.g. PyWal - in the terminal it is possible to style all apps, according to the dominant colors of your current wallpaper - without knowing the app's specific config systems. Not possible outside the terminal. All in all I(!) think, the terminal is here to stay, for - people who can, skillwise, automate things plus - do certain things very often, e.g. professionally. Then nothing beats the terminal, imho. For all the rest, I'm with you. For stuff I don't do very often I rather click around foolishly in UIs and, magically, usually somehow reach my goal - faster than reading man pages or studying code. Expressivity in the term is far higher but the 99% use case is easier to grok in a well made UI.

[@katech6020]

I find terminal much faster, since I am a developer

[@briansrcadventures1316]

It's been a while since I've used XFCE! The last time I used it seriously was way back on Xubuntu 12.04! However I'm pretty settled on Cinnamon on Mint nowadays.

[@r.a.f.f.a.]

I think it depends. On very low power systems such as those with 1GB RAM (ahem, my tablet), the slightly more limited MATE environment feels much more responsive under larger loads in general.

[@nichtgestalt]

what a cool outro music!

[@TheLinuxEXP]

Thanks :)

[@robertkagan3]

I thought parole was XFCE's default media player and XFCE users often use MATE and not GNOME tools because of the menu bar

[@arnone1862]

I use Xubuntu and Linux Mint Xfce for that super snappy feel. I also replace Thunar with Caja