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Why I Use Suckless Tools

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Re: Why I Use Suckless Tools

#101

Post by fish45 »

Macha wrote: post #4

I get that people enjoy very minimalist computer experiences, but startup time is hardly that different between these programs and other slightly more ergonomic programs which offer conveniences like a config file. If you look at my startup time for my system it goes something like this: 10s - waiting for monitor to wake up to pick OS at dual boot menu 15s - typing disk encryption password 15s - system uses disk encr…

I don't care about startup time in my window manager but st launches in 50 ms and alacritty takes 500 which is a noticeable and annoying difference so I'll take st every time. A lot of the time I want to open the terminal with a specific command in mind so with alacritty I ended up typing before it launched.

Re: Why I Use Suckless Tools

#102

Post by simias »

jck wrote: post #31
simias wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see why you're focusing on speed (does the author even mention it? I skimmed TFA and didn't find it mentioned). Less bloat, simpler code means fewer bugs and it means that it's easy for a hacker/power user to dig into the code to understand and modify it, that 's the killer feature. After one hour poking into DWM I understood how it worked and how I could modify it to fit my needs exactly. I use a bunch of su…

Doesn't everything you're saying also apply to most tiling window managers? i3, bspwm etc

It does mostly, I was mainly contrasting with the big DEs like Gnome and KDE. I don't have any particular allegiance with Suckless, I just like they tool. I try to stay away from their community (mailing list etc...) because they have a rather arrogant mindset IMO, as an other comment here points out.

Re: Why I Use Suckless Tools

#103

Post by feute »

geerlingguy wrote: post #66

This post highlights many of the reasons why I’ve chosen to just stick with a standard, widely-used desktop OS (macOS in my case, but could easily be Windows or some other OS like Fedora), and use almost all the default settings, adapting to the defaults over the years. Would the tiny incremental gain from tweaking one or two specific settings to my perfect liking save me anywhere near the amount of time, happiness,…

This is why I picked Fedora GNOME and stopped worrying. It gives me the confidence that it won't break and that I can focus on other things instead of having to tweak the system or environment for me to work. I adapted to GNOME defaults (I don't even use dash-to-dock) and it feels great, it doesn't get in the way when doing stuff.

Distro hopping and trying a lot of (minimalistic) tools are fine to learn a thing or two, but at some point you'll have to do some work, and having your mind on "how to do this more efficiently" can be distracting.

Re: Why I Use Suckless Tools

#104

Post by simias »

masklinn wrote: post #33
simias wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see why you're focusing on speed (does the author even mention it? I skimmed TFA and didn't find it mentioned). Less bloat, simpler code means fewer bugs and it means that it's easy for a hacker/power user to dig into the code to understand and modify it, that 's the killer feature. After one hour poking into DWM I understood how it worked and how I could modify it to fit my needs exactly. I use a bunch of su…

> I don't see why you're focusing on speed (does the author even mention it? I skimmed TFA and didn't find it mentioned). Second paragraph, second phrase. > However as a side effect of suckless tools having their configuration baked into the executable at compile time, they start up instantly.

Fair enough, I missed that. I agree that it's a rather minor advantage in this day and age.

Re: Why I Use Suckless Tools

#105

Post by [deleted] »

junke wrote: post #73
kamranjon wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In what way are they combative or unpleasant? I've never experienced this. I enjoy the philosophy and opinionated approach they have to development. I setup an old thinkpad with openbsd and dwm and st and it all worked great and i learned some C along the way. I also used sent - their plaintext slide presentation tool to give a talk at work and it was a pretty cool way to put a presentation together quickly and focus…

There was a tweet about Nazi stuff: https://twitter.com/pid_eins/status/1113738764797534208?s=19 See also https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20845633 I don't know much more about the community, I don't like suckless tools.

[deleted]

Re: Why I Use Suckless Tools

#106

Post by ori_b »

amelius wrote: post #91
arp242 wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don’t have enough time in my life to debug and recompile my window manager or Terminal app on a regular basis. Maybe a long time ago, when I was single and had a lot more time to burn. I set up dwm, st, and dmenu once years ago, and have worked flawlessly without faults ever since. I actually use a stripped-down hacked-up dwm that I did on a Sunday years ago and have since lost the source for it; I can't recompil…

> I actually use a stripped-down hacked-up dwm that I did on a Sunday years ago Aha, so in some sense the software was still not totally suckless to you.

The point of simple software is that it's malleable.

Re: Why I Use Suckless Tools

#107

Post by arp242 »

amelius wrote: post #91
arp242 wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I don’t have enough time in my life to debug and recompile my window manager or Terminal app on a regular basis. Maybe a long time ago, when I was single and had a lot more time to burn. I set up dwm, st, and dmenu once years ago, and have worked flawlessly without faults ever since. I actually use a stripped-down hacked-up dwm that I did on a Sunday years ago and have since lost the source for it; I can't recompil…

> I actually use a stripped-down hacked-up dwm that I did on a Sunday years ago Aha, so in some sense the software was still not totally suckless to you.

I removed some of the stuff I don't use because the compiler complained about it after I removed the mappings and I was sufficiently bored that day :-) Being bored was actually the reason I was even looking at dwm in the first place, and somewhat to my own surprise it seems to have stuck.

I don't like dealing with multiple things on my screen (from the WM, tmux panes, Vim windows, whatnot) and like focusing on one thing, so I've had a pretty simple and straightforward "full screen all the things" workflow for years (well before I used dwm) which doesn't demand much from my WM. I mostly use tags/workspaces, tmux windows, and Vim tabs to switch between things.

Re: Why I Use Suckless Tools

#108

Post by noobermin »

booleandilemma wrote: post #76
geerlingguy wrote: post #66

This post highlights many of the reasons why I’ve chosen to just stick with a standard, widely-used desktop OS (macOS in my case, but could easily be Windows or some other OS like Fedora), and use almost all the default settings, adapting to the defaults over the years. Would the tiny incremental gain from tweaking one or two specific settings to my perfect liking save me anywhere near the amount of time, happiness,…

Yeah, the closer I can get to just opening Visual Studio and pressing F5 the happier I am. I like to focus on writing software and shipping a product, not troubleshooting toolchains and figuring out config files for each piece involved. I know not everyone feels this way.

You say it like it's so simple, until your OS decides to update and then the things you've been relying on are broken, yet again, or there's some new behavior that requires getting used to. I'm surprised people think the "defaults" don't get in your way because they have for me in the past which is why I looked for alternatives.

Re: Why I Use Suckless Tools

#109

Post by carapace »

enriquto wrote: post #82
factorialboy wrote: post #34

Back in the day, I used to distro hop, window manager hop and try to find the ever eluding "perfect" setup. This lasted maybe 15 years. There was a sense of vanity in trying to be different yet spectacular. Today I would tell my younger self that use what makes you productive. Even if it is the standard Windows or Mac OS environments. R/unixporn is the nerds equivalent of shirtless beach dudes.

> R/unixporn is the nerds equivalent of shirtless beach dudes. Wait, what kind of savage goes to the beach in a shirt?

For some of us it's just a public service. If I go to the beach on a sunny day and take my shirt off the glare from my belly could blind people. In low-flying planes. Disrupt migratory patterns of seafowl. Interfere with satellites, etc...

Re: Why I Use Suckless Tools

#110

Post by tomcooks »

geerlingguy wrote: post #66

This post highlights many of the reasons why I’ve chosen to just stick with a standard, widely-used desktop OS (macOS in my case, but could easily be Windows or some other OS like Fedora), and use almost all the default settings, adapting to the defaults over the years. Would the tiny incremental gain from tweaking one or two specific settings to my perfect liking save me anywhere near the amount of time, happiness,…

Usually you tune things to your liking and compile them once, not everyday.

From my own experience and talking with other suckless users this seems to be the common behaviour.

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