Show HN: SteppeWM – a stacking IceWM-like Wayland compositor • Hacker News Board

Show HN: SteppeWM – a stacking IceWM-like Wayland compositor

#1

Post by uncognic » Fri, Aug 21, 2026, 3:27 PM UTC

Every Wayland compositor I could find is a tiling one: sway, river, Hyprland, dwl, niri. If you want windows that float and overlap with titlebars and a taskbar, the way IceWM does it, there's almost nothing. That is Steppewm

Show HN: SteppeWM – a stacking IceWM-like Wayland compositor
github.com

Re: Show HN: SteppeWM – a stacking IceWM-like Wayland compositor

#2

Post by [deleted] » Fri, Aug 21, 2026, 3:50 PM UTC

[deleted]

Re: Show HN: SteppeWM – a stacking IceWM-like Wayland compositor

#3

Post by ChocolateGod » Fri, Aug 21, 2026, 4:15 PM UTC

labwc?

Re: Show HN: SteppeWM – a stacking IceWM-like Wayland compositor

#4

Post by jamesgeck0 » Fri, Aug 21, 2026, 4:53 PM UTC

ChocolateGod wrote: post #3

labwc?

labwc is closer to Openbox; it doesn't ship a taskbar.

Re: Show HN: SteppeWM – a stacking IceWM-like Wayland compositor

#5

Post by nosioptar » Fri, Aug 21, 2026, 6:10 PM UTC

Does it run as well on old/underpowered hardware as IceWM?

(I really only use IceWM on systems that would struggle with XFCE.)

Re: Show HN: SteppeWM – a stacking IceWM-like Wayland compositor

#6

Post by uncognic » Fri, Aug 21, 2026, 11:11 PM UTC

nosioptar wrote: post #5

Does it run as well on old/underpowered hardware as IceWM? (I really only use IceWM on systems that would struggle with XFCE.)

It's pretty lightweight, so yes, but it does use wlroots after all, so there's a limit

Re: Show HN: SteppeWM – a stacking IceWM-like Wayland compositor

#7

Post by uncognic » Fri, Aug 21, 2026, 11:11 PM UTC

ChocolateGod wrote: post #3

labwc?

I tried it but it was really a struggle to get like OSD or an actual good non-janky taskbar; all implementations are either buggy or cannot be as useful as i was hoping

Re: Show HN: SteppeWM – a stacking IceWM-like Wayland compositor

#8

Post by dong2go » Tue, Aug 25, 2026, 10:57 AM UTC

IceWM's other reason I kept it around was the config being a few plain text files. Is SteppeWM configured that way too, or is it still a wlroots compositor that wants XML/Lua for the panel and keybinds?

Re: Show HN: SteppeWM – a stacking IceWM-like Wayland compositor

#9

Post by uncognic » Wed, Aug 26, 2026, 1:53 PM UTC

dong2go wrote: post #8

IceWM's other reason I kept it around was the config being a few plain text files. Is SteppeWM configured that way too, or is it still a wlroots compositor that wants XML/Lua for the panel and keybinds?

It is Lua, but please don't just "Lua = bad", the syntax is sort of similar