On Fri, 16 Apr 1999, Kathy Kee wrote:
> No. Tkdesk is a tcl/tk program that can be used as a file manager in
> conjunction with X and a window manager.
> KDE is a "desktop environment". Like a window manager++. I'm sure someone
> else can explain what that means better than I. You can use Tkdesk from KDE
> though. I still fire it up sometimes.
> Kathy
A window manger just manages your windows. Most have a menu system of some
kind, and a few also have icons and stuff. Think of Windows without the
Explorer, or the Mac without the Finder.
A desktop (like tkDesk) is a program that integrates a file browsing into the
window manager, so that you get a trashcan, drag and drop, and stuff like that.
A desktop environment goes one step forward, and integrates a whole bunch of
stuff into the desktop, usually using some sort of object oriented scheme,
mainly Corba (Windows uses OLE). Desktop environments will package all this
together with the file browswer, and sometimes it's own windowmanager, as in
the case of KDE.
One of the best desktop environments ever was the OS/2 Workplace Shell. It's
"window manager" was the PM. It's file browser was so perfectly integrated into
the desktop environment that you didn't know where one ended and the other
started. Everything was glued together using SOM (system object model).
--
Arandir...
