As I was writing about the release of Linux Mint LXDE it occurred to me that I had not written the article on the release of Linux Mint Fluxbox.  This release has been built with the emphasis on a lightweight and yet fully functional desktop centered on the Fluxbox window manager. The difference between Linux Mint and Ubuntu is the Linux Mint team makes improvements . For a detailed overview of the new features and improvements included in Linux Mint 8 Fluxbox, please read “What’s new in Helena Fluxbox?“.

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I also built a virtual machine to test this version and the install was again flawless.  You can refer to the article on LXDE for screen shots as they are identical except for the different window manager.

Not knowing anything about Fluxbox, my first question was "Where is the application menu?".  I soon discovered if one clicks on the desktop, the application menu pops up.  I was just thinking how one would click on the desktop if a window is open.  Well the toolbar, which his highly configurable, also can be set to various widths.  Currently I have it set to 90% of the screen width.  Clicking on the space to the right or left of the toolbar will pop up the application menu.

As with all of the other versions of Linux Mint, all of the standard applications are installed.  While not as polished as the other window managers I have looked at, Fluxbox seems to have it's advantages.  For example, Fluxbox can be reset and doesn't affect the applications that are running.  I'm not sure how to reset Fluxbox if it freezes, but there is a reset via the System -> Fluxbox menu.

So far I have looked at several different versions of Linux Mint.  Which version one chooses is most definately a personal preference as they all seem to work well and have advantages and disadvantages.  Some versions also would require more technical interraction than others.  It would be interesting to make a comparison of the resources required by each version.  As for my preference... I don't think I would install Fluxbox on my machine although that could always change.  Oh, I have discovered another version of Linux that I haven't looked at.  It is Linux Mint XFCE.  My next article will be about installing it in a virtual  machine and then a review.