Tiling Window Managers (HerbstluftWM Appreciation)

As I've gotten deeper into the world of linux (and trying to keep my computer as light as possible), I've found myself heavily relying on window managers. Up until a couple months ago, I had only considered and used *Box window managers as lightweight alternatives for my desktops. As I have reached the land of Tiling and Manual Configuration, I would like to invite you into this whole new world as well!

I had used multiple different Tiling WMs, from SpectrWM (previously known as ScrotWM) to i3 and Awesome. But I found myself finally setting on HerbstluftWM. Interestingly enough, I have found this to be one of the more obscure Window Managers around, but as far as Tiling Window Managers go, the most intuitive as well! It works via a 'tree-metaphor' where one starts with a single workspace (like on i3), but can divide it into multiple.


This wonderful option, for me personally, improves my work so much more just because of the extra allotted control over how windows work and where they display.

Another great joy of using this window manager is the fact that when another display is plugged in, it does
not add on to the current 'tag' or desktop, it attaches and considers itself, a separate 'tag' or 'workspace'. This is great when giving presentations, or watching media, because you can switch between work without interrupting what is on the other display!

Configuration, though out of a script file instead of a bunch of menus and buttons, is actually rather easy! I would recommend though, for new users at least, to work off of someone else's configuration (which I did, look at Ox HaK) for panels with dzen2 and Conky. The autostart configuration though, is english-understandable. When you want to associate a key combo with an application, simply follow the protocol applied! ("hc keybind $Mod-W spawn firefox".) I was even able to attribute Function keys (damned chromebook) to my screen brightness and sound!