Xfce released the first beta version of the 4.2 branch yesterday. It is a lightweight desktop environment for Unix-like operating systems and focuses on speed without compromising on visual aspects or user-friendliness. Xfce offers all the features you would expect from a modern desktop environment. The changelog announces the following changes:
General
- improved xinerama support
- support for partial struts in xfwm4, xftaskbar4 and xfce4-panel.
- freedesktop specifications compliance for menu and icons themes
- support for xdg basedir spec (all Xfce settings are now stored under ~/.config directory)
- support for “kiosk mode” (in which you can restrict the actions users are allowed to take) in xfce4-session, xfce4-panel, xfdesktop (see included doc/README.Kiosk files)
xftaskbar4
- “always group tasks” option
- selectable left/center/right alignment
- variable width
- right click action menu
xfwm4
- xfwm4 now has his own compositing manager (a manager for the new Xorg compositor extension, which brings true transparency to the Xfce desktop)
- support for image composition with PNG images as layers, which means that one can do gradients or anything else, and that applies to any pixmap that make the window frame
- native multi-head support
- several new themes
- new themes location
- supports the “show desktop” protocol
- supports the KDE context help
- Always on top option
- icons in the “Alt+Tab” dialog
- keyboard shorcuts editor included in the xfwm settings manager dialog xfce-mcs-manager settings manager
- font rendering setup dialog
- merged Desktop workspaces and Workspaces margins dialogs (so for a 4.0.x to 4.2 upgrade, you will need to remove workspaces_settings.* and margins_plugin.* from /usr/local/lib/xfce4/mcs_plugins/ or it won’t work)
- display resolution and gamma correction dialog
- customizable icons
New session manager xfce4-session
- Major performance improvements over the previous snapshot versions
- Gnome/KDE compatibility
- Native multihead support (Xinerama and multiscreen)
- doesn’t rely on smproxy (or any rewrite like gnome-smproxy), but provides (partial) session management even for non-sm or X11R5-sm aware apps
- support for nice themes
xfdesktop
- gradient support for background color
- saturation support for background image
- real multiscreen and xinerama support
- “don’t set background” option to allow apps such as xplanet to be displayed correctly
- optional support for icons in window list and desktop menu
- desktop menu editor with DND support from xfce4-appfinder and .desktop files from Rox, Konqueror, Nautilus, Xffm,…
- desktop menu plugin for the panel: now you can get standard menu from either the panel or the desktop
xffm
- functional double pane
- icons theme editor
- many new features
xfce4 panel
- simplified mcs dialog
- new positioning scheme
- new panel icon theme implementation. The panel now follows the general icon theme, that can be set in the user interface dialog.
- new way to add a plugin to the panel, using a dialog and mouse double-click
- prettier move handles
- unloading of unused modules
- backward compatibility with the Xfce Goodies plugins available from
xfce4 mixer
- complete rewrite
xfce4 appfinder
- new Xfce4 application
xfprint
- xfprint can now use either CUPS, BSD-LPR or a file as destination, and printers are retrieved from the printing system you choosed (no more need to add your printers to the list manually)
xfce4-icon-theme
- a complete icon theme for Xfce and Gtk apps
gtk-xfce-theme-engine
- new themes
[break]
Click for a larger version
| Version number | 4.2 beta 1 |
| Operating systems | Linux, BSD, Solaris |
| Website | Xfce |
| Download | |
| License type | Conditions (GNU/BSD/etc.) |