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How to install XFCE desktop in FreeBSD

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To install XFCE desktop in FreeBSD

In this article we will learn how to install XFCE desktop in FreeBSD. FreeBSD is a UNIX-like operating system used by companies, computer professionals, Internet Service Providers, researchers, students and home users.

Installation of XFCE

First start installing “ xorg” to install XFCE.

[email protected]:~ # pkg install xorg 
Updating FreeBSD repository catalogue...
Fetching meta.txz: 100%    944 B   0.9kB/s    00:01    
Fetching packagesite.txz: 100%    5 MiB 147.8kB/s    00:39    
Processing entries: 100%
FreeBSD repository update completed. 25371 packages processed.
Checking integrity... done (0 conflicting)
The following 1 package(s) will be affected (of 0 checked):

New packages to be INSTALLED:
    xorg: 7.7_2

Number of packages to be installed: 1

Proceed with this action? [y/N]: y
[1/1] Installing xorg-7.7_2...


Then run the following command to install desktop manager Slim.

[email protected]:~ # pkg install slim 
Updating FreeBSD repository catalogue...
FreeBSD repository is up-to-date.
All repositories are up-to-date.
The following 1 package(s) will be affected (of 0 checked):

New packages to be INSTALLED:
    slim: 1.3.6_12

Number of packages to be installed: 1

280 KiB to be downloaded.

Proceed with this action? [y/N]: y
Fetching slim-1.3.6_12.txz: 100%  280 KiB  95.7kB/s    00:03    
Checking integrity... done (0 conflicting)
[1/1] Installing slim-1.3.6_12...
[1/1] Extracting slim-1.3.6_12: 100%
Message from slim-1.3.6_12:
*************************************************************************

Thanks to Nikos Ntarmos, it is now possible to start slim from /etc/ttys.
Please see /usr/local/etc/rc.d/slim for instructions on how to do that.

Alternatively, just put

slim_enable=yes

into /etc/rc.conf

*** Option " sessions"  is no longer supported. ***

Now you need to put session files in the directory specified by option
" sessiondir" . They should be xdg-style .desktop files.
The " Name"  entry in the session file would be used as session name.
The " Exec"  entry would replace %session in login_cmd.
*************************************************************************


Run the following command to install “ xfce” using ” pkg install” command.

[email protected]:~ # pkg install xfce 
Updating FreeBSD repository catalogue...
FreeBSD repository is up-to-date.
All repositories are up-to-date.
The following 22 package(s) will be affected (of 0 checked):

New packages to be INSTALLED:
    xfce: 4.12_1
    gtk-xfce-engine: 3.2.0
    mousepad: 0.4.0_2
    xfce4-notifyd: 0.2.4_1
    libxfce4util: 4.12.1
.
.
.
[20/22] Installing xfce4-appfinder-4.12.0...
[20/22] Extracting xfce4-appfinder-4.12.0: 100%
[21/22] Installing xfce4-wm-4.12.3...
[21/22] Extracting xfce4-wm-4.12.3: 100%
[22/22] Installing xfce-4.12_1...
Message from xfce4-tumbler-0.1.31_2:
To override the default configuration, you must copy the rc-file:

    mkdir ~/.config/tumbler
    cp /usr/local/etc/xdg/tumbler/tumbler.rc ~/.config/tumbler

For more information see http://docs.xfce.org/xfce/thunar/tumbler
Message from xfce4-session-4.12.1_3:
To be able to shutdown or reboot your system, you' ll have to add .rules
files in /usr/local/etc/polkit-1/rules.d directory. Which looks
like this (replace PUTYOURGROUPHERE by your group):

polkit.addRule(function (action, subject) {
  if ((action.id == " org.freedesktop.consolekit.system.restart"  ||
      action.id == " org.freedesktop.consolekit.system.stop" )
      & &  subject.isInGroup(" PUTYOURGROUPHERE" )) {
    return polkit.Result.YES 
  }
}) 

For those who have working suspend/resume:

polkit.addRule(function (action, subject) {
  if (action.id == " org.freedesktop.consolekit.system.suspend" 
      & &  subject.isInGroup(" PUTYOURGROUPHERE" )) {
    return polkit.Result.YES 
  }
}) 

To configure XFCE Desktop

Once the installation is completed start configuring the “ rc.conf” file. Open the file and add the below lines to it.

[email protected]:~ # nano /etc/rc.conf 
moused_enable=" YES" 
dbus_enable=" YES" 
hald_enable=" YES" 
slim_enable=" YES" 


Create .xitirc file auto start the session by running the following command. Create it on root directory or user directory.

[email protected]:~ # nano .xinitrc 
exec xfce4-session


Run the following command to restart the system.

[email protected]:~ # init 6


After rebooting, login using the credentials.
login

XFCE Desktop appears as follows.
xfce_desktop
Right click on the desktop for application launch.
application

Tags:
ethan
Author: 

Comments ( 4 )

Wooty
@guilhermemilhomem Update your laptops BIOS firmware to the latest version/revision. You may have to install Windows 10 (trial works) as Dell firmware is a windows executable (.exe).

Hope this helps others installing FreeBSD 11.2 or 12 on a modern laptop. This is for UEFI, MBR/BIOS install should work no problem on older BIOS.
guilhermemilhomem
Xfce isn't loading on my laptop. I'm using a Dell Inspiron i15-5566 and tried versions 12 alpha 6 and 11.2 of freebsd. Thank you for attention.
rubenerd
Great guide :). Only comment is moused_enable="YES" isn't necessary, this is the console mouse driver not the Xorg one. Cheers.
geminiman112
Thank you so much! This was very helpful.
Add a comment
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Frequently asked questions ( 5 )

Q

Does this affect CPU performance when using XFCE?

A

This is Lightweight Build so it doesn't affect System performance

Q

Is XFCE is a Theme?

A

Not Just a theme It’s a Desktop environment which changes every things in the aspact of Design

Q

Does it have an archive file extraction in XFCE?

A

Yes you can view and extract the archieve files

Q

Is there some way to call the menu with the keyboard in the Xfce?

A

Assign a key with the Keyboard Settings → Shortcuts to the command xfdesktop -menu. (This does not work reliably since Linux Kernel is tickless, so xfdesktop -menu needs a fix) The menu will popup where your mouse is located.

Q

How can I see a list of all the shortcut keys in XFCE?

A

Use the following command, which will produce a nicely formatted text list to standard output:

xfconf-query -c xfce4-keyboard-shortcuts -l -v | cut -d'/' -f4 | awk '{printf "%30s", $2; print "\t" $1}' | sort | uniq

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Can you help Frederick Frazelle ?
How do we clean up sound with PulseEffects?

We've been on Zoom calls now for a while and have a friend with whom we talk on Zoom. His voice is really distorted and difficult to understand. We've installed PulseEffects but are at a loss as to where to begin to "experiment" in order to clean it up. We've recorded part of the most recent conference in order to have something to experiment on but going hit-and-miss doesn't seem to be getting it. Can anyone suggest a step-by-step approach to this clean up effort? Here's our specs...

[code][[email protected] ~]$ inxi -Fzx System: Kernel: 5.12.8-pclos1 x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: gcc v: 10.3.0 Desktop: KDE Plasma 5.23.1 Distro: PCLinuxOS 2021 Machine: Type: Desktop Mobo: Gigabyte model: B450 AORUS M v: x.x serial: UEFI: American Megatrends v: F60e date: 12/09/2020 CPU: Info: Quad Core model: AMD Ryzen 5 3400G with Radeon Vega Graphics bits: 64 type: MT MCP arch: Zen rev: 1 cache: L2: 2 MiB flags: avx avx2 lm nx pae sse sse2 sse3 sse4_1 sse4_2 sse4a ssse3 svm bogomips: 59090 Speed: 3730 MHz min/max: 1400/3700 MHz boost: enabled Core speeds (MHz): 1: 3730 2: 3771 3: 3772 4: 3772 5: 3770 6: 3754 7: 3778 8: 3793 Graphics: Device-1: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD/ATI] Picasso vendor: Gigabyte driver: amdgpu v: kernel bus-ID: 06:00.0 Display: server: X.Org 1.20.13 driver: loaded: amdgpu,v4l resolution: 1920x1080~60Hz OpenGL: renderer: AMD Radeon Vega 11 Graphics (RAVEN DRM 3.40.0 5.12.8-pclos1 LLVM 12.0.1) v: 4.6 Mesa 21.2.4 direct render: Yes Audio: Device-1: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD/ATI] Raven/Raven2/Fenghuang HDMI/DP Audio driver: snd_hda_intel v: kernel bus-ID: 06:00.1 Device-2: Advanced Micro Devices [AMD] Family 17h HD Audio vendor: Gigabyte driver: snd_hda_intel v: kernel bus-ID: 06:00.6 Sound Server-1: ALSA v: k5.12.8-pclos1 running: yes Sound Server-2: sndio v: N/A running: no Sound Server-3: JACK v: 1.9.18 running: no Sound Server-4: PulseAudio v: 15.0 running: yes Network: Device-1: Realtek RTL8111/8168/8411 PCI Express Gigabit Ethernet vendor: Gigabyte driver: r8169 v: kernel port: f000 bus-ID: 03:00.0 IF: eth0 state: up speed: 1000 Mbps duplex: full mac: Drives: Local Storage: total: 585 GiB used: 397.4 GiB (67.9%) ID-1: /dev/sda vendor: SanDisk model: SDSSDH3500G size: 465.76 GiB ID-2: /dev/sdb vendor: Kingston model: RBU-SNS8350DES3128GP size: 119.24 GiB Partition: ID-1: / size: 37.56 GiB used: 11.64 GiB (31.0%) fs: ext4 dev: /dev/sdb2 ID-2: /home size: 403.72 GiB used: 385.76 GiB (95.6%) fs: ext4 dev: /dev/sda7 Swap: ID-1: swap-1 type: partition size: 4 GiB used: 0 KiB (0.0%) dev: /dev/sdb3 Sensors: Missing: Required tool sensors not installed. Check --recommends Info: Processes: 266 Uptime: 38m Memory: 5.81 GiB used: 2.4 GiB (41.4%) Init: SysVinit runlevel: 5 Compilers: gcc: 11.2.0 clang: 12.0.1 Packages: N/A note: see --pkg Shell: Bash v: 5.1.8 inxi: 3.3.06 [/code]

Thanks for any help in advance. Please stay safe and have a super day! :)

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