Problem with Guix install with openbox

Problem with Guix install with openbox

[Alexander Asteroth]

Hi there,

As a former Guile programmer I like the idea to configure my system using guile.
I installed Guix in a vm (VmwareFusion I have to admit) and everything worked fine. 
I used the graphical installer and chose Openbox as a Windowmanager-Option.
Unfortunately after Installation the desktop is empty and right-click menu contains only dead links.
I also tride installing lxde afterwards with no options effect. 
Any hint what I can do to solve the issue?
Thanks! 

	Alex

Re: Problem with Guix install with openbox

[Timothy Sample]

Hi Alexander,

Alexander Asteroth <alexander.asteroth@h-brs.de> writes:

> Hi there,
>
> As a former Guile programmer I like the idea to configure my system using guile.
> I installed Guix in a vm (VmwareFusion I have to admit) and everything
> worked fine.
> I used the graphical installer and chose Openbox as a Windowmanager-Option.
> Unfortunately after Installation the desktop is empty and right-click
> menu contains only dead links.

The last time I looked at our Openbox package, I noticed that it uses a
default menu configuration.  That means it has links to stuff like
Firefox, even though we don’t have a Firefox package.

You will have to edit the Openbox menu configuration to point to
programs that you have in your profile.  If memory serves, it’s at
“~/.config/openbox/menu.xml”.  There, you can tell it how to launch
programs, so you could fix the “emacs” entry to point to
“~/.guix-profile/bin/emacs”, for example.  :)

You will have to get started from the console, because Openbox will not
know how to open any terminal emulators.

> I also tride installing lxde afterwards with no options effect. 
> Any hint what I can do to solve the issue?
> Thanks! 

Unfortunately, I don’t know about LXDE.  Just to be sure, how did you
“install” LXDE?  Did you include it in your operating system
configuration and then run “guix system reconfigure config.scm”?


-- Tim

Re: Problem with Guix install with openbox

[Alexander Asteroth]

Dear Timothy,

Thank you for the hint. Unfortunately “~/.config/openbox/menu.xml” does not exists and "find ~/.config -name openbox” does not yield any result.

Also my ~/.guix-profile/bin is very unpopulated. Also at command line prompt I don’t have emacs. Shouldn’d this be installed by the install process?

W.r.t. how I “installed” lxde (just by guix install lxde). Do I need to reconfigure every time I install something?

Cheers,

	Alex

> On 22. Jul 2019, at 16:03, Timothy Sample <samplet@ngyro.com> wrote:
> 
> Hi Alexander,
> 
> Alexander Asteroth <alexander.asteroth@h-brs.de> writes:
> 
>> Hi there,
>> 
>> As a former Guile programmer I like the idea to configure my system using guile.
>> I installed Guix in a vm (VmwareFusion I have to admit) and everything
>> worked fine.
>> I used the graphical installer and chose Openbox as a Windowmanager-Option.
>> Unfortunately after Installation the desktop is empty and right-click
>> menu contains only dead links.
> 
> The last time I looked at our Openbox package, I noticed that it uses a
> default menu configuration.  That means it has links to stuff like
> Firefox, even though we don’t have a Firefox package.
> 
> You will have to edit the Openbox menu configuration to point to
> programs that you have in your profile.  If memory serves, it’s at
> “~/.config/openbox/menu.xml”.  There, you can tell it how to launch
> programs, so you could fix the “emacs” entry to point to
> “~/.guix-profile/bin/emacs”, for example.  :)
> 
> You will have to get started from the console, because Openbox will not
> know how to open any terminal emulators.
> 
>> I also tride installing lxde afterwards with no options effect. 
>> Any hint what I can do to solve the issue?
>> Thanks! 
> 
> Unfortunately, I don’t know about LXDE.  Just to be sure, how did you
> “install” LXDE?  Did you include it in your operating system
> configuration and then run “guix system reconfigure config.scm”?
> 
> 
> -- Tim
> 

Re: Problem with Guix install with openbox

[Timothy Sample]

Hi Alex,

Alexander Asteroth <alexander.asteroth@h-brs.de> writes:

> Dear Timothy,
>
> Thank you for the hint. Unfortunately “~/.config/openbox/menu.xml”
> does not exists and "find ~/.config -name openbox” does not yield any
> result.

I would guess that Openbox has a default menu somewhere, and if you copy
that to “~/.config/openbox/menu.xml”, you will be able to use it to
change the menu you see.  You can probably find it by running
“guix build openbox” and looking around it the directory that gets
printed as output.  For example, when I run “guix build openbox”, Guix
prints “/gnu/store/9cayp0c39v8xnwwhai0jgp0rd56arai4-openbox-3.6.1” (you
might get something different if we are running different versions of
Guix).  In that folder, there is a file, “./etc/xdg/openbox/menu.xml”,
which is the default menu.  Copy it to “~/.config/openbox/menu.xml”, and
then you will be able to edit the menu.  I’m sorry I can’t be more
helpful, but I haven’t used Openbox for a few years, and I’ve never used
it on Guix.

> Also my ~/.guix-profile/bin is very unpopulated. Also at command line
> prompt I don’t have emacs. Shouldn’d this be installed by the install
> process?

If you run “guix install emacs”, Guix will install Emacs into your user
profile, which gets linked from “~/.guix-profile”.  It’s not installed
by default.

> W.r.t. how I “installed” lxde (just by guix install lxde). Do I need
> to reconfigure every time I install something?

Only for “system” stuff.  If you want to change things like which
daemons are running you need to reconfigure.

The reason I asked is that I wanted to know if LXDE was in your user
profile or in the system profile.  Do you use GDM?  If so, you’ll need
to add LXDE to your system profile for GDM to find it and provide it as
an option when logging in.

To do so, you need to edit your operating system configuration file.
First, you need to use the “lxde” module so that Guile knows where to
find the “lxde” package:

    (use-modules (gnu packages lxde))

Then, you can add “lxde” to your other system packages:

    (operating-system
      ...
      (packages (cons* lxde
                       ...
                       %base-packages))
      ...)

After this, you will need to reconfigure.

I’m not an LXDE user either, but if I wanted to become one, that’s what
I’d do.

Hope that helps!


-- Tim

Re: Problem with Guix install with openbox

[Julien Lepiller]

Le 22 juillet 2019 15:15:08 GMT+02:00, Alexander Asteroth <alexander.asteroth@h-brs.de> a écrit :
>Hi there,
>
>As a former Guile programmer I like the idea to configure my system
>using guile.
>I installed Guix in a vm (VmwareFusion I have to admit) and everything
>worked fine. 
>I used the graphical installer and chose Openbox as a
>Windowmanager-Option.
>Unfortunately after Installation the desktop is empty and right-click
>menu contains only dead links.
>I also tride installing lxde afterwards with no options effect. 
>Any hint what I can do to solve the issue?
>Thanks! 
>
>	Alex

If you log in as a user in a tty, you should be able to install xterm with guix. Thcn, from openbox, you should be able to use xterm from the menu and configure it to your liking.

Re: Problem with Guix install with openbox

[Alexander Asteroth]

That was it actually. No program was installed - at least not for my user. A simple Guix install xterm/emacs/… solved the issue.

Thanks,
Alex

> On 22. Jul 2019, at 16:57, Julien Lepiller <julien@lepiller.eu> wrote:
> 
> Le 22 juillet 2019 15:15:08 GMT+02:00, Alexander Asteroth <alexander.asteroth@h-brs.de> a écrit :
>> Hi there,
>> 
>> As a former Guile programmer I like the idea to configure my system
>> using guile.
>> I installed Guix in a vm (VmwareFusion I have to admit) and everything
>> worked fine. 
>> I used the graphical installer and chose Openbox as a
>> Windowmanager-Option.
>> Unfortunately after Installation the desktop is empty and right-click
>> menu contains only dead links.
>> I also tride installing lxde afterwards with no options effect. 
>> Any hint what I can do to solve the issue?
>> Thanks! 
>> 
>> 	Alex
> 
> If you log in as a user in a tty, you should be able to install xterm with guix. Thcn, from openbox, you should be able to use xterm from the menu and configure it to your liking.
>