Technology Reviews

I know this looks very trivial, but I am sure a lot of you would be facing the issue of installing emerald and switching it to your default window decorator. By default in Ubuntu GTK Window Decorator is the Window Decorator. However, there is a very good, funky and transparent option available in the form of emerald.

A lot of people do not know what these are so let me define the 3 terms I used.

Window Decorator

Window decorations are provided by window managers to improve the usability of a multi-windowed desktop. They typically consist of a title bar along the top of each window and a minimal border around the other three sides, although this can often be varied upon if the user wishes.

In the predominant layout for modern window decorations, the top bar contains a title and buttons which perform windowing-related actions such as minimizing, maximizing and closing . The border exists primarily to allow the user to resize the window.

GTK Window decorator

Gtk-window-decorator is the default window decorator of Ubuntu.

Emerald

Emerald takes the graphic experience in Linux to a new level. It brings all the power of window decorators like transparency and vivid colors.

Emerald Window Decorator (formerly known as cgwd, which stands for Compiz Generic Window Decorator) is a window decorator for the Compiz compositing window manager written by Quinnstorm.

How to install Emerald in Ubuntu 8.10 (Intrepid Ibex)

Installing emerald in Intrepid Ibex is very easy. Start a terminal window by going to Applications > Accessories > Terminal. In the terminal window type the following one by one:

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install emerald

This should install emerald on your Ubuntu machine.

Starting Emerald in Ubuntu

Initiate the Run Prompt by clicking ALT+f2. In the Run prompt type the following to start Emerald.

emerald --replace

This should change your window decorator to Emerald. However, this will only make your window decorator to emerald only for the existing session. If you want to make it your default you’ll have to set it up to launch at startup.

How to start emerald at startup in Ubuntu

Go to System > Preferences > Sessions > Startup Programs and click Add and enter the following details:

This should start emerald window decorator at startup of Ubuntu.

Getting back to GTK Window Manager

However, if you want to get rid of emerald window decorator, at the Run prompt, type

gtk-window-decorator --replace

This should replace emerald to gtk window decorator. Also, delete the entry of emerald from startup if you don’t want it to be your default window manager.