Enlightenment

Enlightenment E17, with former default theme Black&White and GTK+2 programs running using a GTK+2 port of the theme

Original author(s)| Carsten Haitzler
Developer(s)| Enlightenment development team
Initial release| 1997; 29 years ago (1997)
Written in| C (EFL)
Operating system| Unix-like
Type|

* Window manager
* Graphical shell
* Desktop environment

License| BSD-2-Clause[1]
Website| www.enlightenment.org

Enlightenment, also known simply as E, is a compositing window manager for the X Window System. Since version 20, Enlightenment also supports Wayland,[2] and is shipped with some linux distributions such as Bodhi Linux and Pentoo.[3]

Enlightenment includes functions to provide a graphical shell and can be used in conjunction with programs written for GNOME or KDE. When used together with the Enlightenment Foundation Libraries (EFL), Enlightenment can refer to an entire desktop environment.[4]

## Contents

* 1 History
* 1.1 E16
* 2 Reception
* 3 Release history
* 4 See also
* 5 References
* 6 External links

## History

The first version of Enlightenment was released by Carsten Haitzler in 1997.[5][6] Originally, it was just a window manager before the addition of the EFL.[7]

Bodhi Linux was built around the Enlightenment 17 desktop, but forked it to create the Moksha desktop. The Elive Linux distribution also used a fork of E17 as its main desktop environment until 2019, when the 3.7 series was released.

The current version as of August 2023 is E25.[8]

### E16

The release of E17 meant a fundamental redesign of the enlightenment manager. As a result smaller part of the community decided to stay with the E16 codebase and continue independent development of this version, simply naming the manager "e16" while releasing under independent version scheme. It reached the 1.0 milestone in 2009 and is still actively developed (1.0.29 as of 2023).[9]

## Reception

A 2011 review of E16 found it was highly customisable, featuring per-window configurability, support for virtual desktops with much larger screenspace than monitor size, and that "nearly everything can be done with the keyboard." While the appearance was praised, the desktop environment was criticised as being somewhat unstable due to bugs at the time. While E16 could be used as a window manager for GNOME or KDE, the review found they had poor compatibility.[10]

A 2014 review of E17 found the design to be fast, touchscreen friendly and have a nice appearance, but was annoyed by the small selection area to resize windows. The appearance of the default terminal with the desktop environment, called Terminology, was also praised and the author personally liked the desktop left and right click menus.[11]

A 2017 review found E18 to have lightweight performance, remarking a similar appearance to Mac OS, but also mentioning a steep learning curve due to the desktop left and right click menus.[7]

A 2020 review praised Enlightenment for its high number of keyboard shortcuts, and that it was lightweight enough to run well on older hardware, with low idle CPU and RAM usage. However, it criticised the complex desktop left and right click menus for having too much complexity.[12]

## Release history

Major releases[13] Version  | Code name  | Release date  | Notes

|
|
|

pre-alpha  | Enlightenment Alpha1  | October 1996[14] |
0.13.2  | DR13  | 18 January 1998[15] |
0.14.0  | DR14  | 18 July 1998[16][17][18] |
0.15.0  | DR15  | 12 March 1999[19] |
0.16  | DR16  | 27 October 1999[20] | Still maintained as of 2023. Preferred by many people, especially as a "retro" desktop.[21]
0.17  | DR17  | 21 December 2012[22] | Major rewrite version. Was forked to create the Moksha desktop.
0.18  | DR18  | 22 December 2013[23] |
0.19  | DR19  | 15 September 2014[24] |
0.20  | DR20  | 1 December 2015[25] |
0.21  | DR21  | 1 June 2016[26] |
0.22  | DR22  | 22 November 2017[27] |
0.23  | DR 0.23  | 24 August 2019[28] |
0.24  | DR 0.24  | 17 May 2020[29] |
0.25  | DR 0.25  | 16 December 2021[30][31] |
0.26  | DR 0.26  | 23 December 2023[32] | Current release.

## See also

* Comparison of X window managers
* Terminology

## References

1. ↑ "COPYING - core/enlightenment.git". https://git.enlightenment.org/core/enlightenment.git/tree/COPYING.
2. ↑ "Enlightenment DR 0.20.0 Release". https://phab.enlightenment.org/phame/post/view/167/enlightenment_dr_0.20.0_release/.
3. ↑ Zinoune, M. (10 July 2012). "Enlightenment distributions that are still alive!". https://unixmen.com/enlightenment-distributions-that-are-still-alive/.
4. ↑ "Portal:Enlightenment". en.opensuse.org. 2012-12-21. http://en.opensuse.org/Portal:Enlightenment.
5. ↑ "The windows manager Enlightenment – MVPS.net Blog" (in en-US). https://www.mvps.net/docs/the-windows-manager-enlightenment/.
6. ↑ "Enlightenment DR16". Enlightenment. http://www.enlightenment.org/p.php?p=about/e16&l=en.
7. ↑ 7.0 7.1 Germain, Jack M. (2014-05-16). "Enlightenment Linux: It's Not What You Think" (in en-US). https://www.linuxinsider.com/story/enlightenment-linux-its-not-what-you-think-80456.html.
8. ↑ "News". https://www.enlightenment.org/news.
9. ↑ "Enlightenment E16". https://www.enlightenment.org/e16.
10. ↑ "Best lightweight window managers for Linux" (in en). 2011-07-03. https://www.techradar.com/news/software/applications/5-of-the-best-lightweight-window-managers-for-linux-972570.
11. ↑ "The desktop-a-week review: Enlightenment (E17)" (in en-US). https://www.networkworld.com/article/926104/opensource-subnet-the-desktop-a-week-review-enlightenment.html.
12. ↑ Perkins, John (2020-10-01). "Enlightenment Desktop Review: A Beautiful, Lightweight but Different Desktop Manager" (in en-US). https://www.maketecheasier.com/enlightenment-desktop-review/.
13. ↑ "Legacy sources". https://download.enlightenment.org/historical_files/releases/enlightenment_wm/.
14. ↑ "enlightenment-1.0alpha-1.i386.rpm". CDrom Archive. https://ia800603.us.archive.org/view_archive.php?archive=/17/items/LDR0497_6cd/LDR_04974.ISO.
15. ↑ "New E Already Released". Slashdot News. 19 January 1998. https://tech.slashdot.org/story/98/01/19/091100/new-e-already-released.
16. ↑ "Enlightenment 0.14 release". Slashdot. 18 July 1998. https://tech.slashdot.org/story/98/07/18/116224/enlightenment-014-release.
17. ↑ ""E news"". http://www.enlightenment.org/news.html.
18. ↑ "Official Word on Enlightenment DR14". Slashdot. 16 July 1998. https://tech.slashdot.org/story/98/07/16/0913237/official-word-on-enlightenment-dr14.
19. ↑ "Enlightenment 0.15". Slashdot. 12 March 1999. https://tech.slashdot.org/story/99/03/12/1727257/enlightenment-015.
20. ↑ ""E news"". http://www.enlightenment.org/news.html.
21. ↑ "Enlightenment E16". https://www.enlightenment.org/e16.
22. ↑ "After 12 years of Development, E17 Is Out". Slashdot. 21 December 2012. https://tech.slashdot.org/story/12/12/22/0129200/after-12-years-of-development-e17-is-out.
23. ↑ "Enlightenment DR 0.18: Improved Compositing, Wayland Support". slashdot. 22 December 2013. https://tech.slashdot.org/story/13/12/22/0851236/enlightenment-dr-018-improved-compositing-wayland-support.
24. ↑ "v0.19.0". git release. https://github.com/Enlightenment/enlightenment/releases/tag/v0.19.0.
25. ↑ "Enlightenment E20 Released With Full Wayland Support". slashdot. December 2015. https://tech.slashdot.org/story/15/12/01/1458210/enlightenment-e20-released-with-full-wayland-support.
26. ↑ "v0.21.0". git release. https://github.com/Enlightenment/enlightenment/releases/tag/v0.21.0.
27. ↑ "v0.22.0". git release. https://github.com/Enlightenment/enlightenment/releases/tag/v0.22.0.
28. ↑ "v0.23.0". git release. https://github.com/Enlightenment/enlightenment/releases/tag/v0.23.0.
29. ↑ "v0.24.0". git release. https://github.com/Enlightenment/enlightenment/releases/tag/v0.24.0.
30. ↑ "Enlightenment 0.25.0 Release". 2021-12-16. https://www.enlightenment.org/news/2021-12-26-enlightenment-0.25.0.
31. ↑ "v0.25.0". git release. https://github.com/Enlightenment/enlightenment/releases/tag/v0.25.0.
32. ↑ "Enlightenment 0.26.0 Release". 2021-12-23. https://www.enlightenment.org/news/2023-12-23-enlightenment-0.26.0.

## External links

* Official website for older e16
* Sources(git)
* Operating-systems distribution status
* Elive Linux's fork of E17

* v
* t
* e

Operating systems and Linux distributions that offer Enlightenment

* Antergos
* Bodhi Linux
* FreeBSD
* Granular Linux
* OpenGEU
* Pentoo
* SparkyLinux
* Void Linux

* v
* t
* e

Desktop environments and window managers based on X11 or Wayland

Desktop
environments
(comparison)|

| GTK-based|

* Budgie
* Cinnamon
* GNOME
* GPE
* LXDE
* MATE
* ROX Desktop
* Sugar
* Xfce

|

Qt-based|

* KDE Plasma
* Lumina
* LXQt (Razor-qt perpetuated)
* OPIE
* Trinity

Motif-based|

* CDE
* DECwindows
* IRIX Interactive Desktop
* VUE

Other|

* EDE (FLTK-based)
* Étoilé (GNUstep-based)
* Mezzo
* OpenWindows (OLIT-based)
* UDE (Xlib/XCB-based)
* Enlightenment (EFL-based)

Graphical
shells|

* GNOME Shell
* KDE Plasma 4
* KDE Plasma 5
* Maynard
* Unity

X window
managers
(comparison)|

| Compositing|

* Compiz
* KWin
* Metacity
* Muffin
* Mutter
* Xfwm
* Enlightenment

|

Stacking|

* 4Dwm
* 9wm
* AfterStep
* amiwm
* Blackbox
* CTWM
* cwm
* Fluxbox
* FLWM
* FVWM
* IceWM
* JWM
* Matchbox
* Motif Window Manager
* olwm
* Openbox
* Qvwm
* Sawfish
* swm
* twm
* tvtwm
* vtwm
* Window Maker
* WindowLab
* wm2

Tiling|

* awesome
* dwm
* i3
* Ion
* larswm
* ratpoison
* StumpWM
* wmii
* xmonad

Wayland
compositors|

* Enlightenment
* Gala
* KWin
* Mir
* Mutter
* Muffin
* Budgie-wm
* sway
* Weston

Related|

* Display server
* GUI
* GUI widget
* Painter's algorithm
* Resolution independence
* Shell
* Virtual desktop
* Widget toolkit
* WIMP
* Windowing system

* v
* t
* e

Free and open-source software

General|

* Alternative terms for free software
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* Comparison of source-code-hosting facilities
* Free software
* Free software project directories
* Gratis versus libre
* Long-term support
* Open-source software
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* Outline

Software
packages|

* Audio
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* Collaboration
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* Device drivers
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* Television
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* Web applications
* Content management systems
* E-commerce
* Word processors
* Android apps
* iOS apps
* Commercial
* Trademarked
* Formerly proprietary

Community|

* Free software movement
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* Open-source-software movement
* Organizations
* Events

Licenses|

* AFL
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* MIT
* MPL
* Ms-PL/RL
* Python
* Python Software Foundation License
* Sleepycat
* Unlicense
* WTFPL
* zlib

| Types and
standards|

* Comparison of free and open-source software licenses
* Contributor License Agreement
* Copyleft
* Debian Free Software Guidelines
* Definition of Free Cultural Works
* Free license
* The Free Software Definition
* The Open Source Definition
* Open-source license
* Permissive software license
* Public domain
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|

Challenges|

* Digital rights management
* Firmware security
* Hardware restrictions
* License proliferation
* Mozilla software rebranding
* Proprietary device drivers
* Proprietary firmware
* Proprietary software
* SCO/Linux controversies
* Secure boot
* Software patents
* Software security
* Trusted Computing

Related topics|

* Forking
* GNU Manifesto
* Microsoft Open Specification Promise
* Open-core model
* Open-source hardware
* Shared Source Initiative
* Source-available software
* The Cathedral and the Bazaar
* Revolution OS

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