White Paper: GNOME Technologies

GNOME, the Window Manager, and X

One aspect of GNOME that new users have a hard time understanding is the relationship between GNOME and the window manager and GNOME and X. To understand this relationship you must break down the three components.

The X Window System is the software that allows graphical elements to be drawn to the screen. This is the base of the whole system and provides the libraries and technologies to make the graphical display possible.

The window manager is the software that essentially defines the way windows are placed on the screen and how the window borders look and act.

GNOME is a desktop environment that runs on top of the X Window System and a window manager. GNOME was designed to not be dependent on any one window manager. Therefore, the user can have a choice in which window manager to use. GNOME provides a number of ''hints'' to let the window manager to work with it in a seamless manner. If a window manager contains these hints it is considered ''GNOME Compliant.[1]'' Currently there are a few window managers with all or some GNOME compliancy.

Figure 1. GNOME, X, and the Window Manager working together.

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