Desktop environments include basically everything you see after you log into your user account on your Linux distribution’s sign-in screen. The desktop itself, desktop background, panels, menus, file manager, settings windows, and many other applications and utilities all come from a desktop environment. Even each window’s titlebar is provided by an application known as a window manager that comes with the desktop environment.

Different desktop environments have different strengths and weaknesses. Ubuntu’s default Unity desktop environment is designed to provide a single interface that will work well on computers, tablets, smartphones and TVs, while Linux Mint‘s Cinnamon desktop environment is designed to provide a more traditional Linux desktop experience. The LXDE desktop environment included with BlackWeb is designed to be fast and use little resources.

Here’s how you’d install XFCE from the terminal:

  sudo apt-get install xfce4

The above command would give you the standard XFCE desktop environment. However, you might want Xubuntu’s customized XFCE desktop environment instead:

Log out of your Linux desktop after installing another desktop environment. When you see the login screen, click the Session menu and select your preferred desktop environment. You can adjust this option each time you log in to choose your preferred desktop environment.