Mabox Linux proves that old-school Linux is here to stay, and it’s free to use – ZDNet

The Mabox desktop includes a Welcome app to help you acclimatise to the environment.

Screenshot by Jack Wallen/ZDNET

ZDNET’s key takeaways

• Mabox is a free, open-source operating system that is available to download and install on as many machines as you need.
• This user-friendly desktop operating system is beautiful, fast, and reliable.
• It might take new users a bit of time to retrain their mouse hand to use the right button to access the menu.

Back in the early 2000s, I used to jump from window manager to window manager. I was in pursuit of desktop nirvana. That search took me around the entirety of the Linux landscape and, for a while, I remained on a window manager called Blackbox. It was as simple as you could get, with a minimal interface and footprint that made my computer feel as if it had been supercharged with jet fuel and magic.

I cloud look back on that period and say, “Those were the days.” But because we’re talking about Linux, those halcyon days are not only still around, they are thriving.

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That’s certainly the case with Openbox, which was originally derived from Blackbox. Since then, Openbox has been completely rewritten in C and no longer contains any of the original code. 

Openbox is a simple but highly configurable window manager, and can even be integrated into desktop environments.