I will bet there are many people out there that think LXDE is just something to use here and there. Personally, for a few years I thought the same way. It took me time to understand the amount of work that was done for this desktop that makes it quite durable and great to use. Now for all those wishing to use this awesome desktop as a standalone, I also want to suggest you use ppa:lubuntu-desktop/ppa. As you can see in the picture I have taken of my current OS which runs only LXDE, the weather applet works 100% correct. Also zero errors on transparency for taskbar which I have placed on top of the screen. The repository I have listed contains some very intense and serious developers that refuse to let anyone consider LXDE as nothing less than a standalone desktop.
Now most people would also think LXDM is a sad/lame window manager. Why? Well, yes login is not real pretty to be honest. Still, LXDM can be configured to handle all the necessary permissions other window managers do automatically. The main reason I constructed the current OS I am using is to show how proud I am of all the hard work these great developers have done. Also the major benefit is one solid brick wall system that just does exactly what I want it to do. Could I ask for more? No, because this is what I have been looking for, so I feel I have arrived at my destination.
What really makes LXDE special is its ability to use Gnome and KDE components so gracefully and easily. If I said any other desktop handled the variety very easily, boy was I wrong. Then we have the ease of assembly when constructing a system like mine. Hardly any apt-get -f installs to talk about, nowhere near what I have done in the past. Another aspect that is truly awesome and quite hilarious, I built this system close to 2 years ago, the first time. I built it for my laptop to be a simplistic system that could take a beating and still keep going. Was I right about that? You bet. Of course I was still foolish and ran that other multiple desktop folly of mine for close to 2 years on the PC. Now whenever the desktop gave me a hassle, I jumped right to that laptop and presto no hassle whatsoever. So, the system was on 14.10 originally.
I considered it my best work yet, kept the image and then just updated that image one week ago. Most would think, forget it build it over again make a fresh one, right? Thought about it, but then figured Ubuntu and LXDE have just been humpin away working their fingers to oblivion to get things top notch. Let's see what will happen. Well, this is amazing as programs just fire away with zero hassle. Boots quick, shuts down fast. I honestly love it. Will I built a fresh one? Yes, since I love doing it. I also want to explore a few other ideas I have. Is only natural for those of us that enjoy building our own OS's. Least, I have one fine system to work with to do that, so should be zero hassles. A big smile is on my face now and LXDE developers are responsible for that fact. This is the reason I call LXDE the little big guy. Looks like something small, but set it to a big task and handles just as easily as those other larger desktops. Hats off to all those developers that have had many sleepless nights and days of intense work to make this one of the greatest desktops in Linux. P.S Yes is still my old Cyana-3D theme displayed. Has stood the test of time and can still be downloaded. Eventually, will do some theming again when time permits.