Making a User Configuration Directory

Launch an xterm window by pressing Ctrl+Alt+T and make sure that the prompt says that you are indeed in the /home/user directory. At the command line, enter the following commands to create the directory and then switch to it:

> mkdir .icewm
> cd .icewm

Now, you need to copy some files:

> cp /etc/X11/icewm/preferences .
> cp /etc/X11/icewm/menu .

The trailing dot is shorthand for the current directory, and is required because the cp command needs a destination argument.

You’ll be editing both files, so you need to either use sudo to issue the command to load the file into the editor of choice, or change the file permissions to read/write. I mentioned before that this is done through the chmod command, which is explained in Chapter 11. To change the permissions on the files, issue the following command:

> chmod 666 *

The 666 sets the permissions bits to read and write for the user/group/world permissions.

Now you can easily edit either of the files without sudo. This time, use the built-in kwrite editor:

> kwrite preferences &

The & spawns a separate process for the editor, and it’s no longer tied to the terminal window. Use the Find command in the Edit menu and look for the following string: TaskBarShowStartMenu.

You should find a section that looks like this:

#  Show 'Start' menu on task bar
# TaskBarShowStartMenu=1 # 0/1
TaskBarShowStartMenu=0

Change the last:

TaskBarShowStartMenu=0

to

TaskBarShowStartMenu=1

This will enable the Start menu. It’s fairly anticlimactic, but that’s all there is to it. Save the file, close all of your files and save any information. Restart X Window System by pressing Ctrl+Alt+Backspace.