swarm32 | JWM on Debian Bookworm 2024

After finding a lot of posts from over a decade ago, I figured it wouldn't hurt to write out some notes on getting a minimally functional JWM environment going on Debian Bookworm.

My particular requirements for going with JWM are:

Need something lightweight to run on ram limited hardware.

Need somthing especially lightweight as Hardware is further limited by the fact it's also running Proxmox, Ceph and Debian VMs

Need at least one node with a local UI for managing the cluster

My spouse would be most displeased if I can't direct her how to bring the internet back if I'm out of town.

Step 1 : Have a working Debian Bookworm Box with the bare minimum installed (base system + ssh server is fine)
Step 1A : Install some useful utilities like htop and screen
Step 2 : install xinit and jwm

apt-get install xinit jwm

Step 3 : Launch X and enjoy minimal graphical-ness

startx

That's cool but ...

It also doesn't automatically create all the fun systemd needs to use the graphical.target to load on boot. This is in part because a basic install of JWM + xinit doesn't generate or bring in anything that makes a display-manager.service file.
Now there's a few ways this could be handled, such as:

Install a common session manager

Roll your own systemd scripts

Roll your own crazy auto-login shenanigans

Now since my last requirement is bascially to make something automagical and somewhat user-proof, I need to have something that :

Starts at boot

Automatically loads a web browser pointing to the local Proxmox Node's UI

Preferably allows VM/node monitoring access with minimal fuss
Optional: loads additional tabs/windows to view critical services like Ipfire, Pi-hole and Samba AD

So the question becomes, which of the options available to me are the most user-friendly and most stable? nodm would have been a great choice as all we need is a basic Kiosk Mode access, but it appears it's creator dumped all his programming time into making lightdm behave basically the same way.

At a bit after midnight, I'm not quite ready to go down that part of the rabbit-hole yet, but I will likely go the lightdm route with a special user account. As for web browser, I'm a fan of Firefox, but it may be a bit RAM hungry for this use case. So I may try Midori, Seamonkey or others to see which play nice with the Proxmox UI without bringing in too many requirements.

Special thanks to these posts: