Window Maker is a X11 window manager originally designed to provide integration support for the GNUstep desktop environment. In every way possible, it reproduces the elegant look and feel of the NEXTSTEP user interface. It is fast, feature rich, easy to configure, and easy to use. It is also free software, with contributions being made by programmers from around the world.

Window Maker includes compatibility options which allow it to work with other popular desktop environments, namely GNOME and KDE, and comes with a powerful GUI configuration editor, called WPrefs, which removes the need to edit text-based config files by hand. Please see the features section for more specifics on what Window Maker can do, and how it compares with other popular window managers.

Here are some key features of "Window Maker":

Core (usability)

· almost complete ICCCM compliance
· national language I18N support (over 11 locales)
· built-in icon dithering with support for 4bpp and 8bpp displays
· popup menus that support keyboard traversal, which can be "pinned" to the root window
· support for GNUstep, GNOME, and KDE window hints to better integrate with those desktop environments
· support for Motif[tm] and OPEN LOOK[tm] window hints to better interface with applications based on those toolkits
· built-in GUI configuration utility that eliminates the need to hand edit config files
· application Dock (similar to NEXTSTEP/MacOS X Dock) that can be configured using drag and drop
· workspace Dock (aka Clip/Fiend) which is a workspace specific Dock extender
· support for rudimentary session management
· support for dockapps (equivalent of applets or epplets)
· ability to change all preferences and menus on-the-fly without having to restart the window manager
· support for multiple workspaces (aka "virtual desktops")

Extras (eye candy)

· built-in themes support
· over 13 types of window decorations, including custom defined
· support for XPM, PNG, JPEG, TIFF, GIF and PPM icons (no conversions with external programs) with an alpha-channel
· support for setting the root window background (via the wmsetbg utility)
· optional superfluous animations, such as window shading, customizeable icon miniturization effects, slide/scrolling menus, and much more

What's New in This Release:

· fixed crash with info panel and alt-tabbing
· updated Japanese translations
· allow disable of switch panel when SwitchPanelImages=None
· added X Input Methods support in WINGs
· fixed issues with compiling on Solaris with openwin
· reduced minimum required version number for the Xft library to 2.1.0
· fixed some compilation issues with gcc-2.9x
· removed --with-appsdir option and replaced it with --with-gnustepdir. Also, default installation path (for non GNUstep users) is now $(prefix)/bin
· fixed bug with infinite loop in some circumstances in fitText() in WINGs
· fixed to allow parallel builds on SMP systems using make -j
· updated Italian translation
· applied .AppInfo --> Library path rename patch
· added code to automatically update the icon paths from the old .AppInfo style to the new Library/WindowMaker style in WMWindowAttributes when Window Maker starts to make transition transparent for users.
· fixed issue with window being moved by 1 pixel up and left when the window move was initiated by the client
· improved hide/unhide animation for applications with multiple windows (only animate the active window hiding/unhiding, which makes Window Maker faster and more responsive for such applications). This also makes the restart operation much faster.
· fixed bug with windows shrinking to very small sizes when Unmaximize was used on them, after they were closed in a maximized state.
· fixed bug with restoring maximized state from NetWM atoms.
· fixed issue with GNUstep applications losing focus when all their windows are closed and there remains only their menu
· try fixed font for the technical drawing font if helvetica-12 is not available to avoid crashing
· new algorithm for placing miniwindows after unhiding the application they belong to, that works without auto-arranging the icons, while still avoiding multiple icons in the same spot by moving the miniwindows to a new slot if their old slot was occupied in the meantime.
· double clicking an appicon will also raise the miniwindows that belong to that application to the front (along with the normal windows).