Xiwi, Xfce… what are you talking about? Well it has to be another exciting episode in the series of Chromebook updates.
Recently Chrome pushed a major update to its Operating System (OS). It was a fantastic update because it brought all manor of Android applications to my Chromebook, happily making it into an Android Tablet, which is kind of cool. The flip side though is that when the update was done my Crouton installation of Linux wouldn’t work anymore. (My earlier posts explain Crouton and Linux installation on a Chromebook).
If you’ve read my posts you know that I pretty much take Linux on the Chromebook for granted until it breaks. I use Linux whenever the task calls for a full feature Office suite of software. Having Linux on my Chromebook allows it to do the things I used to need a full laptop computer for.
In any event, with the OS upgrade it was time for a fresh installation of Linux. Although it isn’t new, there was something called a Xiwi extension that had functionality that sounded useful. So I had to take it for a spin.
Xiwi is a Chrome extension that works with Crouton to permit Linux to run in a window on the Chromebook rather than having to toggle completely between Chrome and Linux as I have done in the past. Further, Xiwi permits the basic task of cut and paste to carry its contents from Linux to Chrome or from Chrome to Linux.
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I put my Chromebook in Developer mode, downloaded Crouton, and selected Xfce as my flavor of the month (okay, six months). Upon downloading Linux into the Chromebook I was intrigued to see it had put in what’s called the Xenial version of Ubuntu, rather than the Trusty version I’ve used for the past year or so. But the best feature of this new install was that I added Xiwi. And sure enough I can run a full version of Linux in a window on the Chromebook.
To be sure the Xiwi and Crouton installation also permit completely switching between the Chrome OS and the Linux OS (at least from the driver’s seat – I realize internally the way Crouton works it is essentially running both operating systems at a time, just suspending whichever one is not in use).
So, what does this mean, you ask. It means I can bring up any Google account I have (personal or work) and then shell into a window that runs Linux at the same time. Pleasantly, the Xfce desktop and Xenial version of the Ubuntu Distro use extremely little of the Chromebook’s resources (CPU power and battery) when it is idle. There is very little overhead to this configuration.
When you add to this the existing Chrome Remote application that allows a quick and simple remote connection to any full size computer you use at work or elsewhere, there is less and less reason to purchase or carry around anything other than a Chromebook.