Is it safe to install i3 or BSPWM alongside XFCE?

I’m a big r/unixporn fan and want to rice my system. You might ask, ‘Why not just install Manjaro i3?’. I already installed the XFCE version and don’t want to keep wiping my drive. Is it okay?

# inxi because i have to

System:
  Kernel: 5.14.10-1-MANJARO x86_64 bits: 64 compiler: gcc v: 11.1.0
  parameters: BOOT_IMAGE=/boot/vmlinuz-5.14-x86_64
  root=UUID=a260f330-e133-4867-ad68-6a09f51598ed rw quiet udev.log_priority=3
  Desktop: Xfce 4.16.0 tk: Gtk 3.24.29 info: xfce4-panel wm: xfwm 4.16.1
  dm: LightDM 1.30.0 Distro: Manjaro Linux base: Arch Linux
Machine:
  Type: Laptop System: HP product: HP Laptop 15s-du2xxx
  v: Type1ProductConfigId serial: <filter> Chassis: type: 10 serial: <filter>
  Mobo: HP model: 85F3 v: 40.33 serial: <filter> UEFI: Insyde v: F.43
  date: 03/31/2021
Battery:
  ID-1: BAT1 charge: 13.7 Wh (36.3%) condition: 37.7/41.0 Wh (91.8%)
  volts: 11.1 min: 11.4 model: COMPAL PABAS0241231 type: Li-ion
  serial: <filter> status: Discharging
Memory:
  RAM: total: 3.62 GiB used: 1.38 GiB (38.1%)
  Array-1: capacity: 32 GiB slots: 2 EC: None max-module-size: 16 GiB
  note: est.
  Device-1: Bottom-Slot 1(left) size: 4 GiB speed: 2667 MT/s type: DDR4
  detail: synchronous bus-width: 64 bits total: 64 bits
  manufacturer: Ramaxel Technology part-no: RMSA3310NA86H9F-2666
  serial: <filter>
  Device-2: Bottom-Slot 2(right) size: No Module Installed
CPU:
  Info: Dual Core model: Intel Core i3-1005G1 socket: U3E1 bits: 64
  type: MT MCP arch: Ice Lake family: 6 model-id: 7E (126) stepping: 5
  microcode: A6 cache: L2: 4 MiB bogomips: 9524
  Speed: 1001 MHz min/max: 400/3400 MHz base/boost: 1200/8300 volts: 0.7 V
  ext-clock: 100 MHz Core speeds (MHz): 1: 1001 2: 1001 3: 1000 4: 1000
  Flags: 3dnowprefetch abm acpi adx aes aperfmperf apic arat arch_capabilities
  arch_perfmon art avx avx2 avx512_bitalg avx512_vbmi2 avx512_vnni
  avx512_vpopcntdq avx512bw avx512cd avx512dq avx512f avx512ifma avx512vbmi
  avx512vl bmi1 bmi2 bts clflush clflushopt cmov constant_tsc cpuid
  cpuid_fault cx16 cx8 de ds_cpl dtes64 dtherm dts epb ept ept_ad erms est
  f16c flexpriority flush_l1d fma fpu fsgsbase fsrm fxsr gfni ht hwp
  hwp_act_window hwp_epp hwp_notify hwp_pkg_req ibpb ibrs ibrs_enhanced ida
  intel_pt invpcid invpcid_single lahf_lm lm mca mce md_clear mmx monitor
  movbe msr mtrr nonstop_tsc nopl nx ospke pae pat pbe pcid pclmulqdq pdcm
  pdpe1gb pebs pge pku pln pni popcnt pse pse36 pts rdpid rdrand rdseed rdtscp
  rep_good sdbg sep sha_ni smap smep split_lock_detect ss ssbd sse sse2 sse4_1
  sse4_2 ssse3 stibp syscall tm tm2 tpr_shadow tsc tsc_adjust
  tsc_deadline_timer tsc_known_freq umip vaes vme vmx vnmi vpclmulqdq vpid
  x2apic xgetbv1 xsave xsavec xsaveopt xsaves xtopology xtpr
  Vulnerabilities: Type: itlb_multihit status: KVM: VMX disabled
  Type: l1tf status: Not affected
  Type: mds status: Not affected
  Type: meltdown status: Not affected
  Type: spec_store_bypass
  mitigation: Speculative Store Bypass disabled via prctl and seccomp
  Type: spectre_v1
  mitigation: usercopy/swapgs barriers and __user pointer sanitization
  Type: spectre_v2 mitigation: Enhanced IBRS, IBPB: conditional, RSB filling
  Type: srbds status: Not affected
  Type: tsx_async_abort status: Not affected
Graphics:
  Device-1: Intel Iris Plus Graphics G1 vendor: Hewlett-Packard driver: i915
  v: kernel bus-ID: 00:02.0 chip-ID: 8086:8a56 class-ID: 0300
  Device-2: IMC Networks HP TrueVision HD Camera type: USB driver: uvcvideo
  bus-ID: 1-5:3 chip-ID: 13d3:56c9 class-ID: 0e02 serial: <filter>
  Display: server: X.Org 1.20.13 compositor: xfwm4 v: 4.16.1 driver:
  loaded: modesetting alternate: fbdev,vesa display-ID: :0.0 screens: 1
  Screen-1: 0 s-res: 1920x1080 s-dpi: 96 s-size: 508x285mm (20.0x11.2")
  s-diag: 582mm (22.9")
  OpenGL: renderer: Mesa Intel UHD Graphics (ICL GT1) v: 4.6 Mesa 21.2.3
  direct render: Yes
Audio:
  Device-1: Intel Ice Lake-LP Smart Sound Audio vendor: Hewlett-Packard
  driver: snd_hda_intel v: kernel alternate: snd_sof_pci_intel_icl
  bus-ID: 00:1f.3 chip-ID: 8086:34c8 class-ID: 0403
  Sound Server-1: ALSA v: k5.14.10-1-MANJARO running: yes
  Sound Server-2: JACK v: 1.9.19 running: no
  Sound Server-3: PulseAudio v: 15.0 running: yes
Network:
  Device-1: Realtek RTL8111/8168/8411 PCI Express Gigabit Ethernet
  vendor: Hewlett-Packard driver: r8169 v: kernel port: 4000 bus-ID: 01:00.0
  chip-ID: 10ec:8168 class-ID: 0200
  IF: eno1 state: down mac: <filter>
  Device-2: Realtek RTL8822CE 802.11ac PCIe Wireless Network Adapter
  vendor: Hewlett-Packard driver: rtw_8822ce v: N/A modules: rtw88_8822ce
  port: 3000 bus-ID: 02:00.0 chip-ID: 10ec:c822 class-ID: 0280
  IF: wlo1 state: up mac: <filter>
  IP v4: <filter> type: dynamic noprefixroute scope: global
  broadcast: <filter>
  IP v6: <filter> type: dynamic noprefixroute scope: global
  IP v6: <filter> type: noprefixroute scope: link
  WAN IP: <filter>
Bluetooth:
  Device-1: Realtek 802.11ac WLAN Adapter type: USB driver: btusb v: 0.8
  bus-ID: 1-10:5 chip-ID: 0bda:b00c class-ID: e001 serial: <filter>
  Report: rfkill ID: hci0 rfk-id: 6 state: down bt-service: enabled,running
  rfk-block: hardware: no software: yes address: see --recommends
Logical:
  Message: No logical block device data found.
RAID:
  Hardware-1: Intel 82801 Mobile SATA Controller [RAID mode] driver: ahci
  v: 3.0 port: 5060 bus-ID: 00:17.0 chip-ID: 8086:282a rev: N/A class-ID: 0104
Drives:
  Local Storage: total: 931.51 GiB used: 6.48 GiB (0.7%)
  SMART Message: Required tool smartctl not installed. Check --recommends
  ID-1: /dev/sda maj-min: 8:0 vendor: Seagate model: ST1000LM035-1RK172
  size: 931.51 GiB block-size: physical: 4096 B logical: 512 B speed: 6.0 Gb/s
  type: HDD rpm: 5400 serial: <filter> rev: RTM2 scheme: GPT
  Message: No optical or floppy data found.
Partition:
  ID-1: / raw-size: 931.22 GiB size: 915.53 GiB (98.32%) used: 6.48 GiB (0.7%)
  fs: ext4 block-size: 4096 B dev: /dev/sda2 maj-min: 8:2 label: N/A
  uuid: a260f330-e133-4867-ad68-6a09f51598ed
  ID-2: /boot/efi raw-size: 300 MiB size: 299.4 MiB (99.80%)
  used: 288 KiB (0.1%) fs: vfat block-size: 512 B dev: /dev/sda1 maj-min: 8:1
  label: NO_LABEL uuid: 13B1-8756
Swap:
  Alert: No swap data was found.
Unmounted:
  Message: No unmounted partitions found.
USB:
  Hub-1: 1-0:1 info: Full speed (or root) Hub ports: 12 rev: 2.0
  speed: 480 Mb/s chip-ID: 1d6b:0002 class-ID: 0900
  Device-1: 1-2:2 info: Logitech Wireless Receiver type: Mouse
  driver: hid-generic,usbhid interfaces: 1 rev: 1.1 speed: 12 Mb/s power: 50mA
  chip-ID: 046d:c542 class-ID: 0301
  Device-2: 1-5:3 info: IMC Networks HP TrueVision HD Camera type: Video
  driver: uvcvideo interfaces: 2 rev: 2.0 speed: 480 Mb/s power: 500mA
  chip-ID: 13d3:56c9 class-ID: 0e02 serial: <filter>
  Device-3: 1-6:4 info: Elan Micro ELAN:ARM-M4 type: <vendor specific>
  driver: N/A interfaces: 1 rev: 2.0 speed: 12 Mb/s power: 100mA
  chip-ID: 04f3:0c00 class-ID: 0000
  Device-4: 1-10:5 info: Realtek 802.11ac WLAN Adapter type: Bluetooth
  driver: btusb interfaces: 2 rev: 1.0 speed: 12 Mb/s power: 500mA
  chip-ID: 0bda:b00c class-ID: e001 serial: <filter>
  Hub-2: 2-0:1 info: Full speed (or root) Hub ports: 6 rev: 3.1 speed: 10 Gb/s
  chip-ID: 1d6b:0003 class-ID: 0900
Sensors:
  System Temperatures: cpu: 27.8 C mobo: 10.0 C
  Fan Speeds (RPM): N/A
Info:
  Processes: 194 Uptime: 18h 15m wakeups: 26 Init: systemd v: 249
  tool: systemctl Compilers: gcc: N/A Packages: pacman: 883 lib: 267
  Shell: Zsh (sudo) v: 5.8 default: Bash v: 5.1.8 running-in: xfce4-terminal
  inxi: 3.3.08

~- Yes -~

Thanks. Can you give me a link to a tutorial? I’m trying to find one, but they’re all for vanilla Arch.

pamac install i3 🤷

For detailed information see below, these instructions do work well, they are also the first hit in my search engine.

https://wiki.manjaro.org/index.php/Install_Desktop_Environments

Thanks for pointing in a more complete direction.
And for confirming that those still mostly work.
(its been a while)

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