Date: 2014may23 OS: FreeBSD 10 Q. How can I get a nice graphical desktop environment for FreeBSD 10? (The docs I found out there say to use gnome2 which does seem to exist in the packages) Including a graphical login. A. Gnome has been replaced with Mate. This worked for me... Do this as root:

pkg install mate slim xorg

mate = the replacement for gnome slim = the login manager xorg = X Windows Its also useful to install these packages which have commonly used programs. But I suggest installing it later since its big:

pkg install gnome2-fifth-toe firefox

gnome2-fifth-toe = commonly used desktop programs firefox = web browser Modify /etc/rc.conf:

dbus_enable="YES" hald_enable="YES" avahi_daemon_enable="YES" avahi_dnsconfd_enable="YES" slim_enable="YES"

Modify ~/.xinitrc for the non-root users:

exec mate-session

Add /proc to /etc/fstab:

proc /proc procfs rw 0 0

Finally, restart:

reboot

After some text you should see the slim graphical login screen. With slim, you can enter username "halt" and the root password to shutdown cleanly. I tried the gdm login manager but after login it displayed a wristwatch icon for the pointer. And I could not move windows.