Customizing the XFCE desktop

[engineer]

I realize that most people are running the KDE desktop, however my old laptop does not have enough memory.

What are some approches to customizing the xfce desktop? I know other distros us dockbarX and mate.
I would like to dress up my desk top; any ideas?

Thank you,

engineer

[doktor5000]

Before you start customizing, maybe try the other small desktops. There's at least e17, MATE, cinnamon, or razor-qt to try out. For Mageia 5 also lxqt.
Also, you can try with only a window manager, like IceWM, fluxbox, openbox, afterstep, windowmaker ...

Question is: What customization do you want? Another dock, then you could try something like cairo-dock. Some multi-purpose applet, then try out conky.

As an idea, maybe you want to go through this thread: viewtopic.php?f=5&t=1840