I've begun studying aewm (which I can't post a link to), because I'm interested in learning how window managers, desktop environments, and X work. My long-term goal is to develop a usable and simple DE for Linux that has the look and feel of Mac OS 9. It's possible to configure your themes and stuff to make it look like Mac OS 9 to a certain extent, and I've done that, but I wasn't satisfied.

So I figured why not make my own. The thing is, I figured I'd start with a simple wm that others have been based on, since that would mean it was a good one to learn, so I chose aewm. However, the documentation isn't that good for it, and I've never dabbled with WMs before, just program/application development (and only for certain, niche situations I've found myself in).

I realized I don't really understand how the whole thing is supposed to work together.

Should I choose a different one to learn, or can someone who's programmed WMs before possibly give me some tips or sagely advice on how to get started?

At this point I'm thinking about choosing another WM, since I am not able to compile this one. Does anyone have any other WM that they think I should study instead (hopefully with decent documentation)? I'm really looking forward to learning this, but maybe I need someone else's philosophy or point-of-view to see this from another angle so I can begin understanding WM mechanics and design.

Thanks in advance

[Edit: All the books on smile.amazon that look promising are almost 30 years old.]
[Edit 2: I found an article (which I can't post a link to...) that looks very good on beginning to program with Xlib.]