Glx-Dock/Cairo-Dock is an interactive dock (like the one you know from a Mac) that provides easy access to some of the files, folders, and applications on your computer, and more. You can use it with OpenGL (to use your graphics card) or without, and it is compatible with Compiz, but it can also run without a composite manager. It works under Unity, GNOME, KDE, and Xfce.

Cairo Dock (also known as GLX-Dock) 2.2.0 will be a truly amazing release. After announcing a new autohide option, a new systray and the MeMenu applet, a new video with a feature to be released in Cairo Dock 2.2.0 was published on YouTube by the Cairo Dock developers: multiple Cairo Dock instances, each with its own settings:

Cairo-Dock is a system dock similar to Awn and the dock in Mac OS X. It’s not as fancy as Awn, but Cairo-Dock is very configurable and supports some slick graphical effects.

Cairo-Dock is an animated application launch bar for the desktop, comparable to the dock in Mac OS X or Rocket Dock (for Windows). It is compatible with Compiz, but it can also run without a composite manager . Cairo-Dock can run under GNOME, KDE and XFCE.

When Cairo Dock v2.0 was out, it instantly became my favourite dock for Linux.

Unfortunately, some Intel and ATI graphic card users were not able to run it in OpenGL mode (which is what's amazing about Cairo Dock). If you were among them, this is going to be great news for you: Cairo Dock in OpenGL mode now works with the very latest OpenSource drivers for ATI and Intel video card.

wbar is a quick-launch bar (not a dock) that has an appearance similar to Avant Window Manager and Cairo Dock. It is GTK (Gnome) based but can work in all desktop environments. It does not require a compositing manager to be installed and is therefore quicker and more suitable for low-end hardware systems.

A light and eye-candy dock to launch your programs .It uses Cairo / OpenGL to render graphics (many in correlation with Compiz) with full hardware acceleration. It’s fully configurable and fully customisable and can be used as a taskbar too. You can easily add applets in the dock or as a desklet.

Cairo-Dock is a pretty, fast and customizable desktop interface. You can see it as a good alternative/addition to Unity, Gnome-Shell, Xfce-panel, KDE-panel, etc
After 6 months of hard work, a new version of Cairo-Dock is available.

After 3 months of hard work, the new version of GLX-Dock/Cairo-Dock (2.1.3) is out. The new version brings a lot of fixes for some existing problems such as smoother auto-hide, automatic detection of indirect rendering for Intel/ATI cards, but the most visible change in Cairo Dock v2.1.3 is the new configuration panel which is now very easy to use