I've been around adelie for 2 years and I was always excited with its development and have to admit impatient at times.

Live as far as I understand the term is a full functional linux system, meaning you have most of the tools you need to do what you like, install native or build and install other software. What is a non-live system, a minimal system which only runs an install script. In the older days there were more of them and less of live systems.

I have installed and use openbox without a DM ever since I started. I played with the live system so much and kept configuring things that I was too worried to lose it through an installation, so I just copied the live system into a an empty partition. Didn't even bother to change my username, I am still called live. I don't use the service management that is used currently, s6 init and 66 on top of it just as found on obarun and void. Where my other installations are nice sports cars, I see adelie as a pure race car, if this makes sense.