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News Recommended Links Architecture Configuration X display manager XDMCP
Exporting_display "Can't open display" Error .Xresources How to Install XRDP daemon on Centos or RHEL Using xauth Xdefaults
Fonts in X X11 security Xming Cygwin/X vnc vino
Installing X11 and Gnome Desktop in RHEL Activating the gnome VNC vino-server from the command line Diagnosing problems with remote X11 sessions via SSH How to Install XRDP daemon on Centos or RHEL Too high refresh rate/ too high resolution problem  
Troubleshooting The Unix Hater’s Handbook Sysadmin Horror Stories Tips Humor Etc

The X Window System. The Athena project at MIT was a joint effort between that university and Digital Equipment to create a graphical interface for Unix, which was finally released in April of 1994. The current version of X, which is now the standard graphical interface for Unix, is Version 11, Release 6. X Windows, often called ``X'', is also known as X11R6 (pronounced ``ex eleven, are 6''). X Windows is the generic name for that overall program that interfaces the graphical software environment with your system's hardware.

The X Window system consists of three main parts - the X server, the window manager and the clients.

  1. The X Server. The ubiquitous XFree86 is a free version that is quite good in its own right. It is distributed under the GNU public license. Most all Linux distributions come with XFree86.
     

  2. The Window Manager. The window manager governs the actual look and feel of your X Windows graphical environment. The hardware and system needs of the graphical environment are handled by the X Server, but the actual appearance and behavior are handled by the humble window manager.

    There are many different window managers which are all designed to run on X11R6. This is because X11R6 is standard and uniform, hopefully, so window managers can be also.  One of the most popular on Linux are Gnome and KDE.
     

  3. X Clients. The graphical environment is useless unless you have software that runs on it. Those individual software programs that run on X Windows are called X Clients. The thing to remember about an X client is that it usually only runs under X Windows. Many programs run under a non-graphical interface as well as X Windows itself, but these use programs use two different resources.

    X clients normally use one of the many graphical toolkits available for X Windows. These are libraries of common pieces of code that different programs may share on an X Windows system. Several such ``toolkits'' exist that are popular among developers, so your X client programs may actually look different in some respects. One program may use "widgets'' (radio buttons, checkboxes, scrollbars, etc) from the Motif libraries, while another program may use Tk libraries, while still another may use X Forms libraries. This is permissible under X Windows, and some client software may even be available for compiling under your choice of graphical libraries.

One of the most interesting feature of X Window System is the ability to export display to other computer over TCP/IP network.  See Exporting_display for details.

In addition to the X server itself, here are a few of the noteworthy utilities:


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[Mar 28, 2021] How to Install and Configure VNC on Ubuntu 20.04

Mar 26, 2021 | linuxize.com

... ... ...

We'll be installing TigerVNC. It is an actively maintained high-performance VNC server. Type the following command to install the package:

sudo apt install tigervnc-standalone-serverCopy
Configuring VNC Access

Once the VNC server is installed, the next step is to create the initial user configuration and set up the password.

Set the user password using the vncpasswd command. Do not use sudo when running the command below:

vncpasswdCopy

You will be prompted to enter and confirm the password and whether to set it as a view-only password. If you choose to set up a view-only password, the user will not be able to interact with the VNC instance with the mouse and the keyboard.

Password:
Verify:
Would you like to enter a view-only password (y/n)? n
Copy

The password file is stored in the ~/.vnc directory, which is created if not present.

Next, we need to configure TigerVNC to use Xfce. To do so, create the following file:

~/.vnc/xstartup
nano ~/.vnc/xstartupCopy
#!/bin/sh
unset SESSION_MANAGER
unset DBUS_SESSION_BUS_ADDRESS
exec startxfce4
Copy

Save and close the file. The commands above are automatically executed whenever you start or restart the TigerVNC server.

The ~/.vnc/xstartup file also needs to have execute permissions. Use the chmod command to set the file permissions:

chmod u+x ~/.vnc/xstartupCopy

If you need to pass additional options to the VNC server, create a file named config and add one option per line. Here is an example:

me title=

geometry=1920x1080
dpi=96
Copy

me title=

vncserver command:
vncserverCopy
New 'server2.linuxize.com:1 (linuxize)' desktop at :1 on machine server2.linuxize.com

Starting applications specified in /home/linuxize/.vnc/xstartup
Log file is /home/linuxize/.vnc/server2.linuxize.com:1.log

Use xtigervncviewer -SecurityTypes VncAuth -passwd /home/linuxize/.vnc/passwd :1 to connect to the VNC server.
Copy

Note the :1 after the hostname in the output above. This indicates the number of the display port on which the vnc server is running. In this example, the server is running on TCP port 5901 (5900+1). If you create a second instance with vncserver it will run on the next free port i.e :2 , which means that the server is running on port 5902 (5900+2).

What is important to remember is that when working with VNC servers, :X is a display port that refers to 5900+X .

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You can get a list of all the currently running VNC sessions by typing:

vncserver -listCopy
TigerVNC server sessions:

X DISPLAY #	RFB PORT #	PROCESS ID
:1		      5901		    5710
Copy

Before continuing with the next step, stop the VNC instance using the vncserver command with a -kill option and the server number as an argument. In this example, the server is running in port 5901 ( :1 ), so we'll stop it with:

me title=

vncserver -kill :1Copy
Killing Xtigervnc process ID 5710... success!
Copy
Creating a Systemd unit file

Instead of manually starting the VNC session, let's create a systemd unit file so that you start, stop, and restart the VNC service as needed.

Open your text editor and copy and paste the following configuration into it. Make sure to change the username on line 7 to match your username.

sudo nano /etc/systemd/system/[email protected]
/etc/systemd/system/[email protected]
[Unit]
Description=Remote desktop service (VNC)
After=syslog.target network.target

[Service]
Type=simple
User=linuxize
PAMName=login
PIDFile=/home/%u/.vnc/%H%i.pid
ExecStartPre=/bin/sh -c '/usr/bin/vncserver -kill :%i > /dev/null 2>&1 || :'
ExecStart=/usr/bin/vncserver :%i -geometry 1440x900 -alwaysshared -fg
ExecStop=/usr/bin/vncserver -kill :%i

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target
Copy

Save and close the file.

Notify systemd that a new unit file is created:

sudo systemctl daemon-reloadCopy

Enable the service to start on boot:

me title=

sudo systemctl enable [email protected]

The number 1 after the @ sign defines the display port on which the VNC service will run. This means that the VNC server will listen on port 5901 , as we discussed in the previous section.

Start the VNC service by executing:

sudo systemctl start [email protected]

Verify that the service is successfully started with:

sudo systemctl status [email protected]
[email protected] - Remote desktop service (VNC)
     Loaded: loaded (/etc/systemd/system/[email protected]; enabled; vendor preset: enabled)
     Active: active (running) since Fri 2021-03-26 20:00:59 UTC; 3s ago
...
Copy
Connecting to VNC server

VNC is not an encrypted protocol and can be subject to packet sniffing. The recommended approach is to create an SSH tunnel and securely forward traffic from your local machine on port 5901 to the server on the same port.

Set Up SSH Tunneling on Linux and macOS

If you run Linux, macOS, or any other Unix-based operating system on your machine, you can easily create an SSH tunnel with the following command:

me title=

ssh -L 5901:127.0.0.1:5901 -N -f -l vagrant 192.168.33.10Copy

You will be prompted to enter the user password.

Make sure to replace username and server_ip_address with your username and the IP address of your server.

Set Up SSH Tunneling on Windows

If you run Windows, you can set up SSH Tunneling using the PuTTY SSH client .

Open Putty and enter your server IP Address in the Host name or IP address field.

Under the Connection menu, box, expand SSH , and select Tunnels . Enter the VNC server port ( 5901 ) in the Source Port field and enter server_ip_address:5901 in the Destination field and click on the Add button as shown in the image below:

Go back to the Session page to save the settings, so you do not need to enter them each time. To the remote server, select the saved session and click on the Open button.

Connecting using Vncviewer

Now that the SSH tunnel is created, it is time to open your Vncviewer and to connect to the VNC Server at localhost:5901 .

You can use any VNC viewer such as TigerVNC, TightVNC, RealVNC, UltraVNC, Vinagre, and VNC Viewer for Google Chrome .

We'll be using TigerVNC. Open the viewer, enter localhost:5901 , and click on the Connect button.

Enter your user password when prompted, and you should see the default Xfce desktop. It will look something like this:

You can start interacting with the remote XFCE desktop from your local machine using your keyboard and mouse.

Conclusion

We've shown you how to install and configure a VNC server up and running, on Ubuntu 20.04.

To configure your VNC server to start a display for more than one user, create the initial configuration and set up the password using the vncpasswd command. You will also need to create a new service file using a different port.

Feel free to leave a comment if you have any questions.

[Mar 15, 2021] Install GNOME GUI on RHEL 7 Linux Server

Jul 24, 2018 | linuxconfig.org

If you have performed a RHEL 7 Linux Server installation and did not include Graphical User Interface (GUI) you can do it later directly from command line using yum command and selecting an appropriate installation group. To list all available installation groups on Redhat 7 Linux use:

[root@rhel7 ~]# yum group list
Loaded plugins: product-id, subscription-manager
This system is not registered to Red Hat Subscription Management. You can use subscription-manager to register.
There is no installed groups file.
Maybe run: yum groups mark convert (see man yum)
Available environment groups:
   Minimal Install
   Infrastructure Server
   File and Print Server
   Basic Web Server
   Virtualization Host
   Server with GUI
Available Groups:
   Compatibility Libraries
   Console Internet Tools
   Development Tools
   Graphical Administration Tools
   Legacy UNIX Compatibility
   Scientific Support
   Security Tools
   Smart Card Support
   System Administration Tools
   System Management
Done


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me title=


From the above list select Server with GUI installation group:
[root@rhel7 ~]# yum groupinstall 'Server with GUI'
Transaction Summary
=================
Install  261 Packages (+604 Dependent packages)

Total download size: 527 M
Installed size: 1.7 G
Is this ok [y/d/N]:
Just because gnome desktop environment is a default GUI on RHEL 7 linux system the above command will install gnome. Alternatively, you can run the below command to only install core GNOME packages:
[root@rhel7 ~]# yum groupinstall 'X Window System' 'GNOME'
Once the installation is finished, you need to change system's runlevel to runlevel 5. Changing runlevel on RHEL 7 is done by use of systemctl command. The below command will change runlevel from runlevel 3 to runelevel 5 on RHEL 7:
[root@rhel7 ~]# systemctl set-default graphical.target
Depending on your previous installations you may need to accept Redhat License after you reboot your system. Once you boot to your system you can check GNOME version using:
[root@rhel7 ~]# gnome-shell --version
GNOME Shell 3.8.4

[Mar 07, 2021] How to install the NVIDIA drivers

Mar 07, 2021 | linuxconfig.org

... ... ...

  1. Open up the terminal and identify your Nvidia graphic card model by executing to following command:
    $ lspci -vnn | grep VGA
    01:00.0 VGA compatible controller [0300]: NVIDIA Corporation GP106 [GeForce GTX 1060 6GB] [10de:1c03] (rev a1) (prog-if 00 [VGA controller])
    
  2. Download the Nvidia driver package from nvidia.com using search criteria based on your Nvidia card model and the Linux operating system. Download an appropriate Nvidia driver for your VGA card. Download an appropriate Nvidia driver for your VGA card. Alternatively, if you know what you are doing you can download the driver directly from the Nvidia Linux driver list . Once ready you should end up with a file similar to the one shown below:
    $ ls NVIDIA-Linux-x86_64-*
    NVIDIA-Linux-x86_64-460.39.run
    
  3. Next, install package prerequisites to be able successfully compile and install Nvidia driver on you AlmaLinux system.
    # dnf groupinstall "Development Tools"
    # dnf install libglvnd-devel elfutils-libelf-devel
    
  4. Permanently disable the nouveau driver by modifying the GRUB boot menu:
    # grub2-editenv - set "$(grub2-editenv - list | grep kernelopts) nouveau.modeset=0"
    
    After execution of the above grub2-editenv command the GRUB boot line should look similar to the one below:
    # grub2-editenv - list | grep kernelopts
    kernelopts=root=/dev/mapper/almalinux-root ro crashkernel=auto resume=/dev/mapper/almalinux-swap rd.lvm.lv=almalinux/root rd.lvm.lv=almalinux/swap  nouveau.modeset=0
    
  5. Reboot your AlmaLinux 8 Desktop:
    WARNING
    Depending on your Nvidia VGA model your system might misbehave. At this stage be ready to get your hands dirty. After the reboot you may end up without GUI at all. Be sure that you have the SSH enabled on your system to be able login remotely or use CTRL+ALT+F2 to switch TTY console and continue with the installation.
    # reboot
    
  6. The Nvidia drivers must be installed while the Xorg server is stopped. Switch to the text mode by:
    #  systemctl isolate multi-user.target
    
  7. Install the Nvidia driver by executing the following command via TTY console or remote SSH login:
    NOTE
    ERROR: Unable to find the kernel source tree for the currently running kernel
    In case you receive the above error message during the execution of the below command, follow the kernel source instructions on how to install kernel source on CentOS / RHEL / AlmaLinux Linux system.
    # bash NVIDIA-Linux-x86_64-*
    
    When prompted answer <code><noscript><img src= When prompted answer YES to installation of NVIDIA's 32-bit compatibility libraries. Allow automatically update of your X configuration file. Allow automatically update of your X configuration file. You should see the following message after successful NVIDIA driver installation. You should see the following message after successful NVIDIA driver installation.
  8. Reboot your system one more time.
    All done. Reboot your system. The Nvidia driver should now be installed on your AlamLinux 8 Desktop. Login and run nvidia-settings to further configure your Nvidia graphic card settings.
    # reboot
    

Troubleshooting GDM on Xorg server does not start after user login and user ends up with black screen. The Xorg log contains the following or similar error messages:

[  3515.464] (II) systemd-logind: got pause for 13:68
[  3515.738] (II) systemd-logind: got resume for 13:64
[  3515.757] (II) NVIDIA(0): Setting mode "DFP-1:nvidia-auto-select"
[  3515.793] (II) NVIDIA(0): ACPI: failed to connect to the ACPI event daemon; the daemon
[  3515.793] (II) NVIDIA(0):     may not be running or the "AcpidSocketPath" X
[  3515.793] (II) NVIDIA(0):     configuration option may not be set correctly.  When the
[  3515.793] (II) NVIDIA(0):     ACPI event daemon is available, the NVIDIA X driver will
[  3515.793] (II) NVIDIA(0):     try to use it to receive ACPI event notifications.  For
[  3515.793] (II) NVIDIA(0):     details, please see the "ConnectToAcpid" and
[  3515.793] (II) NVIDIA(0):     "AcpidSocketPath" X configuration options in Appendix B: X
[  3515.793] (II) NVIDIA(0):     Config Options in the README.
[  3515.793] [dix] couldn't enable device 8
[  3515.793] (II) systemd-logind: got resume for 13:66
[  3515.793] [dix] couldn't enable device 6
[  3515.794] (II) systemd-logind: got resume for 13:65
[  3515.794] [dix] couldn't enable device 7
[  3515.794] (II) systemd-logind: got resume for 13:72
[  3515.794] [dix] couldn't enable device 14
[  3515.794] [dix] couldn't enable device 17
[  3515.794] (II) systemd-logind: got resume for 13:71
[  3515.794] [dix] couldn't enable device 13
[  3515.794] (II) systemd-logind: got resume for 13:67
[  3515.794] [dix] couldn't enable device 9
[  3515.794] (II) systemd-logind: got resume for 13:73
[  3515.794] [dix] couldn't enable device 15
[  3515.794] (II) systemd-logind: got resume for 13:69
[  3515.794] [dix] couldn't enable device 11
[  3515.794] [dix] couldn't enable device 16
[  3515.794] (II) systemd-logind: got resume for 13:70
[  3515.794] [dix] couldn't enable device 12
[  3515.794] (II) systemd-logind: got resume for 13:68
[  3515.794] [dix] couldn't enable device 10
Try restart the systemd's systemd-logind service:
# systemctl restart systemd-logind

[Jun 17, 2019] Accessing remote desktops by Seth Kenlon

Jun 17, 2019 | www.redhat.com

Accessing remote desktops Need to see what's happening on someone else's screen? Here's what you need to know about accessing remote desktops.

Posted June 13, 2019 | by Seth Kenlon (Red Hat) Anyone who's worked a support desk has had the experience: sometimes, no matter how descriptive your instructions, and no matter how concise your commands, it's just easier and quicker for everyone involved to share screens. Likewise, anyone who's ever maintained a server located in a loud and chilly data center -- or across town, or the world -- knows that often a remote viewer is the easiest method for viewing distant screens.

Linux is famously capable of being managed without seeing a GUI, but that doesn't mean you have to manage your box that way. If you need to see the desktop of a computer that you're not physically in front of, there are plenty of tools for the job.

Barriers

Half the battle of successfully screen sharing is getting into the target computer. That's by design, of course. It should be difficult to get into a computer without explicit consent.

Usually, there are up to 3 blockades for accessing a remote machine:

  1. The network firewall
  2. The target computer's firewall
  3. Screen share settings

Specific instruction on how to get past each barrier is impossible. Every network and every computer is configured uniquely, but here are some possible solutions.

Barrier 1: The network firewall

A network firewall is the target computer's LAN entry point, often a part of the router (whether an appliance from an Internet Service Provider or a dedicated server in a rack). In order to pass through the firewall and access a computer remotely, your network firewall must be configured so that the appropriate port for the remote desktop protocol you're using is accessible.

The most common, and most universal, protocol for screen sharing is VNC.

If the network firewall is on a Linux server you can access, you can broadly allow VNC traffic to pass through using firewall-cmd , first by getting your active zone, and then by allowing VNC traffic in that zone:

$ sudo firewall-cmd --get-active-zones
example-zone
  interfaces: enp0s31f6
$ sudo firewall-cmd --add-service=vnc-server --zone=example-zone

If you're not comfortable allowing all VNC traffic into the network, add a rich rule to firewalld in order to let in VNC traffic from only your IP address. For example, using an example IP address of 93.184.216.34, a rule to allow VNC traffic is:

$ sudo firewall-cmd \
--add-rich-rule='rule family="ipv4" source address="93.184.216.34" service name=vnc-server accept'

To ensure the firewall changes were made, reload the rules:

$ sudo firewall-cmd --reload

If network reconfiguration isn't possible, see the section "Screen sharing through a browser."

Barrier 2: The computer's firewall

Most personal computers have built-in firewalls. Users who are mindful of security may actively manage their firewall. Others, though, blissfully trust their default settings. This means that when you're trying to access their computer for screen sharing, their firewall may block incoming remote connection requests without the user even realizing it. Your request to view their screen may successfully pass through the network firewall only to be silently dropped by the target computer's firewall.

Changing zones in Linux.

To remedy this problem, have the user either lower their firewall or, on Fedora and RHEL, place their computer into the trusted zone. Do this only for the duration of the screen sharing session. Alternatively, have them add either one of the rules you added to the network firewall (if your user is on Linux).

A reboot is a simple way to ensure the new firewall setting is instantiated, so that's probably the easiest next step for your user. Power users can instead reload the firewall rules manually :

$ sudo firewall-cmd --reload

If you have a user override their computer's default firewall, remember to close the session by instructing them to re-enable the default firewall zone. Don't leave the door open behind you!

Barrier 3: The computer's screen share settings

To share another computer's screen, the target computer must be running remote desktop software (technically, a remote desktop server , since this software listens to incoming requests). Otherwise, you have nothing to connect to.

Some desktops, like GNOME, provide screen sharing options, which means you don't have to launch a separate screen sharing application. To activate screen sharing in GNOME, open Settings and select Sharing from the left column. In the Sharing panel, click on Screen Sharing and toggle it on:

Remote desktop viewers

There are a number of remote desktop viewers out there. Here are some of the best options.

GNOME Remote Desktop Viewer

The GNOME Remote Desktop Viewer application is codenamed Vinagre . It's a simple application that supports multiple protocols, including VNC, Spice, RDP, and SSH. Vinagre's interface is intuitive, and yet this application offers many options, including whether you want to control the target computer or only view it.

If Vinagre's not already installed, use your distribution's package manager to add it. On Red Hat Enterprise Linux and Fedora , use:

$ sudo dnf install vinagre

In order to open Vinagre, go to the GNOME desktop's Activities menu and launch Remote Desktop Viewer . Once it opens, click the Connect button in the top left corner. In the Connect window that appears, select the VNC protocol. In the Host field, enter the IP address of the computer you're connecting to. If you want to use the computer's hostname instead, you must have a valid DNS service in place, or Avahi , or entries in /etc/hosts . Do not prepend your entry with a username.

Select any additional options you prefer, and then click Connect .

If you use the GNOME Remote Desktop Viewer as a full-screen application, move your mouse to the screen's top center to reveal additional controls. Most importantly, the exit fullscreen button.

If you're connecting to a Linux virtual machine, you can use the Spice protocol instead. Spice is robust, lightweight, and transmits both audio and video, usually with no noticeable lag.

TigerVNC and TightVNC

Sometimes you're not on a Linux machine, so the GNOME Remote Desktop Viewer isn't available. As usual, open source has an answer. In fact, open source has several answers, but two popular ones are TigerVNC and TightVNC , which are both cross-platform VNC viewers. TigerVNC offers separate downloads for each platform, while TightVNC has a universal Java client.

Both of these clients are simple, with additional options included in case you need them. The defaults are generally acceptable. In order for these particular clients to connect, turn off the encryption setting for GNOME's embedded VNC server (codenamed Vino) as follows:

$ gsettings set org.gnome.Vino require-encryption false

This modification must be done on the target computer before you attempt to connect, either in person or over SSH.

Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 remoted to RHEL 8 with TightVNC

Use the option for an SSH tunnel to ensure that your VNC connection is fully encrypted.

Screen sharing through a browser

If network re-configuration is out of the question, sharing over an online meeting or collaboration platform is yet another option. The best open source platform for this is Nextcloud , which offers screen sharing over plain old HTTPS. With no firewall exceptions and no additional encryption required, Nextcloud's Talk app provides video and audio chat, plus whole-screen sharing using WebRTC technology.

This option requires a Nextcloud installation, but given that it's the best open source groupware package out there, it's probably worth looking at if you're not already running an instance. You can install Nextcloud yourself, or you can purchase hosting from Nextcloud.

To install the Talk app, go to Nextcloud's app store. Choose the Social & Communication category and then select the Talk plugin.

Next, add a user for the target computer's owner. Have them log into Nextcloud, and then click on the Talk app in the top left of the browser window.

When you start a new chat with your user, they'll be prompted by their browser to allow notifications from Nextcloud. Whether they accept or decline, Nextcloud's interface alerts them of the incoming call in the notification area at the top right corner.

Once you're in the call with your remote user, have them click on the Share screen button at the bottom of their chat window.

Remote screens

Screen sharing can be an easy method of support as long as you plan ahead so your network and clients support it from trusted sources. Integrate VNC into your support plan early, and use screen sharing to help your users get better at what they do. Topics: Linux Seth Kenlon Seth Kenlon is a free culture advocate and UNIX geek.

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[Nov 09, 2017] TERM strings by Tom Ryder

Jan 26, 2013 | sanctum.geek.nz

A certain piece of very misleading advice is often given online to users having problems with the way certain command-line applications are displaying in their terminals. This is to suggest that the user change the value of their TERM environment variable from within the shell, doing something like this:

$ TERM=xterm-256color

This misinformation sometimes extends to suggesting that users put the forced TERM change into their shell startup scripts. The reason this is such a bad idea is that it forces your shell to assume what your terminal is, and thereby disregards the initial terminal identity string sent by the emulator. This leads to a lot of confusion when one day you need to connect with a very different terminal emulator.

Accounting for differences

All terminal emulators are not created equal. Certainly, not all of them are xterm(1) , although many other terminal emulators do a decent but not comprehensive job of copying it. The value of the TERM environment variable is used by the system running the shell to determine what the terminal connecting to it can and cannot do, what control codes to send to the program to use those features, and how the shell should understand the input of certain key codes, such as the Home and End keys. These things in particular are common causes of frustration for new users who turn out to be using a forced TERM string.

Instead, focus on these two guidelines for setting TERM :

  1. Avoid setting TERM from within the shell, especially in your startup scripts like .bashrc or .bash_profile . If that ever seems like the answer, then you are probably asking the wrong question! The terminal identification string should always be sent by the terminal emulator you are using; if you do need to change it, then change it in the settings for the emulator.
  2. Always use an appropriate TERM string that accurately describes what your choice of terminal emulator can and cannot display. Don't make an rxvt(1) terminal identify itself as xterm ; don't make a linux console identify itself as vt100 ; and don't make an xterm(1) compiled without 256 color support refer to itself as xterm-256color .

In particular, note that sometimes for compatibility reasons, the default terminal identification used by an emulator is given as something generic like xterm , when in fact a more accurate or comprehensive terminal identity file is more than likely available for your particular choice of terminal emulator with a little searching.

An example that surprises a lot of people is the availability of the putty terminal identity file, when the application defaults to presenting itself as an imperfect xterm(1) emulator.

Configuring your emulator's string

Before you change your terminal string in its settings, check whether the default it uses is already the correct one, with one of these:

$ echo $TERM
$ tset -q

Most builds of rxvt(1) , for example, should already use the correct TERM string by default, such as rxvt-unicode-256color for builds with 256 colors and Unicode support.

Where to configure which TERM string your terminal uses will vary depending on the application. For xterm(1) , your .Xresources file should contain a definition like the below:

XTerm*termName: xterm-256color

For rxvt(1) , the syntax is similar:

URxvt*termName: rxvt-unicode-256color

Other GTK and Qt emulators sometimes include the setting somewhere in their preferences. Look for mentions of xterm , a common fallback default.

For Windows PuTTY, it's configurable under the "'Connections > Data"' section:

Setting the terminal string in PuTTY

More detail about configuring PuTTY for connecting to modern systems can be found in my article on configuring PuTTY .

Testing your TERM string

On GNU/Linux systems, an easy way to test the terminal capabilities (particularly effects like colors and reverse video) is using the msgcat(1) utility:

$ msgcat --color=test

This will output a large number of tests of various features to the terminal, so that you can check their appearance is what you expect.

Finding appropriate terminfo(5) definitions

On GNU/Linux systems, the capabilities and behavior of various terminal types is described using terminfo(5) files, usually installed as part of the ncurses package. These files are often installed in /lib/terminfo or /usr/share/terminfo , in subdirectories by first letter.

In order to use a particular TERM string, an appropriate file must exist in one of these directories. On Debian-derived systems, a large collection of terminal types can be installed to the system with the ncurses-term package.

For example, the following variants of the rxvt terminal emulator are all available:

$ cd /usr/share/terminfo/r
$ ls rxvt*
rxvt-16color  rxvt-256color  rxvt-88color  rxvt-color  rxvt-cygwin
rxvt-cygwin-native  rxvt+pcfkeys  rxvt-unicode-256color  rxvt-xpm
Private and custom terminfo(5) files

If you connect to a system that doesn't have a terminfo(5) definition to match the TERM definition for your particular terminal, you might get a message similar to this on login:

setterm: rxvt-unicode-256color: unknown terminal type
tput: unknown terminal "rxvt-unicode-256color"
$

If you're not able to install the appropriate terminal definition system-wide, one technique is to use a private .terminfo directory in your home directory containing the definitions you need:

$ cd ~/.terminfo
$ find
.
./x
./x/xterm-256color
./x/xterm
./r
./r/rxvt-256color
./r/rxvt-unicode-256color
./r/rxvt
./s
./s/screen
./s/screen-256color
./p
./p/putty-256color
./p/putty

You can copy this to your home directory on the servers you manage with a tool like scp :

$ scp -r .terminfo server:
TERM and multiplexers

Terminal multiplexers like screen(1) and tmux(1) are special cases, and they cause perhaps the most confusion to people when inaccurate TERM strings are used. The tmux FAQ even opens by saying that most of the display problems reported by people are due to incorrect TERM settings, and a good portion of the codebase in both multiplexers is dedicated to negotiating the differences between terminal capacities.

This is because they are "terminals within terminals", and provide their own functionality only within the bounds of what the outer terminal can do. In addition to this, they have their own type for terminals within them; both of them use screen and its variants, such as screen-256color .

It's therefore very important to check that both the outer and inner definitions for TERM are correct. In .screenrc it usually suffices to use a line like the following:

term screen

Or in .tmux.conf :

set-option -g default-terminal screen

If the outer terminals you use consistently have 256 color capabilities, you may choose to use the screen-256color variant instead.

If you follow all of these guidelines, your terminal experience will be much smoother, as your terminal and your system will understand each other that much better. You may find that this fixes a lot of struggles with interactive tools like vim(1) , for one thing, because if the application is able to divine things like the available color space directly from terminal information files, it saves you from having to include nasty hacks on the t_Co variable in your .vimrc . Posted in Terminal Tagged term strings , terminal types , terminfo

Ion

Ion is a tiling tabbed window manager designed with keyboard users in mind.

So-called "modern desktop environments" converge on total unusability, and present-day mainstream graphical user interfaces in general are far less usable than they are praised to be. Usability simply does not equal low learning curve, and hiding system details from the user, as the Official Truth seems to be these days. Convenience foods are also easy and fast, but not very palatable (and you don't want to know all the ingredients).

Those of us who prefer to use the computer primarily with the keyboard for reasons of efficiency or health, are forgotten when "modern" graphical programs are designed. Mouse-based search-and-click interfaces simply are not efficient except for some very specialised tasks and in other cases involve lots of tedious repetitive clicking and searching. While most widget-based GUIs provide keyboard shortcuts to some operations, these are often sub-optimal – for example, commands can often be superior to cryptic shortcuts – and the general application design still makes them difficult to use from the keyboard. For example, tabbing through dialog entries is difficult if the dialog is laid out in a complex fashion. Most command line and other text mode programs are simply much more usable once you get used to them, but are limited in their output capabilities.

Summary of Ion features

Ion3 2 October 2008

Features include:

  • Tiled workspaces with tabbed frames
  • Designed to be primarily used from the keyboard
  • Fully documented configuration and scripting interface on top of the lightweight Lua extension language
  • Modular design
  • The query module implements a line editor similar to mini buffers in many text editors. It is used to implement many different queries with tab-completion support: show manual page, run program, open SSH session, view file, goto named client window or workspace, etc. Menus are also displayed as queries
  • A statusbar that adapts to the tilings, taking only the space it really needs, modulo constraints of the layout. The statusbar can also be configured to swallow other (small) windows, and does so automatically for Window Maker protocol dockapps, and KDE-protocol system tray icons
  • Full screen client windows are seen as workspaces on their own. It is possible to switch to a normal workspace while keeping several client windows in full screen state and also switch clients that do not themselves support full screen mode to this state
  • The scratchpad module provides a conveniently toggleable area for random tasks, akin to the consoles of many FPS games
  • Supports floating windows of the PWM flavour. These can be had as separate workspaces without an underlying tiling, or floating on top of a tiling. Tiled windows can be detached to float, and reattached

[Aug 4, 2008] TECH SOURCE FROM BOHOL 20 Most ble and S Managers for Linux

JWM
JWM (Joe's Window Manager) is a window manager for the X Window System written by Joe Wingbermuehle. JWM is written in C and uses only Xlib at a minimum. Support for the following can be added as compile-time options:

* PNG and/or XPM icons
* Xft
* Xinerama
* FriBidi
* The Shape extension

JWM is the default window manager used in Damn Small Linux, System Rescue CD, most versions of Puppy Linux, and the ultra-lightweight distribution Slitaz.

Sawfish

Sawfish is a window manager for the X Window System. Formerly known as Sawmill, the name was changed because another software program had the same name (a commercial web log analysis program). Distinctively, Sawfish uses a Lisp-like scripting language, rep, for all of its code, making it particularly easy to extend. For example, it can incorporate keybindings for XMMS.

Sawfish does not come with a panel and was used with the GNOME desktop environment until it was replaced by Metacity in GNOME 2.2.

Scwm
Scwm or Scheme Constraints Window Manager is a window manager for the X Window System. Its main features are dynamic configurability and programmability via a language based on GNU Guile and the embedded arithmetic Cassowary constraint solver. Other features include flexible GUI-driven customization and per window decoration settings (per window 'themes'). The primary developers were Greg Badros and Maciej Stachowiak.

dwm
dwm is a minimalist dynamic tiling window manager for X11. It is externally similar to wmii, but internally much simpler. dwm is written purely in C and, for simplicity, lacks any configuration interface besides editing the source code. This is not as inconvenient as it sounds, however: one of the project's guidelines is that the source code will never exceed 2000 lines, and options meant to be user-configurable are all represented by macros and contained in a single header file. According to the author, it is optimized for high resolution laptop and widescreen displays.

ratpoison
ratpoison is a free minimalist window manager for the X Window System primarily written by Shawn Betts. Its user interface and much of its functionality are inspired by the GNU Screen terminal multiplexer. Its name comes from the fact that it lets the user manage windows without using the mouse (rat).

Its intended successor is Stumpwm; ratpoison was growing increasingly large, and Betts decided to largely reimplement its functionality in Common Lisp.

[Feb 25, 2008] Steve's RHCE Study Guide X Window System

X Window System

[Feb 25, 2008] X Window System

The X Window system comes with a huge set of fonts. To see a listing of the fonts available on your system, try a program called xlsfonts:
xlsfonts | more 

This lists out many fonts, such as:

-adobe-courier-bold-r-normal--12-120-75-75-m-70-iso8859-1
-adobe-new century schoolbook-medium-r-normal--34-240-100-100-p-181-iso8859-1
-daewoo-gothic-medium-r-normal--16-120-100-100-c-160-ksc5601.1987-0
-misc-fixed-medium-r-normal--14-130-75-75-c-140-jisx0208.1983-0
lucidasans-bold-14
cursor

[Feb 25, 2008] X Window System Components

Configuring The X Window System

If you've installed the X Window System in any prefix other than /usr, become the root user and update the library linker's cache by adding /usr/X11R6/lib to /etc/ld.so.conf and running ldconfig.

Additionally, while still the root user, ensure /usr/X11R6/bin and /usr/X11R6/lib/pkgconfig are added to the PATH and PKG_CONFIG_PATH environment variables, respectively. Instructions for doing this are described in the section The Bash Shell Startup Files.

Ensure you replace /usr/X11R6 with $XORG_PREFIX in the previous two paragraphs if you did not create the compatibility symlink in the previous step.

As the root user create a basic X Window System configuration file with the following commands:

For Xorg:

cd ~ &&
Xorg -configure

For XFree86:

cd ~ &&
XFree86 -configure

The screen will go black and you may hear some clicking of the monitor. This command will create a file in your home directory, xorg.conf.new for Xorg, or XF86Config.new for XFree86.

Edit the newly created configuration file to suit your system. The details of the files are located in the xorg.conf.5x and XF86Config.5x man pages. Some things you may want to do are:

Test the system with one of the following commands:

For Xorg:

X -config ~/xorg.conf.new

For XFree86:

XFree86 -xf86config ~/XF86Config.new

You will only get a gray background with an X-shaped mouse cursor, but it confirms the system is working. Exit with Control+Alt+Backspace. If the system does not work, take a look at /var/log/Xorg.0.log or /var/log/XFree86.0.log to see what went wrong.

As the root user, create the configuration directory and move the configuration file to the new directory:

For Xorg:

install -v -m644 -D ~/xorg.conf.new /etc/X11/xorg.conf

For XFree86:

install -v -m644 -D ~/XF86Config.new /etc/X11/XF86Config

As a convenience, Xorg-7.2 users should populate the /etc/X11 directory with symlinks to various configuration directories that were located in /etc/X11 with previous versions of Xorg. This step is not needed for XFree86 users. Execute the following commands as the root user:

mkdir $XORG_PREFIX/share/X11/twm &&
ln -svt /etc/X11 \
    $XORG_PREFIX/lib/X11/{fs,lbxproxy,proxymngr,rstart} \
    $XORG_PREFIX/lib/X11/{xdm,xinit,xserver,xsm} \
    $XORG_PREFIX/share/X11/{app-defaults,twm,xkb}

As the root user, create .xinitrc:

cat > ~/.xinitrc << "EOF"
# Begin .xinitrc file
xterm  -g 80x40+0+0   &
xclock -g 100x100-0+0 &
twm
EOF

This provides an initial screen with a small clock that is managed by a simple window manager, Tab Window Manager. For details of twm, see the man page.

... ... ...

Setting up Fonts

There are two font systems in the X Window System. The first is the core X font protocol, and the second is Xft. Toolkits that use the core X font protocol include Xt, Xaw, Motif clones and GTK+-1.2. Toolkits that use Xft include GTK+-2 and Qt and use Fontconfig for control. Both font systems should be configured for proper font coverage in the X Window System.

Core X Font Protocol

The core X font protocol finds fonts from the server configuration file (xorg.conf or XF86Config). If no font paths exist in the configuration file, the server will fall back to an internal hard-coded path. Assuming the prefix for your X installation is /usr/X11R6, the core fonts will reside in subdirectories of /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts. For each directory in the path, the server reads three files:

The core X fonts protocol uses names such as -misc-fixed-medium-r-normal--13-120-75-75-c-80-iso8859-1. These fonts are rendered by the X server without antialiasing. The server itself uses the "cursor" font for painting the mouse cursor, and the protocol specification requires the font "fixed" to be available.

Scalable fonts, such as Type1 and TrueType, are read from fonts.scale files by the server. The core X font system uses the "freetype" module for non-antialiased rendering of these fonts. Ensure that the "freetype" module is loaded in the XF86config or xorg.conf file by adding it to the "Module" section:

Section "Module"
    ...
    Load  "freetype"
    ...
EndSection

The character set used is part of the font name, e.g. "-iso8859-1". It is important that applications which support a non-English interface specify the character set correctly so that the proper glyphs are used. This can be controlled through the X resources, which will be described later.

In some cases, applications rely upon the fonts named "fixed" or something like "9x18". In these cases, it is important that the fonts.alias file specifies the correct character set. Users of ISO-8859-X encodings where X != 1 should modify the /usr/lib/X11/fonts/misc/fonts.alias file by replacing the "iso8859-1" string with the proper encoding name. This is accomplished by running the following command as the root user, substituting the proper value for <X>:

sed -i 's,iso8859-1\( \|$\),iso8859-<X>\1,g' \
    /usr/lib/X11/fonts/{75dpi,100dpi,misc}/fonts.alias

Users of Cyrillic fonts have properly defined aliases in /usr/lib/X11/fonts/cyrillic/fonts.alias. However, this file will not be used unless the /usr/lib/X11/fonts/cyrillic directory is first in the font search path. Otherwise, the /usr/lib/X11/fonts/misc/fonts.alias file will be used.

Xft Font Protocol

Xft provides antialiased font rendering through Freetype, and fonts are controlled from the client side using Fontconfig. The default search path is /usr/share/fonts and ~/.fonts. Fontconfig searches directories in its path recursively and maintains a cache of the font characteristics in fonts.cache-1 files in each directory. If the cache appears to be out of date, it is ignored, and information is (slowly) fetched from the fonts themselves. This cache can be regenerated using the fc-cache command at any time. You can see the list of fonts known by Fontconfig by running the command fc-list.

The X fonts were not installed in a location known to Fontconfig. This prevents Fontconfig from using the poorly rendered Type 1 fonts or the non-scalable bitmapped fonts. Symlinks were created from the OTF and TTF X font directories to /usr/share/fonts/X11-{OTF,TTF}. This allows Fontconfig to use the OpenType and TrueType fonts provided by X (which are scalable and of higher quality).

Fontconfig uses names such as "Monospace 12" to define fonts. Applications generally use generic font names such as "Monospace", "Sans" and "Serif". Fontconfig resolves these names to a font that has all characters that cover the orthography of the language indicated by the locale settings. Knowledge of these font names is included in /etc/fonts/fonts.conf. Fonts that are not listed in this file are still usable by Fontconfig, but they will not be accessible by the generic family names.

Standard scalable fonts that come with X provide very poor Unicode coverage. You may notice in applications that use Xft that some characters appear as a box with four binary digits inside. In this case, a font set with the available glyphs has not been found. Other times, applications that don't use other font families by default and don't accept substitutions from Fontconfig will display blank lines when the default font doesn't cover the orthography of the user's language. This happens, e.g., with Fluxbox in the ru_RU.KOI8-R locale.

In order to provide greater Unicode coverage, it is recommended that you install these fonts:

The list above will not provide complete Unicode coverage. For more information, please visit the Unicode Font Guide.

As an example, consider the installation of the DejaVu fonts. From the unpacked source directory, run the following commands as the root user:

install -v -d -m755 /usr/share/fonts/dejavu &&
install -v -m644 *.ttf /usr/share/fonts/dejavu &&
fc-cache -v /usr/share/fonts/dejavu

Setting up Keyboards

In this version of X, non-Latin keyboard layouts do not include Latin configurations as was previous practice. To set up a keyboard for Latin and non-Latin input, change the XkbLayout keyboard driver option in the InputDevice section of the XF86Config or xorg.conf file. For example:

Section "InputDevice"
    Identifier          "Keyboard0"
    Driver              "kbd"
    Option "XkbModel"   "pc105"
    Option "XkbLayout"  "en_US,ru"
    Option "XkbOptions" "grp:switch,grp:alt_shift_toggle,grp_led:scroll"
EndSection

In this example, you can use the Alt+Shift combination to switch between keyboard layouts and use the Scroll Lock LED to indicate when the second layout is active.

Setting up XDM

xdm provides a graphical logon capability and is normally set up in /etc/inittab. Most of the information you need to customize xdm is found in its man page. To execute xdm during bootup, change the initdefault level to 5 and add the following lines to /etc/inittab:

# Run xdm as a separate service
x:5:respawn:/usr/X11R6/bin/xdm -nodaemon

If Linux-PAM is installed on your system, you should create a PAM entry for xdm by duplicating the login entry using the following command:

cp -v /etc/pam.d/login /etc/pam.d/xdm
Using X Resources

There are many options that can be set in X and X clients via resources. Typically resources are set in the ~/.Xresources file.

The layout of the ~/.Xresources file consists of a list of specifications in the form of

object.subobject[.subobject...].attribute: value

Components of a resource specification are linked together by either tight, represented by a dot (.), or loose, represented by an asterisk (*), bindings. A tight binding indicates that the components on either side of the dot must be directly next to each other as defined in a specific implementation. An asterisk is a wildcard character that means that any number of levels in a defined hierarchy can be between the components. For example, X offers two special cursors: redglass and whiteglass. To use one of these resources, you need to add the following line:

Xcursor.theme: whiteglass

However, you can specify the background for all clients with:

*background: blue

More specific resource variables will override less specific names.

Resource definitions can be found in the man pages for each respective client.

In order to load your resources, the xrdb program must be called with the appropriate parameters. Typically, the first time resources are loaded, you use:

xrdb -load <filename>

To add resources to X's database in memory, use:

xrdb -merge <filename>

The xrdb instruction is usually placed in ~/.xinitrc or ~/.xsession. To get more information, see the xrdb man page.

[Dec 26, 2007] GNOME Terminator 0.6 by Chris Jones

About: Terminator is an application that provides lots of terminals in a single window, saving valuable screen space otherwise wasted on window decorations and not quite being able to fill the screen with terminals.

Changes: This release uses a new gnome-terminal gconf key to find available profiles. A few more hard-coded items have been moved to the settings array (not that it can be overridden yet). Handling of exiting child processes has been fixed to properly track gnome-terminal settings. Ctrl-Tab and Ctrl-Shift-Tab have been added as options for switching terminals. This release no longer uses parent.show_all() when removing/adding a terminal, and instead shows the actual widgets that have been created. This prevents scroll bars from re-appearing after they have been hidden.

X11 Tutorial by Grant Edwards

A tutorial prepared for SciC 8011, Spring 1995

This paper provides an introductory look at the X Window System. It is intended to provide the reader with information in two areas:

[Jun 14, 2007] XBindKeys

xbindkeys, a program that allows you to launch shell commands with your keyboard or your mouse. Some say it is better that Keylaunch.

If you find xbindkeys a little limited or you hack a lot of scheme for it, maybe you can have an interest in this window manager (clfswm).

xbindkeys is a program that allows you to launch shell commands with your keyboard or your mouse under X Window. It links commands to keys or mouse buttons, using a configuration file. It's independant of the window manager and can capture all keyboard keys (ex: Power, Wake...).

[Jun 4, 2007] PYWM - your Python-programmable X Window Manager

PYWM is a small, simple python-programmable X window manager that's packed with features, yet very easy to learn and use. It gives you easy-to-use tools to create your own personal dream desktop. Control Freak Heaven.

Some window managers are mouse heaven and keyboard hell. Other window managers are the other way around. But PYWM aims to be very comfortable to use from either.

At the moment PYWM is a "pythonised" version of the fast and light FLWM window manager, but it migth grow up and lose all the c(++) code.

So What Can I Do With It?

All sorts of stuff, limited only by your imagination. Here's a short (and very incomplete) list:

Why???

I've seen dozens of window managers in my time.

At one extreme are the morbidly obese KDE and Gnome desktops, which can take longer to fire up than Linux itself! One wonders if development of these two projects is funded by manufacturers of memory and hard disks :p

At the other extreme are hard-core 'minimalist' window managers like 'LWM' and 'TWM', which can be very functionality-challenged, or have some annoying quirks. For example, one WM I tried requires you to hold down the ALT key while using the mouse within a window!

On the fringes are 'rodentophobic' window managers like Matchbox, RatPoison, Ion etc. One thinks of certain people (who will go nameless) who take pride in still using ASCII dumb terminals.

On the advanced end of the spectrum is the wonderful LISP-driven 'Sawfish' window manager.

But PyWM is aimed at the middle ground. On one hand, it's easy to set up magickal key bindings to do pretty much what you want. But on the other hand, it's also comfortable and courteous for mouse users. I find myself often switching from mouse/keyboard to straight keyboard, so PyWM is there for me all the way.

And, above all, it's built to support easy customisation in Python, the world's coolest programming language.

[Jun 4, 2007] Does anybody know a programmable window manager

On Tue, 2005-10-04 at 21:13 +0200, Clemens Eisserer wrote:
> Does anybody know a window-manager which is optimized for beeing
> programmable and extendable?
> The only thing I would like to do is to modify the size of a single
> window on an x-server where only this single window is running -
> withought simulating mouse clicks or something similar ;-)

Devil's Pie (http://www.burtonini.com/blog/computers/devilspie) can
manipulate windows when they appear so you can use it to resize the
window. It isn't a window manager so you can use any WM you want.

[Nov 3, 2006] freshmeat.net Project details for Xming by Colin Harrison

About: Xming is a port of the X Window System server to Windows. It shares the same source code base as Cygwin/X, but does not depend on the Cygwin environment or cygwin1.dll. Xming is a fully featured X11 server for Windows that is very simple to install and use.

[Sep 15 2006] BigAdmin - Submitted Tech Tip Redefining Escape Sequences Generated by Function Keys Using xterm by Phillip Wu, September 2006

Often it is necessary to change the escape sequences generated by xterm when function keys are pressed, in order to match what an application expects. For example, this is very common for Oracle applications. Here's a way to do this.

Start xterm as follows where the escape sequences for F1, F2, and F3 have been redefined. Also, start an application called appl.sh.

/usr/openwin/bin/xterm  -name appl -xrm \
'/*
 F1=Exit
 F2=Clear Record
 F3=Back Tab
*/
runlod*VT100.translations:   #override\n\
        <Key>F1:        string(0x1b) string("OS")\n\
        <Key>F2:        string(0x1b) string("[32~")\n\
        <Key>F3:        string(0x1b) string("OP") string(0xff09)' \
-e  appl.sh

Giri Mandalika's scratchpad An Odyssey to Solaris 11 on Solaris Express 17

Unable to launch any application from command line. The following error message appears on the console:

 Xlib: connection to ":0.0" refused by server
 Xlib: Invalid MIT-MAGIC-COOKIE-1 key
 Thu Aug 15 21:29:59 2005 Gtk-WARNING **: cannot open display: :0.0 at (eval 1) line 1.

[Jun 28, 2006] How to get widescreen resolution in Linux

http://blogs.sun.com/roller/page/alanc?entry=x11_forwarding_102

Chris Gerhard wrote a post last week he called "X11 Forwarding 101" on using xauth to grant permissions to your X display when you su to root. I was all ready to write a response about how the complex steps he'd shown could be replaced by a simple, yet secure, command in Solaris 10 [1]:

xhost +si:localuser:root

UNIX Tips and Tricks

Misc FAQs X Windows

Slashdot Dealing with the Unix Copy and Paste Paradigm

Excellent article on the subject (Score:5, Informative)
by toomim (492480) on Wednesday June 02, @05:02PM (#9319134)
You should read this article: http://www.jwz.org/doc/x-cut-and-paste.html [jwz.org].

In a nutshell, there are TWO completely different clipboards implemented in X:

  1. The "select->middle click" clipboard
  2. And the "copy->paste" clipboard

These two clipboards do not affect or interact with each other.

Other OS's (like Windows) only have the second kind. Modern Unix applications (like anything based on GTK, QT, or Mozilla) support both clipboards simultaneously and independently.

Old X Windows applications like XTerm only support the first kind. This is why you can't copy from or paste into an XTerm using C-c and C-v.

So if you are using modern applications, you should always be able to use C-c and C-v. If you have to copy or paste something into an XTerm, you will have to select it and middle-click. The solution is to use a moderm terminal, like gnome-terminal, instead of XTerm.

If you read the article, you'll learn that there are actually three different clipboards in X (one of which is never used), and that Emacs and XEmacs then implement yet another fourth clipboard!

Also see the freedesktop.org reference [freedesktop.org].

Re:Excellent article on the subject (Score:2)
by 0x0d0a (568518) on Wednesday June 02, @06:49PM (#9320210)
(Last Journal: Tuesday May 25, @07:31PM)
Old-style-clipboards in X == drag-and-drop on Windows/Mac OS. It's just easier to use.

New-style-clipboards n X == copy-and-paste on Windows/Mac OS

Emacs's internal clipboard (the "kill ring") really is an artifact of the fact that Emacs can run in an environment that lacks its own copy/paste support (like a VT200, say). Emacs has a very nice clipboard with a huge history that is generally better than that of the normal operating environment.

It's rather ironic that people are now complaining that X doesn't support clipboards persisting past the life of programs -- it actually *did* at one point with cut buffers, but it's kind of inefficient when you're working with a remote windowing environment to immediately dump every cut to the X server.

Missing the real story (Score:3, Insightful)
by rabtech (223758) <russ&boneville,net> on Wednesday June 02, @05:02PM (#9319143)
The real story is why doesn't Linux have a clipboard standard with well-defined interop standards ala OLE/COM?

I can copy text from VS and paste it into Word, in which case it pastes as RTF with colors and formatting. If I paste it into notepad, I get plain text. This is because the clipboard understands high-level text (RTF) and casting that down into standard text. It also allows apps to provide multiple data formats; copying an image can put a JPG, Bitmap, and PNG on the clipboard and the consuming app can select the format it likes best.

Even better would be to support Office-style multiboard functionality where there are 10-12 "slots" on the clipboard and you can cut and paste from each slot at will.

(Ex: in VS, CTRL+SHIFT+V will cycle through each of the last X copied items for pasting, meaning you can go to one spot of code and copy, then another and

Random links

Xsel is a quick hack to give access to the X selection from the command-line. by Ville Herva

You can then copy stuff between stdin/stdout and the X selection buffer. For example, 'echo puppa | xsel -c' makes "puppa" the current X selection. 'xsel -p | less' pastes the current X selection to less.

Changes: This version adds the possibility to select between PRIMARY, SECONDARY, and CLIPBOARD X selection. It adds a --merge action, and incorporates some code cleanups.

Learning to Use X11

The X Window System was specifically designed to allow the graphical output of a program running on one machine to appear on a different machine, possibly one that is physically remote and/or a different make and architecture. In other words, X11 was designed to be a platform-independent, networked graphics framework.

In X11 parlance, the "display" denotes the box on which the graphical output will appear. Interestingly, an individual display is defined by the X11 documentation as having exactly one keyboard and one pointer (i.e., mouse), but potentially multiple CPUs, monitors, etc.

The "screen" corresponds to the actual physical display device; in most cases this will be a monitor. X11 allows for an arbitrary number of screens to be connected to each display. Think of a workstation with two monitors or a departmental server, connected to a larger number of (relatively dumb) X terminals.

Finally, a "window" is a rectangular area of the screen that can be used for input and output. If the rectangular area is not directly associated with a screen, but instead resides in memory, it is referred to as a "pixmap". Pixmaps and windows share the property of being "drawable" and can be used interchangeably in some function calls. It is important to remember that to X11 a window is merely a rectangular area on the screen. As such, it does not include things like titlebars, scrollbars and other GUI elements that we have come to associate with the word window. If these elements are present, they are controlled by a different program called a window manager.

Every GUI-oriented computer ships with a mouse or equivalent. When X11 came about, the development of graphical input devices was still in its infancy. Consequently the X11 documentation always speaks (somewhat bashfully) of a "pointer" (a generic term for mice), trackballs, digitizing tablets or other yet-to-be-invented graphical input devices. A final cause of confusion is the specific usage of the words client and server in X11: a "client" is any application that creates data for graphical output. The "server" is the program that manages the shared resource accessed by all clients, namely the (finite) amount of screen real estate. The unfortunate consequence of this naming convention is that the (X11) client typically executes on the server (machine), while the (X11) server runs on the client (computer).

Linux.com - Mapping Extras Function Keys with XFree 4.0

Use the xev program that omes with every XFree86 distribution to get your key's scancodes. The default install location of this program is in /usr/X11R6/bin/xev. When you run this program you'll be looking at a white window with a black square in the middle. This program is used to record X11 Events such as mouse clicks, keyboard keys, etc.

Now that you have the program running, try pressing one of your keyboard's extra function keys. In the terminal from which you launched xev, the output should be similar to this:

xev output:
----------------------------------------------------------------
KeyPress event, serial 29, synthetic NO, window 0xe00001,
        root 0x4d, subw 0x0, time 3608986670, (524,-135), root:(589,304),
        state 0x0, keycode 223 (keysym 0x0, NoSymbol), same_screen YES,
        XLookupString gives 0 characters:  ""

KeyRelease event, serial 29, synthetic NO, window 0xe00001,
        root 0x4d, subw 0x0, time 3608986842, (524,-135), root:(589,304),
        state 0x0, keycode 223 (keysym 0x0, NoSymbol), same_screen YES,
        XLookupString gives 0 characters:  ""
----------------------------------------------------------------

Notice that we get 2 events, one KeyPress and one KeyRelease.

The Important part of this event output is the "keycode 223 (keysym 0x0, NoSymbol)" line. By looking at this we can tell a few things. First, the key's scancode is 223. Second, there is no keysym or symbol assigned to that key.

What you need to do now is get the scancode for every extra function key on your keyboard. I suggest you pull out a pen and paper for this process because if you move the mouse or do anything else while trying to get the scancode xev will register a bunch of events that we have no interest in. So make sure to only press the key you want to get the scancode for. Also, make sure you note which button the scancode was associated with. As an example, I've included the scancodes I've gathered for my keyboard/

Key                                             Keycode
-------------------------------------------------------
Standby                                         223
Mute                                            160
Volume Down                                     174
Volume Up                                       176
Play/Pause                                      162
Stop                                            164
Prev Track                                      144
Next Track                                      153
Email                                           236
Web Search                                      229
Run                                             230
Web Home                                        178
--------------------------------------------------------

Once Again, this is just an example! Don't use these values because your keyboard will probably be different than mine.

If you get no output from xev while trying to get your keycodes that probably means you can't use your keyboard with XFree86 4.0. Some keyboards might produce weird keycodes that X can't understand.

Giving a Name to your New Keys

Now that you've gathered all your keycodes, we have to give each one a name in order to assign keysums. This is done in the ~/.Xmodmap file. That's /home/username/.Xmodmap. If this file does not exist just create it with your favorite text editor.

You have to put a line for each key in the format "keycode XXX = keyname". I will list the content of of my .Xmodap file as an example.

~/.Xmodmap Content:
-------------------------------------------------------
keycode 223 = LStandby
keycode 160 = LMute
keycode 174 = LVoldown
keycode 176 = LVolup
keycode 162 = LPlaypause
keycode 164 = LStop
keycode 144 = LRew
keycode 153 = LFwd
keycode 236 = LMail
keycode 229 = LFind
keycode 230 = LRun
keycode 178 = LWeb
------------------------------------------------------

The name you give your keys can be whatever you wish, I suggest giving then a descriptive name in order to avoid confusion. The L prefix in my example stands for "Logitech" and is just there for my reference. Name your keys whatever name makes you happy.

Finally Assign Keysysms to the Keys

For the final configuration, we need to assign keysyms to the keys in order to use them with X. This is done in the XKeysymDB file, located in /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/XKeysymDB on a default installation of XFree86 4.0. You must be root to edit this file.

Here's my additional entries in the XKeysymDB file for my keyboard:

-------------------------------------------------------
! (comments start with a "!")
! Logitech iTouch Keyboard
LStandby                :10090000
LWeb                    :10090001
LMail                   :10090002
LFind                   :10090003
LRun                    :10090004
LMute                   :10090005
LVoldown                :10090006
LVolup                  :10090007
LPlaypause              :10090008
LStop                   :10090009
LRew                    :1009000A
LFwd                    :1009000B
------------------------------------------------------

Once done, save that file and restart X. Start xev once again to verify your setup. Now if you follow the instructions in the first step again to get the scancodes of your keys, you'll notice that there is now a keysym and Symbol assigned to your key. If that was successful, you can now assign those keys to shortcuts or to launch programs. This is done differently with every window manager, so I won't go trough the process; check your window manager's documentation on how to assign shortcut keys.

Gateway - 2001-02-23 23:14:28
Unfortunately, my Gateway PC's keyboard sends a series of signals. So when I hit the 'Pause' button at the top I get ctrl-meta1-alt-p or something.

Also, I found jwz's xkeycaps utility to be very useful. Still can't use my keys as I want to, but I did get it to find out what was going on in a much easier fashion than xev...

X already has quite a few... - 2001-02-23 18:03:54
This can done also by using the files in /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/xkb/symbols. For example, the Logitech iTouch is in the inet file. This can be loaded with setxkbmap file section

where file is the file in the above directory, and section is the type of keyboard you have. This will then give you symbols such as XF86Mail, which can the be mapped in the window manager. One problem with this is that KDE 2 doesn't like these.

Another way to do this is using hotkeys (do a search of freshmeat). Along with libosd (find from the hotkeys homepage). This will work independently of the window manager.

Moving Around the Console

So you're new to Linux and wondering how this virtual terminal stuff works. Well you can work in six different terminals at a time. To move around from one to another:

To change to Terminal 1 - Alt + F1 
To change to Terminal 2 - Alt + F2
...
To change to Terminal 6 - Alt + F6
That's cool. But I just did locate on something and a lot of stuff scrolled up. How do I scroll up to see what flew by?
Shift +  PgUp - Scroll Up
Shift +  PgDn - Scroll Down

Note: If you switch away from a console and switch back to it, 
you will lose what has already scrolled by.

If you had X running and wanted to change from X to text based and vice versa

To change to text based from X - Ctrl + Alt + F(n) where n = 1..6

To change to X from text based - Alt + F7

Something unexpected happened and I want to shut down my X server.
Just press:

Ctrl + Alt + Backspace

ADA95 -- specialist in X Windows.

Slashdot Ask Slashdot Configuring Monitors in X

Slashdot X Windows Must Die!

X windows disasater -- written by Don Hopkins

Possible the greatest work of literature ever written about X. Guaranteed to entertain you for several minutes at least. I think he hangs around /. as well. Just get him started on the topic. :)

Really, it's solid stuff. Think about it, instead of having a knee-jerk reaction.

Re:A lovely summary of all that's wrong with X (Score:5, Informative)
by SimHacker
([email protected]) on Friday July 14, @01:47PM EDT (#445)
(User #180785 Info) http://www.catalog.com/hopkins
You're wrong about your "Windows-convert/Machophile" accusation. I wrote it long before I learned to program Windows or the Mac. (Or did you really mean Mach?) At the time, I was a disgruntled ex Sun employee. "Slowlaris: So bad I left the company."

Nobody's blaming X itself for the mistakes of its designers. I'm blaming ignorant hypsters like yourself for all the insincere uninformed cheerleading that led to the widespread adoption of X11, in spite of all of its severe technical problems. Stop being such an appologist for bad design and poor execution.

I tried to make constructive criticism in that chapter, comparing it to NeWS's downloadable code and extensible protocols. NeWS was certainly not perfect, but X11 had a lot to learn from it, and people like you still refuse to open your eyes to that fact.

The software we're using today has evolved into a model much closer to NeWS than X11. Web servers are like NeWS clients (the program that runs an application remotely). The web browser is like the NeWS server (the program running on the user's machine), that controls the display. The web server can download html and javascript to the browser, that interacts locally with the user, much in the same way that NeWS clients download PostScript code to the NeWS server.

So before you tell me that NeWS's model of downloadable extensibility sucks and nobody uses it, you should do some research and check out that new craze that everybody's been talking about recently, called the world wide web. If you have never heard of the web, and can't find a book about it in the library or your local book store, just search for "www" on yahoo.

-Don
Home page: http://www.catalog.com/hopkins

No alternative (Score:4, Interesting)
by Kaa
(freedomdotnet!kaa) on Friday July 14, @10:29AM EDT (#29)
(User #21510 Info)
Well, the reason why X Window is so deeply rooted in the UNIX world is that, to quote one of my friends, "There are no fucking attractive alternatives!". I agree that X is a nightmare and should be killed off by a better competitor, but there is no better competitor.

And BTW, X has plenty of problems but user interface inconsistency is not one of them. X is low-level and user interface standards are clearly not in its domain. The fact that, say, a middle mouse click can do anything at all in an X application is not a drawback of X -- it's a side effect of the UNIX world being fragmented, idiosyncratic, and, yes, free to do whatever one wants.

Kaa
Kaa's Law: In any sufficiently large group of people most are idiots.

It IS that bad... (Score:5, Insightful)
by MenTaLguY ([email protected]) on Friday July 14, @11:01AM EDT (#137)
(User #5483 Info) http://moonbase.rydia.net/mental
Unfortunately, this particular baby's grown into an immense, slimy, tentacled beast that's strangling the development of graphical technology on Unix.

I would like to note that I don't agree with some of the criticisms in the article -- for example, I think the componentization of the Window manager and various other items is generally a Good Thing. X wouldn't have survived as long as it has if something like the 80s-era window managers were part of the standard server.

While X has a lot of good points (network transparency, platform independence, flexibility in window management), those doesn't make up for its defects. It IS possible to design systems with these characteristics that don't have the downsides that X does.

The underlying X protocol is incredibly clean and extensible, but there are now so many (effectively mandatory) extensions that the code required to support them makes the X server software absolutely huge. ICCCM is a nightmare in its own right.

Moreover, many of these extensions/auxiliary protocols (a prime example would be the X font system) were not designed in the same forward-looking manner as the basic X protocol, meaning that it is necessary to replace, rather than enhance them. However, since existing software still relies on the old extensions, it's not possible to drop them -- you end up with even more redundant code bloat.

X doesn't really give you any choice with regard to widget toolkits, either. You're stuck with the one the app was compiled with, or, more often, coded soley against.

With an architecture like Berlin (or a number of others), it's possible replace the widget set in any or all all apps with the one of your choice -- on the fly.

There's also the problem that EVERY primitive operation in X requires the request to be marshalled/demarshalled across process boundaries.

The address space separation (and consequent easy network transparency) between client and server is not a bad thing, IMO, as it helps stability, but I belive the X designers made a fundamental mistake when they cut the client/server boundary at such a low level.

Having to do this sort of low-level chatting across process boundaries really hurts performance.

Architectures like Berlin maintain the client/server separation, but cut down on the performance hit by communicating at a significanty higher level of abstraction. This means a decently-written Berlin app, even if using a chunky protocol like IIOP, would create significantly less IPC traffic (in bytes) than the equivalent X app.

Of course X has DGA. X has shared memory. Unfortunately, those only work locally. If you rely on them, you just shot network transparency. Whoops.

And, there's another problem: instead of writing graphics drivers independent of any one application class or GUI architecture (which means basic kernel support), everyone's been writing drivers directly for the X server. (Thanks, XFree86!)

This means that to even reach a usable stage, every non-X project has to rewrite their own driver suite from scratch (as a rule, X drivers make too many assumptions about X for the code to be readily reusable for other things).

Although we have fbcon now, fbcon is pretty much unaccelerated, and doesn't have that broad a range of hardware coverage. Berlin is still mostly tested on top of X as a result.

If you have to keep X around to run Berlin, or face severely reduced hardware support, then what's the point?

X has been repeatedly marginalizing other graphical efforts this same way. (Who here has heard of Y Windows, for example? How many of you know someone who uses it? What hardware does it support?)

Thankfully, due to GGI, Berlin can run on fbcon and KGI -- if KGI ever becomes more widespread, Berlin might finally be able to break free of X.

It's time we stopped relying on the X server for everything graphical.

It's too late to throw out the bathwater, baby or no. It's outgrown the bathtub and eaten your dog.

It's time to break out the napalm...

...ceterum censeo delendam esse X11. :)

Recommended Links

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Sites

X Window System core protocol - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Kenton Lee Technical X Window System and Motif WWW Sites

Tutorials

Individual pages

XFree86 Version 4.1.0: The official page for the current release of the open-source version of the X Window System. At the bottom of the page one finds the complete set of man pages.

X11-Related Links

Xlib Programming Manual by Adrian Nye. Volume 1 of the X Window System Series at O'Reilly. The book is wordy (it needs three chapters and almost 80 pages to cover not much more material than the present article), and the presentation is not always noted for its clarity. Nevertheless, it is probably still the standard introduction to X11 programming.

X Window Applications Programming by Eric F. Johnson and Kevin Reichard. One of the few truly introductory books on X11 programming

FAQs

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Before posting questions to these newsgroups, I recommend that you read the newgroup FAQs.

Note that some of these groups, especially those not in the comp.* hierarchy, may not be universally available. Contact your system administrator for more information.

Papers:

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Note: an alternative (and usually much cheaper) way to run X on a IBM PC is to run a PC UNIX in place of or in addition to your Microsoft OS. See the previous solution for more information.

General human-computer interaction links (not all X related):

Lists of X-based applications and products:

This web site lists only the basic X products, such as X servers, Motif, and CDE. The following pages have (much) more information on commercial and non-commercial X-based applications and products.

More X-related sites:

Many of these contain more listings of X-related sites. These overlap with this page, but you may find their organization of the material to be useful. See also the FAQs for more X-related links.



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