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- Information for Linux Users
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- Orest Zborowski, Dirk Hohndel
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- May 13, 1997
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- 1. Linux versions on which XFree86 has been tested
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- XFree86 has been tested with Linux version 2.0.30. It should work with any ver-
- sion since 1.0 without change. The binaries and libraries are based on the
- 5.4.7 Elf C libraries, and the 1.7.14 dynamic linker ld.so. You will at least
- need the 5.2.x Elf C libraries to successfully use the servers.
-
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- 2. Backwards Compatibility
-
- X11R6 is considered a major update from X11R5, so the shared libraries in
- XFree86 3.1 and later are not compatible with XFree86 2.1.1 and older
- libraries. To continue to run X11R5 applications, you must keep the old
- libraries somewhere on your machine. They can be moved from /usr/X386/lib else-
- where, but /etc/ld.so.conf must be updated. All X11R5 applications should work
- with the X11R6 servers without problems.
-
- X11R6.1 is yet another update to X11R6. While the minor number for some
- libraries has been increased to '1' it is believed to be fully compatible with
- X11R6 based applications.
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- X11R6.3 is yet another update to X11R6.1. While the minor number for some
- libraries has been increased to '3' it is believed to be fully compatible with
- X11R6 based applications.
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- Very old binaries (linked to XFree86-1.2, XFree86-1.3 or XFree86-2.0 libraries)
- will continue to work, but may need an explicit symlink from
- /lib/libX{11,t,aw}.so.3 to /usr/X386/lib/libX{11,t,aw}.so.3.
-
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- 3. Installing XFree86
-
- Starting with version 3.0, XFree86 is installed in /usr/X11R6. Each binary
- distribution of XFree86 3.X comes with a detailed installation document rele-
- vant to that release. The most up-to-date information is kept there, while this
- document describes basic features of XFree86 3.X on Linux and how to compile
- the sources.
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- 4. Running XFree86
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- XFree86 requires about 4mb of virtual memory to run, although having 8mb of RAM
- is probably the minimum comfortable configuration. A 387 coprocessor is helpful
- for 386 machines, although greater gains in interactive performance are
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- Information for Linux Users
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- Information for Linux Users
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- obtained with an increase in physical memory. Also, a faster graphics card,
- bus or RAM, will improve server performance.
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- After unpacking the tar files, you need to include /usr/X11R6/lib in
- /etc/ld.so.conf (where it should already be by default) or in your
- LD_LIBRARY_PATH environment variable. Also, the configuration file
- /etc/XF86Config or /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/XF86Config must be properly filled out
- based on the host setup. Ideally this is done using XF86Setup or (if for some
- reason this doesn't work) using xf86config. If you really insist in hand-creat-
- ing your config file use XF86Config.eg as a starting point and README.Config as
- guideline. You may damage your hardware if you use a wrong XF86Config file, so
- read the docs, especially the man pages and the other README files in
- /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/doc.
-
- XFree86 has the ability to perform VT switching to and from the X server. When
- first started, XFree86 will automatically locate the first available VT (one
- that hasn't been opened by any process), and run on that VT. If there isn't
- one available, XFree86 will terminate with an error message. The server can be
- run on a specific VT by using the ``vt<nn>'' option, where <nn> is the number
- of an available VT (starting from 1). If you don't have a free VT XFree86 can-
- not run. Normally you can simply disable one of the getty programs in
- /etc/inittab, but if this is not an option, you can increase the number of
- available VTs by increasing the value of NR_CONSOLES in include/linux/tty.h and
- recompiling the kernel.
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- Once running inside X, switching to another VT is accomplished by pressing
- Ctrl-Alt-<Fnn> where nn is the number of the VT to switch to. To return to the
- server, press the proper key-combination that moves you back to the VT that
- XFree86 is using: by default, this is Alt-<Fmm>, where mm is the number of the
- VT the server is running on (this number is printed when the server is
- started). Note that this is NOT the VT from which the server was started.
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- NOTE: you can redefine the text-mode keybindings with the `loadkeys' command
- found in the kbd-0.81.tar.gz archive (or a later version thereof). With this,
- you can (for example) make Ctrl-Alt-<Fmm> work from text mode the same way it
- works under the XFree86 server.
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- When the server is exited, it will return to the original VT it was started
- from, unless it dies unexpectedly, when the switch must be done manually. There
- still seem to be weird combinations of graphic cards and motherboards that have
- problems to restore the textfont when returning from XFree86 to the text mode.
- In these cases using the runx script from the svgalib distribution might help.
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- The XFree86 server now queries the kernel to obtain the key binding in effect
- at startup. These bindings are either the default map in place when the kernel
- was compiled, or reloaded using the `loadkeys' utility. Not all keys are bound:
- kernel-specific, multiple keysym, and dead keys are not handled by the server.
- All others are translated to their X equivalents. Note that the XFree86 server
- only allows for four modifier maps: unshifted, shifted, modeswitch unshifted
- and modeswitch shifted. Depending on what the modeswitch key is (it is config-
- urable in your XF86Config and defaults to Alt), XFree86 will read those tables
- into its keymaps. This means if you use certain keys, like left-Control, for
- Linux modeswitch, that will not be mappable to X.
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- Information for Linux Users
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- 5. Installing Xdm, the display manager
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- Since xdm is dynamically linked, there's no issue on export restriction outside
- US for this binary distribution of xdm: it does not contain the DES encryption
- code. So it's now included in the bin package.
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- However the file xc/lib/Xdmcp/WrapHelp.c is not included in the XFree86-3.3
- source, so support for XDM-AUTHORIZATION-1 is not included here. You'll have to
- get WrapHelp.c and rebuild xdm after having set HasXdmAuth in xf86site.def.
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- The file is available within the US; for details see ftp.x.org:/pub/R6/xdm-
- auth/README.
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- To start the display manager, log in as root on the console and type: ``xdm
- -nodaemon''.
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- You can start xdm automatically on bootup by disabling the console getty and
- modifying /etc/inittab. Details about this setup depend on the Linux distribu-
- tion that you use, so check the documentation provided there.
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- The xdm binary provided should run with both shadow- and non-shadow password
- systems.
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- 6. xterm
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- The XFree86-3.3 binary release contains an xterm binary that has been linked
- statically against libtermcap. This was done to make sure that it will cor-
- rectly work with all distributions, regardless whether they rely on libtermcap
- or libncurses. Contrary to the xterm binaries in some beta version following
- XFree86-3.1.2, this binary does not rely on a recent libncurses being installed
- on your system.
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- 7. Input devices
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- XFree86 now support the dynamic loading of drivers for external input devices
- using the XInput extension. Currently supported devices are:
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- o Joystick (xf86Jstk.so)
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- o Wacom tablets (Wacom IV protocol only, xf86Wacom.so)
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- o SummaSketch tablets (xf86Summa.so)
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- o Elographics touchscreen (xf86Elo.so)
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- To use a specific device, add the line
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- load "module"
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- in the Module section of XF86Config, where module is the name of the .so file
- corresponding to your device. You also need to set up a XInput section in
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- Information for Linux Users
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- XF86Config. Refer to the XF86Config(5) man page for detailed configuration
- instructions.
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- You can then change the device used to drive the X pointer with the xset-
- pointer(1) command.
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- For joystick support, you'll need to install the joystick device driver in the
- kernel.
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- 7.1 Configuring PEX, XIE and GLX extensions
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- The PEX, XIE and GLX extensions are now supported as external modules. If you
- want to have access to these extensions, add the following lines to the Module
- section of XF86Config:
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- load "pex5.so"
- load "xie.so"
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- For GLX you need to get the appropriate GLX modules, first. They are, at this
- time, not part of the XFree86 distribution.
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- 8. Compiling XFree86
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- There are no special instructions required for compiling XFree86. This version
- was compiled with gcc-2.7.2.1, the 5.4.7 Elf libraries and the 1.7.14 shared,
- dynamic linker ld.so. The server has been compiled with -m486, which optimizes
- it for the 486 processor, but the binary will run on the 386 processor (there
- is a slight increase in binary size over using -m386, but no loss of perfor-
- mance).
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- All extensions and clients have been ported and tested. By default, the servers
- are compiled without any extra extensions (PEX, XIE, etc), but libraries for
- those extensions are always generated. They can be loaded at runtime, see the
- XFree86 man page for details. By modifying site.def, extra extensions can be
- compiled into the server. Alternately, the link kit can be used to craft modi-
- fied servers.
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- The distribution is very large, but it is possible to compile XFree86 on a sin-
- gle 64mb partition, if the source tree is carefully trimmed (no manpages, PEX
- or large clients). Simply run ``make Makefiles'' to create the Makefiles, then
- stop the make and run each piece individually. It is not necessary to run
- ``make depend'' as well, which saves some space. Having 150mb available makes
- compiling XFree86 a lot easier. You will need about 10mb of virtual memory to
- compile the entire server.
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- If an aout version of XFree86 is to be built and patches are applied which sig-
- nificantly change the libraries, modified jump_xxx files will be needed. Those
- can be generated according to instructions given in the DLL tools package, and
- will be made available as XFree86 patches.
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- The JUMP_xxx defines used to compile the X libraries can also be used to com-
- pile external X shared libraries, like Xaw3d. Detailed instructions are
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- Information for Linux Users
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- provided in /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/config/lnxLib.rules, where the X library defini-
- tions are provided, as an example.
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- 9. Bug Notification
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- Bug reports should be sent to XFree86@XFree86.org or posted to the comp.win-
- dows.x.i386unix newsgroup.
-
- Generated from XFree86: xc/programs/Xserver/hw/xfree86/doc/sgml/Linux.sgml,v 3.13.2.3 1997/05/23 12:19:40 dawes Exp $
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- $XConsortium: Linux.sgml /main/6 1996/10/28 04:47:37 kaleb $
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- Information for Linux Users
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- CONTENTS
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-
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- 1. Linux versions on which XFree86 has been tested ......................... 1
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- 2. Backwards Compatibility ................................................. 1
-
- 3. Installing XFree86 ...................................................... 1
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- 4. Running XFree86 ......................................................... 1
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- 5. Installing Xdm, the display manager ...................................... 3
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- 6. xterm .................................................................... 3
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- 7. Input devices ............................................................ 3
- 7.1 Configuring PEX, XIE and GLX extensions .............................. 4
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- 8. Compiling XFree86 ....................................................... 4
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- 9. Bug Notification ........................................................ 5
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