Welcome to the MacNN Forums.

dont.wanna.tell · Apr 24, 2003, 12:36 PM

Hi there, I just saw that a new version of XDarwin is available for download starting now on http://www.xdarwin.org/ .

Does anybody know in what respect they differ? Is this the apple code merged with X11 Technologie?

I haven't seen a link there where I could find some decent writing about this...

Thanks all,

cu Martin

clarkgoble · Apr 24, 2003, 02:19 PM

Just from looking at the web page, it appears that XDarwin finally got hardware acceleration like X11.app had. (Which is largely why a lot of people switched) Most of the changes to XDarwin are just features that X11.app has had since beta 1.

The big advantage to XDarwin is that it offers both rooted and rootless modes while X11.app doesn't.

dont.wanna.tell · Apr 24, 2003, 06:01 PM

Hmm...

So we will have to wait for some performance comparisions then.

Well I'l see if the rooted mode and perhaps performance can top the "it just works" factor of X11.app.

Thanks for the response!

cu Martin

clarkgoble · Apr 24, 2003, 06:07 PM

I'd also expect that 10.3 will probably have hooks for Apple to better integrate X11.app into the OSX experience. I'm not sure how, but it might conceivably be possible to treat X11 apps as real OSX apps in the dock. (I'm not sure how that works under most X11 window managers, but presumably there is information to distinguish a running X11 application from a regular unix application)

The big thing I like about X11.app is that cut and paste works a lot better than it did under XDarwin. I've not run the new version of XDarwin, so I can't say if they've improved things. I'm hoping that the release version of X11.app will support copy and paste of more than just straight text.

Pierre B. · Apr 25, 2003, 04:19 AM

Originally posted by clarkgoble:

The big advantage to XDarwin is that it offers both rooted and rootless modes while X11.app doesn't.

Exactly, full screen operation of XDarwin is an indeed invaluable feature. Not only you have a separated desktop with full X11 functionality, but you can also have multiple workspaces. I think even a huge display cannot replace, in organization and ease of navigation, say 10 workspaces full of open documents and applications.

Pierre B. · Apr 25, 2003, 04:28 AM

I forgot to say that 2D accelaration in full screen XDarwin is very nice and makes work very confortable. It remains to see if Apple will have the intention to implement (and how) multiple workspaces in its own X11.

clarkgoble · Apr 25, 2003, 05:58 PM

You can have multiple workstations in X11.app. There is absolutely no reason why virtual desktops amongst window managers won't work. Remember that even under X11.app you can run multiple window managers. (I most typically run KDE in tandem with aspects of Apple's window manager for cutting and pasting)

Now under X11.app the "switch" will leave OSX windows in place. And I suspect many will find that disconcerting, which is why XDarwin is advantageous for some. Personally I don't really use virtual desktops that often and prefer simply minimizing application windows or hiding applications using ASM.

BTW - I should add that if you want to use a window manager other than quartz-wm do the following to enable its features for OSX integrattion. This is my .xinitrc

quartz-wm --only-proxy &
exec wmaker # or whatever other wm you want

P · Apr 26, 2003, 11:39 AM

Apple's X11 is based on an earlier CVS snapshot of XDarwin, and lacks recent things like the threaded Xlib. Apple has also removed all support for fullscreen and console mode, as well as broken support for older versions of OS X, in order to get a working copy out quickly.

Apple's X11 code - minus the window manager - will eventually be folded into XDarwin. This has not happened yet.

bmedina · Apr 26, 2003, 01:24 PM

So before I get home and try this out...

Is it possible to have both Apple's X11 and XDarwin installed and functional?

undotwa · Apr 26, 2003, 11:56 PM

Can i use the quartz-wm in XDarwin? Or does that particular WM require Apple X11?

EDIT: Oh, and if it does work, can you run XDarwin in >console using startx with the quartz-wm? I just really love that window manager

P · Apr 27, 2003, 07:58 AM

Originally posted by undotwa:
Can i use the quartz-wm in XDarwin? Or does that particular WM require Apple X11?

EDIT: Oh, and if it does work, can you run XDarwin in >console using startx with the quartz-wm? I just really love that window manager

At this point I suspect it will only work in Apple's X11. When Apple's changes are folded back into XDarwin, it will still only work in rootless. Quartz-wm is not some lookalike Aqua, it's real Aqua windows that X11 draws into. You'll need Quartz running to get it to work.

P · Apr 27, 2003, 08:03 AM

Originally posted by bmedina:
So before I get home and try this out...

Is it possible to have both Apple's X11 and XDarwin installed and functional?

Sort of. If you install the two distributions into different directories, like /usr/ApplesX11R6 and /usr/XDarwinX11R6, and then add a symlink at /usr/X11R6 that points to the version you want to use, it will work. One way to do this is to

* install one of them
* make a tarball out of the current /usr/X11R6
(like cd /usr/X11R6; tar cf ~/x11r6.tar *)
* install the other one,
* make a new tarball
* expand the two tarballs into their new respective directories
* make the symlink