From 067217351cde37b66a24ed7017cf24de5a396e93 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: Mark Linimon Date: Tue, 8 Jun 2004 08:35:38 +0000 Subject: [PATCH] Add information about the work in progress to bring in the X packages (server, client, libraries) from freedesktop.org. Once the website has next been updated, please feel free to post the following URL in response to the questions about it: http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/faq/x.html#WHICH-X Discussed on: freebsd-doc, freebsd-x11 --- en_US.ISO8859-1/books/faq/book.sgml | 80 +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ 1 file changed, 80 insertions(+) diff --git a/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/faq/book.sgml b/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/faq/book.sgml index ad9597af5f..9743b2162b 100644 --- a/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/faq/book.sgml +++ b/en_US.ISO8859-1/books/faq/book.sgml @@ -7001,6 +7001,86 @@ options SYSVMSG # enable for messaging The X Window System and Virtual Consoles + + + What is the X Window System? + + + + + The X Window System is the most popular windowing system + capable of running on UNIX or UNIX-like systems, including + &os;. X.org administers + the X protocol + standards. The current release of the specification + is 11.6, so you will often see references shortened to + X11R6 or even just X11. + + + Many implementations are available for different + architectures and operating systems. For instance, an + implementation of the server-side code is properly known + as an X server. + + + + + + + Which X servers are available for &os;? + + + + + In the past, if you wanted to run X on &os;, you were + basically restricted to running an X implementation called + XFree86™ which is maintained by + The XFree86 Project, + Inc. This software was installed by default on + &os; versions up until 4.10 and 5.2. Although X.org + itself maintained an implementation during that time + period, it was basically only provided as a reference + platform, as it had suffered greatly from bitrot over + the years. + + However, early in 2004, the XFree86 Project split + over issues including the pace of code changes, future + directions, and a licensing change. X.org updated its + source tree to the last XFree86 release before the + licensing change (XFree86 version 4.3.99.903), incorporated + many changes that had previously been maintained separately, + and has released that software as X11R6.7.0. A separate but + related project, + freedesktop.org (or fd.o for short), + is working on rearchitecting the original XFree86 code to + reflect modern graphics card technology (with the goal of + greatly increased performance) and modern software practices + (with the goal of incresed maintainability, and thus faster + releases as well as easier configuration). X.org intends to + incorporate the fd.o changes in its future releases. + + The current technology roadmap for &os; includes + replacing XFree86 with fd.o as the default server sometime + later in 2004 under the assumption that the pace of its + development will more closely match that of &os; itself. + The XFree86 ports + (x11/XFree86-4 and + subports) will remain in the ports collection and be supported + as developer interest permits. Note that it is not currently + possible to mix-and-match pieces of each implementation; + work is under way to correct this problem. + + + The following paragraphs refer to the existing + XFree86 implementation, but most should also be applicable + to the fd.o implementation as well. While the default + configuration filename for the fd.o implementation is + xorg.conf, it will search for + XF86Config if it cannot find it. + + + + I want to run X, how do I go about it?