Setting Up Paths in the Configuration File

The Files section is by far the easiest to set up in your XF86Config file. That’s because just about everybody has the same paths. In the Files section, you need to tell X where the RGB (Red-Green-Blue) color database file is kept and where the fonts are located. Because both should go in standard locations, you can simply use the following section in your XF86Config file (in fact, the sample version already comes this way):

  Section "Files"

     RgbPath     "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/rgb"

     FontPath    "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/misc/"

     FontPath    "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Type1/"

     FontPath    "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Speedo/"

     FontPath    "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/75dpi/"

     FontPath    "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/100dpi/"

  EndSection

This Files section tells XFree86 that your RGB database is located in /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/ and that the fonts are located in /usr/X11R6/ lib/X11/fonts/. These are the standard locations for both. One tricky thing to note is that you may not have loaded all the font directories (we recommend you do, though). Because of this, you should check the /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/ directory:

     $ ls /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/

     100dpi/  75dpi/   PEX/     Speedo/  Type1/   misc/

On our system, we have all the directories listed and a PEX directory for PEX fonts (you can ignore this for now; see Appendix B for more on PEX, the 3D extension to X). What you should do is delete any entries in the XF86Config file if you don’t have the corresponding font directory. For example, if you did not load the 100-dots-per-inch fonts (the 100dpi) directory, then your Files section should look like:

  Section "Files"

     RgbPath     "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/rgb"

     FontPath    "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/misc/"

     FontPath    "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Type1/"

     FontPath    "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/Speedo/"

     FontPath    "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/fonts/75dpi/"

  EndSection

We removed the entry for 100dpi fonts.

When running xf86config, you should say you do not intend to use the X font server, even if you’d like to. If the font server isn’t running before you start X, then your system may lock up. We found it’s much easier to split the problem. First, get X up and running. Then, configure the X font server (which provides scaled fonts). You may have to go back and edit the XF86Config file, but that’s a lot easier than having your system lock up.

Configuring the ServerFlags Section

After the Files section comes the ServerFlags section. Again, you rarely have to do much with this. In fact, we normally have everything commented out in this section. The main options you can set here are listed in Table 3.7.

Most of these flags work backwards. If you uncomment the entry, it turns the feature off. By default, we comment out (leaving on) the two “don’t” features. We also comment out (leaving off) the NoTrapSignals option.

We like being able to kill an errant X server by simply holding down Ctrl-Alt-Backspace, so we always comment out DontZap. If you turn on DontZap, you are disabling this feature.

DontZoom disables the keyboard sequences that allow you to switch between graphics modes. We find this switching to be essential in testing our XF86Config files, so we always leave this feature on by commenting it out in the XF86Config file.

Our ServerFlags section, with everything commented out, looks like:

  Section "ServerFlags"

  #    NoTrapSignals

  #    DontZap

  #    DontZoom

  EndSection

Just like in UNIX shell scripts, the # character marks a comment line in the XF86Config file.