Chapter 22
Using X Windows

by Steve Burnett

In this chapter

Navigating X Windows

Using Window Managers for Linux

Using X Applications in Red Hat

Using X Windows Applications with Slackware 96

Having Fun with DOOM for Linux

If you’re familiar with other GUIs, such as Microsoft Windows or the Macintosh user interface, you shouldn’t find many differences in X Windows. X Windows presents to the user several windows, each showing the output of an X Windows application, called a client. The client can be running on the user’s PC, which is more than likely with Linux, or on another workstation on the network.

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NOTE:  Remember that with X Windows, the client/server paradigm is reversed from the usual meaning of the client and server.

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How you move around in X Windows very much depends on window managers. Most windows use an on-screen pointer called a cursor to indicate where you’re working. The cursor can take on many shapes, depending on what you’re doing and what window manager you’re running.

Navigating X Windows

X Windows, like most GUIs, allows input from the keyboard and the pointing device, usually a mouse. Typically, for a window to accept input, it must be the active window. An active window normally has a different appearance (for example, a highlighted border) than inactive windows.

Making a window active depends on the window manager. Some window managers allow the window to become active by merely moving the cursor into the window; others require you to click the window with the mouse, like you do in Microsoft Windows.

Using Menus

Many GUIs on PCs today provide drop-down and pop-up menus. Again, such items depend on the window manager, including the types of menu choices provided. Most X Windows window managers don’t have a main menu bar across the top of the monitor; instead, they use a floating menu. You typically invoke this floating menu by clicking over an empty area of the desktop. You hold down the mouse button and drag the cursor through the various menu selections. When you find the desired menu choice, simply release the button, which is very much like how you navigate menus on a Macintosh and very unlike how you navigate menus under Microsoft Windows.

Using Virtual Terminals in X Windows

Your X server runs on a virtual terminal assigned by Linux. This terminal is assigned to the seventh virtual terminal, which you can reach with the <Ctrl-Alt-F22> key from a character terminal. From X Windows you can reach the other terminals with the <Ctrl-Alt-Fx> key combination, where x represents the number of the virtual terminal you want to access. Although accessing the other virtual terminals can be handy, X Windows does allow you to start character terminal emulators, called xterm sessions.

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NOTE:  If your X server is running, you must use the <Ctrl-Alt-Fx> combination to move from the X server to a virtual terminal. You can still use the <Alt-Fx> combination to move among the virtual terminals.

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Using Window Managers for Linux

As stated earlier in the chapter, X Windows doesn’t specify a window manager. The look and feel of X Windows is left up to the user—completely up to the user. Almost every aspect of the behavior of the GUI is in your control. In this spirit, Linux doesn’t provide just one window manager for X Windows, although the default installation of Red Hat and Slackware installs fvwm as the default window manager. Table 22.1 lists some of the various window managers available for Linux.