First Experiences with X.org's X11 Server?

Slashdot Reader CanadianCrackPot decided to be adventurous and went and installed the latest offering from X.org's X-Server project. Below, you'll find "the basics" of his "first attempt to install [their] X Window Server on a system with a 450 MHz PIII, and Diamond Viper V770 (TNT2 chipset) graphics card, running Mandrake 10.0 Official (FTP download of everything but the RPMS.cooker dir)." To make a long story short, while he did have some luck with installing it, running it was...problematic. He asks: "I'm just wondering how other Slashdot readers are doing with the new X11R6 server, and more importantly, how did you install it?" "I decided to try installing X.org's X Server today while I had nothing to do here's the results:

• get a test bed system: check
• get sources: check
• ./configure: N/A...I'm worried
• make World: check
• make install; make install.man: check
• startx: crash
• xf86config: check
• startx, again: check -- now I need a manager
• startgnome: galeon not found (crash)
• startkde: crash"

If you've had any luck getting X.org's X-server running on your machine, what hurdles did you have to overcome before it worked?

Comments

Gentoo

[Gaima]

emerge x11-base/xorg-x11
emerge unmerge xfree

No crashes, no errors, no odd behaviour at all.

(Dell Dimension, P4 2.66, Matrox G400MAX, Matrox drivers, xinerama)

Re:Gentoo

[crstophr]

don't you mean:

ACCEPT_KEYWORDS="~x86" emerge x11-base/xorg-x11

You see, this is still in "unstable"...

Re:Gentoo

[superjaded]

Ew, that's bad.
echo "x11-base/xorg-x11" >>/etc/portage/package.keywords
(you'll have to do the same thing for things like utempter and xterm as well, since those are ~x86)
emerge -C xfree (xfree blocks xorg, so you have to uninstall first)
emerge xorg-x11

And as should be implied, if you already have an installation of xfree, the config file works with it out of the box. In fact, the config file generated from xorgconfig (which, incidentally, looks exactly like the XF86Config util) is pretty much the same as the one generated from the XF86Config util, save for a different header most likely ("This config file was generated" by blah).

But there's really no difference between the current X.org release and Xfree4.3.0 save for some patches that they have may have backported from 4.4. But I've been running X.org's implementation for quite a few months now and while I haven't noticed any significant difference between xfree and X.org at the moment.. that's not to say that will be the same as time goes on.

I think this "release" was mostly just to get the thing out of the door and get its name out there. The REAL cool stuff will be coming during the next releases. They're already trying to get the damage and composite extensions ported to the X.org tree. Those who've played around with KeithP's kdrive/Xserver have seen both of those extensions in action. Just imagining the composite extention in cooperation with something like cairo and glitz just makes me drool.

Slack-current xorg packages worked

[c.r.o.c.o]

I did not try to compile xorg, I just installed the default packages from Slack-current installed without any problems. Once that was done, I just renamed XF86Config to xorg.conf, and it worked without ANY problems. If I didn't know I had xorg instead XFree86, I couldn't tell the difference. This is obviously because for now they are virtually identical (other than a few different names).

If the packages are available for your distribution, give those a try to see if you have any incompatibilities. Compiling xorg is not easy, I remember it took me three tries in Gentoo (can't remember what was the problem, this was XFree86 4.1.0). In your case, something tells me that you wouldn't be able to compile XFree86 4.4.0 on your system either.

Fedora Core 2

[Joff_NZ]

I'm running X.org, by way of "upgrading" my FC1 install to FC2... a couple of problems: had to change the "XkbRules" option to "xorg".

Now I can't bind most of the multimedia keys to X keycodes. I expect this is related to the XkbRules thing.

Apart from that, its been running fine.

Re:Fedora Core 2

[Feztaa]

Well, I did a clean install of FC2, and I'm running X.org with no problems at all...

I just chose my proper keyboard in the keyboard prefs, and then went into the keyboard shortcut prefs, and pressed the keys and everything worked just fine (eg, bound "mute" to my mute button, and it came up as "XF86AudioMute"). The only key that didn't work was the "Log Off" button, unfortunately... but that's probably a side effect of me using the slightly wrong keyboard layout (for some reason, no program I've ever used has ever heard of the "Microsoft Natural MultiMedia Keyboard", I had to pick "Microsoft Wireless Multimedia Keyboard", which was closest in name (my keyboard isn't wireless).

I should look into writing my own keyboard layout file or something to get that log off key working. I know it works; back on FC1 I had to manually program all the extra keycodes to have the XF86* keysyms so that programs would even recognise them, then I bound commands to them all manually with gconf.

Re:Fedora Core 2

[prefect42]

Or just recompile the kernel with the 4k stacks option removed, or download the binaries that are available.

Re:Fedora Core 2

[13Echo]

You don't need to wait on nVidia since X.org and XF86 are virtually the same. The nVidia driver set works fine with X.org. I'm using it with an FX 5900 XT without any problems.

The only difference is that you'll need to configure an "xorg.conf" file instead of an "XF86Config" file.

Re:i'm not sure

[bersl2]

That's the only gotcha I encountered. Other than that, I like it more than XFree86. I use a Voodoo3 as a second graphics card, and XFree86 had some problems with it; X.org handles it perfectly.

Re:i'm not sure

[Gaima]

It's using the exact same XF86Config as xfree was.
As I don't have an xorg.conf it will use the Xfree name.

mahdell root # grep /X11/ /var/log/Xorg.0.log
(==) Using config file: "/etc/X11/XF86Config"

Slackware current...

[cymen]

I used swaret to upgrade my slackware current install to the X.org packages (x11). Everything worked but fonts rendered poorly (I did recompile and symlink all the freetype libraries to my version that has the bytecode rendering enabled) and my Synaptics touchpad (Dell laptop) didn't function properly in regards to the advanced features. I didn't notice the second item as I don't use those features (my brother does) but the first problem, with the fonts, was very annoying. I'm going back to slackware 9.1 when I get a chance.

I just put in a new 40 gb drive so I loaded up Windows XP to get a little experience with it. Not too bad but Cleartype is a little funky even with 32 bit video. I prefer the freetype rendering under X when it is working nicely.

slackware

[blindbat]

Installed them off of slackware current.

No problems installing or running.

Fedora

[wowbagger]

Under Fedora, the single biggest problems I had were:

1) Bitchslapping the system into allowing me to install the RPMs - I had to do a few "rpm --erase --justdb --nodeps" on a few things to "resolve" some conflicts.

2) Removing the /usr/X11R6/lib/tls/libGL* files to get the new Mesa renderer to run.

Other than that, I had very little problem.

I would suggest checking your X executable with ldd (ldd `which X`) and seeing if you are picking up a bad library somewhere.

Re:i'm not sure

[Curtman]

It will parse XF86Config if xorg.conf isn't there. Just like XFree 4 would parse XF86Config if XF86Config-4 wasn't there.

# grep /X11/ /var/log/Xorg.0.log
(==) Using config file: "/etc/X11/xorg.conf"

No problems here here either. I was really expecting at least some, but nothing so far. Now hopefully Gatos will shift full on into Xorg, (patches exist already for Xorg & XFree 4.4.0) and merge in the TV-Out branch while we're at it. :)

Re:why is X.org's better?

[Anonymous Coward]

As far as I can tell, its just an XFree86 fork from before they changed the license. Exactly the same as XFree86, except X.Org's license is still considered GPL compatible.

lin XOrg

[sofar]

using lunar linux. It automatically replaced xfree86, no need to specifically install startx as it comes with the XOrg package already. Didn't need to adjust any config files... the old one just works fine on all boxes I upgraded (nvidia setup, ati fglrx 9500, and an old trident based laptop).

Gentoo

[nempo]

Point your browser to http://forums.gentoo.org and do a search for xorg. You'll find all the information that you'll ever need.

At this point, the license

[Feztaa]

As noted in another post, X.org and XFree86 are basically identical code-wise. The only difference is that X.org has a more palatable license, which is why all the major distros switched over so quickly.

The other reason requires looking into the mysterious future... basically, politics at XFree86 were getting in the way of development, which was part of the reason for the fork; in 1 year's time, you can expect X.org to have a vibrant community of developers, with all funky new features in the X server, while XFree86 just sits and stagnates.

Read up about the X.org server

It didn't cause me any more than one problem

[Yrd]

I installed from the Gentoo Linux xorg-x11 6.7.0 ebuild (onto a Gentoo box, oddly enough). The ebuild authors did a good job, so it downloaded, compiled and installed happily.

I did have some difficulty with the ATi binary graphics card drivers for my Radeon 9800 Pro... the installed ones wouldn't work with X.Org, and the ebuild insisted on having XFree86 available. I haven't checked to see if the ebuild's been updated to handle X.Org, but I would expect it has. I'm not that bothered anyway, as I don't game under Linux very much, so the open source drivers work very nicely, as I get decent 2D performance, and Xv so I can watch DVDs.

I may revise my opinion on the value of good 3D acceleration for my Linux desktop when there's an OpenGL compositing X server available, but the drivers for that are likely to be completely different anyway.

Very Problematic

[untwisted]

So far, I've had nothing but trouble with the new X.org. I've recently installed Fedora Core 2, which was a dumb idea from the start. I have a Nvidia geForce4 ti4400, which doesn't get along nicely with 4k stacks (which is a default kernel setting in FC2). Well, when I tried to run FC2 for the first time, I got all kinds of problems with X (because of the nVidia driver). So being the resourceful person that I am, I used lynx to browse the web and find a solution. The first solution was to download a vanilla kernel from www.kernel.org, and compile without 4k stacks. I did this, but for some reason, X still gave me problems. I then tried rolling back to the generic nv driver that comes with FC, and again, X gives me problems. Story short, I went through about 30 different solutions, none of which work. The closest I've gotten is X starts, but it just sits there on a black screen. I can get Xtern to work, but not much else. I'm waiting on the new nVidia drivers, maybe everything will work with a set of good drivers, and the default Fedora settings, but I'm not going to hold my breath. Maybe it's just FC, but as far as I can tell, X is just being bitchy.

BLFS

[Ann Elk]

Beyond Linux From Scratch has step-by-step instructions for installing many packages from source, including the latest Xorg.

First time user

[wellard1981]

Doing a fresh install of Gentoo 2004.1, I thought I would try out X.org's X11R6. After a short time compiling, the software was installed and ready to run. I found the xorgconfig program and ran it. After that I edited the xorg.conf in /etc/X11 and updated it to include my mouse settings.

Ran startx and there it was! .. Seemed to load a bit quicker than XFree.

I then emerged the nVidia GLX and Kernel drives, updated my xorg.conf and fired up X again, this time it reported "No screens found", due to the kernel module not being loaded, an lsmod later showed that it was there.

I copied the nVidia driver from /usr/portage/distfiles to /root and ran it myself, after doing this, another modprobe nvidia and a startx and up popped X, so this said to me there is something screwy with Gentoo's way of managing nVidia drivers.

Two days later, and it's working perfectly, already started another game of Farcry and Call of Duty! (Yes, they do run on Linux with a little bit of fiddling) :)

Anyway, I can quite happly say that I am impressed with X.org's X11.

fedora core 2 & matrox g450 & xinerama (du

[i621148]

step 1: i did a clean install, letting fedora set up my xorg.conf file.
i am using a matrox g450 with two dell flat panel monitors. right out
of the box, they were both enabled in "clone" mode.

step 2: i just used the advanced tab under preferences: screensaver to
enable display power management. i set power management enabled. standby
after 15 min, suspend after 15 min, and off after 15 minutes. this
automatically enabled the power features. i did not have to add any
lines the x configuration file as in previous versions of redhat.

step 3: become root and edit /etc/X11/xorg.conf after the section entitled
Section "Module"
blah
EndSection
I inserted these lines:

Section "ServerFlags"
Option "Xinerama"
EndSection

I saved and pressed control-alt-backspace to restart the xserver. after loggin in again,
i went to system settings: display.

there appeared a tab labeled "dual head" i clicked "use dual head"
then i configured my second monitor and picked spanning desktops.
after hitting ok, i hit ctrl-alt-backspace again and presto!!!!!!
xineraman was enabled with power management. i did not install any of the matrox drivers or use the mgapdesk utility.
i just used the above instructions and that was it right out of the box....

also as to everyone badmouthing fedora core 2 , i am very impressed and
have found a great many features that have been improved and generally
well thought out. i am very glad i upgraded....

if anyone wants to see my xorg.conf file here it is:
# Xorg configuration created by system-config-display Section "ServerLayout" Identifier "Multihead layout" Screen 0 "Screen0" LeftOf "Screen1" Screen 1 "Screen1" 0 0 InputDevice "Mouse0" "CorePointer" InputDevice "Keyboard0" "CoreKeyboard" Option "Xinerama" "on" Option "Clone" "off" EndSection Section "Files" # RgbPath is the location of the RGB database. Note, this is the name of the # file minus the extension (like ".txt" or ".db"). There is normally # no need to change the default. # Multiple FontPath entries are allowed (they are concatenated together) # By default, Red Hat 6.0 and later now use a font server independent of # the X server to render fonts. RgbPath "/usr/X11R6/lib/X11/rgb" FontPath "unix/:7100" EndSection Section "Module" Load "dbe" Load "extmod" Load "fbdevhw" Load "glx" Load "record" Load "freetype" Load "type1" Load "dri" EndSection Section "ServerFlags" Option "Xinerama" EndSection Section "InputDevice" # Specify which keyboard LEDs can be user-controlled (eg, with xset(1)) # Option "Xleds" "1 2 3" # To disable the XKEYBOARD extension, uncomment XkbDisable. # Option "XkbDisable" # To customise the XKB settings to suit your keyboard, modify the # lines below (which are the defaults). For example, for a non-U.S. # keyboard, you will probably want to use: # Option "XkbModel" "pc102" # If you have a US Microsoft Natural keyboard, you can use: # Option "XkbModel" "microsoft" # # Then to change the language, change the Layout setting. # For example, a german layout can be obtained with: # Option "XkbLayout" "de" # or: # Option "XkbLayout" "de" # Option "XkbVariant" "nodeadkeys" # # If you'd like to switch the positions of your capslock and # control keys, use: # Option "XkbOptions" "ctrl:swapcaps" # Or if you just want both to be control, use: # Option "XkbOptions" "ctrl:nocaps" # Identifier "Keyboard0" Driver "keyboard" Option "XkbModel" "pc105" Option "XkbLayout" "us" EndSection Section "InputDevice" Identifier "Mouse0" Driver "mouse" Option "Protocol" "IMPS/2" Option "Device" "/dev/input/mice" Option "ZAxisMapping" "4 5" Option "Emulate3