Re: Stupid X Q.
On Thu, 10 Aug 2000, Nadav Har'El wrote: > > X11R6 is the spec, thre protocols, the APIs. > > > > xfree86 is an xserver project, an implementation of that standard (viva > > Several people said roughly the same thing, and I beg to differ. X11 was I just wanted to give a quick simplistic answer to a short simple question. I'm always glad to learn the history of another technology, but I don't think that's what our friend was after... btw, I was the second to answer, but my post took 6-7 hours to get to the list (transition pains at actcom I suppose), so appologies if it seems like I'm posting an answer after 20 others. -- Ira Abramov, GNU/Linux advocate. (@- //\ "Akamai, Google, MicroSoft, Sun, Oracle, Intel, NASA, Sony, v_/_Python, JPG, PNG - CS masturbation is changing the world." -- C.S. explaining her views on masturbation to Linus, 3/7/2000 = To unsubscribe, send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the word "unsubscribe" in the message body, e.g., run the command echo unsubscribe | mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Stupid X Q.
On Wed, Aug 09, 2000, Ira Abramov wrote about "Re: Stupid X Q.": > On Wed, 9 Aug 2000, Y. Benado wrote: > > > > What is the difference between X11R6 & XFree86 ? > > X11R6 is Xfree86 Release 6 AFAIK > > ASCII silly question, get a stupid ANSI. :) > > X11R6 is the spec, thre protocols, the APIs. > > xfree86 is an xserver project, an implementation of that standard (viva > standards!) if you have an application written for X11 (on Solaris, BSD, > Linux, AIX or even windogs) is can connect to any X11 server running on > another machine (xfree86, Excede, Starnet Xwin32, MI/X, Xinside, MetroX, > Solaris whatever). Several people said roughly the same thing, and I beg to differ. X11 was *not* a standard, spec or protocol per se, it was also complete implementation. It was an implementation with a complete, open and free, specification. In 1994, when I got at work a Sun workstation with crappy X11R3 & OpenLook, I took the X11R4 distribution from MIT's ftp site, compiled it (took almost half a day to compile), and got myself a fully working X server. The distribution included the X protocol specification, the Xlib specification, the ICCCM, the Xt Intrinsics, an example Xt widget set (the Athena widgets) but also a complete implementation of the server (for several systems) and many client applications (including xterm, the twm ICCCM-compliant window-manager, and many other basic applications). When MIT's X team was at it's peak, makers of commercial Unix (like Sun, Digital, Hp, etc.) licensed MIT's source, and added their own stuff (mainly straightforward porting to new graphic systems, but also some new features like Sun's NeWS, Display Postscript, and so on. An additional Xt-based widget set, Motif, was also created by third parties, and so was (later) the CDE "standard".) Anyway, as far as I know, X servers for all Unix-flavors are directly based on MIT's original source code. Not only that, but when the X Consortium released X11R6 (after several years of X11R5), the XFree86 team worked hard at reintegrating the new code into their servers. Windows servers like Excede may be completely new code, but I'm not even sure of that. The nice thing about the X Window System is that it's wonderful definition documents (available with any source distribution of X, by the way) outlasted the original MIT X project and now continues to act as a standard. About the same thing is happening to Unix. When was the last time any of you used an AT&T-released Unix? Pretty soon people will start saying that Unix is just a standard, and Linux is it's implementation... As I said, Sic transit gloria mundi... -- Nadav Har'El| Wednesday, Aug 9 2000, 9 Av 5760 [EMAIL PROTECTED] |- Phone: +972-53-245868, ICQ 13349191 |I am logged in, therefore I am. http://nadav.harel.org.il | = To unsubscribe, send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the word "unsubscribe" in the message body, e.g., run the command echo unsubscribe | mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Stupid X Q.
On Wed, 9 Aug 2000, Y. Benado wrote: > > What is the difference between X11R6 & XFree86 ? > X11R6 is Xfree86 Release 6 AFAIK ASCII silly question, get a stupid ANSI. X11R6 is the spec, thre protocols, the APIs. xfree86 is an xserver project, an implementation of that standard (viva standards!) if you have an application written for X11 (on Solaris, BSD, Linux, AIX or even windogs) is can connect to any X11 server running on another machine (xfree86, Excede, Starnet Xwin32, MI/X, Xinside, MetroX, Solaris whatever). kapish? -- Ira Abramov, GNU/Linux advocate. (@- //\ "Akamai, Google, MicroSoft, Sun, Oracle, Intel, NASA, Sony, v_/_Python, JPG, PNG - CS masturbation is changing the world." -- C.S. explaining her views on masturbation to Linus, 3/7/2000 = To unsubscribe, send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the word "unsubscribe" in the message body, e.g., run the command echo unsubscribe | mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Stupid X Q.
Ben-Nes Michael wrote: > > Hi All > > What is the difference between X11R6 & XFree86 ? > One is a standard, the other is an implementation of that standard. Like HTTP is a standard, and apache is an implementation of its server side. Was that your question? Or did you ask what the differences were between what is actually implemented in XFree86 and the X11R6 standard? Herouth = To unsubscribe, send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the word "unsubscribe" in the message body, e.g., run the command echo unsubscribe | mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Stupid X Q.
Hi, Ben-Nes! On Wed, Aug 09, 2000 at 11:12:13AM +0300, you wrote the following: > What is the difference between X11R6 & XFree86 ? X.org releases a reference implementation of the X protocol and the standard X libraries. Their latest release of that code is X11R6.4. Of course this code is far from being able to run as an X server -- there are no hardware drivers, no OS interface for configuration and all that stuff; it's just a pile of code implementing a certain standard. XFree86 takes this reference implementation and turns it into actually usable software that you can run on your computer. -- Alex Shnitman| http://www.debian.org [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED] +--- http://alexsh.hectic.netUIN 188956PGP key on web page E1 F2 7B 6C A0 31 80 28 63 B8 02 BA 65 C7 8B BA "Everything that can be invented has been invented." -- Charles Duell, head of the U.S. Patent Office, 1899 = To unsubscribe, send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the word "unsubscribe" in the message body, e.g., run the command echo unsubscribe | mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Stupid X Q.
On Wed, Aug 09, 2000, Y. Benado wrote about "Re: Stupid X Q.":
>> From: Ben-Nes Michael <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>> What is the difference between X11R6 & XFree86 ?
>
> X11R6 is Xfree86 Release 6 AFAIK
Not quite...
Sic transit gloria mundi :)
And now for a short history lesson:
"The X Window System", the windowing system we all use on our Linux (and Unix)
machines, was originally designed and written by people at MIT. The first
version they released outside MIT was X10 (X version 10), and that was followed
by the version that would overtake the world, X11. Since then the version "11"
stuck, and newer versions were dubbed "releases". The first X11 release I
worked on (in 1991) was X11R3. Later came X11R4 (with a few major improvements),
X11R5 and X11R6 (with small improvements, as far as I'm concerned), and the
latest release is named X11R6.4patch3.
If you think the convergence of the version numbers is strange (much like
TeX's version 3.14159) you're right. What actually happened is that after
X11R4 MIT stopped working on X11. In the beginning of 1994 the rights of
X11 passed to a new organization "The X Consortium" and by the end of 1996
this organization was disolved and the rights were assigned to "the Open
Software foundation" (which currently also holds the Unix trademark and the
Motif source rights - don't confuse it with the "Free Software Foundation"!).
All these reassignments didn't do X Windows any good, and no major
improvements appeared on X-Windows appeared since 1994 (I'm talking about the
X server, not widget sets or applications, of course).
Anyway, around that time, Unix on PC became popular (first AT&T's various
System V Release 4, and Unixware, and then came Linux) and the X11R5 server was
ported for PC ("86") machines (previously, the most common implementation was
on Sun workstations). This started out as a straightforward port, but it got
more and more complicated: as opposed to Sun machines, for example, that
have a fixed and small number of video cards, PCs use numerous video cards
that need supporting, various kinds of mice, displays, and so on. Special
optimization for PCs were added, binary distributions were created, easy
configuration scripts, and so on. All this makes the "XFree86" project.
Nowadays, the original X Windows project is a zombie, and all new development
seems to be coming from the XFree86 people (correct me if I'm wrong), so
people start to get the impression that "X" is a shortcut of "XFree86". But
it isn't :) In fact, the latest releases also support non-"86" machines, so
the assumption XFree86=X will soon become true. I just hope they add anti-
aliased outline font support soon... Other things sorely missing from X Windows
currently is a sound server and a print server that work as normal X clients
(i.e., the X server should not be touched - the ICCCM should be updated to
support these notions and the work would be done by seperate processes). I
once started designing an X Print Server (not like the rather-useless XPrint
extension), and written a very-simplistic sound server, but, alas, I don't
have time to work on it any more :(
By the way, if you're curious, the latest XFree86 release is 4.0.1. So
XFree86 4.0.1 is based on X11R6... A lot of numbers and confusion :)
[I'm writing this from memory. For more authoritative information, take a look
at www.x.org and www.xfree86.org, and 'man XFree86']
--
Nadav Har'El| Wednesday, Aug 9 2000, 8 Av 5760
[EMAIL PROTECTED] |-
Phone: +972-53-245868, ICQ 13349191 |Everybody lies, but it doesn't matter
http://nadav.harel.org.il |since nobody listens.
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Re: Stupid X Q.
Ben-Nes Michael wrote: > What is the difference between X11R6 & XFree86 ? X11R6 is revision 6 of X11, the communication protocol. XFree86 is an implementation of an X server (supporting the X11R6 protocol) for x86 machines and their videocards. Having a unified protocol means other clients on different OSes could connect your XFree86 server and display on it. (or so I know :) -- Best regards, Ilya Konstantinov = To unsubscribe, send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the word "unsubscribe" in the message body, e.g., run the command echo unsubscribe | mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Stupid X Q.
X11R6 is Xfree86 Release 6 AFAIK Yarin Benado - Original Message - From: Ben-Nes Michael <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: ILUG <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Wednesday, August 09, 2000 10:12 AM Subject: Stupid X Q. > Hi All > > What is the difference between X11R6 & XFree86 ? > > -- > -- > Canaan Surfing Ltd. > Internet Service Providers > Ben-Nes Michael - Manager > Tel: 972-6-6925757 > Fax: 972-6-6925858 > http://www.canaan.co.il > -- > > > > = > To unsubscribe, send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with > the word "unsubscribe" in the message body, e.g., run the command > echo unsubscribe | mail [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > = To unsubscribe, send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the word "unsubscribe" in the message body, e.g., run the command echo unsubscribe | mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Stupid X Q.
Hi All What is the difference between X11R6 & XFree86 ? -- -- Canaan Surfing Ltd. Internet Service Providers Ben-Nes Michael - Manager Tel: 972-6-6925757 Fax: 972-6-6925858 http://www.canaan.co.il -- = To unsubscribe, send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the word "unsubscribe" in the message body, e.g., run the command echo unsubscribe | mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]
