So I have access to a macbook air M4 now, and I run XQuartz (2.8.5) on it in full-screen mode with a traditional window manager, usually ctwm.
Normally I would build my own version of ctwm, but on this new laptop
I'm using a pkgsrc-based binary package provider to install extra
software, especially X11 stuff, and so I installed their build of
ctwm-4.1.0.
https://pkgsrc.smartos.org/install-on-macos/
It started up and ran and initially showed me my root menu, but then
got "stuck" -- it appeared to just hang.
I'm not sure where it's getting stuck, presumably though it's in some
system call. I tried to run dtrace to see which system call, but that
seems to fail. The only solution was to kill it from a Terminal window.
So I jumped through the hoops to fetch the source to my version and
built it locally on the laptop, and viola it works flawlessly.
My version is largely the same as 4.1.0, especially in all the important
bits, so the only substantial difference I can think of will be which
version of the compiler and SDK (system headers) were used.
The pkgsrc build was done on a macos 14.5 system, presumably with
clang-16 or maybe clang-15. My build was on macos 15.7 with clang-17.
Apple have been enormously successful at maintaining backward
compatability for programs built with older SDKs. I've run complex
stuff built for 10.6 on 15.x systems without any problems so I find it
hard to believe these hangs could be their problem.
So as a shot in the dark I'm asking here if anyone has seen any kind of
hang with ctwm, especially on macos, before. Maybe someone else can
even try this same pkgsrc build, as well as their own build and report
back.
Also if anyone has any ideas about debugging this better, let me know!
I think I may be able to try running it under a debugger if I set up my
xinitrc to just start an xterm instead of a window manager, but I don't
think this pkgsrc build has debug symbols. I'm not going to try to
reproduce the pkgsrc build, even with the current compiler and SDK, as
that would require cmake and I'm not going down that road....
--
Greg A. Woods <[email protected]>
Kelowna, BC +1 250 762-7675 RoboHack <[email protected]>
Planix, Inc. <[email protected]> Avoncote Farms <[email protected]>
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