On Tue, Oct 14, 2003 at 12:03:47AM -0400, Gerald S Stoller wrote: > FreeBSD 4.3-RELEASE FreeBSD 4.3-RELEASE #0: Sat Apr 21 10:54:49 GMT 2001 > [EMAIL PROTECTED]:/usr/src/sys/compile/GENERIC i386 > > I run XFree86 on my system. Each process has an environment > variable named WINDOWID . What purpose does this variable serve? How > is it used? What can I do with it ((redirect output to another window, > no! for that I can use /dev/tty )? I noticed (by converting several > values to hex) that the form of this variable is > 2 * y * 16^5 + 14 , and I never saw y > 22 ; this is a result of > looking at around a dozen values.
Actually, that's set for all of the child processes of any xterm(1) windows you may use. It seems to be an xterm(1) specific thing to set in the environment, but then I haven't actually checked any of the xterm-alike programs. As far as I know, it's not used for anything much from the shell. The WINDOWID value itself just reports the Window id value known to the X server -- all X windows on the server will have a unique ID number which is used within the server to make sure that X events and window updates and so forth get directed to the right place. Use xwininfo(1) to display that, and other, data about any windows on your display. xwininfo(1) returns the window id value in hex, and it does have the same sort of pattern for all windows as you mention. It looks like some sort of bitmap to me, probably to tell the X server what the capabilities of the window are, but I can't find the appropriate man page that describes that. Try using xwininfo(1) against the root window, icons and so forth. Cheers, Matthew -- Dr Matthew J Seaman MA, D.Phil. 26 The Paddocks Savill Way PGP: http://www.infracaninophile.co.uk/pgpkey Marlow Tel: +44 1628 476614 Bucks., SL7 1TH UK
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