X11 Archive

The X.Org Foundation announced the release of an update for the X Window System, which addresses the possible security vulnerability announced on September 15, 2004. This bug affects all known versions and releases of the X Window System shipping versions of libXpm, whether from X.Org or other vendors. Slackware upgraded to it today.

The X.org Foundation has released the sources for Xorg 6.8.0. Announcement here.

The X.Org Foundation announced today that it has begun tagging pre-release builds for the X11R6.8 release of the Xorg server & X Window System and asked for volunteers to start building and testing them. The Release Plan and Status web page lists the new features and changes included in this release, and updates on bugs found in testing so far.

KDE and GNOME combine window managers with suites of applications to create comprehensive work environments. As complete as they are, it's easy to forget that there are other graphical ways to work on a Linux desktop. Sometimes a lighter-weight window manager is in order, such as for laptop usage, children's use, or quick startup applications. Here are four "alternative" window managers that are mature, fast, and functional. My Take: Should we also add *Box, WindowMaker and XFce to the mix?

From Slashdot: Metisse is a special X build and window environment working with OpenGL and accelerated graphics.

Sun finally released a preview of Project Looking Glass. Sources are of course included, and it's GPL-ed. Project Looking Glass is/should_be a revolutionary new aproach to the way we interact with the applications, the biggest change to GUI in 20 years. I wonder if 21" is enough, cause having 20 windows folded like the ones in the screen-shots should be a bit troublesome at 'only' 1600x1200.

There is a three day X Developer's meeting from Wednesday, April 28, through Friday, April 30, 2004, at the Cambridge Research Laboratory (CRL) in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Ximian's Federico Mena-Quintero was there and outlined the talks of Keith Packard & Jim Gettys regarding where X11 should go.

Jim Farnsworth takes a look at the ICEwm under MEPIS. On other X11 news, with Release, X.Org seals the fate of XFree86 says InternetNews.

David Dawes seems a little suspicious of the underwhelming support for XFree86 by Linux distributors: "I have heard privately that some vendors were planning to move to an X.Org release even before this licence issue came up. That probably makes business sense for the vendors given that X.Org is a vendor-oriented organization sponsored by hardware and software companies, while XFree86 is an independent group of volunteer developers. I suspect that the licence issue may have affected the timing, but not the end result", he concluded.

"There's another schism going on in the Linux world. Just in case you've been under a rock in the last few months the XFree86 team has changed their license. There's an uproar from several of the largest Linux distributions where they're refusing include XFree86 4.4 in their new releases. This is bad news for a few but also in the middle of this conflict begs the question. What are the alternatives?" Read the editorial at Linux.Warcy.com.

For the past year, there has been a slow and steady stream of news events regarding XFree86, X11, or new X server implementations. To those not paying close attention (and even those who are), the meaning of some of these events may not be clear. In this brief article, I attempt to share my impression on what the changes mean for users of free software on the desktop. It appears that XFree86 is in some turmoil, and it may leave some to infer that free desktop systems will suffer.

The Y Window System Project have started while XFree86 4.3.0 now makes it in Debian Unstable.

The XFree86 Project modified their license (fully effective as of the upcoming 4.4.0 release). The updated license change applies to the base XFree86 license, and to source files that explicitly carry a copyright notice in the name of The XFree86 Project, Inc. Copyrights and licenses in the names of others will not be affected by this change, however some fear that these changes might be GPL-incompatible.

Daniel Stone writes over at Slashdot: "A short time ago, freedesktop.org xlibs 1.0 was released. Simply put, this is the collection of libX11, libXext, and other little-used libraries that kind of power your whole desktop. The xlibs team at fd.o are now maintaining all these libraries, and more, and we're going to be making releases as part of the fd.o platform, which is far more wide-ranging, but it still forms an important part of the platform. Share and enjoy!"