jim@fuji.eng.yale.edu (James J. Szinger) (01/25/91)
This should probably be a RTFM question, but I don't know which of TM's to FR. So, I would appreciate hints as how to change the root window xdm displays. Right now it's the default black and white stipple pattern. I'd like to get it to display colors and bitmaps while displaying the login prompt. xsetroot seems like a good idea but the server doesn't respond until after xdm relinqushes control to the user. Peease send me e-mail to tell me what I'm doing wrong. Jim
rthomson@mesa.dsd.es.com (Rich Thomson) (01/26/91)
In article <JIM.91Jan25091218@fuji.eng.Yale.edu> jim@fuji.eng.yale.edu (James J. Szinger) writes: >I would appreciate hints as how to change the root window xdm displays. The black and white stipple pattern you see is a result of the server resettting itself. After a user's X session ends, there are no open connections to the server and the server resets. When it resets, it paints the screen to this default background. Now, when the login box comes back up, the server has been locked by xdm. In between those two would be a place where you would like to have some command execute to tweak the background. But there's a problem. If you put it in the Xreset script (which is run after the user's session ends), it won't stay around because the script will exit and the server will reset. It really needs to be added as an (oh no! ;-) extra resource to xdm -- it should be a program to execute after the connection to the server has been made (so the server won't reset) for the login box. I heard a rumor about some such resource in xdm at MIPS, but it isn't in the generic MIT code. I've thought about putting in this code (it shouldn't be that hard), but is has some potential problems: what if the command fails or never returns? I guess this isn't too much of a problem because the resources aren't set by users, but by the sysadmin. If anybody has a patch to the MIT xdm that does this, I'd like to have a copy ;-}. -- Rich -- ``Read my MIPS -- no new VAXes!!'' -- George Bush after sniffing freon Disclaimer: I speak for myself, except as noted. UUCP: ...!uunet!dsd.es.com!rthomson Rich Thomson ARPA: rthomson@dsd.es.com PEXt Programmer
alan@pivot.sbi.com (Alan Zeigler) (01/26/91)
In article <JIM.91Jan25091218@fuji.eng.Yale.edu>, jim@fuji.eng.yale.edu (James J. Szinger) writes: > I'd like to get it to display colors and bitmaps while displaying > the login prompt. This kludge doesn't entirely address your problem, i.e. you can't display arbitrary bitmaps ala xsetroot, but it does allow you to get a somewhat more pleasant background color on the xdm login screen ... I get a bit queazy looking at the default X stipple pattern so I bumped the borderwidth of the xdm login window to cover the whole screen. Here's the relevant chunk of my Xresource file: #ifdef COLOR *background : #cccccc *borderColor : #40a0c0 *foreground : #000000 *greetColor : #000000 *promptColor : #000000 *failColor : #ff0000 #endif COLOR *borderWidth : 400 *geometry : +-150+-100 The login window comes up grey on a blue "root" for my color machines and white on black for my mono. One caveat, the geometry specification is a bit hard-coded for my greeting message and for Sun frame buffer dimensions (1152x900), so you'll have to diddle them a bit for your setup (and get fancier with the #if's if your running in a hetero. environment). Hope it helps... -- Alan M Zeigler | E-Mail: uunet!sbi!alan Salomon Brothers Asia Ltd | V-Mail: 1 212 747-9808 2-2, Otemachi 2-chome | Work: 81 3 5255-4483 Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo 100 | FAX: 81 3 5255-5598
mouse@larry.mcrcim.mcgill.EDU (01/27/91)
> This should probably be a RTFM question, but I don't know which of > TM's to FR. So, I would appreciate hints as how to change the root > window xdm displays. (More text makes it clear he means the background to the login window.) There is nothing that is obviously intended for this. However, UTSLing reveals that xdm uses xrdb to load resources just before creating the login window and at no other time. So, if you change your xdm-config to run something else, that something else can set up the root background. For example, in xdm-config on one machine here I have DisplayManager*xrdb: /local/lib/X11/xdm/xrdb where /local/lib/X11/xdm/xrdb is a shell script: #! /bin/sh # always called as $0 -display <disp> -load <file> # we should parse the arglist, but not yet.... /local/bin/X11/xsetroot -solid black -display $2 /local/bin/X11/xrdb "$@" This gives a solid black background for the login window (as one would hope from the xsetroot arguments). As the comments in the shell script imply, my example is very fragile: it depends on xdm always running it with the arguments as commented (determined by UTSLing). I did this as an experiment to make sure it works; if you are going to use this hack regularly I would definitely urge you to have your replacement xrdb do a proper parse of its argument list to figure out the display to use for the xsetroot (or substitute). X people, it might be nice to document this (or, preferably, provide a somewhat less "magic" way of putting hooks before the login window is popped up).... der Mouse old: mcgill-vision!mouse new: mouse@larry.mcrcim.mcgill.edu
pive@BANRUC01.BITNET (01/28/91)
A few months ago there was a simmilar discussion, this was one of the answers (I kept it, but never tried it out) hopes this helps Excerpts from X.varia: 2-Aug-90 Re: xsetroot in xdm? Keith Packard@expo.lcs.m (905) > > > > > > Try to put the next command in the file /usr/lib/X11/xdm/Xreset: > > > xsetroot -bitmap "filename" > > > > I have tried this before, but there was no result. Is there > > any other way to change the background inbetween the xdm > > sessions? > The only place you can put xsetroot and get it to work is inside a shell scrip > which runs as a replacement for xrdb (the name of which is configurable inside > xdm-config). You'll need to extract the display name from the argument list > passed to xrdb (fixed in next release). Here's an example: > (/usr/lib/X11/xdm/xrdb+xsetroot) > #!/bin/sh > /usr/bin/X11/xrdb "$@" > /usr/bin/X11/xsetroot -display $2 -bitmap /usr/include/X11/bitmaps/escherknot > exit 0 > (add to /usr/lib/X11/xdm/xdm-config) > DisplayManager*xrdb: /usr/lib/X11/xdm/xrdb+xsetroot > No, I haven't tested this exact script, but I have run similar scripts quite > successfully. > Keith Packard > MIT X Consortium P. Verhaeghe University of Antwerp, RUCA Algebra / Geometry Groenenborgerlaan 171 B-2020 Antwerpen, Belgium Tel: +32 3 2180308 Fax: +32 3 2180217 Telex: RUCABI 33362 E-mail: pive@banruc01.bitnet (or pive@ccu.uia.ac.be)
stumpf@Informatik.TU-Muenchen.DE (Markus Stumpf) (01/28/91)
In article <1991Jan26.001505.29420@dsd.es.com>, rthomson@mesa.dsd.es.com (Rich Thomson) writes: |> It really needs to be added as an (oh no! ;-) extra resource to xdm -- |> it should be a program to execute after the connection to the server |> has been made (so the server won't reset) for the login box. I heard |> a rumor about some such resource in xdm at MIPS, but it isn't in the |> generic MIT code. I've thought about putting in this code (it |> shouldn't be that hard), but is has some potential problems: what if |> the command fails or never returns? I guess this isn't too much of a |> problem because the resources aren't set by users, but by the |> sysadmin. |> |> If anybody has a patch to the MIT xdm that does this, I'd like to have |> a copy ;-}. You don't need a patch! It's already there, even if it's kind of a _hack_: If used the following to display xmas-bitmaps: (of course you have to be root/have write acces to the files/directories) in /usr/lib/X11/xdm (default directory for xdm configs) change/add the line in xdm-config: DisplayManager*xrdb: /usr/lib/X11/xdm/xrdb+xsetroot make the file /usr/lib/X11/xdm/xrdb+xsetroot to look like e.g.: #!/bin/sh # # load the resources and change the root-window background pixmap # /usr/bin/X11/xrdb "$@" echo "setting root background" >> /usr/lib/X11/xdm-errors /usr/bin/X11/xsetroot -display $2 -bitmap /usr/wiss/stumpf/bitmaps/xmastree.xbm exit 0 To really get it to work, you have to kill all xdms and restart xdm! \Maex -- +- Markus Stumpf Technische Universitaet Muenchen -+ | Institut fuer Informatik, Rechnerbetriebsgruppe | | stumpf@informatik.tu-muenchen.de Postfach 202420 | +- ...@{unido.uucp,relay.cs.net} D-8000 Muenchen 2, West Germany -+