peterson@milano.UUCP (03/13/87)
Useful documents to learn about X (the MIT window system) The following documents provide the basic information necessary to be able to work with X. All X files are contained in a subtree rooted at /usr/local/X on our system, their location on your system may vary. The X Window System - An overview of the X window system. It was written for Transactions on Graphics, Special Issue on User Interface Software. Appears to be the best overall description of the X window system. In doc/Paper/x.mss (Scribe form) and doc/Paper/x.PS (PostScript form). (38 pages) man pages - there are 41 man pages for X, its related programs, functions, commands, games and maintenance commands. These cover X (the window server), window managers (xwm, wnwm, uwm), the x terminal emulator (xterm), the C programming library interface to X (Xlib), and so on. In man/ The Makefile can be used to print a paper copy of the man pages, but needs to be modified for your local troff/printer mechanism. (99 pages ) Xlib - C Language X Interface Protocol Version 10 - describes the C language programming interface that can be used to write programs to run under X. Includes Window Related Operations, Graphic Operations, Cursors, Color Map Manipulation, Fonts, Text Operations, Input Event Handling, and Error Handling. In doc/Xlib/*.t as a set of troff files. The Makefile can be used to generate a printed copy, but again be aware of your local troff/printer mechanism. (67 pages) X Window System Protocol, Version 10 - describes the actual bit/byte level protocol between X clients and the X server. The protocol consists of 24 (or more) byte blocks. This document tells you exactly what bytes are used for what server requests and the format of the parameters for the requests. Xlib provides a packaging around this level of the protocol. In doc/X.doc (which is a symbolic link to X/X.doc) (36 pages) X Window System Protocol, Version 11 - describes the new Version 11 protocol which is currently being implemented and should be available in late 1987. In doc/x11.spec (79 pages) Commentary on X Version 11 Design - describes some of the problems with Version 10 X and how and why Version 11 will try to solve these problems. In doc/x11.commentary (10 pages) X Toolkit, A Proposed Architecture - describes the design of a toolkit of objects (called widgets) that is proposed to set on top of X version 11. Includes Primitive Widgets (Boolean Button, Valuator, Label, Text Subwindow, Numeric Subwindow), Composite Widgets (Titlebar, Scrollbar, Radiobutton, CheckBox, Pushbutton, Textedit, RasterSelect, RasterEdit, Cascading Menu), and Geometry Managers (Columned, Rowed, Centered, Constrained, Scrolled, Fixed, and Paned). In doc/x- toolkit- proposal.out (65 pages) XMenu - X Deck of cards Menu System -- describes a "deck of cards" style menu, such as used in the Andrew window system. In man/man3/XMenu.3x (11 pages) -- James Peterson peterson@mcc.com or ...sally!im4u!milano!peterson