Re: X11

["C.P.Briscoe-Smith" <cpb4@ukc.ac.uk>]

>Right, I need to set up X11 on two colour ST's. I don't want to do
>anything serious with them (that would require too much memory). What I
>want to do is to redirect X-output from another box to them. Basically
>making them X-display workstations.
>
>Now, I had a bit of a hack ag the basic X11 setup, and it took me a few
>minutes to get anything working at all, but what did I get? Half a
>screen of mixed- bitplane background. This looks suspiciously like a
>mono-only server.
>
>This obviously isn't a lot of good to me, as is. Mono monitors
>(secondhand) cost more than three times the price of a new colour
>monitor (*sigh*).
>
>Is there a way of enabling colour? Is there a server available that
>will deal with a colour monitor (I don't _care_ if it will only display
>monochrome, so long as it _looks_ right)?
>
>Advice?

Use SeBra (from atari.archive, of course).  It's a pretty good, fast
mono emulator, and MiNT-X works well with it.  If it doesn't work on
your STs (I -think- SeBra may be STe only), use another mono emulator;
I think the X server goes via the Line A variables, so it should be
able to cope with most emulators...

BTW, I thought mono monitors were usually cheaper than colour ones?

On the subject of X: I think we need a modular X server next.  It
should be possible to split the ddx part of the server off into a
separate executable.  Then supporting colour and/or graphics cards
would not mean re-porting the whole server.  I've thought about using a
scheme similar to PageStream's printer/import/export drivers: the main
server dix code would load the driver with Pexec(3, ...) (load, don't
go), then call the start of the driver's TEXT segment, which returns a
struct of function pointers to the ddx routines.  I believe the server
dix code uses function pointers to call the ddx anyway, so this could
be done with no performance overhead (a critical issue on an 8MHz
68000!)

Any thoughts on this?  I'm thinking of grabing a copy of X11R6 and
trying to implement this over the summer.  (I'm also thinking of
removing most of the font handling code from the X server and forcing
it to use a font server.  This might free up a bit of RAM...)

--Charles