Subject: Re: Little X problem

From: Russell King - ARM Linux Admin <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 28 Jan 1998 22:22:12 +0000 (GMT)

Paul Koning writes:
> I'm puzzled.  XWindows is a type of windowing system, of which XFree86
> is an instance.  So to say that XWindows doesn't have VT switching
> support seems odd.  Did you mean "The XFree86 implementation of
> XWindows has VT switching support, but the Fubar42 version of XWindows
> does not" ?

XFree86 is {X server + XFree code} - it is a specific hardware `type' in that
it has it's own ddx backend for X.  The X server is made up of various
modules, one of them is ddx - the `device dependent' end.  XFree86 is one
such backend that happens to support VT switching.  XNest is another DDX,
as is the vfb, virtual frame buffer.  To give you more of an idea, the
standard X distribution comes with the following 'device drivers'
(minus the armlinux entry of course):

hw:
drwxr-xr-x   2 src      src          1024 May 24  1997 armlinux/
drwxr-xr-x   3 src      src          1024 Apr 21  1994 dec/
drwxr-xr-x   5 src      src          1024 Apr 21  1994 hp/
drwxr-xr-x   6 src      src          1024 Apr 21  1994 ibm/
drwxr-xr-x   2 src      src          1024 Apr 21  1994 macII/
drwxr-xr-x   2 src      src          1024 Apr 21  1994 omron/
drwxr-xr-x   2 src      src          1024 Apr  4  1995 sun/
drwxr-xr-x   2 src      src          1024 Apr 21  1994 sunAmoeba/
drwxr-xr-x   3 src      src          1024 Apr 21  1994 svga/
drwxr-xr-x   2 src      src          1024 Apr  5  1995 vfb/
drwx------  11 src      src          1024 Apr  1  1995 xfree86/
drwxr-xr-x   2 src      src          1024 Apr 21  1994 xnest/

Thus, if you have an Xserver built with, say, the macII ddx, then you will
not get VT switching.
   _____
  |_____| ------------------------------------------------- ---+---+-
  |   |        Russell King        [email-masked]        --- ---
  | | | |    http://www.arm.uk.linux.org/~rmk/home.html      /  /  |
  | +-+-+                                                     --- -+-
  /   |               THE developer of ARM Linux              |+| /|\
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