X11 messed up - how to change color depth and available color map
 

Hi!

I was trying to work-around for more than two days now and probably this is a very easy task for an expert.

I need a very old software to analyze some (new :) data. It requests this output after
'xdpyinfo':
> number of visuals: 6
> default visual id: 0x21
> visual:
> visual id: 0x21
> class: PseudoColor
> depth: 8 planes
> available colormap entries: 256
> red, green, blue masks: 0x0, 0x0, 0x0
> significant bits in color specification: 8 bits

I am working on a Fedora release 10(Cambridge)
Kernel Linux 2.6.27.41-170.2.117.fc10.i686
GNOME 2.24.3 and a Intel Pentium 4 CPU 3.2GHz


I did not have a xorg.conf so I did:
# Xorg -configure
to copy the configure file from the one created there into /etc/X11/xorg.conf.

If I do xdpyinfo, I get (now):



I guess, that I want the visual id: 0x26 to run (it looks similar to what I need...). Does anyone know how to change that? This is my actual xorg.conf
and I added the line 'DefaultDepth 8'.




For reasons I do not understand, the color mode changed after the screensaver was activated. I do now have still a good resolution but less colors, there is no light green color and everything seems to be messed up.
Is there a way to change to the color-mode I wanted (in the beginning of the meassage)?

Thanks a lot for your help,
Christoph

You do know that Fedora 10 is completely unsupported? I highly suggest you upgrade to the latest version, which is Fedora 16. And I also highly recommend that you edit your post, and use code tags, as such - [code ] [/code ] (without the spaces)

thanks first of all and sorry for the messy message.
OK, I'll upgrade first

Awesome, thanks man! Most people ignore me when I ask them to use code tags..... I love you for that, I really do..... :p

Anyway, versions up to Fedora 13 are not supported anymore. Fedora 16 just came out not that long ago, and is the freshest version. Upgrading will be your best bet, since you will be running the latest "Fedora" kernel, and all security related bug fixes will be installed. This is for your safety.....

Here I am again...

I upgraded to fedora 16 now.

I need an old scientific software to analyze my data. It's about 15-20 years old but still the fastest,
easiest and most convenient way to work and it would save me months (!) if I could use it.
It needs an 8-bit display and 256 colors in order to display correctly.

my pdpyinfo looks like this:

Now, I would expect to have something like visual id: with depth 8 and 256 colors but anyway...

The software I want to use tells me the following:
1. Make sure there is not a current X server running on :1
2. /usr/X11R6/bin/X :1 -depth 8 -auth any vt8
3. /usr/X11R6/bin/twm -display :1
4. Use Control-Alt-F8 to switch to :1 display

Following these steps gives me a color-error message of the program I want to use, but at least the windows of it open,
so at least it seems to start. Thats why I guess its a color-issue 'only'.

If I do as told, the screen freezes if I follow the 2nd instruction as a root user.
without root, I get this here:
I guess that [text] '(EE) RADEON(0): Value for Option "DepthBits" must be 16 or 24
(EE) RADEON(0): [dri] RADEONInitVisualConfigs failed (depth 8 not supported). Disabling DRI.'
[/text] is at least one source of error...

If I then follow 3. and 4., my program gives me the error. Anyway, if I do xdpyinfo in the new environment, I get
And here, the 8 planes depth option is available and seems to be set correctly?

Is there a way to fix this? My program gives me:
SetColor: Unable to allocate 16 or 3 color cells from ColorMap

Could it be that there is a problem with the monitor?
Or that there is a general problem with the software I want to use and it does not depend on the X11 settings?

I do not have a X11.conf file.
I am using gnome-terminal within twm.
I tried to use Xephyr and Xnest to create 8-bit windows but both methods did not work...

Thanks a lot for any help,
Christoph

Okay, I wanted to run 'pipp' to assign NMR spectra and I am still having the same problems on Fedora 16 (as on 10 and 13).
Tried also on Ubuntu 10.4, RedHat 3.x but still had similar issues with sometimes white-on-white shells.

On an old Opensuse 2.6 the program (pipp) runs right away using the 000_INSTALL instructions
and setting the 'sentenv BYTE_SWAP_RD_ACQ 1'
and having nmrpipe installed for proper fonts.

cheers
Christoph

8-bit color using open-source video drivers
 

Not sure if you ever got this working, but for the record, I was able to get 8-bit color using the open-source graphics card drivers. You have to remove the proprietary driver. The proprietary drivers (from Matrox and ATI anyway) do not support 8-bit. That seems to be evident from your error messages also. The open-source drivers have other limitations though.
Also, under 8-bit color you only have 256 entries in the system colormap, so unless your application uses a private colormap, you will have issues even with a window manager like Gnome using up all the entries. This makes you application look weird. I used Mwm and had pretty good results, since it uses a lot fewer colors and is easier to configure.