cairo --enable-xcb
 

It looks like the cairo in the upcoming Slackware release will still be without xcb support (cairo 1.10.2)

Since cairo 1.12.x the XCB backend is no longer considered experimental by upstream, perhaps in the next development cycle, it could enter Slackware-current. Just a suggestion. No pressure. LOL

Thank you.

+1

the latest i3 window manager requires xcb support in cairo. It's easy enough to rebuild cairo though.

The new i3 is the main reason I posted it. One option is to upgrade cairo. I decided, however, to build i3 without pango support (see my blog post)

Awesome wm requires it too, +1

They say it's no longer experimental, but perhaps that's because cairo-1.12.x is so bug ridden that it no longer matters. It passes very few of its own tests, and causes a lot of text corruption in apps (especially ones using GTK+ v3). Try it, and have a look at Audacious if you'd like a nice demonstration.

It used to be that you had to use --enable-xcb to get those bugs, but now they seem to happen regardless. Hopefully they'll get it all ironed out at some point during our next devel cycle. And, if a newer cairo along with --enable-xcb ever ends up working well enough in our testing, we'll try it (but probably with --disable-xlib-xcb).

Thanks for you response, Pat. Obviously, getting a stable system is a priority. If that's the case with cairo, I'm sure everybody will be patient enough to wait until cairo developers get it right.

In the meantime, the recommended version of i3 is 4.2 (available from SlackBuilds). Alternatively, for people who like living on the edge, i3v4.3 (w/o pango) - see my blog or do it yourself.

On a related note, that's a perfect example showing why Slackware is known for its stability.

xcb support in cairo
 

Todays current changelog:
Thanks Pat!

I dont remember the last time I was in a hurry to get straight home after work on a Friday evening! Thanks Pat and cairo developers.