How do I start XFCE 4.4

brooky9999 · 04-03-2007, 04:56 PM

Hi all,

How do choose XFCE 4.4 as my default window manager?

I'm running Slack 10.2 - and I when I used XFCE 4.2 I ran xwmconfig to choose it as the default window manager.

Now I have compiled it from source, when I run xwmconfig I get no option for 4.4 (kinda expected).

Can anyone point me in the right direction.

Many thanks,

Mark.

Berto · 04-03-2007, 05:29 PM

Don't know what your login manager is but what I would do under xdm is put "startxfce" without the quotes in my ~/.xsession file and make it executable with chmod +x ~/.xsession.

Then xdm would read that file and start xfce and kdm should do the same if you specify "system default" or something like that in the "session" menu. Don't know about gdm though, the last time I tried it it wouldn't read my .xsession file.

XGizzmo · 04-03-2007, 05:35 PM

Check and see if you have a initrc in /etc/X11/xdg/xfce4 if so then do this:

Code:

  cd /etc/X11/xinit
  ln -sf ../xdg/xfce4/xinitrc xinitrc.xfce
  chmod 755 ../xdg/xfce4/xinitrc

Then run xwmconfig again and see if you cant pick xfce as a option.
If you don't have that file then recompile xfce with these options to configure:

Code:

    ./configure --prefix=/usr \
      --sysconfdir=/etc/X11 \
      --enable-compositor \
      --enable-static=no \
      --enable-xinerama

And now do this:

Code:

  cd /etc/X11/xinit
  ln -sf ../xdg/xfce4/xinitrc xinitrc.xfce
  chmod 755 ../xdg/xfce4/xinitrc

brooky9999 · 04-03-2007, 05:40 PM

Thanks guys, I'll give that a go and report back.

M.

brooky9999 · 04-03-2007, 06:23 PM

Hiya guys,

Right...

Berto: I don't have a ~/.xsession file. I created one and add "startxfce" without the quotes, but it didn't work :-(

XGizzmo: I don't have a /etc/X11/xdg/xfce4 folder. I created one and created the symlink, but that didn't work either (double :-( ). Also, I installed XFCE 4.4 using the xfce4-4.4.0-installer.run file - do you have a method which doesn't involve me installing XFCE 4.4 from scratch?

Thank you both for your help,

M.

bioe007 · 04-03-2007, 09:01 PM

I don't use either of the files mentioned above, but the command for my xfce4.<something) is startxfce4, and i always choose the WM from my ~/.xinitrc file.

i do this:

Code:

$echo "startxfce4" > ~/.xinitrc

or I edit the .xinitrc by hand if I need other things in there. just another alternative.

<edit, sorry, forgot the '>'

>

Berto · 04-04-2007, 01:47 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by bioe007

I don't use either of the files mentioned above, but the command for my xfce4.<something) is startxfce4, and i always choose the WM from my ~/.xinitrc file.

i do this:

Code:

$echo "startxfce4" ~/.xinitrc

or I edit the .xinitrc by hand if I need other things in there. just another alternative.

You could also just symlink the two files with "ln -s .xsession .xinitrc" since they are almost the same file.

Are you starting X with startx or using a login manager?

rworkman · 04-04-2007, 03:35 PM

I'll take this in a different direction.
Have a look at http://rlworkman.net/pkgs/sources/11.0/xfce-4.4.0/ - that's directions for building Xfce-4.4 on a Slackware 11.0 system. You'll need vte for sure, but you can build it without dbus, dbus-glib, and gamin if you don't want to bother with those. On something older than 11.0, you'll also want to install hicolor-icon-theme and desktop-file-utils (see the source directories for Slackware 11.0 to find SlackBuild scripts for those). If you've never used a SlackBuild script before, see http://slackbuilds.org/howto/

The advantage of building a set of packages is that you get the xwmconfig entries and all that good stuff, plus you can easily remove/upgrade/whatever them later. Note that you will need to remove all traces of your attempts with Xfce's installer if you elect to go this route - you don't want any of the leftovers hanging around in /usr/local.

nutronix · 04-04-2007, 03:58 PM

I assume you are booting in runlevel 3 ; at the prompt type= startxfce4

You could use pkgtool and pick the option ; Choose Slackware installation scripts to run again

then scroll down the list and you will have the option to choose your default window manager.

Hummm that would give you the option for xfce3something i guess...hummm try the startxfce4 option first . Or edit your xinitrc file as suggested by the other slackers.