XOrg Vs. XFree

Igman · 08-13-2004, 11:12 PM

Hey, i was wondering, what makes xork and xfree difrent? Which one is better> Faster? Thanks.

MikeZila · 08-14-2004, 12:22 AM

people may bicker, but I see no difference between the two. The only thing I ever noticed different was the name of the config file.

There may, however, be some underlying tech. differences I don't know about, so make sure to get better documentation if every little detail matters to you.

Personally, I use xorg inside of Slack10. Works good for me.

idaho · 08-14-2004, 12:28 AM

Xorg is a recent fork of XFree, so there is not much difference at the moment.

motub · 08-14-2004, 05:30 AM

A number of people (including me) have reported that they perceive X.org to be noticeably faster in 2D than XFree86 was, but that's of course subjective.

X.org also apparently has a higher active level of development, so people are hoping that various X problems may be getting solved sooner rather than later.

And of course, there's the license issue that caused the whole hubub in the first place, but that is irrelevant to many users.

XFree86 still works, and many people still use it. But those distros that still offer it are expected to stop doing so soon (whenever the distro's individual transitional period is considered to be done), so many of us are biting the bullet and attempting to get used to in now.

But since, as noted, there's not much difference at the moment, "getting used to it" is not a big deal, really.

Niels@debian · 08-14-2004, 07:04 AM

Slap me if i'm wrong but i rembember i've read somewhere that Xfree is not open source ?!

XavierP · 08-14-2004, 07:55 AM

X.org was forked because of disagreements over the licensing. At the moment X.org is the same as XFree86 because it is the version of XFree86 that was acceptable to all before the disagreements.

motub · 08-14-2004, 08:04 AM

XFree86 is still open source; the issues are-- as I understand them-- that 1) for the very strict (like Debian), the Xfree documentation is no longer completely compatible with the GPL; and 2) for the less strict, the new license is an unnecessary PITA which seems to violate the spirit of the GPL insofar as it suggests a very proprietary desire for individual recognition.

The old license:

Quote:

XFree86 License (version 1.0)

Copyright (C) 1994-2004 The XFree86 Project, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE XFREE86 PROJECT BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.

Except as contained in this notice, the name of the XFree86 Project shall not be used in advertising or otherwise to promote the sale, use or other dealings in this Software without prior written authorization from the XFree86 Project.

A garden variety license, perfectly GPL-compatible.

The new license:

Quote:

Version 1.1 of XFree86® Project Licence.

Copyright (C) 1994-2004 The XFree86®Project, Inc.
All rights reserved.

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicence, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright notice, this list of conditions, and the following disclaimer.
2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution, and in the same place and form as other copyright, license and disclaimer information.
3. The end-user documentation included with the redistribution, if any, must include the following acknowledgment: "This product includes software developed by The XFree86 Project, Inc (http://www.xfree86.org/) and its contributors", in the same place and form as other third-party acknowledgments. Alternately, this acknowledgment may appear in the software itself, in the same form and location as other such third-party acknowledgments.
4. Except as contained in this notice, the name of The XFree86 Project, Inc shall not be used in advertising or otherwise to promote the sale, use or other dealings in this Software without prior written authorization from The XFree86 Project, Inc.

THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED ``AS IS'' AND ANY EXPRESSED OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE XFREE86 PROJECT, INC OR ITS CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE.

As soon as we hit "subject to the following conditions", we left GPL-land. But yeah, it's still free, as long as you follow the rules and advertise us (or, rather, make a big point of treating us like a proprietary developer-- who else do you know who needs "third-party acknowledgements" but Adobe, and Microsoft, and ATI and nVidia?-- even though we are not). Which really is downright offensive to some, and just annoying to many others (like distro develpers, who would have to reorganize their distributions in order to comply with this licence).

Sonderblade · 08-14-2004, 10:13 AM

A little warning: There are a few minor bugs in Xorg. The Xvisual for example seem to not work correctly. But since my installation is a few months old it is likely that that bug has already been fixed or will be fixed very soon. For now, XFree86 seem to have fewer such issues that might change though.

darin3200 · 08-14-2004, 10:42 AM

You could also easily argue that X.org is and will be better due that the increased number of users and developers. Xfree won't be going anywhere because all of the major distributions dropped it like a (very hot) rock.