[svlug] X Sessions

[Erik Steffl]

On 11/14/2014 07:34 AM, Scott DuBois wrote:
> On 11/14/2014 12:41 AM, Erik Steffl wrote:
>>    ok, what happens if you try this:
>>
>>    - start the X :1
>>
>>    - go to vt7 (your original X display)
>>
>>    - open a terminal window (xterm, gnome terminal, konsole, aterm etc.,
>> any will do)
>>
>>    - in the terminal window run: xterm -display :1
>>
>>    - switch to vt8 (new X server)
>>
>>    do you see xterm window there? Plain terminal window where you can
>> type and execute commands etc. The window would not have any title or
>> borders so you cannot move or resize it (you are not running window
>> manager, just plain X)
>
> Ok, I switched back to the Nouveau driver, rebooted, followed your
> instructions, and now have a terminal prompt in the upper left corner of
> VT8; it does respond to keyboard.

   perfect, that means you have X :1 working,

   now the question is what do you want to do with it (think you 
mentioned KDE in another email),

   Rick gives pretty good explanation and examples in his email in this 
thread, here are few more pointers on where to go from here.

   As you can see plain X does not do much for you in terms of user 
interface. You need some window manager 
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X_window_manager 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_X_window_managers) or 
"desktop environment" (essentially window manager plus few other things, 
e.g. Gnome or KDE).

   how to start additional X server and what is started along (like a 
window manager) depends on which distro you are using, the following 
will likely work in most distros.

   Generally you have two options, startx or display manager.

   When using startx it usually (always?) uses ~/.xinitrc (you can also 
refer to e.g. http://www.x.org/archive/X11R6.8.1/doc/startx.1.html or 
for KDE specific instructions see 
http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/view/svn/kde/config.html)

   When using display manager (see e.g. 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X_display_manager_(program_type)) the 
specific way to set up multiple X servers/displays depends on the 
display manager so you would have to look it up there (or ask here about 
the specific display manager if you don't find anything useful).

	erik