Author Topic: XFree86-OS/2  (Read 21252 times)

Martin Iturbide

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XFree86-OS/2
« on: March 13, 2019, 10:48:39 pm »
Hi

One of my frustrations is that I was never able to run the X11 GUI from XFree86-OS/2.
 
Is it possible to run it under ArcaOS today inside a Virtual Machine? Or is it require some specific hardware?
I want to give it try, nothing specific, I want to try some software that was ported to it as a curiosity.

Regards
Martin Iturbide
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Dave Yeo

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Re: XFree86-OS/2
« Reply #1 on: March 13, 2019, 10:56:37 pm »
It runs under ArcaOS with real hardware fine. Need to use the VESA driver unless you have a supported card.

Martin Iturbide

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Re: XFree86-OS/2
« Reply #2 on: March 14, 2019, 12:48:12 pm »
Thanks
I will give it a try again, only in real hardware.

This is the latest version, right? http://hobbes.nmsu.edu/h-browse.php?dir=/pub/os2/system/x11/XFree86/v3.3.1
Correction: I found the last one is 3.3.6, right? (Archived WebSite)

I'm using Panorama on my real hardware machine (Intel HD Graphics 3000), which will be the file of the VESA driver?

Regards

« Last Edit: March 14, 2019, 05:16:08 pm by Martin Iturbide »
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Sean Casey

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Re: XFree86-OS/2
« Reply #3 on: March 14, 2019, 04:29:03 pm »
Hey Martin,

Please post your experience getting X installed as I am interested in using XSane and GIMP on OS/2.

Dave Yeo

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Re: XFree86-OS/2
« Reply #4 on: March 14, 2019, 04:33:21 pm »
Latest is at ftp://ftp.netlabs.org/pub/xfree86/4.5.0/. The vesa driver is called just that.

Dave Yeo

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Re: XFree86-OS/2
« Reply #5 on: March 14, 2019, 05:12:50 pm »
Attached is my xfEnvSetup.cmd, started as "xfEnvSetup f" here as X11 is installed in f:\usr\X11R6. And the XF86Config I'm currently using. XF86Config here goes in f:\usr\X11R6\X11.
« Last Edit: March 14, 2019, 05:30:30 pm by Dave Yeo »

Sean Casey

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Re: XFree86-OS/2
« Reply #6 on: March 14, 2019, 06:08:36 pm »
Latest is at ftp://ftp.netlabs.org/pub/xfree86/4.5.0/. The vesa driver is called just that.

I'm not familiar with a "vesa" specific driver.  Does Panorama work w. XFree as it is based on the GRADD driver which I believe is also VESA compliant.  I found I was limited to 1280x1024 using the GRADD driver, but I have been very happy using the Panorama driver which supports 1900x. 

Dave Yeo

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Re: XFree86-OS/2
« Reply #7 on: March 14, 2019, 06:25:03 pm »
Latest is at ftp://ftp.netlabs.org/pub/xfree86/4.5.0/. The vesa driver is called just that.

I'm not familiar with a "vesa" specific driver.  Does Panorama work w. XFree as it is based on the GRADD driver which I believe is also VESA compliant.  I found I was limited to 1280x1024 using the GRADD driver, but I have been very happy using the Panorama driver which supports 1900x.

Xfree/2 uses its own video driver infrastructure, giving you another desktop independent of usual OS/2 desktop. It comes with various video drivers but generally they're too old for modern systems, so just like we have to use Panorama now, on Xfree/2, we use the VESA driver.
I'm not sure what resolution XFree is running at here but it looks fine, as in not stretched, on this 1680x1050 monitor.
I should play around more.

Dave Yeo

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Re: XFree86-OS/2
« Reply #8 on: March 14, 2019, 09:35:50 pm »
Looking, here it seems to be running at 1280x1024. Tried forcing it higher but got no screens found error. In theory by feeding it the right settings, should be able to get full resolution. It's an old port now.

Sean Casey

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Re: XFree86-OS/2
« Reply #9 on: March 15, 2019, 04:04:15 am »
Xfree/2 uses its own video driver infrastructure, giving you another desktop independent of usual OS/2 desktop.

Thanks for the education as I was dreaming about keeping the PM windows manager and running X windows applications either in a multi-window or seamless mode on the PM desktop.  I'll just stick to Linux when I need to work with GIMP or XSane.  There's nothing better than PM and its native applications - the reason I decided to move back to OS/2 after taking a 25 year hiatus.

Dave Yeo

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Re: XFree86-OS/2
« Reply #10 on: March 15, 2019, 04:17:01 am »
It's is possible to run the VNC X video driver and display the X session on the desktop on PMVNC, be sorta seamless mode.
There's also alternative X programs such as HobX, http://hobbes.nmsu.edu/download/pub/os2/system/x11/ux1135.zip for a seamless X server.

Martin Iturbide

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Re: XFree86-OS/2
« Reply #11 on: March 16, 2019, 02:12:43 am »
Hi Dave

It seems it worked by using your files. This is what I did.
1) I unziped the XFree86 files with the two fixes from netlabs. I add them on my  "x:\usr". X:\ is my primary partition on the ArcaOS machine I have.  I found a conflict on x:\etc\fonts\fonts.conf. I just leave the newer one from my system and did not used the one from XFree86.
2) Copied Dave's XF86Config to x:\usr\x11R6\X11
3 ) Copied Dave's xfEnvSetup.cmd to the root and modified it with my drive and trying to point direcctly to the paths (sorry but I don't get the %1 thing)
4) Added to my config.sys path "x:\usr\X11R6\bin;" and to the libpath "x:\usr\X11R6\lib;"
5) Added to the config.sys file "DEVICE=X:\usr\X11R6\lib\xf86sup.sys"
Reboot
Run the xfEnvSetup.cmd and see the X interface running.

I'm attaching the modified just in case someone wants to try it out.

Now I need to learn how to run some games, tools and take some screenshots. 
Thanks Dave for helping me with this, I wanted to run XFree86 since long time ago.

Regards
« Last Edit: March 16, 2019, 02:22:10 am by Martin Iturbide »
Martin Iturbide
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Dave Yeo

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Re: XFree86-OS/2
« Reply #12 on: March 16, 2019, 04:13:09 am »
Hi Martin, glad it is working for you.
Quote
3 ) Copied Dave's xfEnvSetup.cmd to the root and modified it with my drive and trying to point direcctly to the paths (sorry but I don't get the %1 thing)

The %1 thing is the first parameter to xfEnvSetup.cmd, so you'd run it as
Code: [Select]
xfEnvSetup X
To make it more portable
Quote
4) Added to my config.sys path "x:\usr\X11R6\bin;" and to the libpath "x:\usr\X11R6\lib;"
Also so you didn't need this in your config.sys as xfEnvSetup.cmd took care of adding it.

To start programs, IIRC
Code: [Select]
start /n program
In an xterm or on the OS/2 desktop
Code: [Select]
start /n program -display 0:0

Martin Iturbide

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Re: XFree86-OS/2
« Reply #13 on: March 17, 2019, 02:35:50 pm »
Hi

I'm testing some games like xkobo and xgalaga and I get errors like:
Quote
xkobo: (warning) can't read score-file X:/XFree86/lib/x11/xkobo/0

The path is wrong since I'm just putting the bin on X:\usr\X11R6\bin.  Is this some configuration thing? or the path was hard coded on xkobo  when compiled?

Regards
« Last Edit: March 17, 2019, 05:29:53 pm by Martin Iturbide »
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Re: XFree86-OS/2
« Reply #14 on: March 17, 2019, 06:10:36 pm »
The PATH was probably hard coded. Xfree86 3.3 and earlier were installed in x:\XFree86 rather  then \usr\X11R6. At that Holger at one point had a nice installer that installed XFree86 along with TVFS and set up a bunch of symlinks to have it installed on X: as a TVFS volume. The advantage was that all volumes could also be symlinked to X: so those programs that didn't understand drive letters could see all drives.