205 lines
8.9 KiB
Markdown
205 lines
8.9 KiB
Markdown
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______ ____ __ _
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/ ___\ \ / / \/ | _ __ ___ __ _ __| |_ __ ___ ___
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| | _ \ \ /\ / /| |\/| | | '__/ _ \/ _` |/ _` | '_ ` _ \ / _ \
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| |_| | \ V V / | | | | | | | __/ (_| | (_| | | | | | | __/
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\____| \_/\_/ |_| |_| |_| \___|\__,_|\__,_|_| |_| |_|\___|
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* What is GWM?
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* What is new in this version?
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* Where is GWM? Current version: 1.8, 2021, November 7
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For all inquiries, contact:
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midfavila(at))sdf.org
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=======================================================================================
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What is GWM?
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------------
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The GWM (Generic Window Manager) is an extensible Window Manager for the X
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Window System Version 11. It is based upon a WOOL (Window Object Oriented
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Langage) kernel, which is an interpreted dialect of Lisp with specific window
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management primitives. The user builds a window manager by writing WOOL files
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to describe objects on the screen, including a Finite State Machine triggering
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WOOL actions on response to X events (e.g. mouse buttons) on that object. These
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objects can be used as decorations around X applications windows, as pop-up
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menus or as independent windows. GWM should be able to emulate efficiently
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other window managers, and play the same role for window managers as EMACS does
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for text editors.
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GWM comes with already defined profiles (standard, vtwm-like, twm-like,
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mwm-like). Some screenshots are avialable on the W3 page. Or you can design
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exactly what you want.
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Copyright
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---------
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MIT X11, copyright Bulle Group 1989-1995, Mid Favila/GWM Restoration Crew 2021
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Author
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------
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GWM has been designed and realized by Colas Nahaboo, in the Koala Project with
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the invaluable help of the community of GWM users all over the world on the
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internet since 1989.
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GWM has been maintained by Mid Favila and the other members of the GWM Restoration
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Crew since 2021.
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Present State
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-------------
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GWM currently cannot be compiled on modern Unices, but that is a goal of this project.
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In the future it will support the ICCCM and EWMH fully. See the issue tracker for
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what's currently being worked on.
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=======================================================================================
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NOTES FROM PREVIOUS MAINTAINERS BELOW...
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=======================================================================================
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History
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-------
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Our Koala project was one of the first to base its experiments on the new X11
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window system. One of our ambitions was to continue the research work of the
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ROOMS team at Xerox, who designed this revolutionary window managing system
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back in 1986 but on proprietary systems. We planned to realize a research
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prototype flexible enough to prototype easily new ideas, but at the same time
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always validate our ideas by making real users use our prototype in everyday
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use to gain relevant feedback, so the system could be run on low-end
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workstations currently in use, e.g. 68020s with 4M ram total.
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I decided to go the emacs way, but with a lisp dialect that would be much more
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efficient in machine ressource use. So I designed WOOL, a very special kind of
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lisp dialect in January 1988. After a first rewrite, GWM was running better
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than we could expected so we make it publicly available in July 1989.
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GWM was a success, but was overwhelmed by its maintenance and support due to
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the feedback brought back by the internet community, so that in the following
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years I did not have time to put actual research work on the original goal, the
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profiles on top of the kernel. Then I became too busy to maintain it so I kept
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a low profile so as not to attract new user and keep a small base of faithful
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users. I wanted to change a lot of things but did not want as it would have
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induced incompatibilties for my users. So I waited for GWM to die slowly and
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some other new Window Manager to come and replace it.
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Present state
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-------------
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But, 6 years after, I still use GWM. Why? because it stills offers the best
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environment a hacker can dream of among the available WMs. So I decided to
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clean the distribition, integrate all the patches sent to me by contributors,
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and issue the 1.8 release (30 June 1995) to offer a stable useful base for all
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hackers to use while I could begin writing a new incompatible incarnation with
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all insight gained by these years. GWM now can now do a suprising amount of
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things, at the expense of a quite involved hacking part from profile writers.
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So gwm 1.8 can be seen as the "final edition" of gwm.
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What is GWM for?
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----------------
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Although GWM can be used by normal users, hackers will feel much more at ease
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with it. If you do not want to edit your emacs profiles, chances are that GWM
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is not for you.
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On what machines does GWM run?
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------------------------------
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All unixes.
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-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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What is new in this version?
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============================
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This version (1.8) has three important new features, thanks to the main
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contribution of Anders Holst aho@nada.kth.se:
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* recursive bars. now GWM decorations are quite flexible.
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* shaped elements anywhere. weird shapes are now possible.
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* bug fixes. all known bugs or memory leaks have been fixed.
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You can see the list of changes in detail.
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What about the next version?
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----------------------------
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The last version (1.7o) was issued 18 months ago (sept. 1993), and this 1.8
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version should be the last one as far as the C code is concerned (except bug
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fixes or patches to work around some buggy applications). It is very likely
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that I will make a new version of gwm, but it will be incompatible with the
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current gwm , so I will likely call it by another name, but dont hold your
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breath! The lisp part is ready, however (see /pub/Klone on ftp at
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koala.inria.fr, but I need to re-design the C part and the base profiles, in my
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spare time...
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Support
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-------
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GWM is not what I am paid for. It serves me a lot to test my ideas, and I want
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to help people to use it, but most of the time I will be too busy to answer
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beginner questions, so try to post questions about its use on the news or
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mailing list instead of mailing only to me. Moreover, as I use only the
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standard profile, I am of very little help on questions specific to the other
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profiles (mwm, twm, vtwm...)
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-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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Where is GWM?
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=============
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GWM is available by FTP on the X consortium ftp site, ftp.x.org, in
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/contrib/window_managers/gwm and all its mirrors, or on the koala project ftp
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site, koala.inria.fr, in /pub/gwm, where pre-compiled executables are also
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stored for some architectures.
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Mailing list
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------------
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Discussions on GWM happen on the GWM mailing list, gwm-talk@sophia.inria.fr.
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You can subscribe/unsubscribe by mailing to:
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gwm@sophia.inria.fr
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And on the koala.inria.fr ftp site you can browse:
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* The list of mailing list members
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* The archive of past mails
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* General info on this list
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Newsgroups
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Best places to ask questions are comp.windows.x.apps and comp.windows.x. Please
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try to put the uppercase "GWM" in the subject of the post to allow easy
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spotting by other users among the numerous messages there.
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-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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************************************ WARNING *********************************
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A warning
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When gwm starts (and after that once a day) GWM by default sends me an UDP
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packet transparently for me to have a rough idea of gwm use in the world. By
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default the only value inside the packet is the hostname of the machine, and I
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will keep these data private, but you can of course supress this feature if
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you want. Just (re)compile with the compilation flag -DNO_GWM_LOG, or for 1.8a
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or later you can also set the shell environments NO_GWM_LOG or NO_KOALA_SPY to
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disable this feature without recompilation.
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******************************************************************************
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-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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Colas Nahaboo, Koala, BULL @ INRIA Sophia, http://www.inria.fr/koala/colas
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colas@sophia.inria.fr
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33 (FRANCE) 93.65.77.70 (VOICE PHONE)
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Colas Nahaboo (SURFACE MAIL)
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INRIA
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B.P. 93
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06902 Sophia Antipolis cedex
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FRANCE
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