First off, I admit that most of my knowledge on this subject comes from reading the headlines/summaries on slashdot. Second, this is kind of me just rambling and trying to make sense of some news. Anyway, what is going on with the XFree86 team? It seems like I heard they had forked the project, but then maybe they had merged again. Now, they have altered their license so it may not be GPL-compatible. As a result, a lot of distro''s are not going to use XFree86 4.4. Is that a fairly accurate? Did I miss anything important? I''ve also heard a lot of talk about replacements and alternatives to XFree86. Have any of you guys used any of them? Are there any good ones? It seems like people may be ready to move in large numbers over to an alternative, and there also seems to be interest in a new replacement system for X. Are there non-X based environments that are any good? Anyway, thanks for the help, just wondering what you all know or think.

replacement for X? No.

Replacement for Xfree86? yes.

The roadmap looks like this at the moment:

1. see if David Dawes backs down on the license thing.
2. if not, for now just keep up with xfree 4.3
3. when that becomes problemsome (new hardware, etc) move to another X server (brand new one that''s a result of this, or xouvert is already there, i think)
4. eventually fd.o''s xserver will mature, and looks very innovative.

/. had some interasting news about a new replacement project for XFree that was started: The Y Window System.

As of the 4.4/4.3 issue: Some of the code in 4.4 has some lisencing mishaps, so they are reverting back to 4.3 to stay out of legal trouble. I am not 100% acurate about this, I havent done my research

quote: Original post by C-Junkie
1. see if David Dawes backs down on the license thing.
2. if not, for now just keep up with xfree 4.3
3. when that becomes problemsome (new hardware, etc) move to another X server (brand new one that''s a result of this, or xouvert is already there, i think)
4. eventually fd.o''s xserver will mature, and looks very innovative.

Even the early releases of XFree86 4.4 were under the nicer old license. I''m sure Xouvert will not be accepting the newer brokenly licensed code (just look at the people running Xouvert), so Xouvert may unintentionally become a "clean" XFree86, as it did seek to mostly share its code base with XFree86 originally. FreeDesktop''s Xserver is pretty nice already, it just needs a lot of drivers (XFree86''s drivers can''t be directly ported because FreeDesktop''s Xserver requires additional features from the drivers). FreeDesktop apparently wants to use OpenGL to accelerate the entire X server when possible, which also requires changes from the driver architecture of XFree86 4.x.

So, in the end, it''s no big matter when it comes to the average user''s X experience. While I don''t know Dawes'' inspiration for dirtying the licence for new code, he isn''t going to get much leverage for his plans through XFree86; there are just too many ways to work around the issue almost painlessly rather than just put up with it.

quote: Original post by aftermath
/. had some interasting news about a new replacement project for XFree that was started: The Y Window System.

The Y Window System isn''t meant as a replacement for just "XFree", but for the whole X Window System. Like the so many other seeking-to-be-X11-replacements, I''ll wait until I see real results before giving it much real attention. While it may just be personal opinion, I think it attempts too high a level of abstraction which makes it prone to design flaws that are impractical to remove (if the level of abstraction doesn''t count as one on its own). Seems like it made many of the same decisions as Fresco. While some of their changes from the X11-way-of-doing-things are probably good ideas, there''s a couple big ones that just put me off from liking the projects.

Just about the only X11 alternative I give any heed to is DirectFB, but it''s obviously not meant to altogether replace X11 (it just doesn''t have some of the capabilities that X11 does). It is an alternative is some situations though. Mostly by focusing on simpler goals, they''ve been able to make a design that doesn''t bother me somehow . It doesn''t hurt that the GTK+ (GDK) and Qt people seem to give a decent amount of support to DirectFB either.

i looked at Y back at the original announcement months ago.

it has a NICE client side API (libY++), but as an x server replacement, it sucks.

In short, the XFree86 project committed suicide.

Basically, we''re going to use XFree86 until another major project comes to a reasonably mature point. I''m keeping my eye on 3--Xouvert, FreeDesktop.org, and Y Window System, FreeDesktop being my fav so far.

quote: Original post by Promit
FreeDesktop being my fav so far.

Have you used it? I heard it supports hardware accelerated transparency, just like Aqua, so I could have [true] transparent terminals and shadows without the slowdown of software transperecy. Anyway, have you tried it? I dont know if I want to switch to it because someone in irc told me it was extremely buggy.

The thing is that XFree86 is soooo stable! In Windows, if one program hangs, you have to press Alt-Ctrl-Del about 463 times, then an End Task window comes up. You press "End Task", and the End task window disappears without any other visible effects! Then the window you were trying to move suddenly moves rapidly, leaving bits of window everywhere. Then, 15 End Task windows appear and nothing happens. If you're lucky you eventually get the BSOD telling you to give up, Windows has won the battle yet again.
X, on the other hand, is so stable (along with the Linux kernel) that if one thing goes wrong (even I admit that its possible, though unlikely, for an open source program to fail) everything else continues to work fine.
What I don't understand, though, is why we can't, as an open source community, just pick up XFree86 and go on on our own where they left off.

EDIT: embarressing spelling mistake

Zorx (a Puzzle Bobble clone)
Discontinuity (an animation system for POV-Ray)

[edited by - clum on February 21, 2004 11:31:14 PM]

quote: Original post by clum
What I don''t understand, though, is why we can''t, as an open source community, just pick up XFree86 and go on on our own where they left off.

There''s nothing stopping anyone from maintaining XFree86 from before it was tainted. That''s what I now kind-of expect of the Xouvert project in the short term, at least. All the code that was under the nicer original license is still under the nicer license.

The license didn''t really change, it''s just clearer what the intent always was. I prefer the xfree license, and those used by libraries such as boost.

The license is less restrictive than the GPL or LGPL, so I don''t see how it''s a conflict. GPL would taint the xfree license.