Colour Digital Logo on DECwindows Login

[Rob Jarratt]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: cctalk-bounces at classiccmp.org [mailto:cctalk-
> bounces at classiccmp.org] On Behalf Of Dave McGuire
> Sent: 28 July 2010 00:06
> To: General Discussion: On-Topic and Off-Topic Posts
> Subject: Re: Colour Digital Logo on DECwindows Login
> 
> On 7/27/10 6:09 PM, Rob Jarratt wrote:
> > I would agree that it sounds odd, but the person telling me knows his
> stuff
> > and this has been his experience.
> 
>   I'm sorry for how terrible this will sound, but I don't know how else
> to say it...Where X is concerned, I know my stuff as well, and it
> really
> doesn't sound like your friend does.  I mean no disrespect either to
> you
> or to him by that statement.  I have an X11 window directly to the
> right
> of the window I'm typing this message in, it's showing colors, and it's
> being displayed here from another system on the network.  I run like
> this all day, every day.  I'm not running Exceed, but a different
> (current technology) X server, but the concepts and protocol are the
> same.
> 
> > I suspect the SHM thing could be why it works on a real workstation,
> 
>   Nope.  SHM (more properly "MIT-SHM") is only used for images.
> (XImage
> objects in particular, and sometimes pixmaps)  Background colors or
> drawn objects don't use SHM.  It's used where image transfer speed is
> important, like video and animations.
> 
> > or perhaps it is some DEC-specific thing?
> 
>   Nope.  I've run color X terminals (which is essentially what you're
> doing with Exceed) from DEC X implementations, and they work fine.
> This
> is where it call came from, after all: DEC was a member of MIT's
> Project
> Athena, where X originated.  I've never seen anything DEC specific
> there
> with the exception of DDX (device-dependent) code and their window
> manager.  The former is almost by definition vendor-specific, and the
> latter is too, but perhaps less so depending on your point of view.
> 
>   Some background: An X client program (which includes your login
> window, it's an X client too) initiates a connection to the X server
> and
> does a few things, including optionally making a call to
> XGetVisualInfo() to get the list of "visuals" that the server supports.
>  A "visual" is basically a target display type that specifies the color
> depth of the display, and might be something like "monochrome", "8-bit
> greyscale", "8-bit pseudocolor", "true color", etc.  Most X servers
> support many different visuals simultaneously.  The X client then
> selects the visual it wants to use.  (a note for the pedantic: yes,
> I've
> skipped many Xlib calls and details here for brevity)
> 
>   It's possible that Exceed does not have any color visuals that the
> login window X client supports or wants to select.
> 
>   Note that I typed "OPTIONALLY makes a call to XGetVisualInfo()"
> above.
>  It's possible for an X client to just use the "default" visual, and
> that is server-specific, and usually configurable.  On most X servers,
> the default visual (actually visual "class") is set on the command line
> when the server is started.  I have no idea of how to set the default
> visual for Exceed.
> 
>   We can drill down a bit further if you'll log into the machine via
> Exceed, and run "xdpyinfo" and look at the output.  Pay attention to
> the
> visual names and IDs that it reports as being available.  Are there any
> color visuals present?  Also, look at the default visual ID for the
> first "screen" entry.  See if that visual ID is that of a color visual.
>  If it isn't, but if there are in fact color visuals present, it's
> possible that the login window X client was written to only use the
> default visual, which may not be a color visual under Exceed, but might
> be a color visual on the workstation.  It's also possible that the
> login
> window X client is configurable via its app-defaults file.  We can
> check
> on that if you strike out with the visuals described above.
> 
>               -Dave
> 
> --
> Dave McGuire
> Port Charlotte, FL

Well I definitely know very little when it comes to X. I don't have xdpyinfo
as far as I know (it seems to be a Unix thing, I am running VMS 5.4). Exceed
offers the following settings for the server visual:

Auto Select
GrayScale
PseudoColor
StaticColor
StaticGray
StaticGray (Depth 1)
TrueColor

I got Exceed to create a trace file, this is what it showed after I started
the login program:


Exceed for Win32 Version 11.0.0.0
Transports DLL For Network And Local Loopback
Copyright C 1991-2005 Hummingbird Ltd. All Rights Reserved.

8:21pm Wed, Jul 28, 2010

Windows XP Version: 6.1  CJK installed
Machine Class:      686 Model 23 Stepping 6
Num. of Processors: 1
Computer Name:      WIN7TEST
User Name:          RobAdmin
User Path:
C:\Users\RobAdmin\AppData\Roaming\Hummingbird\Connectivity\11.00\Exceed\
Keyboard File:      uk102.kbf
Alternate Keyboard: us.kbf
Imm32.dll status:   Loadable
CJK Input:     Available.
RENDER:             Enabled
Trace Initially On: Yes
PC Address:         192.168.0.11:0 (TCP/IP) 
PC Address:         fe80::1cba:bfa:3f57:fff4:0 (TCP/IP6)

-1 > Set Font Path: default
  Load FDB report: 

Screen 0: Physical Monitor 1 (RDPDD Chained DD) - Video Capabilities: 
 Primary Monitor :  TRUE
 Depth           :  32
 Palette Manager :  Not present
 Server Class    :  TrueColor

Screen 0 Dimensions: top:0, left:0, width:1024, height:728.


-1 > OpenFont: fixed
-1 < C:\Program
Files\Hummingbird\Connectivity\11.00\Exceed\Font\misc\6x13.fon

-1 > OpenFont: cursor
-1 < C:\Program
Files\Hummingbird\Connectivity\11.00\Exceed\Font\misc\cursor.wff

3 > OpenFont: -*-menu-medium-r-normal--*-120-*-*-p-*-iso8859-1
3 < C:\Program
Files\Hummingbird\Connectivity\11.00\Exceed\Font\dec100\menu12.fon
Connection read error at 41988

3:Window (login_db) 

Cannot find color 'decwblue'


Clearly that last entry is of some significance! I found a definition of
decwblue and added it to the Exceed rgb.txt file. With that I got a colour
logo. However I still get a horrible fine-grained black and white pattern
for the background, rather than a smooth colour as shown here:
http://toastytech.com/guis/DWlogin.gif. It is the background you get when
you start the X server and before a client has connected. There don't seem
to be any errors related to that though.

There is also an error in the log above reading a font, is the font supposed
to be on the X server or downloaded from the client?

After I got the colour logo, I then logged in and got some other errors in
the log too:

3 > OpenFont: decw$cursor
3 < C:\Program
Files\Hummingbird\Connectivity\11.00\Exceed\Font\misc\deccurs.wff

Warning: Access refused on ChangeHosts request based on security setting in
Xconfig.

Warning: Access refused on ChangeHosts request based on security setting in
Xconfig.
Connection read error at 144525

Not sure what ChangeHosts means and what the implications are.

Anyway I have some colour now and it looks more like I would like it.

Thanks 

Rob