[OS X] Leopard: upgrade your X11

[Andy Jacobson]

Howdy Folks,

You may have heard that with Leopard (OS X 10.5), Apple has changed  
its X11 software from the old X11R6 codebase to the much more modern  
X.org codebase.  While setting the stage for a more sustainable  
future, this has introduced some annoying bugs in the short term.

Fortunately, the Apple programmer whose team is responsible for X11  
in OS X is working very closely with the open source X.org community,  
and since the 10.5 launch there has been a steady stream of bug fixes  
and improvements packaged up by the "XQuartz" project.  Within fink  
circles, it appears to be accepted practice to update the Apple- 
supplied X11 software with these patches from XQuartz.  It is  
expected that Apple will eventually bundle these patches up and  
distribute them via Software Update, but in the mean time you might  
consider installing the XQuartz patches.

For all the relevant info, I suggest you peruse http:// 
forums.macosxhints.com/showthread.php?t=80171 , which starts with a  
nice summary and quickly devolves into too much detail.  Among the  
interesting things I discovered there:

1- The DISPLAY variable should be set automatically to something like  
"/tmp/launchd/..." instead of the more familiar-looking "localhost: 
0.0".  In the past it has been common to set this variable in  
a .cshrc or .bashrc file; if you do so now you'll not have luck with  
the launch-on-demand X11.

2- It's easy to turn off the launch-on-demand X11 server and run a  
'standard' X11 server.  You can't do this by running /Applications/ 
Utilities/X11.app, you have to run /usr/X11/X11.app instead.

My colleague with a 10.5 machine installed the XQuartz patches  
yesterday and hasn't reported any troubles.

Cheers,

Andy

--
Andy Jacobson
andy.jacobson at noaa.gov

NOAA Earth System Research Lab
Global Monitoring Division
325 Broadway
Boulder CO 80305

303/497-4916