#x11cp — Public Fediverse posts

As part of the #x11cp I'm working on, I have also begun getting #mgr working. It's a slightly difficult task, but worth it

So far, I'm working through fixing compiler issues.

More info here:. https://hack.org/~mc/mgr/

Historically this is important. I hope @mc agrees. I'm sure he won't mind me resurrecting this.

It's going to be fun!

#x11cp #x11 #archaic application.

This time, it's #xsclock which is a 56x56 #dockapp intended to be used in #afterstep's wharf module, but equally applies to #fvwmbuttons as well.

Originally written by Namio MATUDA, around 1999-Nov-24. The version I have here is 0.22

There is only one option `--day` which shows the day/month in the window.

Screenshots attached.

#x11cp #archaic #x11 application.

This time it's a #toolbar written in #motif. #xmtoolbar

#xmtoolbar was written sometime in 1995 -- I cannot find the author's name, apart from 'Spiff'.

It's a catchy name, but there were quite a few toolbars like this which emulated #fvwm goodstuff, which was a forerunner to what is now #FvwmButtons

With #xmtoolbar you can build up a panel with pixmap icons (XPMs) and launch programs. In #xmtoolbar's case, this can be done interactively and then the running configuration can be saved to disk for #xmtoolbar to load next time.

What do I mean by this? Well...

#x11cp #archaic #x11 application

This time, it's #vgp

#vgp is a Vector Globe Projection application, which allows for visualising vectors which change over time.

It's designed for engineers or scientists to model how different vectors can change across three different axis.

Originally written by Frederick A. Niles, November 1995.

The program accepts a data file parameter on the command line, and the data file itself consists of rows (vectors) of three parts each, describing the X, Y and Z axis. For example:

0.000000 0.000000 0.000000
-0.376300 -0.537412 0.754710
-0.381369 -0.565402 0.731354

The default dataset represents a globe which can be rotated in real time.

I love this -- a really niche yet interesting program which solves a very specific purpose, but can be reused to visualise anything that's vector-based.

@ephemeris -- indeed. #sunclock (and #xtide) are on my list, as they're #x11 applications I've used a lot in the past.

#sunclock is "a fancy clock for the X Window system, providing local time a fancy clock for the X Window system, providing local time (legal time and solar time), sunrise, sunset and various geographical data through a point and click interface".

Translated -- this means it has an interface, which even after reading the manpage makes bugger all sense. ;)

I do love it though -- and it's still packaged my most Linux distros, and you can certainly still find it on the BSDs.

This application is worth exploring as it can do a lot of things I wouldn't know where to begin to highlight here.

Screenshot below. For me (in England), it's night-time, but perhaps not too long now until dawn? :)

#x11cp

It's #archaic #x11 application time!

This time, it's #xmcolor (the Motif Color Picker), written by Ti Kan. I believe this was written sometime in 1994. The embedded ident marker indicates: `@(#)xmcolor.c 1.11 94/12/05`

This was developed using Xt and #motif, and provides a means of mixing one's own colours, as well as using pre-defined colours from `rgb.txt`. One could then select the hexadecimal string for that colour.

It operates on 8-bit colour-depth displays only, which is why I have been running this inside #Xephyr so I can emulate this.

To this day, it compiles just fine -- only very minor tweaking from myself. Not bad for a program that's ~28 years old!

I really like how simple and self-contained so many of these applications were, and how much of a teaching aid it meant for someone to write them. The source file has 1066 lines in it -- quite a lot when you consider how much of that is Xt/Xm boilerplate.

These days, you'd just use a colour-picker from google without giving it a second thought. #x11cp

For those of you who are #motif fans (as am I), I have pushed a minor portability/sands of time fix for #moxfm.

#moxfm is the Motif version of #xfm which itself is "X File Manager". An absolute thing of beauty.

The sources are here for anyone wanting to play about. It compiles, albeit with a tonne of warnings:

https://github.com/ThomasAdam/moxfm

I'll post a screenshot of this later when this instance allows for it. #x11cp