247 lines
12 KiB
HTML
247 lines
12 KiB
HTML
<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 3.2 Final//EN">
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<HTML>
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<HEAD>
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<META NAME="GENERATOR" CONTENT="SGML-Tools 1.0.7">
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<TITLE>AfterStep FAQ: Getting and installing AfterStep</TITLE>
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<LINK HREF="AfterStep-FAQ-3.html" REL=next>
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<LINK HREF="AfterStep-FAQ-1.html" REL=previous>
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<LINK HREF="AfterStep-FAQ.html#toc2" REL=contents>
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</HEAD>
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<BODY>
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<A HREF="AfterStep-FAQ-3.html"><IMG SRC="next.gif" ALT="Next"></A>
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<A HREF="AfterStep-FAQ.html#toc2"><IMG SRC="toc.gif" ALT="Contents"></A>
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<HR>
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<H2><A NAME="s2">2. Getting and installing AfterStep</A></H2>
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<P>
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<H2><A NAME="ss2.1">2.1 Where do I get AfterStep?</A>
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</H2>
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<P>The main AfterStep resources on the net are below.
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<P>
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<UL>
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<LI>WWW Page
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<P>The official WWW page is at
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<A HREF="http://www.afterstep.org">http://www.afterstep.org</A><P>The web site has again lost its home, and may not be currently available to
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the public. It should be under new administration soon.
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<P>
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</LI>
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<LI>FTP Site
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<P> The FTP site,
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<A HREF="ftp://ftp.afterstep.org/pub/">ftp://ftp.afterstep.org/pub/</A>, is the
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best place to get AfterStep. It also supports uploads:
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<A HREF="ftp://ftp.afterstep.org/incoming/">ftp://ftp.afterstep.org/incoming/</A>. Please read the instructions
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about uploads before asking why your upload is not immediately available.
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Some links to the FTP site are provided from the Web site.
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<P>Please note that the FTP site has moved to a new server under new
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administration. Any questions about the current status of the FTP site
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should be directed first to the mailing list.
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<P>
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</LI>
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<LI> Developers' sites.
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<P>There are several sites which have been generous enough to act as
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developers' sites. Note that you can expect development-level support for
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development-level programs. That means that if you aren't willing to fix it
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yourself, you mustn't complain! (You are, of course, encouraged to make
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<EM>detailed</EM> bug reports.) You can find links to the development sites
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from the main AfterStep WWW site. That site is accessible through lynx, so
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anyone with a UNIX-type networked system should be able to get AfterStep.
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<P>Here is the list of developers' sites:
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<P>
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<P>
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<A HREF="http://http.the-site.dyn.ml.org/Linux/AfterStep/">the-SITE: Linux: AfterStep Page</A><P>
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<P>
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<A HREF="ftp://fuf.sh.cvut.cz/pub/AfterStep/">ftp://fuf.sh.cvut.cz/pub/AfterStep/</A><P>
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<P>
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<A HREF="http://members.xoom.com/sashav/afterstep.html">AfterStep window manager</A><P>
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<P>
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<A HREF="http://bewoner.dma.be/Albert/afterstep/">AfterStep applets</A><P>
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</LI>
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<LI>Other Web Resources:
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<P> There are also some useful things to be found on the following pages.
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The first is the current, official AfterStep Customization Page; it includes
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a web-based BBS with helpful suggestions. It was originally designed around
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AfterStep v. 1.4.x; but the remarks are, on the whole, applicable to v.
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1.5.x. The second is a page offering help to new users, maintained by Tomas
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Duewiger (<CODE>td@music-satellite.de</CODE>). It is, again, designed around v.
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1.4.x, but is nevertheless useful for users who have v. 1.5.x. The last is
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a page which centres around AfterStep-Classic, but which will still no doubt
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offer help even to people who are working under AfterStep v. > 1.0. It is
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important to note that any one of these may offer information which is not
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perfectly current with the present development of AfterStep: for the very
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latest, official word, subscribe to the AfterStep mailing list. Still, any
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one of these sites will be a helpful resource to any AfterStep user:
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<P>
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<P>
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<A HREF="http://www.via.ayuda.com/~smw/afterstep/">AfterStep Customization Page</A><P>
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<P>
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<A HREF="http://www.music-satellite.de/spearhead/">AfterStep and some tricks</A><P>
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<P>
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<A HREF="http://the-labs.com/AfterStep/">Kiwi's AfterStep Page</A><P>
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</LI>
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<LI>AfterStep IRC channel:
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<P>AfterStep has a presence on IRC, through EFnet. The channel is #afterstep.
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If you need to find a server, try irc.txdirect.net.
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<P>
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</LI>
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</UL>
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<P>
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<H2><A NAME="ss2.2">2.2 What is the latest version of AfterStep?</A>
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</H2>
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<P> The latest official version is 1.4.5, released in April 1998.
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A development release, 1.4.5.55N6, was widely considered to be a true
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stable release; it has, in fact, fewer bugs than 1.4.5.
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<P>Version 1.5.0 should be available by the time you read this. If you are
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contemplating installing a version of AfterStep, it is worth either waiting
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for the release of version 1.5.0, or installing the latest beta version of
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1.5. Any version of the 1.5 series is a significant improvement over any
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1.4.x release.
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<P>There is also a current development effort around the old version of
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AfterStep (v. 1.0). This effort is called AfterStepClassic. It is
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primarily directed towards fixing bugs in the old 1.0 release of AfterStep,
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and is not always compatible with new developments in AfterStep. It uses
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<EM>only</EM> the .steprc-style configuration, so if you are looking for
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information on how to configure AfterStepClassic, you should assume that the
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information about versions < 1.2 apply to you. The lead developer for
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AfterStepClassic is Stephen Ma (<CODE>stephen_ma@mindlink.bc.ca</CODE>).
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<P>
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<H2><A NAME="ss2.3">2.3 What do I need to install AfterStep?</A>
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</H2>
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<P> AfterStep is an X window manager. So, you need to have an X
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workstation. It will apparently compile against, and work with, X11R5, but
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for optimal performance, it is preferable that you use X11R6. In order to
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compile AfterStep from the source, you need (apart from a C compiler, like
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gcc) the X developers' libraries on your system. The most common problem
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that people have in compiling AfterStep is as a result of not having the
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required libraries on their system. In particular, XFree86 lists the
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necessary libraries as an "optional" package. As a result, many people do
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not install them, and so cannot compile AfterStep. You should be able to
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get the libraries wherever you got your distribution of XFree86.
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<P>AfterStep is known to run on Linux, FreeBSD (not all modules work), HP-UX,
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and Solaris. For the latter two, you should read the relevant READMEs
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before trying to compile.
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<P>X, and hence AfterStep, is really designed with an eye to the assumptions of
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multiuser systems like UNIX or VMS. If you are using X on some other
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platform, and particularly, if you are trying to run X atop any version of
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Windows, you will have to do much of the porting work yourself. There is a
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link above offering advice on getting AfterStep to work under Windows; but
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this practice is not encouraged. You are likely to get greater ease of use
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by using LiteSTEP.
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<P>
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<H2><A NAME="ss2.4">2.4 I receive the message: Cannot open display. What should I do?</A>
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</H2>
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<P>AfterStep is an X window manager and cannot be run from the terminal.
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It must be run through X. The easiest way to do that is to create (or
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edit) your own .xinitrc file (which contains a list of the programs you
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wish to load upon startup) and to add the line exec afterstep to the end.
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This last exec'd line is significant in that it says to shut down X when
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that program is terminated. Now that you have that file, simply startup X
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in your customary manner (most likely by issuing "startx" or "xinit").
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Now you're off and running. Good luck!
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<P>If you are using xdm, you will need to put the call to afterstep in your
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.xsessions file.
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<P>
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<H2><A NAME="ss2.5">2.5 How can I install AfterStep without being root?</A>
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</H2>
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<P>This is fairly easy, but you must be sensitive to the version you
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are using.
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<P>You will have to install all the files under your home directory. The
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usual recommendation is to use the same directories as suggested in the
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installation procedure, but replacing /usr/share, usr/local, or whatever
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you like by your home directory. For example, if you home directory is
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/home/blah you would use directories like /home/blah/bin, /home/blah/etc,
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/home/blah/lib, and the like.
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<P>Compile AfterStep following the standard installation procedure (i.e the
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one described in the README) until the install step. Then, do the
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following (make sure to create the destination directories first if they
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don't exist. All the source paths are relative to the AfterStep source
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directory):
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<P>
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<OL>
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<LI> Copy afterstep/afterstep to $HOME/bin/.</LI>
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<LI> Copy modules/*/(binaries) to $HOME/bin/.</LI>
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<LI> Copy apps/*/(binaries) to $HOME/bin/.</LI>
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<LI> Copy GNUstep/ to $HOME/.</LI>
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<LI> Edit $HOME/GNUstep/Library/AfterStep/base.* to reflect the above paths
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in the lines starting with ModulePath and PixmapPath.</LI>
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<LI> Put $HOME/bin in your path.</LI>
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</OL>
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<P>You should be set. Feel free to modify this procedure according to
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your particular needs or the particular setup of your machine/account.
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<P>You should note that, during the 1.4.5.x series, the source paths changed.
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If the changes are not transparent to you, you should probably move to the
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1.5 series anyway. The 1.5 series includes an install script that allows
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you to set the install directories to whatever you want. Even though the
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instructions say you should have root access, you can install AS under your
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home directory. The trick here is to specify only directories to which
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you have write permissions. <EM>Importantly, you must specify the full
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path</EM> on most systems. Otherwise, there is a good chance that something
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will not read correctly; this will affect your installation of AfterStep.
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On some systems, you may also have to add the new subdirectories to your
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".profile", ".cshrc", ".xsessions", or other such file. If you don't know
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what this means, you should either contact your system administrator, or read
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a good book about your operating system or X windowing system.
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<P>
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<H2><A NAME="ss2.6">2.6 Why do I keep getting compile errors?</A>
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</H2>
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<P>
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<P>The most common reason for problems compiling is that you do not have all
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the necessary libraries and headers available on your system. This often
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happens to people who have recently upgraded their distribution of XFree86.
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The necessary libraries are included in an "optional" file which matches the
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version of XFree86 in question; the most recent of these is X332prog.tgz
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(for XFree86 3.3.2). You should be able to find the file you need wherever
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you obtained your distribution of X.
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<P>
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<H2><A NAME="ss2.7">2.7 Why do I keep getting an error referring to sgmltools?</A>
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</H2>
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<P>
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<P>This FAQ file is maintained in SGML according to the Linuxdoc DTD; some
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version of the FAQ is included with every AfterStep distribution. In order
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to make it easily readable, a program called sgml2html (part of sgmltools)
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converts the file to HTML. A script, afterstepdoc (by default, the first
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button on the Wharf), should open a browser and allow you to read the FAQ.
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Unfortunately, not everyone has sgmltools; and even if they are installed,
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they are not detected correctly at install time. As a result, the HTML
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version of the FAQ is now shipped with the latest versions of AfterStep.
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The SGML source is still included with the AfterStep source, however, so if
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you want other versions of this FAQ -- dvi, PostScript, or even plain text
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-- just use the sgmltools package to convert the SGML source to whatever
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format you like.
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<P>
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<H2><A NAME="ss2.8">2.8 Why can't I get AfterStep to compile on SGI or SCO?</A>
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</H2>
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<P>The problem here was tracked down and reported by Benjamin J. Tracy
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(<CODE>tracy@wsicorp.com</CODE>) and (independently) John Koch
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(<CODE>JKOCH1@Tandy.com</CODE>). The ordering of the libraries in the link command
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is wrong. Just make sure that the afterstep library appears <EM>before</EM>
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the -lX11 argument on the link command line (in the Makefile). Everything
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should work after that.
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<P>
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<H2><A NAME="ss2.9">2.9 Will AfterStep compile correctly on FreeBSD?</A>
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</H2>
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<P>AfterStep itself works fine on FreeBSD, but some as-apps will not work. In
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particular, there are some that depend upon a Linux-type /proc filesystem.
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That filesystem is very different on BSD-type system.
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<P>
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<HR>
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