Re: X

[Pigeon <jah.pigeon@ukonline.co.uk>]

On Tue, Mar 25, 2003 at 03:46:54PM +1100, Cameron Hutchison wrote:

< snip results of confusion caused by loose use of "X" and "xdm" >

> Hmmm, I've been arguing a different point. I should have read the entire
> message first (I though I did, but then found more as I replied).
> 
> A lot of what I have said relates to installing via apt-get, so the user
> knowingly installs xdm. I will be interesting to see if you do better
> than me, and read all the way to here before refuting my points above
> :-)

No probs... I was talking about the new user doing their first
installation from CD-ROM, using tasksel/dselect, and either (a) xdm is
installed without them realising about it, or (b) they think they've got
to have it to be able to use X at all, or (c) they know they don't
want/need it, but fail to make dselect accept their decision, or (d)
they think they don't want/need it, but dselect's reaction makes them
think (b).

> I've left my points above because they address what you wrote with
> regards to the distinction between X and xdm. 

In the "new clarified context" I pretty much go along with what you
said.

> However it now seems clear to me that you think the installation process
> should not necessary automatically install xdm. Instead it should ask
> the user whether they want a graphical login.
> 
> I hope I've got this right, because now I'm going to argue against that.
> :-)

Yeah, that's right.

> The default should be a graphical login if you install the graphical
> sub-system. It would be the most obvious outcome from installing X.
> Installing X only to use it sometimes is a more advanced usage of the
> machine than operating in a purely graphical environment, in that a
> novice user can typically navigate around a graphical environment more
> easily than a command line environment.

That's true to some extent, but modified according to the relative
power of the graphical and command-line interfaces. In Windoze, it's
pretty much a case of if you can't do it from the GUI, you can't do
it. In Linux, s/GUI/command line/.

It's a little bit like the situation with Windoze 3.x and earlier.
Plenty of people would install Windoze but only use it sometimes
because they had lots of stuff that could only be used in DOS.

In any case, there are plenty of novice users who do want to install X
but only use it sometimes. Otherwise they wouldn't keep asking the
list how to achieve this! Or replying to this thread saying "yeah,
like me".

> A policy of "Sensible by default" (which I believe debian employs)
> pretty much means you've got to install xdm when you install X.

What's wrong with something along the lines of: (Wording could
probably be improved)

  You are installing the X Windows system.
  If you like, you can also install the xdm X Display Manager, which
  gives you a graphical login prompt on bootup instead of a text console
  login.

  Do you want a graphical login? [Y/n]

> The issue of xdm not handling xserver crashes, and making the machine
> unusable should be handled by xdm, IMHO. xdm should be able to detect
> the xserver abnormally terminating without doing anything and not keep
> restarting it. It should also be able to detect that the xserver hung on
> the last attempt to start it (before the reboot) and not try to run it
> again, unless explictly told to do so.

I quite agree. Although this doesn't cover the situation where X
simply buggers up the video card. It hasn't actually crashed, but you
can't do anything because you can't see what you're doing. You may not
be able to get back to a usable text mode screen either...

> Enough from me for now. I dont have a vested interest in this
> discussion, since I just install a base system, upgrade to sid and
> manually apt-get everything I want. But I've been using debian for a
> while, so I typically know what I want. I can see a newbie would have
> difficulties, but I find it hard to see them because its been a while
> since I was a newbie.

OK. I've just done an installation for a mate, who is technically
oriented but up to now has been using a mixture of DOS, Win3.1 and
Win98, with him looking over my shoulder and me explaining what I was
doing. I think the description given of xdm is such as to give the
impression that "you'd better install it or you won't be able to log
into X, which means you won't be able to use X" if you don't really
know yet how the various bits of Linux fit together. Knowing that this
is not true, I unselected xdm in dselect... which of course made it
start moaning like mad... enough to put any new user off not having
xdm. Or if it doesn't you still have to figure out what hoops to jump
through to make it accept your choices.

Is there some issue connected with the packaging system that makes it
really hard to ask if you want a graphical login? Not being into the
details of the packaging system, I can't rule out the possibility of
some weirditude making the answer "yes".

Pigeon