Xorg

Support

Xorg was successfully tested on :

• qemu
• VMware
• VirtualBox
• Actual Hardware Installations

Installing

Xorg is available in extra, and so can be installed as simply as anything else:

pacman -Sy xorg xf86-input-keyboard xf86-input-mouse xf86-video-vesa

You will also need to add "-c" to the CONSOLEOPTS variable in your /etc/rc.conf file. While you are editing rc.conf you also need to set a driver for CONSOLEMOUSE (usually pc_mouse). Once you have done this, reboot.

You should now see a new directory, /dev/cons. This contain the console mouse and keyboard interfaces, but Xorg expects those device nodes to be in different places. If you use a xorg.conf file, you can simply edit it to point to those devices, if not:

ln -s /dev/cons/kbd /dev/kbd
ln -s /dev/cons/mouse /dev/mouse

Additionally, if you wish to run X terminal emulators as a normal user, you need to create the ptyp device:

cd /dev
MAKEDEV ptyp

Now your system is ready to run Xorg.

.xinitrc

The most convenient way to run Xorg is to set up a .xinitrc file starting various programs and suchlike for you when you start the X server. A simple example below, saved as ~/.xinitrc, is sufficient to start openbox:

#!/bin/bash

exec openbox

The .xinitrc file is executed by whatever interpreter you specify (even python, if you so desire), so it can contain whatever logic or commands you like, for example:

#!/bin/bash

if [[ "$WM" == "" ]]; then
    echo "Starting openbox..."
    exec openbox
else
    echo "Starting $WM..."
    exec $WM
fi

Starting X

It is advisable to install a window manager, such as openbox, which is currently in the xorg repository.

pacman -S openbox

Once you have your .xinitrc (or whatever you're using) and your window manager set up, simply start X:

startx -- -retro