View Source: X11 - Waikato Linux Users Group

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According to [http://x11.org]:

> The X Window System, more simply 'X' or 'X11', is judged worldwide to be one of the most successful open source, collaborative technologies developed to date. It is the de facto standard graphical engine for the Unix and Linux operating systems and provides the only common windowing environment bridging the heterogeneous platforms in today's enterprise computing. The inherent independence of the X Window System from operating system and hardware, its network-transparency, and its support for a wide range of popular desktops are responsible for its continuing and growing popularity. All major hardware vendors support the X Window System. Many third parties provide technologies for integrating X Window System applications into network or personal computer environments under [MS-DOS], [Windows], Windows 9x, and Windows NT, while thousands of independent software developers provide X Window System applications. The worldwide community of users of the X Window System currently exceeds 30 million.

When you start an X11 application you specify which host it is to display on. This host is called the [XServer]. An [XServer] typically has a screen and a keyboard and mouse. The application is an X client. This is initially a little confusing to many people. This means that you can [SSH] to a host and start X11 applications and have them display on your workstation. This is very cool.

Server implementations of the X11 protocol include:

[XOrg]:
     A free [X11] server for [Unix] systems. It is more or less the default [X11] server.
~OpenWin:
     SunMicrosystems [Solaris] [X11] server.
[X11ForMicrosoftWindows]:
     See this page for a list of and information about various [X11] servers for MicrosoftWindows.
[X11ForMacOSX]:
    It's obvious, no?


!What socket do the X11 clients use to connect to the X server?

You can run X Windows programs if you give them write access to a socket in ''/tmp/.X11-unix/''.

! See also:

* [XFree86Notes]
* [SSHNotes], for running [X11] applications remotely via [SSH]
Last edited on Friday, June 8, 2007 10:54:50 am by BenStaz
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