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IRIX Customizing the Desktop
Install new Icons
For each .fti icon file you will need a corresponding .ftr file. These ftr files should go in /usr/lib/filetype/install/ and the fti files should go in /usr/lib/filetype/install/iconlib/. Here is my firefox ftr for example:
TYPE firefoxExecutable SUPERTYPE Executable MATCH tag == 770069; LEGEND web browser CMD OPEN /usr/nekoware/bin/firefox CMD DROP /usr/nekoware/bin/firefox $SELECTED ICON { if (opened) { include("../iconlib/generic.exec.open.fti"); } else { include("../iconlib/generic.exec.closed.fti"); } include("/usr/lib/filetype/install/iconlib/firefox.fti"): }
Notes on the FTR example:
Obviously replace the firefox part of "firefoxExecutable" with the correct name for a given app. If it were a script instead of an executable you'd write that instead.
Supertype: Either executable or script
Match tag numbers: First go to the directory of the executable/script that you want to give an icon, and check to see if it has a match number already. Use the command tag -q myapp to do this. Usually developers are supposed to tag their stuff and you should not use a number that has already been taken by another program, but it's not like there are a ton of apps on irix, and the chances of picking a random number that has already been used is small. I used "tag 770069 firefox" to give firefox that match number as you can see. Also make sure not to forget this guy at the end of the number ---> ;
Legend: what you type here is the description you get when you right-click > Get Info. A short description of the program.
The last part of the .ftr is self-explanatory. This is a bare-bones ftr, they can have more funtionality besides drag & drop added to them.
Wrapping it up
Once you have your fti & ftr files in place change directory to /usr/lib/filetype and make sure you're a super user (type su, and then give root password). Enter "make -u". After it has finished doing its thing, log out and then log back in.
If everything was setup correctly your programs should now have shiny new icons. :)
Courtesy of DaJuice.
Install, delete or amend toolchest entries
To modify the toolchest systemwide edit /usr/lib/X11/system.chestrc or /usr/lib/X11/nodesktop.chestrc. Or, you need to create a .chestrc in your home directory for this.
Use custom background
First you must enable 24-bit support on your X server.
Next obtain some backgrounds; depending on your display configuration most likely 1280x1024 or 1024x768 8-bit X11 PixMap (XPM) format. You can convert JPEG images to XPM using ImageView, xv, NetPBM or similar, and resizing/cropping to the correct size and aspect can be accomplished with an image editor (such as GIMP or Photoshop).
Once you have a suitable XPM file you'll need to configure 4Dwm to use it as a background. First, create and edit a .backgrounds file by copying the system.backgrounds file from /usr/lib/X11 to your home directory as .backgrounds:
cp /usr/lib/X11/system.backgrounds ~/.backgrounds
Using a text editor, add additional entries for your new backgrounds file like this:
background "Anime" command "-xpm /usr/people/neko/backgrounds/anime.xpm" default "-xpm /usr/people/neko/backgrounds/anime.xpm" readok "/usr/people/neko/backgrounds/anime.xpm"
Change the three path entries /usr/people/neko/backgrounds/anime.xpm to reflect the full name and path of the background file you are using. Also be sure to change the background name from "Anime" to whatever you'd like to show up in your Background control panel. You can add several entries like the above to easily switch between multiple backgrounds; I have at least twenty myself.
Once all this has been accomplished you can select your new background(s) from Toolchest -> Desktop -> Customize -> Background. In addition to the increased performance, you'll even get a snippet of the new background in your Desks Overview which is another benefit of using XPM files.
Rather use 24bit images?
If you'd rather use 24-bit images for your background, you can do so using either xli or Esetroot. xli is part of the xli.1.16 X11 image loader/viewer package on SGI Freeware:
http://freeware.sgi.com/Installable/xli-1.16-sgipl1.html
Esetroot is part of the Eterm-0.8.10 Enlightenment-aware xterm package on SGI Freeware:
http://freeware.sgi.com/Installable/Eterm-0.8.10.html
Example xli entry:
background "Anime2" command "-execute /usr/freeware/bin/xli -onroot -fork /usr/people/neko/backgrounds/anime2.jpg" default "-execute /usr/freeware/bin/xli -onroot -fork /usr/people/neko/backgrounds/anime2.jpg" exeok "/usr/freeware/bin/xli"
readok "/usr/people/neko/backgrounds/anime2.jpg
Example Esetroot entry:
background "Anime3" command "-execute /usr/freeware/bin/Esetroot /usr/people/neko/backgrounds/anime3.jpg" default "-execute /usr/freeware/bin/Esetroot /usr/people/neko/backgrounds/anime3.jpg" execok "/usr/freeware/bin/Esetroot" readok "/usr/people/neko/backgrounds/anime3.jpg"
xli is the easiest of the two to install as it has no additional dependencies. It's rather dated in that it does not support progressive JPEG or PNG so some backgrounds will need to be converted to standard JFIF JPEG before xli can deal with them. xli also does not support pseudo transparency effects with some applications, a good example being X-Chat.
Esetroot supports progressive JPEG and pseudo transparency in X-Chat and seems a bit faster overall. The downside for those tight on disk space is that it requires 62 additional dependent packages to install.
There are a couple of caveats to note when using 24-bit images. Desks Overview will not display background previews in the desk panes and you'll find that desktop switching slows down dramatically, though that's less of an issue on newer hardware. If you are not a multi-desktop user these issues may not be important to you, but I recommend trying both xpm and the alternate methods given above to see which works best in your environment.
Using IRIX 6.5.22 and Up
IRIX 6.5.22 brought native support for many image formats; backgrounds can now be JPEG, PNG, BMP, etc. - no conversions required.
The procedure is essentially the same as above (add -class TrueColor -depth 24 to /var/X11/xdm/Xservers, copy /usr/lib/X11/system.backgrounds to your home directory as .backgrounds) except a typical ~/.backgrounds entry now looks like this:
background "Anime" default "-image /usr/people/neko/backgrounds/anime.jpg"
instead of like this:
background "Anime" command "-xpm /usr/people/neko/backgrounds/anime.xpm" default "-xpm /usr/people/neko/backgrounds/anime.xpm" readok "/usr/people/neko/backgrounds/anime.xpm"
A forum member wrote the following script for IRIX 6.5.22+ that will auto-populate a ~/.backgrounds based on the contents of a directory filled with JPEG/BMP/PNG images. Just change BGDIR to reflect an image directory of your choice:
#!/bin/sh BGDIR=$HOME/Backgrounds cp /usr/lib/X11/system.backgrounds $HOME/.backgrounds chmod 644 .backgrounds cd ${BGDIR} for x in *.jpg *.xpm *.png *.bmp; do case ${x} in '*.jpg'|'*.xpm'|'*.png'|'*.bmp') ;; *) NAME=`echo ${x} | tr '.' ' ' | awk '{print $1}' | tr '_' ' '` echo "" >> $HOME/.backgrounds echo "background \""${NAME}"\"" >> $HOME/.backgrounds echo "default \""-image ${BGDIR}/${x}"\"" >> $HOME/.backgrounds ;; esac done
Courtesy of Nekonoko.
Custom background on login screen
edit /usr/lib/X11/xdm/Xsetup At the top of the file add a line similar to:
/usr/nekoware/bin/xli -onroot /path/to/wallpaper/login_pix.jpg
Add pictures to visual login
Use chkconfig to make sure that visuallogin is set to on and noiconlogin to off. The icons (SGI RGB format, at least 100x100 pixels) can be placed in the following locations:
/$HOME/.icons/login.icon /usr/lib/faces/$USER /usr/local/lib/faces/$USER
$USER is the loginname of the user, $HOME the home directory.
Remember, no file extension is needed after the name of the image. $USER is not a directory, but an actual rgb image file with the name of the account that it will use during visual login.
Courtesy of Gerhard Lenerz.
Visual Login Banner
You can display a banner instead of user account icons by
chkconfig visuallogin on chkconfig noiconlogin on
and replacing the stand SGI (RGB) image in /usr/Cadmin/images/cloginlogo.rgb an image of your choice. See the man page for clogin(1) for more details.