GENERAL OUTLINE ============== TITLE: Blackbox-hint LFS VERSION: LFS 3.3 (using gcc-3.1) AUTHOR: Roy Ens <ens@cs.ttu.edu> SYNOPSIS: How to add and configure Blackbox using various Blackbox tools to your personal X configured LFS system. HINT: 1. Introduction ------------------------- This hint is going to attempt to show you how to install Blackbox and eventually how to configure some of it as well. It will also eventually have a brief overview of some of the most common Blackbox tools (also known as bb-tools). Blackbox is very simple to install and does not have any major library requirements. The hint assumes that you have an LFS system that has XFree86 installed and configured on it. It will not attempt to show you how to install and configure X since there is already a good hint on that. This hint is going to attempt to show you how to install Blackbox and eventually how to configure it as well. It will also give you a brief overview of some of the most commmon Blackbox tools (also known as bb-tools). Blackbox is very simple to install and does not have any major library requirements. The hint assumes that you have an LFS system that has XFree86 configured on it. It will not attempt to show you how to install and configure X since there is already a good hint on that. 2. What is Blackbox? ------------------------- For this I'm going to take a quote directly off of the Blackbox homepage <http://blackboxwm.sourceforge.net>. "Blackbox is that fast, light window manager you have been looking for without all those annoying library dependencies. If you have a C++ compiler and the X Window system you can compile and use it." So there you have it. There really are no dependencies except those that you get when you create a LFS system and the XFree86 dependency which is just common sense. 3. ChangeLog ------------------------ 08/22/2002- Creation date 4. Getting Sources ------------------------- We are going to use stable versions for this. Even though the beta versions are very good with only a few bugs. Blackbox v 0.62.1 http://prdownloads.sf.net/blackboxwm/blackbox-0.62.1.tar.gz 5. Installing Blackbox ------------------------- The installation for Blackbox is quite simple. It's just like all the other packages you have installed. I like to install Blackbox in /usr because it doesn't create a whole lot of files and therefore I have everything a little more centralized. I don't like having it in the /usr/X11R6/ directory because the best way to upgrade or even get a new installation of XFree86 is normally easier when getting rid of the entire /usr/X11R6 directory. But following is how to compile Blackbox: ./configure --prefix=/usr --with-x --enable-slit && make && make install Command Explanation: ./configure --prefix=/usr --with-x --enable-slit You should know what --prefix does. I put in --with-x just to make sure it uses X. Of course this isn't necessary but I like to use it for the sake of completeness. --enable-slit is also not necessary but I use it for completeness sake as well. We'll talk about the slit more later on. 6. Editting ~/.xinitrc ------------------------- Once you have installed Blackbox you will have to edit your ~/.xinitrc file to make sure it reflects that Blackbox is now installed and working. If you have no other window managers than edit the line in your ~/.xinitrc that has exec fvwm as the list line of the file to the following exec /usr/bin/blackbox If you have more than one window manager then you will have to add Blackbox to your ~/.xinitrc in whatever way you add window managers. For more information and a good ~/.xinitrc for changing window managers see: http://www.rapierbit.org/linux/winmgrs.html 7. Starting Blackbox ------------------------- If you have only one window manager like Blackbox in your ~/.xinitrc then all you have to do is the following ($ signifies prompt): $ startx If you have an ~/.xinitrc that takes arguments for different window managers than add the argument to the above to get blackbox started. For instance for my personal system I use the following $ startx blackboxBeta This should load your brand new Blackbox window manager. If you have never used it before right-click on the mouse will bring up the menu. 8. TODO List ------------------------- 1. Add configuration information 2. Add bbkeys information 3. Add bbconf information 4. Add other sources for blackbox information ------------------------- END OF HINT