You should have read Chapter 1 in Nye and O'Reilly, Vol. 4, before starting this exercise.

1. Use the xman facility to learn more about xcalc. To do this, select "Manual Page" in xman's window. The xman window is an example of a "paned" application; you can alter the proportions of the two subwindows by grabbing the small black rectangle (called a grip) and moving it. Scroll through the directory subwindow until you locate the entry for xman, then select it to bring up the corresponding text. Read the "Description" section.

2. Most X clients honor a few standard command-line options (the information can also be found in the man page on X, but note that since this is a captial letter, it appears at the very top of the xman directory, not with the X client entries). Use the information on "Color Specification", "Color Names", and "Window Geometry" in Appendix B of the text (Vol. 4) to modify the colors, size, and positioning of a client.

   What is the effect of including (a) just width/height information? (b) just x/y offsets?

3. Many X clients also use specialized options to control their appearance or use. Through xman, you can find the syntax and meaning of these non-standard options.

   In your own words, describe a non-standard option for: (a) xcalc; (b) xclock.

4. In your course directory, create a subdirectory labels. Copy all files from course/labels into your directory.

   ---

   NOTE: From here on course will be used to refer to the general course directory, ~cs551/files

   ---

   Run make, then invoke labels in the background, with no arguments.

   What does it do?

   How does that change when you invoke it with an integer value? When you invoke it with an "invalid" value (e.g., a negative integer or letter)? When you invoke it with one of the standard X command line options? When you invoke it with non-existent "X- like" option (e.g., -highlightColor)?

5. Leave the application running. Note that an .Xdefaults file was supplied with labels, but it isn't taking effect because X doesn't realize it's there. You could move it to your home directory, where it would be found automatically. Instead, make the file known to X by setting the XENVIRONMENT variable:
   setenv XENVIRONMENT .Xdefaults

   Now invoke a second instance of the program, again in the background. What is different about the two?

6. There are many times when you want to capture the appearance of an X application. There are a number of standard X clients to help in doing this. Try out the following:
   • xwd (X window dump): copies the contents of an X window in a special "dump" format (see man pages for details). Note that the files produced are quite large -- the only good use for this is to save a precise image that you will want to re-display a number of times on your screen.
     There are a number of utilities for printing xwd files. However, they are generally very inefficient. Use XtoPS instead, as described below.

   • xwud (X window un-dump): takes a file created by xwd and re-displays it on the screen.

   • XtoPS: copies the contents of an X window and creates a file in PostScript format. This is the best way to print screendumps. Invoke it with the command XtoPS . The cursor will change to a cross-hair, which you should move to the bitmap window and then click. The utility will beep at you as it generates PostScript output.
     To find out about other options, invoke the utility with no arguments at all.

     ---

     NOTE: Be very cautious about using the -root option to generate dumps of entire screens. Not only are the PS files very, very large, but they take forever to print. Have mercy on your fellow-students, and take care never to print full screendumps during peak hours!!

     ---

   • xsnap: creates a new X client window, copying whatever has been rubber-banded by the user. When you invoke this utility, the cursor changes to an upper-lefthand-corner-bracket. Click the cursor in the upper-left-corner of the screen area you wish to capture, and drag the cursor across the area you want. When you release the button, the rubber-banded area will be copied into a new window.
     This utility is the best way to capture portions of an application, or an application that involves multiple windows. After creating the xsnap'ed window, you can save/print it with the other clients you just learned.
     To find out about other options, invoke the utility with a silly argument, like 13. The border, name, etc. options (standard command-line options) refer to how the new window will look.