SGI's migration to X

[Gary S. Moss VLD/VMB <moss>]

In article <SLEHAR.90Aug30173222 at bucasd.bu.edu>, slehar at bucasd.bu.edu
(Steve Lehar) writes:
|> Now I know that X is designed to run on any hardware, which is  why it
|> is so complicated, while the SGI stuff only runs on  SGI, and  that is
|> why  it is so simple  and elegant.   Nevertheless,  I think SGI did an
|> EXCEPTIONAL job in their graphics software, and  I  would not hurry on
|> over to X  unless I  were  absolutely FORCED  to  do  so!  X is messy,
|> inordinately complicated, atrociously documented and unreliable. (My X
|> image windows  are prone to   suddenly  disappearing if  they've  been
|> around for a while) My advice is to stick with SGI!

I think that the perfect mix would be using a real X window manager like
TWM, and to be able to run GL applications in an X window.  X has a way
to go to replace the GL for real graphics, but for the desktop environment,
the availability and economy of using X is tough to beat.  It sure would
be nice to be able to run TWM on the SGI instead of customizing yet another
window manager.  Programming in X is not all that bad, PostScript is much
more foreign to someone used to C programming.  The accellerated development
time provided by Xt toolkits is invaluable, and the volume of quality PD
software is remarkable.

The unreliability of X is a symptom of the server on the SGI (or wherever).
I have never had windows disappear on my Sun (unless the process was
killed, the network connection failed, etc.) and I find it very robust, but
on the SGI, X just plain doesn't work worth a darn under 3.2.x.  Hopefully
3.3 is much better.

-Gary