Common Desktop Environment (CDE)
Last Updated -[Mon Sep 9 15:57:22 1996 by cxh]-
Places to go
What is CDE?
CDE stands for Common Desktop Environment. Vendors like Sun, HP and
DEC are all moving towards using CDE instead of having their own
proprietary window environments. The idea is that the user should not
many different setups to use different vendor's machines.
CDE is similar to HP-VUE, the HPUX9.x window environment. CDE is
available in HPUX10.10 (Currently our sole HP machine is at HPUX10.01,
so CDE is not available). Solaris CDE1.0.2 is part of Solaris2.5.1,
I've installed CDE1.0.2 on our Solaris2.4 machines, which is what most
of the cluster is running.
Why Use CDE?
I've been using CDE for a few months, and it is the first out of the
box window environment that I find useful. For new users, the initial
environment that CDE provides is a very good starting place. CDE has
a style manager that allows a user to easily customize their
environment. CDE also can be setup to save applications upon exiting
and then restart them the next time. CDE has virtual workspaces, like
fvwm and tvtwm.
How to I run CDE?
My plan is to convert all the machines in the cluster over to CDE so
that the CDE login window is presented. To get CDE to run, the
machine must have a command run on it as root
(/usr/dt/bin/dtconfig -e), and then rebooted.
The login window has a Options button that brings up a
menu to select the type of startup session. Under the
Session choice, the submenu choices are:
Most users should at least try CDE, so that they can know what they
are up against. After you have chosen a session, type in your name
and password, and the session should come up.
To use the online help system inside CDE, mouse on the bookshelf icon
in the toolbar at the lower left edge of the screen.
CDE problems
How do I do XXX in CDE
Mathematica and CDE
See my Mathematica page
for details.
Why should I not use CDE?
Many people have spent years tweaking their environment for a certain
window manager, and will not want to go to CDE. If you would like to
use a different window manager, then, add the following to your
.Xdefaults file:
Dtsession*wmStartupCommand: fvwm
Then when you login, select the Openwindows Desktop choice
from the option button.
Your window manager should startup, and your ~/.xinitrc
file should be executed.
You can also choose Failsafe session from the desktop
and get a vanilla tty prompt.
CDE information for Administrators
CDE Icons
From: rhays@interaccess.com (Bob Hays, Computer Geek)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.solaris
Subject: Re: Q: CDE icons...
Date: Sat, 24 Feb 1996 04:19:33 GMT
Organization: InterAccess, Chicago's best Internet Service Provider
mk@lule.frontec.se (Michael Kolmodin) wrote:
>Has anyone a hint where I could find some kind of icon library
>(free/commecial) useful in the CDE integration work?
Here is a link to Anthony's Icon Library:
http://www.bsdi.com/icons/AIcons/
Second, get a copy of ImageMagick - it is really good for editing and
resizing icons (you will do a LOT of both).
Now, some notes:
a) Icons are 16x16, 32x32 and 48x48 pixels (s,m and l in the name -
icon_l.pm, for example, is a large (48x48) icon in pixmap (xpm)
format).
b) The files are xbitmap (xbm) or xpixmap (xpm) format, but the file
extensions are .bm and .pm respectively.
c) Only use 11 color planes for xpixmap (xpm, pm) files. You can use
the quanitize feature in ImageMagick to for the number of color
planes.
d) If you have a favorite app (for example, let's use Netscape) that
you want an icon for, iconify the program and do:
xwd -out netscape.xwd
The mouse cursor will become a cross. Click once in the icon of the
selected app (Netscape here, remember?) and you will hear a bell and
then two more bells. You now have an xwd image of the icon w/ title.
Use ImageMagick to edit the xwd file, cropping the image to be just a
48x48 icon (assuming you run with large icons), select save and change
the format to xpm. Then, select quantize to force the color map to 11
colors and save it again. Now you can resize, requantize and save
each required size (I rarely bother with 16x16 since I don't use them,
but if you run a system, you might want to be safe - users always do
whatever they want:-).
I hope all this helps. I'm still trying to get the front panel to
invoke a program when a file changes state (mail, in this case).
Have fun! - Bob
Starting up cde
As root:
To start a dtlogin-session run "/usr/dt/bin/dtlogin -daemon".
To start a autostart dtsession run "/usr/dt/bin/dtconfig -e"
To stop a autostart dtsession run "/usr/dt/bin/dtconfig -d"
To stop a dtlogin-session run "/usr/dt/bin/dtconfig -kill"
To start a new dtlogin after changing the config-files run "/usr/dt/bin/dtconfig -reset"
Installing CDE1.0.2