Xref: utzoo comp.sys.apollo:1924 comp.windows.x:7509
Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!lll-winken!ames!oliveb!sun!shrike!rterek
From: rterek@shrike.Sun.COM (Robert Terek [Contractor])
Newsgroups: comp.sys.apollo,comp.windows.x
Subject: Re: X11.3 question on Apollo DN3000.
Keywords: Xwindows, trouble
Message-ID: <87020@sun.uucp>
Date: 26 Jan 89 07:50:19 GMT
References: <13@euteal.UUCP>
Sender: news@sun.uucp
Reply-To: rterek@sun.UUCP (Robert Terek [Contractor])
Organization: Sun Microsystems, Mountain View
Lines: 51

In article <13@euteal.UUCP> mart@euteal.UUCP (Mart van Stiphout) writes:
>
> I have just installed X11.3 on my Apollo DN3000 workstation.
> At the moment I'm still working under SR9.7.
> Guess what, it doesn't work. So now I have two questions:
. . . .
> 2. I found a Pascal file in directory server/ddx/apollo/apc :
>    `apcfont.pas'. (Why a Pascal source file when all the rest of
>    the stuff in written in C??). The corresponding apcfont.bin
>    file is delivered also, in a tar archive. How very peculiar:
>    the first thing make does is extracting this bin file from
>    the archive instead of compiling it.
>    Who has an explanation for all this?

A few comments:
	- It is Pascal rather than C because that is the language Apollo
	  used for most of its system software. This particular file was
	  not written solely for X - it was written before X was around, and
	  contains internal routines of a graphics library (GPR perhaps,
	  not sure anymore). Note the original coding date of 1981.
	  Xapollo coverts snf fonts to gpr format fonts, then uses gpr to
	  display them, so the implementor chose to "borrow" the gpr internal
	  routines. This was done for R2, possibly due to time constraints.
	  Maybe it's time to rewrite in C.

	- Since the Pascal compiler is optional software, it was decided that
	  the binary should be included so that those without the compiler
	  could still build X11. Source is provided for those who need it,
	  eg., if one is running SR10 he/she should alter the Makefile to
	  compile the file, since the binary provided is a 9.7 one.

	- The reason it is in a tar file is to preserve the Apollo specific
	  file "type". MIT does the distribution of R3, and uses a non-Apollo
	  machine to store source and cut tapes. If apcfont.bin was simply
	  given to MIT to include on the tape, the process of putting it onto
	  the non-Apollo machine, cutting a tar tape from that machine, then
	  extracting it onto an Apollo machine would cause the file to lose
	  header info indicating that it was an object. Hence, apcfont.bin
	  was put into a tar archive at Apollo, which would preserve the file
	  "type", and a strange looking target was put into the Makefile.

As far as your difficulties in geting the server to come up, you'll have to
provide more details, me thinks. The fonts should all be located in the
directory indicated in server/include/site.h, as long as they match I can't
think of a reason why the server could not find a font. 


							-Bob


Disclaimer: I *am* just a contractor.