Xorg
| Summary |
|---|
| An all-inclusive overview about installing and managing Xorg |
| Overview |
| The Xorg project provides an open source implementation of the X Window System – the foundation for a graphical user interface. Desktop environments such as Enlightenment, GNOME, KDE, LXDE, and Xfce provide a complete graphical environment. Various window managers offer alternative and novel environments, and may be used standalone to conserve system resources. Display managers provide a graphical login prompt. |
| Related |
| Start X at Login |
| Execute commands after X start |
| Display Manager |
| Window Manager |
| Font Configuration |
| Cursor Themes |
| Desktop Environment |
| Wayland |
| Mir |
| Free Video Drivers |
| Intel Graphics |
| ATI |
| Nouveau |
| Proprietary Video Drivers |
| AMD Catalyst |
| NVIDIA |
From http://www.x.org/wiki/:
- The X.Org project provides an open source implementation of the X Window System. The development work is being done in conjunction with the freedesktop.org community. The X.Org Foundation is the educational non-profit corporation whose Board serves this effort, and whose Members lead this work.
Xorg is the public, open-source implementation of the X window system version 11. Since Xorg is the most popular choice among Linux users, its ubiquity has led to making it an ever-present requisite for GUI applications, resulting in massive adoption from most distributions. See the Xorg Wikipedia article or visit the Xorg website for more details.
Installation
You will need to install the essential package xorg-server, available in the Official Repositories.
Additionally, some packages from the xorg-apps group are useful for certain configuration tasks, they are pointed out in the relevant section/page.
Driver installation
The Linux kernel includes open-source video drivers and support for hardware accelerated framebuffers. However, userland support is required for OpenGL and 2D acceleration in X11.
First, identify your card:
$ lspci | grep VGA
Then install an appropriate driver. You can search the package database for a complete list of open-source video drivers:
$ pacman -Ss xf86-video
The default graphics driver is vesa (package xf86-video-vesa), which handles a large number of chipsets but does not include any 2D or 3D acceleration. If a better driver cannot be found or fails to load, Xorg will fall back to vesa.
In order for video acceleration to work, and often to expose all the modes that the GPU can set, a proper video driver is required:
| Brand | Type | Driver | Multilib Package (for 32-bit applications on Arch x86_64) |
Documentation |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| AMD/ATI | Open source | xf86-video-ati | lib32-ati-dri | ATI |
| Proprietary | catalyst-dkms | lib32-catalyst-utils | AMD Catalyst | |
| Intel | Open source | xf86-video-intel | lib32-intel-dri | Intel Graphics |
| Nvidia | Open source | xf86-video-nouveau | lib32-nouveau-dri | Nouveau |
| xf86-video-nv | – | (legacy driver) | ||
| Proprietary | nvidia | lib32-nvidia-libgl | NVIDIA | |
| nvidia-304xx | lib32-nvidia-304xx-utils | |||
| nvidia-173xx | lib32-nvidia-173xx-utils | |||
| nvidia-96xx | lib32-nvidia-96xx-utils | |||
| VIA | Open source | xf86-video-openchrome | – | VIA |
Xorg should run smoothly without closed source drivers, which are typically needed only for advanced features such as fast 3D-accelerated rendering for games, dual-screen setups, and TV-out.
Running
- See also: Start X at Login
If you want to start X without a display manager, install the package xorg-xinit. Optionally, the packages xorg-twm, xorg-xclock and xterm allows for a default environment, as described below.
The startx and xinit commands will start the X server and clients (the startx script is merely a front end to the xinit command). To determine the client to run, startx/xinit will first look to parse a ~/.xinitrc file in the user's home directory. In the absence of ~/.xinitrc, it defaults to the global file /etc/X11/xinit/xinitrc, which defaults to starting a basic environment with the Twm window manager, Xclock and Xterm. For more information, see xinitrc.
Configuration
Xorg uses a configuration file called xorg.conf and files ending in the suffix .conf for its initial setup: the complete list of the folders where these files are searched can be found at [1] or by running man xorg.conf, together with a detailed explanation of all the available options.
Using .conf files
The /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/ directory stores user-specific configuration. You are free to add configuration files there, but they must have a .conf suffix: the files are read in ASCII order, and by convention their names start with XX- (two digits and a hyphen, so that for example 10 is read before 20). These files are parsed by the X server upon startup and are treated like part of the traditional xorg.conf configuration file. The X server essentially treats the collection of configuration files as one big file with entries from xorg.conf at the end.
Using xorg.conf
Xorg can also be configured via /etc/X11/xorg.conf or /etc/xorg.conf. You can also generate a skeleton for xorg.conf with:
# Xorg :0 -configure
This should create a xorg.conf.new file in /root/ that you can copy over to /etc/X11/xorg.conf.
Alternatively, your proprietary video card drivers may come with a tool to automatically configure Xorg: see the article of your video driver, NVIDIA or AMD Catalyst, for more details.
Sample configurations
xorg.conf
/etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/10-evdev.conf
/etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/10-monitor.conf
Input devices
Udev will detect your hardware and evdev will act as the hotplugging input driver for almost all devices. Udev is provided by systemd and xf86-input-evdev is required by xorg-server, so there is no need to explicitly install those packages. If evdev does not support your device, install the needed driver from the xorg-drivers group.
You should have 10-evdev.conf in the /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/ directory, which manages keyboards, mice, touchpads and touchscreens.
See the following pages for specific instructions, or the Fedora wiki entry for more examples.
Mouse acceleration
See the main page: Mouse acceleration
Extra mouse buttons
See the main page: All Mouse Buttons Working
Touchpad Synaptics
See the main page: Touchpad Synaptics
Keyboard settings
See the main page: Keyboard Configuration in Xorg
Monitor settings
Getting started
First, create a new config file, such as /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/10-monitor.conf.
/etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/10-monitor.conf
Section "Monitor"
Identifier "Monitor0"
EndSection
Section "Device"
Identifier "Device0"
Driver "vesa" #Choose the driver used for this monitor
EndSection
Section "Screen"
Identifier "Screen0" #Collapse Monitor and Device section to Screen section
Device "Device0"
Monitor "Monitor0"
DefaultDepth 16 #Choose the depth (16||24)
SubSection "Display"
Depth 16
Modes "1024x768_75.00" #Choose the resolution
EndSubSection
EndSection
Multiple monitors
See main article Multihead for general information.
See also GPU-specific instructions:
- NVIDIA#Multiple monitors
- Nouveau#Dual Head
- AMD Catalyst#Double Screen (Dual Head / Dual Screen / Xinerama)
- ATI#Dual Head setup
More than one graphics card
You must define the correct driver to use and put the bus ID of your graphic cards.
Section "Device"
Identifier "Screen0"
Driver "nouveau"
BusID "PCI:0:12:0"
EndSection
Section "Device"
Identifier "Screen1"
Driver "radeon"
BusID "PCI:1:0:0"
EndSection
To get your bus ID:
$ lspci | grep VGA
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: nVidia Corporation G96 [GeForce 9600M GT] (rev a1)
The bus ID here is 1:0:0.
Display size and DPI
The DPI of the X server is determined in the following manner:
- The -dpi command line option has highest priority.
- If this is not used, the DisplaySize setting in the X config file is used to derive the DPI, given the screen resolution.
- If no DisplaySize is given, the monitor size values from DDC are used to derive the DPI, given the screen resolution.
- If DDC does not specify a size, 75 DPI is used by default.
In order to get correct dots per inch (DPI) set, the display size must be recognized or set. Having the correct DPI is especially necessary where fine detail is required (like font rendering). Previously, manufacturers tried to create a standard for 96 DPI (a 10.3" diagonal monitor would be 800x600, a 13.2" monitor 1024x768). These days, screen DPIs vary and may not be equal horizontally and vertically. For example, a 19" widescreen LCD at 1440x900 may have a DPI of 89x87. To be able to set the DPI, the Xorg server attempts to auto-detect your monitor's physical screen size through the graphic card with DDC. When the Xorg server knows the physical screen size, it will be able to set the correct DPI depending on resolution size.
To see if your display size and DPI are detected/calculated correctly:
$ xdpyinfo | grep -B2 resolution
Check that the dimensions match your display size. If the Xorg server is not able to correctly calculate the screen size, it will default to 75x75 DPI and you will have to calculate it yourself.
If you have specifications on the physical size of the screen, they can be entered in the Xorg configuration file so that the proper DPI is calculated:
Section "Monitor"
Identifier "Monitor0"
DisplaySize 286 179 # In millimeters
EndSection
If you only want to enter the specification of your monitor without creating a full xorg.conf create a new config file. For example (/etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/90-monitor.conf):
Section "Monitor"
Identifier "<default monitor>"
DisplaySize 286 179 # In millimeters
EndSection
If you do not have specifications for physical screen width and height (most specifications these days only list by diagonal size), you can use the monitor's native resolution (or aspect ratio) and diagonal length to calculate the horizontal and vertical physical dimensions. Using the Pythagorean theorem on a 13.3" diagonal length screen with a 1280x800 native resolution (or 16:10 aspect ratio):
$ echo 'scale=5;sqrt(1280^2+800^2)' | bc # 1509.43698
This will give the pixel diagonal length and with this value you can discover the physical horizontal and vertical lengths (and convert them to millimeters):
$ echo 'scale=5;(13.3/1509)*1280*25.4' | bc # 286.43072 $ echo 'scale=5;(13.3/1509)*800*25.4' | bc # 179.01920
Setting DPI manually
DPI can be set manually if you only plan to use one resolution (DPI calculator):
Section "Monitor"
Identifier "Monitor0"
Option "DPI" "96 x 96"
EndSection
If you use an NVIDIA card, you can manually set the DPI adding the options bellow on /etc/X11/xorg.conf.d/20-nvidia.conf (inside Device section):
Option "UseEdidDpi" "False" Option "DPI" "96 x 96"
For RandR compliant drivers, you can set it by:
$ xrandr --dpi 96
See Execute commands after X start to make it permanent.
DPMS
DPMS (Display Power Management Signaling) is a technology that allows power saving behaviour of monitors when the computer is not in use. This will allow you to have your monitors automatically go into standby after a predefined period of time. See: DPMS
Composite
The Composite extension for X causes an entire sub-tree of the window hierarchy to be rendered to an off-screen buffer. Applications can then take the contents of that buffer and do whatever they like. The off-screen buffer can be automatically merged into the parent window or merged by external programs, called compositing managers. See the following page for more info.
- Compiz -- The original composite/window manager from Novell
- Xcompmgr -- A simple composite manager capable of drop shadows and primitive transparency
- Compton -- A fork of xcompmgr with feature improves and bug fix
- Cairo Composite Manager -- A versatile and extensible composite manager which uses cairo for rendering.
- Wikipedia:Compositing window manager
Tips and tricks
X startup tweaking (startx)
For X's option reference see:
$ man Xserver
The following options have to be appended to the variable "defaultserverargs" in the /usr/bin/startx file:
- Enable deferred glyph loading for 16 bit fonts:
-deferglyphs 16
Nested X session
To run a nested session of another desktop environment:
$ /usr/bin/Xnest :1 -geometry 1024x768+0+0 -ac -name Windowmaker & wmaker -display :1
This will launch a Window Maker session in a 1024 by 768 window within your current X session.
This needs the package xorg-server-xnest to be installed.
Starting GUI programs remotely
See main article: SSH#X11 forwarding.
On-demand disabling and enabling of input sources
With the help of xinput you can temporarily disable or enable input sources. This might be useful, for example, on systems that have more than one mouse, such as the ThinkPads and you would rather use just one to avoid unwanted mouse clicks.
Install the xorg-xinput package from the official repositories.
Find the ID of the device you want to disable:
$ xinput
For example in a Lenovo ThinkPad T500, the output looks like this:
$ xinput
⎡ Virtual core pointer id=2 [master pointer (3)]
⎜ ↳ Virtual core XTEST pointer id=4 [slave pointer (2)]
⎜ ↳ TPPS/2 IBM TrackPoint id=11 [slave pointer (2)]
⎜ ↳ SynPS/2 Synaptics TouchPad id=10 [slave pointer (2)]
⎣ Virtual core keyboard id=3 [master keyboard (2)]
↳ Virtual core XTEST keyboard id=5 [slave keyboard (3)]
↳ Power Button id=6 [slave keyboard (3)]
↳ Video Bus id=7 [slave keyboard (3)]
↳ Sleep Button id=8 [slave keyboard (3)]
↳ AT Translated Set 2 keyboard id=9 [slave keyboard (3)]
↳ ThinkPad Extra Buttons id=12 [slave keyboard (3)]
Disable the device with xinput --disable device_id, where device_id is the device ID you want to disable. In this example we will disable the Synaptics Touchpad, with the ID 10:
$ xinput --disable 10
To re-enable the device, just issue the opposite command:
$ xinput --enable 10
Troubleshooting
Common problems
If Xorg will not start, the screen is completely black, the keyboard and mouse are not working, etc., first take these simple steps:
- Check the log file:
cat /var/log/Xorg.0.log - Check specific pages in Category:Input devices if you have issues with keyboard, mouse, touchpad etc.
- Finally, search for common problems in ATI, Intel and NVIDIA articles.
CTRL right key does not work with oss keymap
Edit as root /usr/share/X11/xkb/symbols/fr, and change the line:
include "level5(rctrl_switch)"
to
// include "level5(rctrl_switch)"
Then restart X or reboot.
X clients started with "su" fail
If you are getting "Client is not authorized to connect to server", try adding the line:
session optional pam_xauth.so
to /etc/pam.d/su. pam_xauth will then properly set environment variables and handle xauth keys.
Program requests "font '(null)'"
- Error message: "unable to load font `(null)'."
Some programs only work with bitmap fonts. Two major packages with bitmap fonts are available, xorg-fonts-75dpi and xorg-fonts-100dpi. You do not need both; one should be enough. To find out which one would be better in your case, try this:
$ xdpyinfo | grep resolution
and use what is closer to you (75 or 100 instead of XX)
# pacman -S xorg-fonts-XXdpi
Frame-buffer mode problems
If X fails to start with the following log messages,
(WW) Falling back to old probe method for fbdev
(II) Loading sub module "fbdevhw"
(II) LoadModule: "fbdevhw"
(II) Loading /usr/lib/xorg/modules/linux//libfbdevhw.so
(II) Module fbdevhw: vendor="X.Org Foundation"
compiled for 1.6.1, module version=0.0.2
ABI class: X.Org Video Driver, version 5.0
(II) FBDEV(1): using default device
Fatal server error:
Cannot run in framebuffer mode. Please specify busIDs for all framebuffer devices
uninstall fbdev:
# pacman -R xf86-video-fbdev
DRI with Matrox cards stops working
If you use a Matrox card and DRI stops working after upgrading to Xorg, try adding the line:
Option "OldDmaInit" "On"
to the Device section that references the video card in xorg.conf.
Recovery: disabling Xorg before GUI login
If Xorg is set to boot up automatically and for some reason you need to prevent it from starting up before the login/display manager appears (if the system is wrongly configured and Xorg does not recognize your mouse or keyboard input, for instance), you can accomplish this task with two methods.
- Change default target to rescue.target. See systemd#Change default target to boot into.
- If you have not only a faulty system that makes Xorg unusable, but you have also set the GRUB menu wait time to zero, or cannot otherwise use GRUB to prevent Xorg from booting, you can use the Arch Linux live CD. Boot up the live CD and log in as root. You need a mount point, such as
/mnt, and you need to know the name of the partition you want to mount.
You can use the command,
# fdisk -l
to see your partitions. Usually, the one you want will be resembling /dev/sda1. Then, to mount this to /mnt, use
# mount /dev/sda1 /mnt
Then your filesystem will show up under /mnt. From here you can delete the gdm daemon to prevent Xorg from booting up normally or make any other necessary changes to the configuration.
X failed to start: Keyboard initialization failed
If your hard disk is full, startx will fail. /var/log/Xorg.0.log will end with:
(EE) Error compiling keymap (server-0) (EE) XKB: Could not compile keymap (EE) XKB: Failed to load keymap. Loading default keymap instead. (EE) Error compiling keymap (server-0) (EE) XKB: Could not compile keymap XKB: Failed to compile keymap Keyboard initialization failed. This could be a missing or incorrect setup of xkeyboard-config. Fatal server error: Failed to activate core devices. Please consult the The X.Org Foundation support at http://wiki.x.org for help. Please also check the log file at "/var/log/Xorg.0.log" for additional information. (II) AIGLX: Suspending AIGLX clients for VT switch
Make some free space on your root partition and X will start.
X creates configuration and temporary files in current user's home directory. Make sure there is free disk space available on the partition your home directory resides in. Unfortunately, X server does not provide any more obvious information about lack of disk space in this case.