[ViewVC] Diff of: cvs/rxvt-unicode/doc/rxvt.7.txt

Comparing rxvt-unicode/doc/rxvt.7.txt (file contents):
Revision 1.25 by root, Tue Nov 8 17:35:28 2005 UTC vs.
Revision 1.36 by root, Tue Jan 10 04:26:54 2006 UTC

     The newest version of this document is also available on the World Wide
     Web at
     <http://cvs.schmorp.de/browse/*checkout*/rxvt-unicode/doc/rxvt.7.html>.
 FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
+    Isn't rxvt supposed to be small? Don't all those features bloat?
+        I often get asked about this, and I think, no, they didn't cause
+        extra bloat. If you compare a minimal rxvt and a minimal urxvt, you
+        can see that the urxvt binary is larger (due to some encoding tables
+        always being compiled in), but it actually uses less memory (RSS)
+        after startup. Even with "--disable-everything", this comparison is
+        a bit unfair, as many features unique to urxvt (locale, encoding
+        conversion, iso14755 etc.) are already in use in this mode.
+            text    data     bss     drs     rss filename
+           98398    1664      24   15695    1824 rxvt --disable-everything
+          188985    9048   66616   18222    1788 urxvt --disable-everything
+        When you "--enable-everything" (which _is_ unfair, as this involves
+        xft and full locale/XIM support which are quite bloaty inside libX11
+        and my libc), the two diverge, but not unreasnobaly so.
+            text    data     bss     drs     rss filename
+          163431    2152      24   20123    2060 rxvt --enable-everything
+         1035683   49680   66648   29096    3680 urxvt --enable-everything
+        The very large size of the text section is explained by the
+        east-asian encoding tables, which, if unused, take up disk space but
+        nothing else and can be compiled out unless you rely on X11 core
+        fonts that use those encodings. The BSS size comes from the 64k
+        emergency buffer that my c++ compiler allocates (but of course
+        doesn't use unless you are out of memory). Also, using an xft font
+        instead of a core font immediately adds a few megabytes of RSS. Xft
+        indeed is responsible for a lot of RSS even when not used.
+        Of course, due to every character using two or four bytes instead of
+        one, a large scrollback buffer will ultimately make rxvt-unicode use
+        more memory.
+        Compared to e.g. Eterm (5112k), aterm (3132k) and xterm (4680k),
+        this still fares rather well. And compared to some monsters like
+        gnome-terminal (21152k + extra 4204k in separate processes) or
+        konsole (22200k + extra 43180k in daemons that stay around after
+        exit, plus half a minute of startup time, including the hundreds of
+        warnings it spits out), it fares extremely well *g*.
+    Why C++, isn't that unportable/bloated/uncool?
+        Is this a question? :) It comes up very often. The simple answer is:
+        I had to write it, and C++ allowed me to write and maintain it in a
+        fraction of the time and effort (which is a scarce resource for me).
+        Put even shorter: It simply wouldn't exist without C++.
+        My personal stance on this is that C++ is less portable than C, but
+        in the case of rxvt-unicode this hardly matters, as its portability
+        limits are defined by things like X11, pseudo terminals, locale
+        support and unix domain sockets, which are all less portable than
+        C++ itself.
+        Regarding the bloat, see the above question: It's easy to write
+        programs in C that use gobs of memory, an certainly possible to
+        write programs in C++ that don't. C++ also often comes with large
+        libraries, but this is not necessarily the case with GCC. Here is
+        what rxvt links against on my system with a minimal config:
+           libX11.so.6 => /usr/X11R6/lib/libX11.so.6 (0x00002aaaaabc3000)
+           libc.so.6 => /lib/libc.so.6 (0x00002aaaaadde000)
+           libdl.so.2 => /lib/libdl.so.2 (0x00002aaaab01d000)
+           /lib64/ld-linux-x86-64.so.2 (0x00002aaaaaaab000)
+        And here is rxvt-unicode:
+           libX11.so.6 => /usr/X11R6/lib/libX11.so.6 (0x00002aaaaabc3000)
+           libgcc_s.so.1 => /lib/libgcc_s.so.1 (0x00002aaaaada2000)
+           libc.so.6 => /lib/libc.so.6 (0x00002aaaaaeb0000)
+           libdl.so.2 => /lib/libdl.so.2 (0x00002aaaab0ee000)
+           /lib64/ld-linux-x86-64.so.2 (0x00002aaaaaaab000)
+        No large bloated libraries (of course, none were linked in
+        statically), except maybe libX11 :)
+    Does it support tabs, can I have a tabbed rxvt-unicode?
+        rxvt-unicode does not directly support tabs. It will work fine with
+        tabbing functionality of many window managers or similar tabbing
+        programs, and its embedding-features allow it to be embedded into
+        other programs, as witnessed by doc/rxvt-tabbed or the upcoming
+        "Gtk2::URxvt" perl module, which features a tabbed urxvt (murxvt)
+        terminal as an example embedding application.
     How do I know which rxvt-unicode version I'm using?
         The version number is displayed with the usage (-h). Also the escape
         sequence "ESC [ 8 n" sets the window title to the version number.
+        When using the rxvtc client, the version displayed is that of the
+        daemon.
     I am using Debian GNU/Linux and have a problem...
         The Debian GNU/Linux package of rxvt-unicode in sarge contains large
         patches that considerably change the behaviour of rxvt-unicode.
         Before reporting a bug to the original rxvt-unicode author please
         For other problems that also affect the Debian package, you can and
         probably should use the Debian BTS, too, because, after all, it's
         also a bug in the Debian version and it serves as a reminder for
         other users that might encounter the same issue.
+    I am maintaining rxvt-unicode for distribution/OS XXX, any
+    recommendation?
+        You should build one binary with the default options. configure now
+        enables most useful options, and the trend goes to making them
+        runtime-switchable, too, so there is usually no drawback to enbaling
+        them, except higher disk and possibly memory usage. The perl
+        interpreter should be enabled, as important functionality (menus,
+        selection, likely more in the future) depends on it.
+        You should not overwrite the "perl-ext-common" snd "perl-ext"
+        resources system-wide (except maybe with "defaults"). This will
+        result in useful behaviour. If your distribution aims at low memory,
+        add an empty "perl-ext-common" resource to the app-defaults file.
+        This will keep the perl interpreter disabled until the user enables
+        it.
+        If you can/want build more binaries, I recommend building a minimal
+        one with "--disable-everything" (very useful) and a maximal one with
+        "--enable-everything" (less useful, it will be very big due to a lot
+        of encodings built-in that increase download times and are rarely
+        used).
+    I need to make it setuid/setgid to support utmp/ptys on my OS, is this
+    safe?
+        Likely not. While I honestly try to make it secure, and am probably
+        not bad at it, I think it is simply unreasonable to expect all of
+        freetype + fontconfig + xft + xlib + ... + rxvt-unicode itself to
+        all be secure. Also, rxvt-unicode disables some options when it
+        detects that it runs setuid or setgid, which is not nice.
+        Elevated privileges are only required for utmp and pty operations on
+        some systems (for example, GNU/Linux doesn't need any extra
+        privileges for ptys, but some need it for utmp support). If
+        rxvt-unicode doesn't support the library/setuid helper that your OS
+        needs I'll be happy to assist you in implementing support for it.
+        So, while setuid/setgid operation is supported and not a problem on
+        your typical single-user-no-other-logins unix desktop, always
+        remember that its an awful lot of code, most of which isn't checked
+        for security issues regularly.
     When I log-in to another system it tells me about missing terminfo data?
         The terminal description used by rxvt-unicode is not as widely
         available as that for xterm, or even rxvt (for which the same
         problem often arises).
     "tic" outputs some error when compiling the terminfo entry.
         Most likely it's the empty definition for "enacs=". Just replace it
         by "enacs=\E[0@" and try again.
-    "bash"'s readline does not work correctly under urxvt.
+    "bash"'s readline does not work correctly under rxvt.
     I need a termcap file entry.
         One reason you might want this is that some distributions or
         operating systems still compile some programs using the
         long-obsoleted termcap library (Fedora Core's bash is one example)
         and rely on a termcap entry for "rxvt-unicode".
         indeed look correct.
         In that case, select a font of your taste and add it to the font
         list, e.g.:
-           urxvt -fn basefont,font2,font3...
+           rxvt -fn basefont,font2,font3...
         When rxvt-unicode sees a character, it will first look at the base
         font. If the base font does not contain the character, it will go to
         the next font, and so on. Specifying your own fonts will also speed
         up this search and use less resources within rxvt-unicode and the
     Mouse cut/paste suddenly no longer works.
         Make sure that mouse reporting is actually turned off since killing
         some editors prematurely may leave the mouse in mouse report mode.
         I've heard that tcsh may use mouse reporting unless it otherwise
         specified. A quick check is to see if cut/paste works when the Alt
-        or Shift keys are depressed. See urxvt(7)
+        or Shift keys are depressed. See rxvt(7)
     What's with this bold/blink stuff?
         If no bold colour is set via "colorBD:", bold will invert text using
         the standard foreground colour.
            URxvt.color6:       #73f7ff
            URxvt.color14:      #73f7ff
            URxvt.color7:       #e1dddd
            URxvt.color15:      #e1dddd
-    How can I start urxvtd in a race-free way?
+    How can I start rxvtd in a race-free way?
-        Try "urxvtd -f -o", which tells urxvtd to open the display, create
+        Try "rxvtd -f -o", which tells rxvtd to open the display, create the
-        the listening socket and then fork.
+        listening socket and then fork.
     What's with the strange Backspace/Delete key behaviour?
         Assuming that the physical Backspace key corresponds to the
         BackSpace keysym (not likely for Linux ... see the following
         question) there are two standard values that can be used for
         For starting a new rxvt-unicode:
            # use Backspace = ^H
            $ stty erase ^H
-           $ urxvt
+           $ rxvt
            # use Backspace = ^?
            $ stty erase ^?
-           $ urxvt
+           $ rxvt
-        Toggle with "ESC [ 36 h" / "ESC [ 36 l" as documented in urxvt(7).
+        Toggle with "ESC [ 36 h" / "ESC [ 36 l" as documented in rxvt(7).
         For an existing rxvt-unicode:
            # use Backspace = ^H
            $ stty erase ^H
         There are some compile-time selections available via configure.
         Unless you have run "configure" with the "--disable-resources"
         option you can use the `keysym' resource to alter the keystrings
         associated with keysyms.
-        Here's an example for a URxvt session started using "urxvt -name
+        Here's an example for a URxvt session started using "rxvt -name
         URxvt"
            URxvt.keysym.Home:          \033[1~
            URxvt.keysym.End:           \033[4~
            URxvt.keysym.C-apostrophe:  \033<C-'>
                l               Scroll to bottom on TTY output
         "Ps = 1011" (rxvt)
                h               Scroll to bottom when a key is pressed
                l               Don't scroll to bottom when a key is pressed
+        "Ps = 1021" (rxvt)
+               h               Bold/italic implies high intensity (see option -is)
+               l               Font styles have no effect on intensity (Compile styles)
         "Ps = 1047"
                h               Use Alternate Screen Buffer
                l               Use Normal Screen Buffer - clear Alternate Screen Buffer if returning from it
            Ps = 711        Set bold fontset to Pt. Similar to Ps = 50 (Compile styles).
            Ps = 712        Set italic fontset to Pt. Similar to Ps = 50 (Compile styles).
            Ps = 713        Set bold-italic fontset to Pt. Similar to Ps = 50 (Compile styles).
            Ps = 720        Move viewing window up by Pt lines, or clear scrollback buffer if Pt = 0 (Compile frills).
            Ps = 721        Move viewing window down by Pt lines, or clear scrollback buffer if Pt = 0 (Compile frills).
+           Ps = 777        Call the perl extension with the given string, which should be of the form extension:parameters (Compile perl).
 menuBar
     The exact syntax used is *almost* solidified. In the menus, DON'T try to
     --enable-lastlog (default: on)
         Write user and tty to lastlog file (used by programs like lastlogin)
         at start of rxvt execution. This option requires --enable-utmp to
         also be specified.
-    --enable-xpm-background (default: off)
+    --enable-xpm-background (default: on)
         Add support for XPM background pixmaps.
-    --enable-transparency (default: off)
+    --enable-transparency (default: on)
         Add support for inheriting parent backgrounds thus giving a fake
         transparency to the term.
     --enable-fading (default: on)
         Add support for fading the text when focus is lost (requires
     --enable-tinting (default: on)
         Add support for tinting of transparent backgrounds (requires
         "--enable-transparency").
-    --enable-menubar (default: off)
+    --enable-menubar (default: off) [DEPRECATED]
         Add support for our menu bar system (this interacts badly with
-        dynamic locale switching currently).
+        dynamic locale switching currently). This option is DEPRECATED and
+        will be removed in the future.
     --enable-rxvt-scroll (default: on)
         Add support for the original rxvt scrollbar.
     --enable-next-scroll (default: on)
         A non-exhaustive list of features enabled by "--enable-frills"
         (possibly in combination with other switches) is:
           MWM-hints
           EWMH-hints (pid, utf8 names) and protocols (ping)
-          seperate underline colour
+          seperate underline colour (-underlineColor)
-          settable border widths and borderless switch
+          settable border widths and borderless switch (-w, -b, -bl)
-          settable extra linespacing
+          settable extra linespacing /-lsp)
           iso-14755-2 and -3, and visual feedback
           backindex and forwardindex escape sequence
           window op and some xterm/OSC escape sequences
-          tripleclickwords
+          tripleclickwords (-tcw)
-          settable insecure mode
+          settable insecure mode (-insecure)
           keysym remapping support
-          cursor blinking and underline cursor
+          cursor blinking and underline cursor (-cb, -uc)
-          -embed and -pty-fd options
+          XEmbed support (-embed)
+          user-pty (-pty-fd)
+          hold on exit (-hold)
+          skip builtin block graphics (-sbg)
+          sgr modes 90..97 and 100..107
     --enable-iso14755 (default: on)
-        Enable extended ISO 14755 support (see urxvt(1), or doc/rxvt.1.txt).
+        Enable extended ISO 14755 support (see rxvt(1), or doc/rxvt.1.txt).
         Basic support (section 5.1) is enabled by "--enable-frills", while
         support for 5.2, 5.3 and 5.4 is enabled with this switch.
     --enable-keepscrolling (default: on)
         Add support for continual scrolling of the display when you hold the
         Use Doug Lea's malloc - which is good for a production version See
         <http://g.oswego.edu/dl/html/malloc.html> for details.
     --enable-smart-resize (default: on)
         Add smart growth/shrink behaviour when changing font size via hot
-        keys. This should keep in a fixed position the urxvt corner which is
+        keys. This should keep the window corner which is closest to a
-        closest to a corner of the screen.
+        corner of the screen in a fixed position.
     --enable-pointer-blank (default: on)
         Add support to have the pointer disappear when typing or inactive.
+    --enable-perl (default: off)
+        Enable an embedded perl interpreter. See the rxvtperl(3) manpage
+        (doc/rxvtperl.txt) for more info on this feature, or the files in
+        src/perl-ext/ for the extensions that are installed by default. The
+        perl interpreter that is used can be specified via the "PERL"
+        environment variable when running configure.
     --with-name=NAME (default: urxvt)
         Set the basename for the installed binaries, resulting in "urxvt",
         "urxvtd" etc.). Specify "--with-name=rxvt" to replace with "rxvt".

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Comparing rxvt-unicode/doc/rxvt.7.txt (file contents): Revision 1.25 by root, Tue Nov 8 17:35:28 2005 UTC vs. Revision 1.36 by root, Tue Jan 10 04:26:54 2006 UTC

Diff Legend

Comparing rxvt-unicode/doc/rxvt.7.txt (file contents):
Revision 1.25 by root, Tue Nov 8 17:35:28 2005 UTC vs.
Revision 1.36 by root, Tue Jan 10 04:26:54 2006 UTC