CERN Accelerating science

fvwm Version 2

  Lionel Cons IT/DIS (and the UMTF/X11 Working Group)

As announced in a previous CNL (CNL 225 - "HEPiX X11 Scripts & fvwm2"), version 2 of the fvwm window manager (widely used at CERN) is available. In fact, by the time this CNL is published, most users of fvwm will have migrated to fvwm2. This article just gives the major features of this new version.

The version of fvwm2 installed on ASIS (2.0.45) has been used without problems for some months by tens of users. Here are the major features:

Features Common to 1.xx and 2.xx (quick list):

• Multiple Disjoint Large Virtual Desktops.
• Smaller memory usage.
• Dynamically extensible via modules.
• Recognizes Motif MWM hints.

Features New to 2.xx (quick list):

• New more powerful and sensible rc file format.
• Change more features on per-window basis.
• Change many features on the fly.

• the fvwm2 Web page at CERN, URL:
  http://wwwinfo.cern.ch/umtf/working-groups/X11/wm/fvwm/fvwm2.html
• the fvwm FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions), URL:
  http://wwwinfo.cern.ch/umtf/working-groups/X11/wm/fvwm/FAQ.text
• or simply type "man fvwm2" on a UNIX machine to access the fvwm2 man page.