1. Starting MacX
2. The Three Button Mouse
3. Making your own Remote Commands file
4. Entering X commands in the terminal window
5. X Windows larger than the Macintosh display
6. Using Splus with MacX
7. Quitting the X terminal session

This document shows how to begin using MacX, an X terminal emulator, in the CIRCA labs.

Starting MacX

MacX stores its settings and preferences in document files. There is a sample MacX document named, "Remote Commands," which can help you get started using MacX with the CIRCA Ultrix VAX named, "elm."

1. Open Lab MacX.

2. Close the Untitled document

3. Open the Remote Commands document.

4. Select a Remote elm command.

5. Enter your elm username.

6. Enter your elm password.

7. Wait for the X client window to open on your Macintosh.

The Three Button Mouse

Many X applications assume your terminal has a three button mouse, but the standard Macintosh mouse has only one button. MacX uses the keyboard's arrow keys to emulate the other two mouse buttons, the meta and the control key, as follows:

With the option key held down, the keyboard's arrow keys behave normally, as follows:

You can reverse the above option/no-option effect by editing the miscellaneous preferences (in the "Edit" pull-down menu).

Making your own Remote Commands file

You can copy and modify the sample Remote Commands document on your own Macintosh diskette. Using the "Remote" pull-down menu, you can make new commands, modify old ones, remove any you don't want, and save these in your personal document for future use.

Don't remove the working sample commands until you've first gotten your new ones to work. Should you experience trouble with your new commands, you will still be able to compare them with commands that are configured properly.

MacX has a special string for use in its remote commands - "reg.display". For example, the sample "elm.xterm" command is:

xterm -title "reg.host" -display "reg.display"

Every remote command you define will probably need the -display option as specified above, so that the X client application will be able to find your MacX display server and open a window on it.

Entering X commands in the terminal window

Many times you will begin an xterm session via the "Remote" pull-down menu, and then enter a command in the terminal window to start an X client application. The X client might not be able to find your display, unless you include the -display option in your command.

The $DISPLAY environment variable contains the information to be entered with the -display option. For example:

xman -display $DISPLAY

In the event that your command cannot interpret the $DISPLAY variable correctly, you can issue the following command in the xterm window immediately after login:

echo $DISPLAY

And note the contents of this variable for use in your command later. The exact contents will vary from Mac to Mac, but will look something like:

128.227.194.85:0.0

X Windows larger than the Macintosh Display

>Many X clients expect a very large display and might open windows much larger than the 13" color monitors in CIRCA labs. The "Remote Commands" MacX document has been configured such that each X window opens with the standard Macintosh window controls. This means you can resize the X windows the same way you resize Macintosh windows. (Note: You can change this default by selecting "Display Preferences" in the "Edit" menu and clicking the "Rooted" button, and editing each Remote Command's display setting, which results in all X windows being displayed inside one Macintosh window.)

To resize a very large X window, first drag it left so that the right edge of the window is visible. You drag the window by grabbing its title bar using the mouse:

To resize the X window to the same size as the Macintosh monitor, click the zoom box in the upper right hand corner of the X window:

To resize the X window to whatever size you want, drag the grow box in the lower right hand corner of the X window:

Using Splus with MacX

In Splus, enter the following command to open the graphics window:

motif(options="display $DISPLAY")

To quit Splus properly, enter the following two commands in the terminal window. The first one closes the graphics window properly. The second one exits Splus properly:

dev.off()

q()

Quitting the X terminal session

To quit the xterm terminal session properly, enter:

exit