On Sat, Aug 24, 2002 at 10:14:47AM -0400, Dan Espen wrote:
> Len Philpot <len_at_philpot.org> writes:
> > Is there a concise, authoritative guide to the proper syntax,
> > organization and such of .fvwm2rc contents somewhere? What I see in the
> > fvwm man page often conflicts with what's in the sample system.fvwm2rc
> > file
>
> Please point out the conflicts so that they can be repaired.
I've done so on FvwmTaskBar, at least to a small degree, in another
post. At this point, I'm not sure how much is inconsistency and how much
is just misunderstanding on my part. For example, the MenuStyle line
in the system.fvwm2rc that was installed on my system was in the old
style, according to the man page. I was trying to basically get the WIN
look, with a couple of things changed. However, I couldn't figure out
the precedence, so my changes never took effect. Usually, the menu would
revert back to the default look (I presume).
> For menus, this works:
>
> MenuStyle * BorderWidth 10
>
> I suspect you are having problems with the borders on windows.
> Perhaps you missed this in the man page:
Right now, I think my issues are more with an understanding of the
fundamental syntax of the config file, not the actual values in it. It's
looking more and more to me that conceptually, the config file is a bit
like Perl in that there are implied values, multiple syntaxes, shorthand
notations, etc. Is this correct? If so, that's something that's always
given me the willies, personally. I tend to like a specified way of
doing something, but that's my preference. Once I understand this, I'm
sure I'll settle on one way. Until then, it's a bit confusing.
For example, in your MenuStyle example above, what's the asterisk for?
All styles? I guess not, since that doesn't make sense, given the
context. Should it be in quotes: "*"? I've seen it that way as well here
and there. I understand about quoting values containing spaces, but how
about without them? Is there a definite order to options? Is it
case-sensitive?
> Fvwm may be speedy and small, but the amount of configuration possible
> is massive. Hence the extremly large man page, and difficulty getting
> started.
What I'm thinking of would be along the lines of what we've all seen in
programming tutorials : skeleton diagrams with placeholders showing how
everything is specified, in what order, what case, with what
punctuation, what's mutually exclusive, what's dependent on each other,
etc., etc. Then some simple examples that build on each other, instead
of a massive .fvwm2rc that can walk and talk and do the jitterbug. Also,
make the examples dovetail with FAQs on how and what can be done.
Someone else mentioned what I think is a very good idea: Supply a few
different config file samples that contain the same "content", but with
a differnt look and feel (native, Win95, CDE, etc.). That way, a newbie
such as myself could see what does and doesn't change.
Just my $0.02.
--
+-----------------------------------------------------+
| Len Philpot ><> http://philpot.org/ |
| len_at_philpot.org len_philpot_at_hotmail.com (alt) |
+-----------------------------------------------------+
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Received on Sun Aug 25 2002 - 16:40:04 BST