1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
130
131
132
133
134
135
136
137
138
139
140
141
142
|
.\" $XConsortium: startx.man,v 1.6 94/04/17 20:24:29 gildea Exp $
.\" Copyright (c) 1993 X Consortium
.\"
.\" Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining
.\" a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the
.\" "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including
.\" without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish,
.\" distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to
.\" permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to
.\" the following conditions:
.\"
.\" The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included
.\" in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.
.\"
.\" THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS
.\" OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF
.\" MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT.
.\" IN NO EVENT SHALL THE X CONSORTIUM BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR
.\" OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE,
.\" ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR
.\" OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.
.\"
.\" Except as contained in this notice, the name of the X Consortium shall
.\" not be used in advertising or otherwise to promote the sale, use or
.\" other dealings in this Software without prior written authorization
.\" from the X Consortium.
.TH STARTX 1 "Release 6" "X Version 11"
.SH NAME
startx \- initialize an X session
.SH SYNOPSIS
.B startx
[ [
.I client
]
.I options
\&\.\|.\|. ] [
.B \-\^\-
[
.I server
]
.I options
\&.\|.\|. ]
.SH DESCRIPTION
NOTE: The \fIstartx\fP script supplied with the X11 distribution is a sample
designed more as a base for customization than as a
finished product. Site administrators are urged to customize it for
their site. And to update this manual page when they do!
.PP
The \fIstartx\fP script is a front end to \fIxinit\fP that provides a
somewhat nicer user interface for running a single session of the X
Window System. It is typically run with no arguments.
.PP
To determine the client to run,
.I startx
first looks for a file called
.I .xinitrc
in the user's home directory. If that is not found, it uses
the file
.I xinitrc
in the
.I xinit
library directory.
If command line client options are given, they override this
behavior.
To determine the server to run,
.I startx
first looks for a file called
.I .xserverrc
in the user's home directory. If that is not found, it uses
the file
.I xserverrc
in the
.I xinit
library directory.
If command line server options are given, they override this
behavior. Users rarely need to provide a
.I .xserverrc
file.
See the
.IR xinit (1)
manual page for more details on the arguments.
.PP
The
.I .xinitrc
is typically a shell script which starts many clients according to the
user's preference. When this shell script exits,
.I startx
kills the server and performs any other session shutdown needed.
Most of the clients started by
.I .xinitrc
should be run in the background. The last client should run in the
foreground; when it exits, the session will exit. People often choose
a session manager, window manager, or \fIxterm\fP as the ``magic'' client.
.SH EXAMPLE
.PP
Below is a sample \fI\.xinitrc\fP that starts several applications and
leaves the window manager running as the ``last'' application. Assuming that
the window manager has been configured properly, the user
then chooses the ``Exit'' menu item to shut down X.
.sp
.in +4
.nf
xrdb \-load $HOME/.Xresources
xsetroot \-solid gray &
xbiff \-geometry \-430+5 &
oclock \-geometry 75x75\-0\-0 &
xload \-geometry \-80\-0 &
xterm \-geometry +0+60 \-ls &
xterm \-geometry +0\-100 &
xconsole \-geometry \-0+0 \-fn 5x7 &
exec twm
.fi
.in -4
.SH "ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES"
.TP 25
DISPLAY
This variable gets set to the name of the display to which clients should
connect. Note that this gets
.I set,
not read.
.SH FILES
.TP 25
.I $(HOME)/.xinitrc
Client to run. Typically a shell script which runs many programs in
the background.
.TP 25
.I $(HOME)/.xserverrc
Server to run. The default is
.I X.
.TP 25
.I <XRoot>/lib/X11/xinit/xinitrc
Client to run if the user has no
.I .xinitrc
file. <XRoot> refers to the root of the X11 install tree.
.TP 25
.I <XRoot>/lib/X11/xinit/xserverrc
Client to run if the user has no
.I .xserverrc
file. This is only needed if the server needs special arguments or is
not named. <XRoot> refers to the root of the X11 install tree.
.SH "SEE ALSO"
.IR xinit (1)
|