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STARTX(1) STARTX(1)
NAME
startx - initialize an X session
SYNOPSIS
startx [ [ client ] options ... ] [ -- [ server ] options ... ]
DESCRIPTION
The startx script is a front end to xinit that provides a somewhat
nicer user interface for running a single session of the X Window Sys-
tem. It is often run with no arguments.
Arguments immediately following the startx command are used to start a
client in the same manner as xinit(1). The special argument '--'
marks the end of client arguments and the beginning of server options.
It may be convenient to specify server options with startx to change
on a per-session basis the default color depth, the server's notion of
the number of dots-per-inch the display device presents, or take
advantage of a different server layout, as permitted by the Xorg(1)
server and specified in the xorg.conf(5x) file. Some examples of
specifying server arguments follow; consult the manual page for your X
server to determine which arguments are legal.
startx -- -depth 16
startx -- -dpi 100
startx -- -layout Multihead
To determine the client to run, startx first looks for a file called
.xinitrc in the user's home directory. If that is not found, it uses
the file xinitrc in the xinit library directory. If command line
client options are given, they override this behavior and revert to
the xinit(1) behavior. To determine the server to run, startx first
looks for a file called .xserverrc in the user's home directory. If
that is not found, it uses the file xserverrc in the xinit library
directory. If command line server options are given, they override
this behavior and revert to the xinit(1) behavior. Users rarely need
to provide a .xserverrc file. See the xinit(1) manual page for more
details on the arguments.
The system-wide xinitrc and xserverrc files are found in the
/etc/X11/xinit directory.
The .xinitrc is typically a shell script which starts many clients
according to the user's preference. When this shell script exits,
startx kills the server and performs any other session shutdown
needed. Most of the clients started by .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 xterm as the ''magic'' client.
EXAMPLE
Below is a sample .xinitrc 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.
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
ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES
DISPLAY This variable gets set to the name of the
display to which clients should connect.
Note that this gets set, not read.
XAUTHORITY This variable, if not already defined, gets
set to $(HOME)/.Xauthority. This is to pre-
vent the X server, if not given the -auth
argument, from automatically setting up inse-
cure host-based authentication for the local
host. See the Xserver(1) and Xsecurity(7x)
manual pages for more information on X
client/server authentication.
FILES
$(HOME)/.xinitrc Client to run. Typically a shell script
which runs many programs in the background.
$(HOME)/.xserverrc Server to run. The default is X.
/etc/X11/xinit/xinitrc Client to run if the user has no .xinitrc
file.
/etc/X11/xinit/xserverrc Server to run if the user has no .xserverrc
file.
SEE ALSO
xinit(1), Xserver(1), Xorg(1)
STARTX(1)
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