TTL
December 28th, 2005, 02:29 PM
Ok, after three days of trouble, I finally got x.org 6.9 running onto Kubuntu Breezy. :)
In short: Yes you could get x.org 6.9 running, but it is not easy so I suggest you should try it only when you have serious problems with the x.org release you are currently using AND have already some experience with Linux.
I would describe the risk of upgrading as follow:
Loss of data: low (but not zero!)
That you throw your PC from the table: medium
That you become crazy: high
That you don't get x.org 6.9 running: very high
That you end up with a PC which does not has a running x-server anylonger: very high
So everyone who do not need 6.9 immediately should wait until Dapper is out :)
For those who still want to upgrade, will follow the HOWTO now.
1: Firs we need the sourcecode of x.org 6.9
go to http://wiki.x.org/wiki/Mirrors select a mirror near you and download
you will need the file X11R6.9.0-src.tar.bz2 which is located on the ftp server at pub/X11R6.9.0/src-single/ . After downloading uncompress the file into a folder wit a few hundred free MB.
2: We will need some tools for building x.org 6.9, so apt-get install bison flex libpam0g-dev
it might be possible that I have forgotten some, so refer to the file BUILD in the source directory if you need to apt-get some more programs.
3: Working around a bug in Breezy
There is a bug in Breezy, which would us prevent from compiling:
http://bugzilla.ubuntu.com/show_bug.cgi?id=18157
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=80678
The bug is fixed in the Dapper packages, so we need them.
Add to your /etc/apt/sources.list
deb http://de.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu dapper main restricted
save and do apt-get update , and then apt-get install libc6 libc6-dev . This will install
libc6 libc6-dev libc6-i686 from Dapper. After that comment
deb http://de.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu dapper main restricted
out and do apt-get update again to prevent future not planned upgrade accidents.
4: make lmdir
I don't know wether this is necessary or not, but I followed the introduction in the file BUILD .
Go into the directory xc/config/util and do make -f Makefile.ini lndir then copy (as root) lndir to /usr/local/bin
After that create a new folder (as normal user again) at the same level as xc , go into it and do
lndir ../xc or similar. This will create some directories and links.
5: compiling
So now we will know if all above worked.
In one xterm do make World > World.log 2>&1 which will direct all messages to World.log. If all goes well the logfile will be 5MB big an hour later. You can watch the messages with tail -f World.log in a second xterm.
At the end my logfile contains a lot of warnings and some error messages. The error messages complains about a missing fcfreetype.h but it looks like this file is not really necessary. No other error are written in the logfile.
6: Now the risky part starts and I suggest you to read the full HOWTO until the end before proceed with this point!!!!
Login as root without a running x-server. Then remove your existing x.org installation.
apt-get -s remove xserver-xorg xorg-common . This will show you that (at least on my machine) 63 packages will be removed. Do it
apt-get remove xserver-xorg xorg-common .
7: Installing the new x.org 6.9
Go into the directory where you did make World > World.log 2>&1 before. Now take a breath (from this point there will be no way back) and enter make install (as far as I know there is no uninstall available). Then he will start copying a lot of files. On my machine he aborts the process, complaining that /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/xkb/symbols/pc is not a directory where he can copy files in. Yes, pc is a file and not a directory, so I simply renamed pc to pc.file and generated a directory pc. mv pc pc.file ; mkdir pc Now just rerun make install , at least for me it ran successfully until the end.
8: Starting x.org 6.9
Entering startx might shock you because it did not work (at least for me). It complains that there is no /usr/bin/X11/X . But when did a reboot kdm started automatically as always. :D Just startx still did not work. I tried to make a link from /usr/bin/X11/X to /usr/X11R6/bin/Xorg but I made a mistake and linked /usr/X11R6/bin/X to /usr/X11R6/bin/Xorg and now nothing worked. But for some reason suddenly there was a executable /usr/bin/X11/X which I simply copied back to /usr/X11R6/bin/X. startx now got much further but aborted with some missing xterm . Fortunately startx icewm did work (you have to apt-get install icewm), so nothing completely lost. I figured out that startx did not start kde anylonger but tries twm by default and that /etc/X11/xinit/xinitrc was wrong configured. I corrected the path to xterm in the file and now startx starts twm but not kde - I can life with that at the moment.
9: What works:
Finally i got x.org 6.9 working and with the new release I am able to play videos without crashing the x-server and there is some 2D acceleration support for my ATI Radeon Xpress 200M now (I had to use noaccel as option before). The disadvantage is that startx does not start kde (but the login manager does). I am sure this could be corrected if I would know where to look ;)
So do this on your own risk and only when you need it and have already some experience with Linux.
Having fun with 2D acceleration now :D
In short: Yes you could get x.org 6.9 running, but it is not easy so I suggest you should try it only when you have serious problems with the x.org release you are currently using AND have already some experience with Linux.
I would describe the risk of upgrading as follow:
Loss of data: low (but not zero!)
That you throw your PC from the table: medium
That you become crazy: high
That you don't get x.org 6.9 running: very high
That you end up with a PC which does not has a running x-server anylonger: very high
So everyone who do not need 6.9 immediately should wait until Dapper is out :)
For those who still want to upgrade, will follow the HOWTO now.
1: Firs we need the sourcecode of x.org 6.9
go to http://wiki.x.org/wiki/Mirrors select a mirror near you and download
you will need the file X11R6.9.0-src.tar.bz2 which is located on the ftp server at pub/X11R6.9.0/src-single/ . After downloading uncompress the file into a folder wit a few hundred free MB.
2: We will need some tools for building x.org 6.9, so apt-get install bison flex libpam0g-dev
it might be possible that I have forgotten some, so refer to the file BUILD in the source directory if you need to apt-get some more programs.
3: Working around a bug in Breezy
There is a bug in Breezy, which would us prevent from compiling:
http://bugzilla.ubuntu.com/show_bug.cgi?id=18157
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=80678
The bug is fixed in the Dapper packages, so we need them.
Add to your /etc/apt/sources.list
deb http://de.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu dapper main restricted
save and do apt-get update , and then apt-get install libc6 libc6-dev . This will install
libc6 libc6-dev libc6-i686 from Dapper. After that comment
deb http://de.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu dapper main restricted
out and do apt-get update again to prevent future not planned upgrade accidents.
4: make lmdir
I don't know wether this is necessary or not, but I followed the introduction in the file BUILD .
Go into the directory xc/config/util and do make -f Makefile.ini lndir then copy (as root) lndir to /usr/local/bin
After that create a new folder (as normal user again) at the same level as xc , go into it and do
lndir ../xc or similar. This will create some directories and links.
5: compiling
So now we will know if all above worked.
In one xterm do make World > World.log 2>&1 which will direct all messages to World.log. If all goes well the logfile will be 5MB big an hour later. You can watch the messages with tail -f World.log in a second xterm.
At the end my logfile contains a lot of warnings and some error messages. The error messages complains about a missing fcfreetype.h but it looks like this file is not really necessary. No other error are written in the logfile.
6: Now the risky part starts and I suggest you to read the full HOWTO until the end before proceed with this point!!!!
Login as root without a running x-server. Then remove your existing x.org installation.
apt-get -s remove xserver-xorg xorg-common . This will show you that (at least on my machine) 63 packages will be removed. Do it
apt-get remove xserver-xorg xorg-common .
7: Installing the new x.org 6.9
Go into the directory where you did make World > World.log 2>&1 before. Now take a breath (from this point there will be no way back) and enter make install (as far as I know there is no uninstall available). Then he will start copying a lot of files. On my machine he aborts the process, complaining that /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/xkb/symbols/pc is not a directory where he can copy files in. Yes, pc is a file and not a directory, so I simply renamed pc to pc.file and generated a directory pc. mv pc pc.file ; mkdir pc Now just rerun make install , at least for me it ran successfully until the end.
8: Starting x.org 6.9
Entering startx might shock you because it did not work (at least for me). It complains that there is no /usr/bin/X11/X . But when did a reboot kdm started automatically as always. :D Just startx still did not work. I tried to make a link from /usr/bin/X11/X to /usr/X11R6/bin/Xorg but I made a mistake and linked /usr/X11R6/bin/X to /usr/X11R6/bin/Xorg and now nothing worked. But for some reason suddenly there was a executable /usr/bin/X11/X which I simply copied back to /usr/X11R6/bin/X. startx now got much further but aborted with some missing xterm . Fortunately startx icewm did work (you have to apt-get install icewm), so nothing completely lost. I figured out that startx did not start kde anylonger but tries twm by default and that /etc/X11/xinit/xinitrc was wrong configured. I corrected the path to xterm in the file and now startx starts twm but not kde - I can life with that at the moment.
9: What works:
Finally i got x.org 6.9 working and with the new release I am able to play videos without crashing the x-server and there is some 2D acceleration support for my ATI Radeon Xpress 200M now (I had to use noaccel as option before). The disadvantage is that startx does not start kde (but the login manager does). I am sure this could be corrected if I would know where to look ;)
So do this on your own risk and only when you need it and have already some experience with Linux.
Having fun with 2D acceleration now :D