osx - How do I properly configure my .xinitrc file to start the openbox session manager

06
2014-04

Bill McCloskey

I've installed openbox twice - once with Fink, and once with MacPorts. Both installations yield the same result: startx terminates with an error diagnostic from xinit.

I have a working .xinitrc for various other window managers. How do I modify my .xinitrc to invoke either openbox or openbox-session? The man page for openbox seems to indicate that it is possible, but I cannot get the syntax down.

The error diagnostic that I receive when invoking startx is

whmcclos@mbp:~
[38] startx
font_cache: Scanning user font directories to generate X11 font caches
font_cache: Updating FC cache
font_cache: Done
xauth:  file /Users/whmcclos/.serverauth.5834 does not exist

/opt/X11/bin/xinit: XFree86_VT property unexpectedly has 0 items instead of 1
Openbox-Message: Invalid button "A-Left" in mouse binding
Openbox-Message: Invalid button "A-Middle" in mouse binding
Openbox-Message: Unable to find a valid config file, using some simple defaults
ObRender-Message: Unable to load the theme 'Clearlooks'
Openbox-Message: Unable to load a theme.
/opt/X11/bin/xinit: connection to X server lost

waiting for X server to shut down

Here is my working .xinitrc - it works when I comment out exec openbox-session and uncomment the line #e16:

[40] cat .xinitrc
#!/bin/sh
# $Xorg: xinitrc.cpp,v 1.3 2000/08/17 19:54:30 cpqbld Exp $

source ~/.profile

userresources=$HOME/.Xresources
usermodmap=$HOME/.Xmodmap
sysresources=/usr/X11/lib/X11/xinit/.Xresources
sysmodmap=/usr/X11/lib/X11/xinit/.Xmodmap

# merge in defaults and keymaps

if [ -f $sysresources ]; then
    if [ -x /usr/bin/cpp ] ; then
        xrdb -merge $sysresources
    else
        xrdb -nocpp -merge $sysresources
    fi
fi

if [ -f $sysmodmap ]; then
    xmodmap $sysmodmap
fi

if [ -f "$userresources" ]; then
    if [ -x /usr/bin/cpp ] ; then
        xrdb -merge "$userresources"
    else
        xrdb -nocpp -merge "$userresources"
    fi
fi

if [ -f "$usermodmap" ]; then
    xmodmap "$usermodmap"
fi

# start some nice programs

xrdb -load $HOME/.Xresources
xsetroot -solid gray &
xclock -g 50x50-0+0 -bw 0 &
xload -g 50x50-50+0 -bw 0 &
gnome-terminal --geometry=80x25+90+90 &
gnome-terminal --geometry=80x25+90-90 &
#gnome-wm
#twm
#quartz-wm
#mwm
#e16
exec openbox-session

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Related Answers

Karl Bielefeldt

You need a session manager to gracefully kill the applications. openbox-session may do what you want. The documents explicitly say it doesn't do the saving session part, but it may do the gracefully kill part. openbox-gnome-session or openbox-kde-session will let you use the respective session managers while using openbox as your window manager.

cYrus

Here's how I solved, I edited ~/.Xsession this way:

# <initialization stuff here>

openbox-session &
WM_PID=$!

sleep 0.5 # time needed to start openbox

# <autostart applications here>

wait $WM_PID

for i in `ps -u $USER -o pid= | grep -v $$` ; do
    kill $i
done

sleep 1 # grace time

I can't find anything better by now. Maybe I should use a session manager but I don't know which one fits my case.

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osx - How do I properly configure my .xinitrc file to start the openbox session manager