Linux Desktop Hacks

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Chapter 9, Administration and Automation

#72 Start Desktop Applications Automatically

HACK

All this does is start up the Fluxbox window manager. To start LinEAK, the

custom keyboard utility, add the following line to the .xinitrc file before you

start Fluxbox:

lineakd &

exec /usr/bin/fluxbox

Notice the ampersand (&) following lineakd, which tells lineakd to start in

the background. Unless a program places itself automatically in the back-

ground without a trailing ampersand, you need to make sure you add the

ampersand. Without the ampersand, the

lineakd command will not release

control back to the ~/.xinitrc script, and Fluxbox will never start.

You can launch many additional commands via ~/.xinitrc, including com-

mands that control how your X11 graphical system behaves. For example,

the

xset -b command turns off beeps in terminal windows. You can also use

xset to set the volume and duration of beeps, control the lights (LEDs) on

your keyboard, and much more. In this case, you don’t need an ampersand

after the

xset commands, because xset returns control to the script on its

own. Here is a slightly more advanced .xinitrc file:

xset -b

xcompmgr -cCfF -l 0 -t 0 -r 5 -o .6 &

lineakd &

exec /usr/bin/fluxbox

This script also includes the xcompmgr command [Hack #33] (which works only

with Xorg-X11 6.8 or better). This command sets window drop shadows

and fade effects. Unlike xset, the xcompmgr program needs ...