XLIB Programming Manual, Rel. 5, Third Edition

Glossary

X uses many common terms in unique ways. A good example is “children.” While most, if not all, of these terms are defined where they are first used in this book, you will undoubtedly find it easier to refresh your memory by looking for them here.

This glossary is an expanded version of the glossary in the Xlib-C Language X Interface, by Jim Gettys, Ron Newman, and Bob Scheifler.

access control list

X maintains lists of hosts that are allowed access to each server controlling a display. By default, only the local host may use the display, plus any hosts specified in the access control list for that display. This access control list can be changed by clients on the local host. Some server implementations may implement other authorization mechanisms in addition to or instead of this one. The list can currently be found in /etc/X#.hosts, where # is the number of the display. The access control list is also known as the host access list.

active grab

Keyboard keys, the keyboard, pointer buttons, the pointer, and the server can be grabbed for exclusive use by a client, usually for a short time period. An active grab causes pointer and keyboard events to be sent to the grabbing window regardless of the current position of the pointer. See passive grab.

ancestor

If window W is an inferior of window A, then A is an ancestor of W. The parent window, the parent’s parent window, and so on are all ancestors of the given window. The root window is the ancestor of all windows on a given screen. ...