Introduction

Xfree86 and EMX have been around for a while, and many OS/2 and eComstation users are running it already. There are also pleany of sources and info on how to install these and use it. I have attempted to document the steps of the install and make it easier for the curious user.

EMX

EMX comes on the 3^rd eComstation CD (The Application CD) and can be used for your X Window system. Although the installer will allow you to install it anywhere, use <boot drive>:\emx and make your life easier.

Download

If for some reason you don't have the eCS CD then download from here.

XFREE86

Binaries

There are a lot of things to download to install. There are recommendations for a basic runtime system on up.

At a minimum you will need to download Xbase.zip, Xbin.zip, Xdoc.zip, Xfnts.zip, and an Xserver for your video card (mine was XSVGA.zip for Matrox G400). The files I used were from the Xfree86OS2 site. Here you can find the binaries for OS/2 and eComStation as well as source code to compile yourself. The current OS2 version is 3.3.6. At Xfree86.org you will find the current version is 4.1.0 however I believe you would have to get the source code and compile it for OS2 and eComStation.

Window Manager

There are other files to download too. I haven't tried the others yet, but I do recommend getting a better Window Manager thant the default one (twm is almost unusable) from the ported software section. There are some other files you will want to download from here also. They all get unzipped into the <boot drive>:\Xfree86 directory tree. That's all you need to install them.
I have installed IceWM which has several GUI styles including Warp 3 and Warp 4, fvWM2 which has the CDE GUI, fvWm95 which looks like Windows 4.0, and AfterStep. I have also modified the REXX script xinitrc.cmd to set a default Window Manager and also allow an argument to be passed containing the desired Window Manager to start.

Ported Software to Download

xfm

The X File Manager

Xpdf

A PDF maker

Xed

A simple text editor

Smedit

A slightly better text editor.

Scicalc

A Scientific Caclulator

X3270

A 3270 Terminal Emulator (It is the one used in Red Hat Linux).

Nedit

Another Editor.

Other X Window applications may be found here.

You might even try any software you have on a Linux CD you are no longer using.

System Configuration

Config.Sys

There are changes you will need to make to your config.sys file up front then reboot before you continue. Pay special attention to the configuration of the localhost parameters and TCP/IP for if this is not set up correctly your ISP connection will stop working, but it is easily fixed.

The rest is coming soon.