Installation of Xfce4 Session
Install Xfce4 Session by running
the following commands:
./configure --prefix=/usr \
--sysconfdir=/etc \
--disable-legacy-sm &&
make
This package does not come with a test suite.
Now, as the root user:
make install
Configuring Xfce4 Session
There are several optional run time dependencies for Xfce4: dbus-1.12.16,
GnuPG-2.2.17, hicolor-icon-theme-0.17 and OpenSSH-8.0p1
When building an Xfce4 package,
some configuration files are installed in /usr/share/applications, /usr/share/icons, and /usr/share/mime. In order to use those files in
your Xfce4 session, you need to
update various databases. Do that by running, as the root user (you need to have the recommended
dependencies installed):
update-desktop-database &&
update-mime-database /usr/share/mime
Starting Xfce4
You can start Xfce4 from runlevel
3, using xinit-1.4.1, or from runlevel 5, using a Display
Manager, such as lightdm-1.30.0.
To start Xfce4 using xinit-1.4.1,
run the following commands:
cat > ~/.xinitrc << "EOF"
dbus-launch --exit-with-session startxfce4
EOF
startx
The X session starts on the first unused virtual terminal, normally
vt7. You can switch to another vtn simultaneously pressing the keys
Ctrl-Alt-Fn (n=1, 2, ...). To switch back to the X
session, normally started at vt7, use Ctrl-Alt-F7. The vt where the
command startx was
executed will display many messages, including X starting messages,
applications automatically started with the session, and
eventually, some warning and error messages. You may prefer to
redirect those messages to a log file, which not only will keep the
initial vt uncluttered, but can also be used for debugging
purposes. This can be done starting X with:
startx &> ~/.x-session-errors
![[Note]](../images/note.png)
Note
You may wish to drop dbus-launch, e.g., just using startxfce4 in
~/.xinitrc. However some capabilities such as mounting or
umounting file systems from a file manager will not be possible,
or the reboot option will be absent or inoperative, among other
problems.
When shutting down or rebooting, the shutdown messages appear on
the vt where X was running. If you wish to see those messages,
simultaneously press keys Alt-F7 (assuming that X was running on
vt7).