Athena Widgets (Xaw) uses Xt (X toolkit Intrinsics) to interface XCB and Xlib. Xaw is part of Project Athena which has a larger scope beyond graphical widgets. Project Athena was started by MIT, with support from IBM and Digital Equipment Corp.
x11-toolkits/neXtaw, x11-toolkits/Xaw3d and x11-toolkits/libxaw3dxft are implementations of Xaw (x11-toolkits/libXaw). Xaw3dxft is an extended version for Unicode fonts of Xaw3d. Most Xaw (Athena Widgets) applications are compatible with these implementations. Some programs that use these implementations also use the main Xaw libraries. These four Xaw implementations are under the MIT license.
pkg info -D Xaw3d gives a hint. It states to rename the original Xaw libraries to Xaw2d names. Then, it says to link the targets of Xaw to the library of the implementation. Because the versions weren't listed in the /usr/local/lib/, I improvised based on the versions that were there.
Go to the directory, /usr/local/lib/, then, move libXaw.so.7 to libXaw2d.so.7, and libXaw.so.6 to libXaw2d.so.6. After that, link both libXaw.so.6 and libXaw.so.7 to libXaw3d.so.8.
To use another implementation, replace the target of libXaw3d.so.8 in the link with libXaw3dxft.so.8 or with libneXtaw.so. To remove the link, use
Screenshots
The screenshot above shows programs that by default run with Xaw3d.
The screenshot above shows programs that by default are installed with Nextaw and Xaw3dxft.
The above screenshot shows programs after being run with Xaw, then upgraded to working with Xaw3d, Xaw3dxft and Nextaw, there's a major visual difference according to the versions they use. This image is in higher resolution, to make it easier to see comparisons.
Xaw3d and Xaw3dxft seem to give the same visual appearance. Their main difference is in text fonts.
The above screenshots are on CTWM.
Comparison to Motif
Motif also uses Xt to interface with Xlib and XCB.
x11-toolkits/open-motif seems to actually be ICS's (Integrated Computer Solutions, Inc.) Motif, not Open Motif. Open Motif is actually, http://www.opengroup.org/openmotif/, and is licensed under IBM Public License (IPL) 1.0. Motif's license change to LGPL 2.1 came after Lesstif (x11-toolkits/lesstif) was started as a toolkit implementation, in order to pressure ICS to open Motif's license. Lesstif is obsolete now.
Interestingly, x11-toolkits/open-motif uses a Xaw library as a dependency, at least on FreeBSD's ports.
x11-toolkits/neXtaw, x11-toolkits/Xaw3d and x11-toolkits/libxaw3dxft are implementations of Xaw (x11-toolkits/libXaw). Xaw3dxft is an extended version for Unicode fonts of Xaw3d. Most Xaw (Athena Widgets) applications are compatible with these implementations. Some programs that use these implementations also use the main Xaw libraries. These four Xaw implementations are under the MIT license.
- https://simson.net/clips/1989/1989.TechRev.Athena.pdf
- http://web.mit.edu/6.933/www/final.pdf
- https://www.x.org/releases/X11R7.7/doc/libXaw/libXaw.html
- https://www.informit.com/articles/article.aspx?p=18227
pkg info -D Xaw3d gives a hint. It states to rename the original Xaw libraries to Xaw2d names. Then, it says to link the targets of Xaw to the library of the implementation. Because the versions weren't listed in the /usr/local/lib/, I improvised based on the versions that were there.
Go to the directory, /usr/local/lib/, then, move libXaw.so.7 to libXaw2d.so.7, and libXaw.so.6 to libXaw2d.so.6. After that, link both libXaw.so.6 and libXaw.so.7 to libXaw3d.so.8.
cd /usr/local/lib
mv libXaw.so.7 libXaw2d.so.7
mv libXaw.so.6 libXaw2d.so.6
ln -s libXaw3d.so.8 libXaw.so.7
ln -s libXaw3d.so.8 libXaw.so.6
To use another implementation, replace the target of libXaw3d.so.8 in the link with libXaw3dxft.so.8 or with libneXtaw.so. To remove the link, use
rm libXaw.so.?, then use another Xaw target. To go back to the original Xaw, link the corresponding library files back to libXaw2d.so.7 and libXaw2d.so.6.Screenshots
The screenshot above shows programs that by default run with Xaw3d.
The screenshot above shows programs that by default are installed with Nextaw and Xaw3dxft.
The above screenshot shows programs after being run with Xaw, then upgraded to working with Xaw3d, Xaw3dxft and Nextaw, there's a major visual difference according to the versions they use. This image is in higher resolution, to make it easier to see comparisons.
To get the last screenshot, I left the programs running, then changed the settings, starting new processes of the programs, for enough to make a screenshot showing a few of the same programs, side by side.
In these, the output with Nextaw looks consistently the best out of these implementations. However, some of these programs can't be restored visually, once they are resized excessively. Also, some programs are difficult to close.
In these, the output with Nextaw looks consistently the best out of these implementations. However, some of these programs can't be restored visually, once they are resized excessively. Also, some programs are difficult to close.
Xaw3d and Xaw3dxft seem to give the same visual appearance. Their main difference is in text fonts.
The above screenshots are on CTWM.
Comparison to Motif
Motif also uses Xt to interface with Xlib and XCB.
x11-toolkits/open-motif seems to actually be ICS's (Integrated Computer Solutions, Inc.) Motif, not Open Motif. Open Motif is actually, http://www.opengroup.org/openmotif/, and is licensed under IBM Public License (IPL) 1.0. Motif's license change to LGPL 2.1 came after Lesstif (x11-toolkits/lesstif) was started as a toolkit implementation, in order to pressure ICS to open Motif's license. Lesstif is obsolete now.
Interestingly, x11-toolkits/open-motif uses a Xaw library as a dependency, at least on FreeBSD's ports.
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