
chooser and xdmping  (version 1.2.1)
------------------------------------


The software here is released under the GNU public license.  A copy of
this license is in the file `GPL'.  The file chooser.c also contains
the original copyright (X Consortium), authored by Keith Packard.

The `chooser' is a modifided version of the standard chooser, with a
slighty nicer 3D-ish interface.  Instead of broadcasting, it allows the
user to supply a host via the keyboard.  This is useful when the list
of machines extends beyond the limit of a broadcast, or is too cumbersome
to enter on the command line (in one of the XDM config files).

Version 1.2.0 (and above) additionally support a configurable drop-down
list of hosts.  For more information see the newly written man-pages! :)

xdmping is a quick way of determining if a host is willing to provide an
XDM login session.  This is probably only useful in certain circumstances.

Compilation is straightforward and uses the usual autoconf/automake.  A
typical configure command might be:

    ./configure --prefix=/usr/local --sysconfdir=/etc

If the X includes/libraries are not found by default, tell configure about
them using the  --x-includes=DIR  and  --x-libraries=DIR  options.  Then
simply make and make install.  The example configuration is *not* installed
by default -- you must do this manually:

To get this to work, copy the file `xdmchoose.conf' to the SYSCONFDIR
directory, specified using --sysconfdir <directory>  option to ./configure.
Typically this defaults to /usr/local/etc.  I prefer /etc/ though.  Then
add/modify the following line in the xdm-config file:

DisplayManager*chooser:         /usr/local/bin/xdmchooser

(subsituting the appropiate path to the chooser executable)

The config file (xdmchoose.conf) contains all of the currently usual
options.  The default setup is with a background pixmap (xdmchoose-blur.xpm).
The config file *must* be modified so it can find the full path of the image,
or just comment the line out.

The idea emerged from discussions between Phill Camp <P.S.S.Camp@ukc.ac.uk>,
Dave Reeve <dcr1@ukc.ac.uk>, and myself <fred@frmb.org>


Enjoy,
  Fred.

