What's the diff between Apple's X11 and Fink?

Posted:
in Genius Bar edited January 2014
Can you tell me the difference please? To me they sound very similar.



Do they depend on each other?

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 4
    wmfwmf Posts: 1,164member
    They're totally different things. They do not depend on each other.



    FInk lets you easily install open source Unix apps on OS X.



    X11 lets you display X11 apps on OS X.



    Some Unix apps use X11, some don't.
  • Reply 2 of 4
    thuh freakthuh freak Posts: 2,664member
    yea, like wmf said, ur getting a little confused. Fink is a general package installation system. it takes care of installing software and the software's requirements. One of those packages that fink can take care of, for you, is X11. Fink has, I think, 2 options there. (a) It can plug in to an already installed X11 (like Apple's), or (b) it can download and install its own.



    The difference between using Fink's and using someone else's (like Apple's) is not very significant, technically. Well, Apple has put in some optimizations, and depending on your predjudices with large corporations you may feel more, or less, safe with them backing the product. The distribution that fink builds itself for X11, I think, comes from XFree86. XFree86 is a large project for bringing X11 to many Unices, and Unix-like systems. Apple's version is based on XFree86 code (v4.3.0 I believe, the most recent). Any X11 implementation you get will allow you to run X11 apps, like the Gnome environment, KDE, the Gimp, or whatever else. There are some proprietary X11 distros available, which I wouldn't recommend (proprietary = evil), but you may want to consider.



    The X11 I use is from xfree86's website. They have a command line installer, which isn't too tough, but definitely more difficult than Apple's. If you have panther, it's probably best and easiest to just stick with the X11 that apple gives you. One thing that apple's doesn't have (actually, I'm not sure about this) is a full screen mode. They have a 'rootless' mode, which makes x11 apps and windows integrate with regular aqua windows/apps. In full screen mode, x11 apps aren't visible at all in aqua, you have to go into the x11 program to see them.
  • Reply 3 of 4
    So, I can use Fink to install KDE, and then use X11 to run KDE?
  • Reply 4 of 4
    Quote:

    Originally posted by dstranathan

    So, I can use Fink to install KDE, and then use X11 to run KDE?



    ***DING DING DING***
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