
================================================================================
WHAT DOES IT DO?
================================================================================


To quote from the xmessage manual page, xmessage is a program to "display a
message or query in a window."

It returns an exit code based on the user's response.

gxmessage is a gtk-2.0 based clone of xmessage.




================================================================================
YES, BUT WHY BOTHER?
================================================================================


  xmessage is jolly useful.

  xmessage isn't based on GTK.

  Just about everything else on my desktop is.

  I was bored.




================================================================================
COMPILATION / INSTALLATION / UNINSTALLATION
================================================================================


  (see the file named INSTALL for details)

  $ ./configure --prefix=/usr/local
  $ make
  $ su
  # make install-strip
  # exit
  $ make clean


  To uninstall, return to the gxmessage source directory and:

  $ su
  # make uninstall
  # exit




================================================================================
USAGE
================================================================================


  man xmessage
  gxmessage -help




================================================================================
DIFFERENCES / PROBLEMS
================================================================================


  Command line options introduced with double dashes are recognized as options
  by gxmessage (eg., --help), but not by xmessage. (This is an intentional
  "bug" in gxmessage, but I'm not convinced it was a good idea. If you have an
  opinion on this, please let me know. Actually, it'd be best not to use
  double dashes with gxmessage: they might disappear in future.)


  gxmessage has three options xmessage doesn't:
    -entry
    -version
    -?
  Ditto the "intentional bug" comment.


  xmessage has options gxmessage doesn't: -bg, -fg, -bd, etc...
  But gxmessage won't complain if it does meet those options: they'll just be
  skipped.


  Appearance: gxmessage <- ~/.gtkrc-2.0
              xmessage  <- ~/.Xresources and command line options


  Unless a geometry is given, xmessage sets the size of its window to fit the
  message it's going to display, up to a certain limit. gxmessage tries to do
  the same, but the code that does so is pretty horrid. YMMV.


  If a geometry is given, the position component is ignored by gxmessage.
  (Use -nearmouse or -center instead.)


  Displaying large(ish) files, gxmessage gets very sluggish. I guess that's
  because it's using a label widget. A text widget would probably be better.
  I'll experiment and see what can be done.


  With the -fn/-font option, the only font name gxmessage knows is "fixed".
  So, you might like to specify a proportional font for gxmessage in your
  ~/.gtkrc-2.0 file and override that, when necessary, by calling gxmessage
  with -fn fixed or -font fixed. (Font size will still come from your gtkrc
  though.)



================================================================================
MISC. NOTES
================================================================================


  Note that message text can be selected (copied to clipboard). Same with
  xmessage, of course, but selectable labels are my fave gtk-2.0 feature so
  I'll point it out :)


  You'll find some toys in the examples directory. Some are really meant to
  be Nautilus scripts, but they'll all work fine on the command line, too.

  These four could also be handy as window manager menu items, or as items
  on a GNOME panel:

    calendar_month.sh
    calendar_year.sh
    dialup.sh
    mutt_alias_lookup.sh


  Also in the examples directory there's a file named gtkrc-2.0. To use it,
  just append it to your own ~/.gtkrc-2.0 file.


  gxmessage (ie., updates) can be found somewhere here:
  http://homepages.ihug.co.nz/~trmusson/


  Bug reports and feedback are welcome:
  Tim Musson <trmusson@ihug.co.nz>


  If you need anything with more options, take a look at GNOME's "gdialog"
  program. gxmessage already has too many :p




================================================================================
CREDIT
================================================================================

  The geometry parsing code comes from GNOME 1.x.
  The code to tweak argv is based on code in GTK.

  xmessage is a neat idea/program. The authors of xmessage are
  Chris Peterson (MIT Project Athena) and Stephen Gildea (X Consortium).




