An upgrade to xorg-server-1.5.3_1,1/libxcb-1.1.93

[Alex Goncharov]

I upgraded my X Window system today, with these instructions in mind:

  # /usr/ports/UPDATING 
  20090124:
    sysutils/hal has been updated and should now properly detect
    mice for use in Xorg.  Use of AllowEmptyInput should no longer
    be needed for most users and moused should now work fine.
  
  20090123:
    Server 1.5.3 also really wants to configure its input devices
    via hald.  This is causing some issues with moused and
    /dev/sysmouse.  

My system is 7.1-STABLE, and I did a full rebuild of relevant ports;
my window manager is `twm'.

Based on my experience, I have a few questions:

1. Up until this upgrade, I have always avoided using HAL, setting
   "WITHOUT_HAL = yes" in my /etc/make.conf file.
   
   Today's rebuild with this setting resulted in the mouse (and I
   think keyboard, too) not working in X.  Following the 20090123
   note, I commented out the WITHOUT_HAL option in /etc/make.conf and
   rebuild everything again, modified `etc/rc.conf' appropriately --
   and the X input is working fine again.

   So, is HAL a mandatory component (from the X11 perspective) now?

   If so, these lines in `x11-servers/xorg-server/Makefile' don't
   really make sense:
   
      OPTIONS= HAL "Compile with HAL config support"...
      .if !defined(WITHOUT_HAL)

   (not having HAL is not an option) -- right? 

2. As soon as my new X was up, I started to notice consistent
   appearances of garbage in my `xterm's -- the garbage that is easily
   removed by redrawing a window.

   More than a year ago, I switched my workstation (not this computer)
   from Debian to FreeBSD, where my primary motivation was to try to
   get rid of the sporadic and quite often garbage in the work windows
   -- after I switched to FreeBSD, I have never seen that garbage
   again.

   The essential point here is that Debian used HAL, and FreeBSD
   didn't.

   Does anybody know if HAL can be a plausible cause of this
   annoyance?

It would be great if it were possible to switch to the new X without
bringing in HAL, at least for some time -- too many variables changed
in this transition and I am not sure what configuration variation to
try next to identify the source of the garbage.

-- Alex -- alex-goncharov at comcast.net --

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