Listen "Episode 4:06: Anything But Common"
Episode Synopsis
Coming up in this episode
* We do a little upgrade
* Firefox fixes a tooltip
* The History of W, V, X and CDE
* How it went
* And a new old desktop to explore
0:00 Cold Open
1:42 Lemmy's Upgraded!
10:56 A 22 Year Old Bug
15:50 Install Firefox Correctly
22:22 CDE History: Intro
24:04 CDE History: X
27:33 CDE History: OPEN LOOK
29:25 CDE History: COSE
31:28 CDE History: CDE & Others
34:24 CDE History: The Opening
36:14 CDE History: The Releases
43:02 How'd CDE Go?
1:16:00 Next Time
1:21:29 Stinger
Watch the video! (https://youtu.be/-tycNQ-Ey9Q)
https://youtu.be/-tycNQ-Ey9Q
Banter
The LUS Lemmy instance (https://lemmy.linuxuserspace.show) got an update (https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy-ansible/releases/tag/1.2.0).
The ansible repo switched to tagged releases. There were ⚠️breaking changes⚠️ that needed to be prepared for (https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy-ansible/blob/main/README.md#upgrading).
One of the issues Dan had is likely fixed now. (https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy-ansible/commit/300a261b2a346dd6489f5eb43d6af632633f4059)
The Bug (https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/10/22-year-old-firefox-tooltip-bug-fixed-in-a-few-lines-offering-hope-to-us-all/) that's old enough to drink and drive, but hopefully not at the same time!
Dan installed Firefox (https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/install-firefox-linux#w_install-firefox-from-mozilla-builds) from the .tar.gz download.
Spoiler - it updates just fine because my user is the owner in the /opt directory.
Announcements
This program was made possible by:
* The letters W, V, X, C, D and E
* 📺️Youtube (https://youtube.com/linuxuserspace)
* 📽️TILvids (https://tilvids.com/a/linuxuserspace)
* And by contributions to your L-U-S station by Patrons (https://patreon.com/linuxuserspace) like you 😍
The History of The Common Desktop Environment (CDE) (https://sourceforge.net/projects/cdesktopenv/)
The Andrew Project (https://web.archive.org/web/20120717074939/http://www.cmu.edu/corporate/news/2007/features/andrew/what_is_andrew.shtml)
W was a windowing system that was originally written for the V operating system (https://web.archive.org/web/20040522163027/http://eia.udg.es/~teo/sd/documents/articles/p314-cheriton.pdf).
In 1984, Robert Scheifler wrote (https://www.talisman.org/x-debut.shtml).
X is our “reaction” to W (https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/22949.24053)
Ultrix Window Manager (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultrix_Window_Manager), or uwm
Tom's Window Manager, which eventually became Tab Window Manager (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twm), or twm
Open Look Specification (https://archive.org/details/openlookgraphica00sunm)
The OSF narrows the search for a User Interface (https://books.google.com/books?id=szsEAAAAMBAJ&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q=open%20look&f=false).
HP (https://www.worldradiohistory.com/Archive-Company-Publications/HP-Journal/90s/HPJ-1990-06.pdf) and Microsoft's CXI and DEC's XUI to create the HP OSF/Motif Window Manager.
Sun went on to build OpenWindows (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenWindows), which was X with OPEN LOOK on top to replace SunView (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SunView).
COSE (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_Open_Software_Environment)
In 1994, The OSF and Unix International, a body meant to standardize UNIX, merged (https://groups.google.com/g/comp.unix.osf.misc/c/Q2uTrTvB8bY/m/8SMI8V-JvE4J), and in 96, merged again (https://www.tech-insider.org/unix/research/1996/0214.html) with X/Open into The Open Group.
Motif and CDE became one (https://groups.google.com/g/cu.motif-talk/c/xMQ-2cBi9bU/m/_VTikcvANZkJ)
KDE enters the scene (https://groups.google.com/g/de.comp.os.linux.misc/c/SDbiV3Iat_s/m/zv_D_2ctS8sJ).
May of 2000 when Motif was released (https://web.archive.org/web/20131003125200/https://groups.google.com/forum/message/raw?msg=comp.windows.x.announce/K2LrU6QusnA/5fRzz-NBIrAJ) as OpenMotif.
LessTif, because Less is Mo, published an initial statement (https://web.archive.org/web/20000619030034/http://www.lesstif.org/future.html)
August 6th, 2012, CDE was relicensed (https://web.archive.org/web/20121124230739/http://devio.us/~kpedersen/forums/viewtopic.php?id=1293) under the LGPL and was available on SourceForge, where it still lives today.
After opening it up, 2.2.1 was released on March 1st, 2014 (https://sourceforge.net/p/cdesktopenv/mailman/message/32043063/).
The final release, at least as of this recording, 2.5.1 (https://sourceforge.net/p/cdesktopenv/mailman/message/37715846/), dropped in October of 2022.
More Announcements
Want to have a topic covered or have some feedback? - send us an email, [email protected] OR jump on over to the open forum on Lemmy (https://lemmy.linuxuserspace.show/c/forum)
Housekeeping
Catch these and other great topics as they unfold on our Subreddit or our News channel on Discord.
* 🗞️ Linux User Space Lemmy (https://lemmy.linuxuserspace.show)
* 📰 Linux User Space subreddit (https://linuxuserspace.show/reddit)
* ⌨️ Linux User Space Discord Server (https://linuxuserspace.show/discord)
* 📲 Linux User Space Telegram (https://linuxuserspace.show/telegram)
* ✉️ Linux User Space Matrix (https://linuxuserspace.show/matrix)
* 📽️ Linux User Space Twitch (https://linuxuserspace.show/twitch)
* 🐘 Linux User Space Mastodon (https://linuxuserspace.show/mastodon)
* 📜 Linux User Space Twitter (https://linuxuserspace.show/twitter)
* 📺️ Linux User Space TILVids (https://linuxuserspace.show/tilvids)
Next Time
Some topics and feedback. Our next history exploration is the Xfce Desktop Environment (https://xfce.org/)
Come back in two weeks for more Linux User Space
Stay tuned 📡 and interact with us on Lemmy, Twitter, Mastodon, Telegram, Matrix, Discord whatever. Give us your suggestions on our subreddit r/LinuxUserSpace Join the conversation. Talk to us, and give us more ideas. All the links in the show notes and on linuxuserspace.show.
We would like to acknowledge 🤩 our top patrons. Thank you 🙏 for your support!
Producer
Bruno
Dave
John
Johnny
Co-Producer
Tim
Super User
A.J.
Advait
CubicleNate
Eduardo S.
Hausken
Jill and Steve
Larry
LiNuXsys666
Livet
Musical Coder
Nicholas
Nick
sleepyeyesvince
The Saigoneer
Tobias
* We do a little upgrade
* Firefox fixes a tooltip
* The History of W, V, X and CDE
* How it went
* And a new old desktop to explore
0:00 Cold Open
1:42 Lemmy's Upgraded!
10:56 A 22 Year Old Bug
15:50 Install Firefox Correctly
22:22 CDE History: Intro
24:04 CDE History: X
27:33 CDE History: OPEN LOOK
29:25 CDE History: COSE
31:28 CDE History: CDE & Others
34:24 CDE History: The Opening
36:14 CDE History: The Releases
43:02 How'd CDE Go?
1:16:00 Next Time
1:21:29 Stinger
Watch the video! (https://youtu.be/-tycNQ-Ey9Q)
https://youtu.be/-tycNQ-Ey9Q
Banter
The LUS Lemmy instance (https://lemmy.linuxuserspace.show) got an update (https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy-ansible/releases/tag/1.2.0).
The ansible repo switched to tagged releases. There were ⚠️breaking changes⚠️ that needed to be prepared for (https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy-ansible/blob/main/README.md#upgrading).
One of the issues Dan had is likely fixed now. (https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy-ansible/commit/300a261b2a346dd6489f5eb43d6af632633f4059)
The Bug (https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/10/22-year-old-firefox-tooltip-bug-fixed-in-a-few-lines-offering-hope-to-us-all/) that's old enough to drink and drive, but hopefully not at the same time!
Dan installed Firefox (https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/install-firefox-linux#w_install-firefox-from-mozilla-builds) from the .tar.gz download.
Spoiler - it updates just fine because my user is the owner in the /opt directory.
Announcements
This program was made possible by:
* The letters W, V, X, C, D and E
* 📺️Youtube (https://youtube.com/linuxuserspace)
* 📽️TILvids (https://tilvids.com/a/linuxuserspace)
* And by contributions to your L-U-S station by Patrons (https://patreon.com/linuxuserspace) like you 😍
The History of The Common Desktop Environment (CDE) (https://sourceforge.net/projects/cdesktopenv/)
The Andrew Project (https://web.archive.org/web/20120717074939/http://www.cmu.edu/corporate/news/2007/features/andrew/what_is_andrew.shtml)
W was a windowing system that was originally written for the V operating system (https://web.archive.org/web/20040522163027/http://eia.udg.es/~teo/sd/documents/articles/p314-cheriton.pdf).
In 1984, Robert Scheifler wrote (https://www.talisman.org/x-debut.shtml).
X is our “reaction” to W (https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/22949.24053)
Ultrix Window Manager (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultrix_Window_Manager), or uwm
Tom's Window Manager, which eventually became Tab Window Manager (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twm), or twm
Open Look Specification (https://archive.org/details/openlookgraphica00sunm)
The OSF narrows the search for a User Interface (https://books.google.com/books?id=szsEAAAAMBAJ&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q=open%20look&f=false).
HP (https://www.worldradiohistory.com/Archive-Company-Publications/HP-Journal/90s/HPJ-1990-06.pdf) and Microsoft's CXI and DEC's XUI to create the HP OSF/Motif Window Manager.
Sun went on to build OpenWindows (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenWindows), which was X with OPEN LOOK on top to replace SunView (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SunView).
COSE (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_Open_Software_Environment)
In 1994, The OSF and Unix International, a body meant to standardize UNIX, merged (https://groups.google.com/g/comp.unix.osf.misc/c/Q2uTrTvB8bY/m/8SMI8V-JvE4J), and in 96, merged again (https://www.tech-insider.org/unix/research/1996/0214.html) with X/Open into The Open Group.
Motif and CDE became one (https://groups.google.com/g/cu.motif-talk/c/xMQ-2cBi9bU/m/_VTikcvANZkJ)
KDE enters the scene (https://groups.google.com/g/de.comp.os.linux.misc/c/SDbiV3Iat_s/m/zv_D_2ctS8sJ).
May of 2000 when Motif was released (https://web.archive.org/web/20131003125200/https://groups.google.com/forum/message/raw?msg=comp.windows.x.announce/K2LrU6QusnA/5fRzz-NBIrAJ) as OpenMotif.
LessTif, because Less is Mo, published an initial statement (https://web.archive.org/web/20000619030034/http://www.lesstif.org/future.html)
August 6th, 2012, CDE was relicensed (https://web.archive.org/web/20121124230739/http://devio.us/~kpedersen/forums/viewtopic.php?id=1293) under the LGPL and was available on SourceForge, where it still lives today.
After opening it up, 2.2.1 was released on March 1st, 2014 (https://sourceforge.net/p/cdesktopenv/mailman/message/32043063/).
The final release, at least as of this recording, 2.5.1 (https://sourceforge.net/p/cdesktopenv/mailman/message/37715846/), dropped in October of 2022.
More Announcements
Want to have a topic covered or have some feedback? - send us an email, [email protected] OR jump on over to the open forum on Lemmy (https://lemmy.linuxuserspace.show/c/forum)
Housekeeping
Catch these and other great topics as they unfold on our Subreddit or our News channel on Discord.
* 🗞️ Linux User Space Lemmy (https://lemmy.linuxuserspace.show)
* 📰 Linux User Space subreddit (https://linuxuserspace.show/reddit)
* ⌨️ Linux User Space Discord Server (https://linuxuserspace.show/discord)
* 📲 Linux User Space Telegram (https://linuxuserspace.show/telegram)
* ✉️ Linux User Space Matrix (https://linuxuserspace.show/matrix)
* 📽️ Linux User Space Twitch (https://linuxuserspace.show/twitch)
* 🐘 Linux User Space Mastodon (https://linuxuserspace.show/mastodon)
* 📜 Linux User Space Twitter (https://linuxuserspace.show/twitter)
* 📺️ Linux User Space TILVids (https://linuxuserspace.show/tilvids)
Next Time
Some topics and feedback. Our next history exploration is the Xfce Desktop Environment (https://xfce.org/)
Come back in two weeks for more Linux User Space
Stay tuned 📡 and interact with us on Lemmy, Twitter, Mastodon, Telegram, Matrix, Discord whatever. Give us your suggestions on our subreddit r/LinuxUserSpace Join the conversation. Talk to us, and give us more ideas. All the links in the show notes and on linuxuserspace.show.
We would like to acknowledge 🤩 our top patrons. Thank you 🙏 for your support!
Producer
Bruno
Dave
John
Johnny
Co-Producer
Tim
Super User
A.J.
Advait
CubicleNate
Eduardo S.
Hausken
Jill and Steve
Larry
LiNuXsys666
Livet
Musical Coder
Nicholas
Nick
sleepyeyesvince
The Saigoneer
Tobias
More episodes of the podcast Linux User Space
Episode 6:06: The Epic Epoch
22/12/2025
Episode 6:05: Plasma is the Way-Land
08/12/2025
Episode 6:04: Attack of the 50 Foot-Guns
17/11/2025
Episode 6:03: Boot Slide N' Boogie
03/11/2025
Episode 6:02B: The Cosmic B-Side
20/10/2025
Episode 6:02: The Lizard and The Wyzyrd
06/10/2025
Episode 6:01: Yet Another Clanker
22/09/2025
Episode 5:14: Bloat Don’t Float
02/06/2025
Episode 5:13: Sloppy AI or Good Fuzzing?
19/05/2025
ZARZA We are Zarza, the prestigious firm behind major projects in information technology.