CRUX ports repository for Xfce 4.16

by David L. Craig (dlcusa) derived from prior work by pedja and sepen

[This page used jue's httpup index.html as a template--thanks, Jürgen!]

Except where otherwise noted, content on this web site is licensed as explained in this text file.

The xfce.org Release 4.16 Announcement and News Article(s)

The announcement published on 2020 Dec 22 at the xfce-announce mailing list is archived at the https://mail.xfce.org/pipermail/xfce-announce/2020-December/000956.html URL. The published News article's XML file was copied to this web site for posterity since the articles for previous releases seem to disappear after a while (but links to new pages containing the releases' news information are now included at the end of the XML file).

Why Use Xfce 4.16?

If you aren't sure about whether this Desktop Environment is worth installing, this one article should help you decide.

CRUX 3.6 xfce_4.16 Collection Status

Mar 25 2021 ~04:20 UT—(RC3) changes:
 xfce4-battery-plugin is upgraded to release 1.1.4
 xfce4-systemload-plugin is upgraded to release 1.3.1
The 4.16 version of xfce4-terminal changed the default behavior of the Tab key such that ls -C results are unaligned. If you want the 4.14 behavior restored, implement the change in this diff file as a local fix. If there is an outcry, I'm willing to add installation of the patch to the port's build function. Note it will be necessary to restart Xfce for the change to reliably affect all xfce4-terminal sessions.

Mar 22 2021 ~04:20 UT—(RC2 changes):
 thunar is upgraded to release 4.16.6

Mar 17 2021 ~16:45 UT—collection established (effectively RC1 per the following, it does install and runs smoothly and it won't badly misbehave if you do not purge existing settings):
 catfish is still not ported to CRUX
 gigolo is still not ported to CRUX
 libburn was inherited from the contrib collection
 libisoburn was inherited from the contrib collection
 libisofs was inherited from the contrib collection
 thunarx-python is not yet ported to the gitlab.xfce.org repository
 xfce4-calculator-plugin is still not ported to CRUX
 xfce4-embed-plugin does not yet build--config can't find libxfce4ui
 xfce4-mixer is not yet functional in Xfce 4.16
 xfce4-notes-plugin is not yet functional in Xfce 4.16
 xfce4-sample-plugin is still not ported to CRUX (still seriously unloved)
 xfce4-session elided unused xflock.patch file
 xfce4-statusnotifier-plugin from Xfce 4.14 has been dropped in Xfce 4.16
 xfce4-stopwatch-plugin is still not ported to CRUX
 xfce4-terminal elided unused 0001-Revert-Allow-underscores-that-are-part-of-tab-titles.patch file
 xfce4-timer-plugin is still not ported to CRUX
 xfce4-vala is still not ported to CRUX
 xfce4-volumed-pulse is not yet ported to the gitlab.xfce.org repository (and it is still not ported to CRUX)
 xfdashboard is still not ported to CRUX

Obtaining the Ports

You can access the repository by using httpup. See the CRUX wiki's httpup and ports FAQs pages for additional information. Here are the /etc/ports xfce_4.16.httpup driver file and xfce_4.16.pub repo public key file.

Quick Start

If you want to install the minimum set of packages, use
 prt-get depinst xfdesktop xfce4-settings xfwm4 xfce4-session
You may add any other packages you want; e.g., xfce4-terminal, to that list (note the order of these packages is not pertinent—prt-get depinst takes care of ordering all packages to be processed whether explicitly or implicitly specified). See the depinst package list for all available Xfce packages in the proper order of installation.

Description of Xfce Installation and Updating

The CRUX collection strategy for Xfce treats each stable (even numbered) release as a different, versioned collection, following the upline software development framework. Xfce release components mostly use the second dot-number to indicate development releases (odd) or stable releases (even), though many components do not conform to the Xfce version numbering, some do not use the odd/even convention, and one uses even for development and odd for stable (read the package announcements!). Consequently this page includes a type designator at the front of every release string:
 s current stable version (part of Xfce even version) 
 d current development version (part of Xfce odd version) 
 t previous stable version (part of Xfce even version) 
 e previous development version (part of Xfce odd version) 
 u version is uncertain, may not matter 

Development Xfce releases are used to produce the next stable release. For example, when release 4.15 was deemed ready, it was frozen while release 4.16 was created from its state and released. Then 4.17 was established to begin the next development cycle. Minor enhancements and bug fixes to the current stable release mostly appear as point (third dot-number) releases of the various individual stable packages.

When a new stable release is announced, deprecated packages from the previous stable release are moved to the archive git group and are no longer installed. Note this did not occur going from Xfce 4.14 to 4.16, nor were any new packages mentioned; however, xfce4-statusnotifier-plugin is now considered deprecated as of Xfce 4.16—its functionality has been absorbed by xfce4-panel).

Gentoo documentation indicates configurations between stable releases are not expected to be compatible. Thus, a need exists to force an uninstall of the previous stable release before installing a new stable release, and this is what the versioned collections facilitate. When the collection for the new stable release becomes available, the upgrade procedure involves:

(1) shutting down the Xfce desktop,

(2) removing (or moving elsewhere) all configuration/profile data per the Gentoo documentation,

(3) uninstalling all the ports installed from the prior collection,

(4) installing all desired ports of the new collection,

(5) starting up the new desktop, and

(6) reconfiguring all global and individualized settings as needed.

After a new stable release is announced, there may be more updates for the packages of the previous stable release, so there can be as many as six months of support for that release; e.g., in the thunar 1.6.18 announcement three months after Xfce 4.14 was announced, it was noted "Probably the last thunar release on the xfce-4.12 branch". Thus a good strategy is to plan to upgrade Xfce deployments within a few months of the announcement of the new stable release.

Maintaining CRUX collections for Xfce development releases is currently not expected due to resource contraints as well as the CRUX policy of avoiding the bleeding edge.

List of Collection's Ports in Depinst Order (bold indicates a required package)

Depends on Information for Required Ports

List of Collection's Ports with Release Info and Brief Description

The definitive index of all Xfce packages used to be at https://git.xfce.org/ which provides a two-page list of packages organized by the Xfce groups. However, in March 2020, https://gitlab.xfce.org/ became the definitive site and it separates the group lists, some of which are multiple pages. The previous site is still available but is said to be read only.

CRUX Xfce collections shall follow the stable releases of the individual packages by xfce.org as announced in the xfce-announce mailing list.

The following list of Xfce packages pertinent to the CRUX Xfce 4.16 collection is sorted by package, then release date in newer-first order. Each release string will have an s, d, t, e, or u prepended to indicate its type (current stable, current development, previous stable, previous development, or uncertain). Thus the list shows the history of the packages (the list in the xfce_4.14/index.html file did not include package history nor track development releases). As versions become unsupported, the list will be pruned to keep only the version's final release information for each package therein.

The Grp column contains a character defining the gitlab.xfce.org group of the package (if any)—the characters and their meanings (unchanged from the git.xfce.org repo) are:
 A apps 
 B bindings 
 D archive (deprecated—none for this release) 
 N N/A (not applicable—the package is not from xfce.org) 
 P panel‑plugins 
 T thunar‑plugins 
 U users 
 W www 
 X xfce (core) 
The Package column is the package name.
The Release column is the release of the package announced with a prefix s, d, t, e, or u character to designate the type (current stable, current development, previous stable, previous development, or uncertain) of the release.
The Announced column is the YY-MM-DD of that release's announcement. These dates are clickable links to the designated announcements if they exist; otherwise, the date is that of the tarball of record in the archive.xfce.org/src tree.
The Description column briefly describes the package or is empty for a package in the archive group. These descriptions are clickable links to the best available documentation for the package.
The Notes column provides some useful information.

Bold package names indicate required packages, and italicized package lines indicate those either not yet ported to CRUX or are not to be ported to Xfce 4.16; i.e., deprecated but not yet moved to the archive group (the Notes column will define the type for the package). Bold release strings are the current release of the package for CRUX xfce_4.16. Also note packages moved to the archive group for Xfce 4.14 are not included in this list.