Cygwin X11 Server slow performance

Tue Jun 5 00:24:00 GMT 2018

Paul Sheer wrote:
>> Cygwin/X is most definitely being used, and this might help:
>>
>> https://x.cygwin.com/docs/ug/using-shared-memory.html
>>
> 
> 
> Being used? I find that very difficult to believe.
----
	What type of PC and network do you have?

I've been using Cygwin since Windows XP days, and while it isn't as
fast as a native linux port, it IS running on top of windows.

	You didn't say -- are you running your Xwindows remotely
or locally?

	For me, I run the server locally, but many of the programs I
run are on linux.

> There are a large number of usability problems I have found and I have only
> been using Cygwin for a couple of hours. It's does not seem ready for
> release yet IMO.
----
	Too late, it was released over a decade ago.  It's maintained by
volunteers.  You seem to have very high expectations of a *free product*.
Today, even most paid products wouldn't meed up with your standards.

> 
> 1. There seems no way to map particular important keys. For instance
> Left-Alt-Tab should be configurable to either Windows or X11 depending
> on the users preference, and this configuration should be available in a menu
> somewhere easy to find -- but it has no configuration menus on the top bar
> like normal applications.
----
	Maybe you aren't familiar with 'X'.  X is just a graphical
transport.  It doesn't have menus unless some other program puts them up.
Try 'X' on linux -- running it from startX from a console and see
how easy it is to use.

> 
> 2. it is extremely difficult to work out that
> "C:\cygwin64\bin>XWin.exe -ac -listen tcp" is the appropriate command
> to type to get the server to serve a remote Linux machine. This seems
> like a common use case -- so why "hide" this information?
---
	Did you look in the start menu as you would with any other
application running on windows?  Go look at the "Cygwin" or "Cygwin-X"
folders.  The cygwin folder has all the documentation pointers you seem
to have missed, and the cygwin-X folder looks like it starts up the
desktop of your choice -- without you having to type in anything.
There's also a link for starting up the XWin Server 

> 3. Forgets that you have your mouse button held down if you drag past
> the edge of the X screen. It should not let your mouse cursor out the
> X screen when you are dragging.
---
	I always start mine in multi-window mode so the windows
intermix with normal windows, so I don't see that problem.

> 4. Is there no option like XWin.exe -ac -listen 10.12.21.0/24 to
> restrict connections to a particular network?? This seems very easy to
> implement and solves the security problem. It might be in a menu also.
---
	Cygwin repackages open-source packages.  Specific program 
features and suggestions should be addressed to those maintaining
those packages OUTSIDE of the Cygwin project.  The Cygwin maintainers
focus on porting those existing packages so they work on windows.

> 5. The performance issue is not related to the shared memory problem.
> My text editor has multiple ways of rendering 8x13bold (font-struct font-set and
> pixmap) and they are all slow. XMing is also slow (I have notified
> Colin Harrison
> but even after a year he cant fix it).
----
	So it's not just Cygwin.  Maybe your graphics card is slow?
What is your DISPLAY set to?
localhost:0? or similar?

> 
> This latency may be because you are not using Windows accelerated
> rectangle copies, or it may be because you have not disabled the
> Nagle algorithm for latency.
---
	Cygwin uses the same network as all programs in windows.
It doesn't re-implement the network stack -- If it is slow, it's
likely because it is slow in windows.

> 6. cygserver-config does not work. It gives:

> Warning: The following function requires administrator privileges!
> A good start is either you don't have administrator privileges
> or a missing cygrunsrv binary.  Please check for both.

> 7. Surely the above program can check if it is a privilege problem
> or not and simply tell you?
---
	How?  How many ways should it try to analyze the situation?
MS doesn't document many of their interfaces.  It is not always easy
to figure out why something doesn't work -- EVEN microsoft can't
figure out things.  I submitted problems on Windows 7 about starting my
event log.  No one at MS monitoring the user or tech forums were able
to fix it -- it happens to multiple people.  The only fix MS suggest now,
is to upgrade to Win10.  IF MS doesn't understand how their OS works, how
do you expect anyone else to?

>  Why should I have to read through
> documentation to enable a simple "checkbox" feature when it
> can only be On or Off and there are no other options???
---
	It's a microsoft feature -- complain to them.  Cygwin cannot
overcome all the problems in windows.

> 
> 8. cygwin seems to have the concept of an administrator,
---
	Actually windows does.

> Is my default user the administrator?  It should be -- it is a home PC.
> I can't even tell what
> the intended behavior is. It keeps asking me for a password for
> psheer but I have never set a password on this PC.
----
	THAT's part of your problem.  Several things won't work  
correctly in windows if you don't have a password set.  If you don't
know how windows works, PLEASE don't expect to install a program on
Windows and it to solve every problem that the underlying OS has.
If you don't know who or what your administrator account in windows
is, you are going to have a hard time installing most programs.
Cygwin provides a unix/linux type environment.  But it sounds like you
have no familiarity with linux or unix or windows.  Cygwin
isn't for you.  It's for people who want to run free software that
is user-written and supported, for *free*.  It doesn't have support.
It isn't known for being user-friendly, but neither is most software
these days.

	You might be happier buying an apple computer.  I don't know
about now, but they tend to provide everything you need including a
virtual companion to hold your hand getting things to work.

> 
> 9. There is no package management that works properly. The
> install program setup-x86_64.exe seems to re-download things
> that are already downloaded. It is kludgy and everything is ambiguous.
> It seems unclear what is a label telling you the state, or a button telling
> you to switch to a state. Surely it is easy to make a Gtk or Qt interface
> for this package manager?
----
	Nope.  Gtk and Qt don't easily run on Windows -- there are ports
and there are the versions that run in cygwin, but those versions require
that cygwin already be installed, creating a catch22 problem.

> How do you know what a "minimal" set of packages is?
---
	Whatever the default selection is when you start setup --
usually the BASE packages.

> 
> Do I have to install everything?
---
> 
> If I install everything does it cache what it has downloaded so
> as not to download everything again?
---
	It can.  Problem is it only downloads what you are installing
and even then, what you installed may be updated and need to be downloaded
again.

> 10. After trying to install more packages I now get: "The procedure
> entry point __memcpy_chk could not be located in the dynamic link
> library cygwin1.dll"
---
	This sounds like a disk corruption problem.  What version of
windows are you running on what hardware?

> 11. Surely the Start menu should have a cygwin-packages menu
> item to manage package, get dependencies correct, and verify
> the integrity of an installation.
---
	Windows doesn't.  Where do you get your expectations?

> 13. Why do some binaries run on the command line and do nothing
> and show no error??? Unix never does this.
---
	It absolutely does this.  The default on Unix was to say
nothing unless there was an error.  Most unix programs say very little
unless you ask them to.  Do you have any specific examples?  Many of
the binaries on cygwin come from the exact same source as is on linux.
(there really isn't any unix anymore)...

> I hope this all helps.
----
	Not really.  You seem to be thinking cygwin should provide
support.  They have enough problems getting all the packages to 
run.  If you want to provide improvements, please do.  But expecting
them to when they can't even support a soft-mount on MS, because they
turned it into a duplicate softlink function, is really a bit too much.

> I'll be uninstalling cygwin now because I can't waist any more time on it.
---
You'll be happier, believe me.  It's not for you.  Try getting an
Macintosh -- it's more likely to provide all the comforts you are seeking.

Cheers --- and BTW, I don't work on cygwin, I merely complain about it, er,
I mean use it (and have for over a decade).

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