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xfig-3.2.4: description + notes

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xfig is an interactive drawing tool which runs under the X Window System. The Xfig home page has more information. The transfig and fig2dev image format converters are in a separate transfig package.

In xfig, figures may be drawn using objects such as circles, boxes, lines, spline curves, text, etc. It is also possible to import images in formats such as GIF, JPEG, EPSF (PostScript), etc. Those objects can be created, deleted, moved, or modified. Attributes such as colors or line styles can be selected from various options. For text, various fonts are available. Text can also include Latin-1 characters such as ``ä'' or ``ç''.

This product installs it's X application default files under /usr/freeware/lib/X11/app-defaults, which is not on the default X search path. There are several ways to extend your X search path. The XUSERFILESEARCHPATH, XAPPLRESDIR, XFILESEARCHPATH, and XENVIRONMENT environment variables all affect resource file loading. The easiest methods are to either create a NetHack symlink in /usr/lib/X11/app-defaults or to add code similar to this to your startup scripts:

   % export XUSERFILESEARCHPATH=
   ${XUSERFILESEARCHPATH:+${XUSERFILESEARCHPATH}:}
   /usr/freeware/lib/X11/%T/%N%C%S:
   /usr/freeware/lib/X11/%T/%N%S:
   /usr/freeware/lib/X11/app-defaults/%N%C%S:
   /usr/freeware/lib/X11/app-defaults/%N%S

(If XUSERFILESEARCHPATH is already set we append the new directories separated by a colon, otherwise we simply set it to the new colon-separated list. The line wrapping above is for clarity; the actual value should be a single line with no embedded whitespace or backslashes.)

Note: The ASCII (-A) and TIFF (-C and -T) preview bitmap options for PostScript and EPS export require fw_ghostscript to work. If you don't have ghostscript, the export will continue without a preview.

Note: xfig uses delegates to perform various tasks. You can edit customize values by editing /usr/freeware/lib/X11/app-defaults/Fig. The defaults are:

• Fig.image_editor: gimp, available from fw_gimp.
• Fig.ghostscript: gs, available from fw_ghostscript.
• Fig.browser: netscape. The freeware distribution has several alternative web browsers.
• Fig.pdfviewer: acroread. An alternative is xpdf from fw_xpdf.
• Fig.spellcheckcommand: spell. An alternative is ispell from fw_ispell.

These packages are not declared as prerequisites, as you can run xfig without them.

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To auto-install this package, go back and click on the respective install icon.

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