VGA

The VGA is a simple color dumb frame buffer. The server supports VGA as 8-bit indexed color with all visual types and a default of PseudoColor (vga8), or 4-bit StaticColor (vga4). When using 8-bit mode, the resolution is most often 1024x768. Four-bit mode is often limited to a resolution of 640x480 because this is the basic VGA graphics mode that is available on all VGA devices. Most VGAs provide a bitsPerRGB of 6. The vga8 server is also capable of supporting the XGA as a dumb frame buffer.

Support for VGA panning is available in modes of the 4-bit VGA. Panning mode provides the ability to have a physical window that maps onto a larger virtual display. Movement within the virtual display is performed by “pushing” the mouse past the edge of the screen. The display automatically moves the physical window in the virtual display in the direction that the mouse was pushed until the physical window touches the edge of the virtual boundary.

Use panning only if you are an experienced OpenWindows user. Icons and pop-up boxes (menus, dialogs, and so on) can appear off screen with no immediate visible notification. You must be experienced enough to recognize these situations, and be able to recover by looking for the hidden window objects. Pop-up pointer jumping is highly recommended while using panning. Virtual window managers, such as olvwm or tvwm, can cause additional confusion; do not use them.