MKS Homepage v8.0 


MKS X/Server is designed to be the ideal solution for interoperability of PCs and UNIX/Linux systems, and provides the usability and flexibility that users as well as enterprise system administrators require. MKS X/Server is a great companion to MKS Toolkit, the leader in UNIX to Windows interoperability.

MKS Inc.
12701 Fair Lakes Circle,
Suite 350
Fairfax VA
22033

Main:
  +1-703-803-3343

Support:
  +1-703-803-7660
  tk_support@mkssoftware.com

www.mkssoftware.com

MKS X/Server 8.0

MKS X/Server 8.0 is a rebranded and updated version of the latest version of SCO XVision Eclipse. It includes several performance enhancements and introduces several new features.

Windows Vista Compatibility

MKS X/Server 8.0 has been validated on Windows Vista Release Candidate 2. As with all beta operating systems, implementations are subject to changes which can cause code that worked on the beta to fail to work on the final release. For this reason, MKS will revalidate and release a version with full Vista support within 30 days of the formal general availability date. This is the date for release to the general public as opposed to the date for release to MSDN.

IPv6 Support

MKS X/Server features full support for the Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) in addition to support for traditional IPv4. This ensures that MKS X/Server is ready to match the future needs of corporate IT infrastructures.

64-bit Support

In addition to a 32-bit version, MKS X/Server also features a native 64-bit version for the x64 platform. The smart MKS X/Server installer automatically senses the platform on which it is being installed and selects the appropriate binaries to be installed on that platform. On x86 and Itanium systems, the 32-bit version of MKS X/Server is installed. On x64 systems, the 64-bit version of MKS X/Server is installed.

AF_UNIX Protocol

MKS X/Server now supports a fast local transport called AF_UNIX. When working with MKS Toolkit for Enterprise Developers, you can port X11 applications to Windows which will use the AF_UNIX transport to communicate with MKS X/Server for added performance. Of course, such applications can also remain on UNIX and be rendered using IPv4 or IPv6 connections.

Windows Installer

MKS X/Server uses Windows Installer technology to ensure secure, bulletproof, compliant installs that work every time. In addition, this technology gives you the ability to perform silent, administrative, and customized installations on one or all of the machines in your network.

In addition to correctly installing the components for your platform, the MKS X/Server installer automatically detects incoming X11 connections and lets you configure the Windows firewall to allow these connections.

Minor updates and fixes to MKS X/Server are delivered in Windows Installer patch format and can be applied to administrative images or delivered in an automated fashion.

All MKS X/Server installation files (and delivered binaries) are digitally signed for your peace of mind. You always know that they came from MKS unmodified and are the genuine, virus-free packages.

After installation, you can run the UNIX application wizard. This wizard guides you through your first and subsequent connections to UNIX servers and lets you select UNIX applications on those servers to be added to your Windows Start menu.

Performance

MKS X/Server increases the performance of ported X11 applications by allowing faster transport of pixmaps through shared memory (MIT-Shm). During installation, MKS X/Server configures itself to deliver the highest performance for each PC. The installer runs the graphics optimizer to benchmark several different drawing methods and recommends the best one.

Visual Styles

MKS X/Server applications have a professional and modern appearance. Additionally, these applications feature a fully skinnable user interface. Using standard msstyles theme files, you can customize the appearance of each MKS X/Server application. Several popular visual styles and themes are included.

To select a new skin for the user interface, pick:

Start > Programs > MKS XServer > Configuration > MKS X Server Configuration
from the Start menu and select Choose Skins from the Manage menu.


Hardware and Software Requirements

  • Windows compatible x86 PC
    • Windows® Vista
    • Windows® 2003 Server
    • Windows® XP
    • Windows® 2000
  • Windows Compatible x64 PC
    • Windows® Vista x64
    • Windows® 2003 Server x64 edition
    • Windows® XP x64 edition
  • Windows® 2003 Server Itanium edition is supported with the 32 bit X Server.
  • Typical installation requires 40 Mb of disk space.


Installing MKS X/Server

If you have SCO XVision Eclipse, you must uninstall it, or install MKS X/Server on another machine.

When installing MKS X/Server you must install from an account with local or domain administrator privileges. You do not need to be an Administrator, but your login ID must be a member of the local or domain Windows Administrators group before you can install.

All MKS X/Server products share a common installer. If you are installing from a CD, insert the MKS X/Server distribution CD; the installer should start automatically. If you are installing from an electronic distribution, run the self-extracting installer.

To install MKS X/Server, click the Install X/Server button and follow the instructions on the dialogs that appear.

Note: You should turn off all virus protection software before installing MKS X/Server. Such software can sometimes cause the installation to be interrupted and rolled back. Once you have installed MKS X/Server, you can turn virus protection back on.

For step-by-step installation instructions and an installation FAQ, see http://www.mkssoftware.com/support/install.asp.

Silent and Administrative Installations

For step-by-step installation instructions and information on administrative and silent installations for MKS X/Server see http://www.mkssoftware.com/support/install.asp.


Uninstalling MKS X/Server

Uninstalling MKS X/Server

To uninstall MKS X/Server, use the following procedure:

  1. From the Control Panel run Add/Remove Programs.

  2. Remove MKS X/Server.

You must reboot your system before reinstalling MKS X/Server.

Uninstalling SCO XVision Eclipse

  1. From the Control Panel run Add/Remove Programs.

  2. Remove SCO XVision Eclipse. (This is only necessary if the XVision X server is installed. This X Server was normally only installed with previous versions of MKS Toolkit for Interoperability and MKS Toolkit for Enterprise Developers.)

You must reboot your system before reinstalling MKS X/Server.


Known Issues

The following known issues exist in MKS X/Server:

  • Setup.
    • Before upgrading any version, you should shut down the X Server.


  • MKS X/Server.
    • On Windows 2000, if you use "Focus Follows Mouse" with the "Leave Windows In Place" policy, you will see strange focus behavior when using MS-DOS Command Prompt windows.
    • On Windows 2000, if you use "Focus Follows Mouse" with the "Leave Windows In Place" policy, an Explorer window will have a corrupted title bar when you move the pointer out of the window. This does not affect the window itself. The window title is restored when the window receives focus again.


  • XRemote and RPS.
    • If you wish to use Remote Program Starter (RPS) to start X clients over XRemote, you must manually set the display name for the RPS command to match the XRemote proxy server display.


  • XVSpy.
    • Do not use a font server while recording an X session.


  • Terminal Emulators.
    • When using an embedded emulator in-place, only a limited implementation of the emulator toolbar support is available.
    • When using an emulator in an ActiveX document container application, the emulator's printing facilities are not available.
    • When using an embedded emulator in-place in Microsoft Word, or in an ActiveX document container application, the emulator's context help does not work.
    • To upgrade desktop VT320 applications, the VT420 emulator must be installed.


  • Vision Resume.
    • To use Vision Resume with XRemote, you must disable host access control for MKS X/Server.
    • When used with Vision Resume, Netscape might display "Sequence lost". You can safely ignore this message.
    • Some SCO UNIX X clients, such as scocal and scocolor, work with Vision Resume when MKS X/Server is using a PseudoColor display but not when it is using a TrueColor display.
      These clients will fail with third-party X servers when running with Vision Resume, unless the following lines are appended to the server's rgb.txt file (for example, /usr/lib/X11/rgb.txt):
      203 203 192            scoBackground
      11  0   113            scoForeground
      255 240 248            scoTopShadow
      255 206 137            scoActiveBackground
      43  45  49             scoActiveForeground
      254 222 255            scoActiveTopShadow
      172 186 204            scoAltBackground
      0   0   255            scoHighlight
      If you have problems starting a Resume session, ensure a link has been made between /usr/bin/xresume and /usr/local/xserver/bin/xresume
      (see the Help topic 'Configuring Vision Resume on UNIX' for more details).
    • If on starting a Resume session you see the error message "Cannot relocate your Resume session to that display" this may be caused by a network naming problem. Try displaying an X client from the UNIX host that you run the proxy server on to your Vision X Server, using the X Server's full DNS name (for example, xclock -display myPC.myCO.co.uk:0). If this reports "Cannot open Display" then you have a naming problem—try adding the full DNS name to /etc/hosts.


  • Multiuser Windows environments.
    • MKS X/Server Printing does not work on Windows 2000 or Windows Terminal Server running in multi-user mode. You can use LPD Printing in these environments.


  • MKS X/Server 3D.
    • Restrictions
      • Backing store shouldn't be used with the GLX extension.
      • OpenGL extensions are not available.
    • Notes
      • The GLX extension is disabled by default. The GLX extension can be re-enabled using the MKS X/Server Configuration program.
      • On true color displays, GLX color index visuals are only available using the Pseudo Color default visual class.
      • If you experience problems with colors when running OpenGL applications on a 256 color display, setting the X/Server default visual class to TrueColor may improve the situation. To do this, choose:
        X/Server Properties > Color tab > Let me specify a particular default visual class.
      • Matrox Millennium video cards running in 16-bit color can prevent some OpenGL applications from running or displaying correctly. Matrox has been informed of this problem.


  • MKS X/Server Skins.
    • When an MKS X/Server skinned application is minimized on Windows XP, some applications (for example, Windows Media Player) fail to re-paint themselves properly. The source of this bug (skinning libraries, Windows XP, or Windows Media Player) is currently unknown. It is known that the minimizing application remains in the Z-Order (through the WM_PAINT message in the lower application) queried from Windows. Hence, if there is no check to see if the window is iconic, the application can believe it is obscured by the higher window which is, in fact, iconic. This is being investigated. The simple workaround is to minimize and restore the application that did not repaint itself.


  • XDMCP Start menu items.
    • When the default profile in use is not set for single window mode, an XDMCP session launched from an XDMCP Start menu item will come up in multi-window mode. You should set "prompt for profile" to use XDMCP Start menu items and be able to pick a profile set for single window mode.


  • Windows Vista RC2 Issues.
    • When you attempt to add access to a new UNIX program by either selecting New Unix Program from the Start menu or New > Unix Program from the context menu while viewing any Explorer window (including the desktop), the Unix Application Wizard will launch and as it tries to save the remote program start file at the very end of the wizard, you will see a dialog about "Server busy". At this point, the file you are creating is inaccessible to any program until Windows Explorer is restarted. Your only recourse is to log off and log on again and delete the .rps file. A bug report will be filed with Microsoft. The workaround is to run Start > MKS XServer > Accessories > Program Starter and save the file to the desktop or to a folder.

    • During uninstall you may see a dialog about needing to stop several programs—including MKS X/Server Services and MKS X/Server Database Services. If you acknowledge this, you may see a dialog claiming that MKS X/Server Database Services has stopped responding and needs to be stopped. Even if you stop this program, the MKS X/Server Services program remains running after uninstall. In any event, you should log out and log in again before reinstalling MKS X/Server.


Customer Support

Contact MKS customer support at:

Web Site: http://www.mkssoftware.com/support
Online Request Form: http://www.mkssoftware.com/support/support.asp
E-mail: tk_support@mkssoftware.com
Telephone: +1-703-803-7660
(9:00am to 7:00pm ET, Mon-Fri, except holidays)
Fax: +1-703-803-3344

Additional MKS Interoperability Resources

There are several other sources for additional information about our MKS Interoperability products.

We have general product information, including technical specifications, detailed utility listings, and datasheets at:

We offer a resource kit including example scripts, additional utilities, more tutorials, and a wide variety of other useful information at:

We have several additional articles, tutorials, and white papers about using features of MKS Interoperability products at:

Through the years, we have accumulated a lot of technical details about the MKS Interoperability products and have put this information in a searchable database at:

Our customers commonly ask certain questions. These questions and their answers are in our Frequently Asked Questions pages at:

Known installation issues are listed at:


Fixed Problems

Several problems were fixed in MKS X/Server 8.0. These are listed at: