packaging slim-fork for Fedora

[maitra]

I have packaged slim-fork for Fedora and have submitted it. I still have to deal with the default wallpaper which I will attend to soon.

[maitra]

One issue that I encountered was the new
xserver_arguments -nolisten tcp -deferglyphs 16
that is default in the file. I am not sure if that is an issue but the package did not work. So I temporarily removed it. However, I still continue to have some issues. Btw, is there a way to test it through say a VM without killing X?

[RobPearce]

I frequently run SLiM in a VM, both with Gentoo and Devuan. It's obviously necessary to have the VM installed with the right drivers for the virtualisation system - X has both vbox and vmware drivers available. Then I can (re)boot the VM at will.

The -nolisten tcp and -deferglyphs 16 are both default options on Gentoo and should be fine generally, but if they seem to cause problems on Fedora then feel free to patch them out.

[RobPearce]

To add to the above, I now have a Fedora 37 box with SLiM installed. I put those xserver arguments back in and it works fine for me.

[maitra]

So, do you recommend keeping those arguments in? I am not sure what they do, but I also like making minimal changes with upstream.

[RobPearce]

-nolisten tcp tells X not to allow connections over TCP, which essentially means it only serves local programs (or remote through ssh/rdp/vnc/etc.) and doesn't act as a display for a network server machine. This is generally considered a good idea from a security PoV.
-deferglyphs 16 tells it to not pre-load 16-bit fonts until they're used.
Gentoo explicitly adds them on V1.3.6
Debian/Devuan add the nolisten one, and Devuan retains both on the newer versions
If it were me, I'd keep them, but this is a configuration file to be optimised for the system it's used on, so as upstream I am agnostic as to what you "should" do. Maybe ask the Fedora team whether anybody sees a reason not to have them?