Notes on Using QNX Photon

Repositories

A repository is a source of software installation packages. It can be accessed as an ordinary file system, and as a web link.
There are typically two repositories automatically listed in the Software installer. One is the CD you installed from (assuming you did install that way). The other is QNX's web-based repository, which has the latest versions, and patches.
Additional repositories can be added to the software installer. They are specified as an ordinary HTTP URL. A good one is http://qnx.wox.org/repository/6.1/, which applies to QNX version 6.1 of course.

To adjust the default properties for Photon terminal windows, right-click on the window (or press CTRL-ALT-M, and select properties. There's lots of self-explanatory items in here.

The shelf is best configured by right-clicking on it, selecting Setup, and using the resultant dialog box. However, its configuration details are stored in the file $HOME/.ph/launch_menu.xml.

The list of supported video cards, and which drivers they use is found in the file /etc/system/enum/devices/graphics.

To adjust whether you boot straight into Photon (bypassing the text console), use the program /usr/photon/bin/phgrafx-startup. There is a checkbox at the bottom of the window that you can check if you want to boot into graphical mode. I prefer to boot into text mode, and then run photon manually, since this gives me a fallback position if Photon is not working properly.

The mouse pointer does not appear in screenshots taken with Photon's screen snapshot utility.

Make sure you set lines and columns in .vimrc to be the same (or smaller) values as set for the pterm terminal window's lines and columns. If you don't, text will be misplaced, especially during vertical scrolling, and you'll end up with a confusing mess.

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Content last updated: 2004-01-30