I have emerged x11-terms/aterm (currently using 0.4.2-r9) and use it quite frequently. However, transparency does not work--not in .Xdefaults, not as a commandline flag. Reproducible: Always Steps to Reproduce: 1. I have tried reemerging. 2. I have updated to the ~x86 version. 3. I have removed .Xdefaults from loading and used the -tr commandline flag. Actual Results: aterm still uses my user background colour. Expected Results: It should have displayed my desktop's background... transparently. Portage 2.0.50-r9 (default-x86-2004.0, gcc-3.3.3, glibc-2.3.3.20040420-r1, 2.6. 8-rc2-love3) ================================================================= System uname: 2.6.8-rc2-love3 i686 Intel(R) Pentium(R) 4 CPU 1300MHz Gentoo Base System version 1.4.16 Autoconf: sys-devel/autoconf-2.59-r4 Automake: sys-devel/automake-1.8.3 ACCEPT_KEYWORDS="x86" AUTOCLEAN="yes" CFLAGS="-march=pentium4 -O3 -pipe -fomit-frame-pointer" CHOST="i686-pc-linux-gnu" COMPILER="gcc3" CONFIG_PROTECT="/etc /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/xkb /usr/kde/2/share/config /usr/kde/3/ share/config /usr/share/config /var/qmail/control" CONFIG_PROTECT_MASK="/etc/gconf /etc/terminfo /etc/env.d" CXXFLAGS="-march=pentium4 -O3 -pipe -fomit-frame-pointer" DISTDIR="/usr/portage/distfiles" FEATURES="autoaddcvs ccache sandbox" GENTOO_MIRRORS="http://open-systems.ufl.edu/mirrors/gentoo ftp://ftp.ndlug.nd. edu/pub/gentoo/ ftp://mirrors.tds.net/gentoo ftp://ibiblio.org/pub/Linux/ distributions/gentoo/" MAKEOPTS="-j2" PKGDIR="/usr/portage/packages" PORTAGE_TMPDIR="/var/tmp" PORTDIR="/usr/portage" PORTDIR_OVERLAY="/usr/local/portage /usr/local/trunk" SYNC="rsync://rsync.gentoo.org/gentoo-portage" USE="X aalib alsa apm avi berkdb bzlib crypt directfb dvd encode esd fbcon gdbm gif gnome gpm gtk gtk2 imlib java jpeg libg++ libwww mad mmx motif mpeg ncurses nls opengl pam pdflib perl png python qt quicktime readline sdl slang spell sse ssl svga tcltk tcpd truetype x86 xml2 xmms xosd xv zlib"
Have you used any previous version of aterm in which the transparency did work? What program do you use to set your background image? What Desktop Manager/Window Manager are you using?
I've never used transparent aterm with Gentoo, but I did use version 0.4.0 on Mandrake with transparency. I use xfdesktop to set my background, and thusly Xfce as my DE.
Could you please try emerging eterm and then using Esetroot to set the background image to check if that will make aterm's transparency work?
Yes, Esetroot does work for the transparency. (It also affects gkrellm's.) However, as gkrellm works fine with xfdesktop's background-setting, wherein does the error lie?
It's not exactly an error, it's just the fact that there are too many 'standards' and some apps/libraries try to make their own instead of using the ones that already exist. In fbsetbg (a wrapper script for setting the background image) we can see: standardrant=\ "$WPSETTER sets the 'wrong' wallpaper. Transparency for fluxbox and apps like aterm and xchat won't work right with it. Consider installing feh, wmsetbg (from windowmaker) or Esetroot (from Eterm) and I'll use them instead." So there are some kinds of 'wrong' wallpapers. In xfdesktop's code the following line can be found: gdk_window_set_back_pixmap (gdk_get_default_root_window (), pixmap, 0); It's setting the GDK's root window background. My guess would be that this GDK root window is not the real X server's root window. So what's happening is that when you use xfdesktop Gnome-aware apps (such as gkrellm) get the right background and others (aterm, Eterm, etc) think that there is no background (black color). I'm marking it as WONTFIX, as I don't think that anything can be done here. I might add a warning about this to the aterm ebuild when I'll be commmiting a new version to CVS.
Thanks for the detailed comments; it's helpful to understand why this won't work. I don't really know the feasibility thereof, but wouldn't it be possible to add one of these programs that you mention which set the "proper" background to the dependencies list? Even to add a transparency USE flag so it would be optional? Of course, maybe it just doesn't work with Xfce, so who knows... ;)
