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<!DOCTYPE article PUBLIC "-//OASIS//DTD DocBook XML V4.1.2//EN" 
          "http://www.oasis-open.org/docbook/xml/4.1.2/docbookx.dtd" [
  <!ENTITY date "Apr 2004"> 
  <!ENTITY appversion "4.1"> 
  <!ENTITY app "<application>xfdesktop</application>"> 
]>

<article id="xfdesktop" lang="en">

<!-- Header --> 
<articleinfo>

  <title>Xfce 4 Desktop Manager</title>
  

<copyright>
   <year>2003</year> <holder>Jasper Huijsmans</holder>
</copyright>


<copyright>
   <year>2003</year> <holder>François Le Clainche</holder>
</copyright>


<copyright>
   <year>2004</year> <holder>Brian Tarricone</holder>
</copyright>


<!-- translators: uncomment this:

  <copyright>
   <year>2002</year> <holder>ME-THE-TRANSLATOR (Latin
   translation)</holder>
  </copyright>

 -->

<!-- I don;t know about this
  <legalnotice id="legalnotice">
    <para>
      This document is provided under the terms of the GNU GPL, version
      2 or (at your option) any later version.
    </para>
  </legalnotice>
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  <authorgroup>

    <author>
      <firstname>Jasper</firstname> <surname>Huijsmans</surname>
      <affiliation>
       <address><email>huysmans@users.sourceforge.net</email></address>
       </affiliation>
    </author>


    <author>
      <firstname>François</firstname> <surname>Le Clainche</surname>
      <affiliation>
       <address><email>fleclainche@wanadoo.fr</email></address>
       </affiliation>
    </author>
	
	
	<author>
		<firstname>Brian</firstname> <surname>Tarricone</surname>
		<affiliation>
			<address><email>kelnos@xfce.org</email></address>
		</affiliation>
	</author>


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maintainers, etc. Commented out by default.

    <othercredit role="translator">
      <firstname>Latin</firstname> <surname>Translator 1</surname>
      <affiliation>
	<orgname>Latin Translation Team</orgname>
	<address><email>translator@gnome.org</email> </address>
      </affiliation> <contrib>Latin translation</contrib>
    </othercredit>
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  </authorgroup>

  <!--
  <revhistory>
    <revision>
      <revnumber>0.2</revnumber> 
      <date>May 2003</date>
      <authorinitials>MA</authorinitials>
    </revision>
  </revhistory>
  -->

  <releaseinfo>This manual describes &app; version &appversion;.
  </releaseinfo>

</articleinfo>

<sect1 id="xfdesktop-intro">
  <title>Introduction</title>

  <para>The &app; application manages the desktop backdrop. It sets a
    backdrop image and/or color and it can optionall pop up an applications
	menu when you click on it with the right mouse button.  It also displays a
	window list of all running applications after a middle button clic.
    Along with the application, a  settings dialog is installed for use with the 
    <emphasis>Xfce 4 Settings Manager</emphasis>. This dialog allows you to 
    change the backdrop image and color. You can also request xfdesktop to
    not set the backdrop, in order to allow another program to perform that
    task.
  </para>

</sect1>

<sect1 id="xfdesktop-background">
  <title>Backdrop</title>

  <para>You can start the backdrop properties dialog by clicking on the
    "Backdrop" button in the 
    <ulink url="xfce-mcs-manager.html#manager-dialog" 
      type="http">settings manager dialog</ulink>.
  </para>

  <figure id="xfdesktop-background-fig">
    <title>Backdrop Settings</title> 
    <screenshot>
      <mediaobject>
	<imageobject>
	  <imagedata fileref="images/xfdesktop-background.png" format="PNG"/>
	</imageobject> 
	<textobject>
	  <phrase>Shows backdrop settings dialog.
	  </phrase>
	</textobject>
      </mediaobject>
    </screenshot>
  </figure>

  <variablelist>
    <varlistentry>
      <term>Color</term>
      <listitem>
	<para>Click the "Backdrop color" button, and a new dialog will
	  appear :</para>
	 
	<figure id="select_bg_color-fig">
	  <title>Select backdrop color</title>
	  <screenshot>
	    <mediaobject>
	      <imageobject>
		<imagedata fileref="images/select_bg_color.png" format="PNG"/>
	      </imageobject>
	      <textobject>
		<phrase>Shows the Select backdrop color dialog</phrase>
	      </textobject>
	    </mediaobject>
	  </screenshot>
	</figure>

	<para>This dialog allows you to choose a color for the desktop
	  backdrop. This color will fill the entire root window, and will
	  remain visible through a transparent backdrop image. There are
	  several ways to do that:
	</para>

	<itemizedlist>
	  <listitem>you can use the colored ring with a triangle inside:
	    select the color you want from the outer ring, then select the
	    darkness or lightness of that color using the inner triangle.
	    Corresponding values of brightness, deepness, and amount of red,
	    green and blue light in the color appear through the entries on
	    the right side of the window.
	  </listitem>
	  <listitem>you can click the eyedropper, then click anywhere on your
	    screen to select the color.
	  </listitem>
	  <listitem>you can enter an HTML-style hexadecimal color value, or
	    simply a color name, in the "Color Name" entry
	  </listitem>
	</itemizedlist>

	<para>Select the "Use color only" option if you want &app; to ignore
	  the backdrop image and only use the choosen color.
	</para>
	  
      </listitem>
    </varlistentry>

    <varlistentry>
      <term>Image</term>

      <listitem>
	<para>The "File" entry shows the path to the currently selected
	  backdrop image. If you want to change it, just drop and image 
	  on the dialog from a file manager, or edit the path, or click the 
	  "Browse" button, and a classic file-browsing dialog will appear.
	  </para>

	<para>Three Style options (Tiled, Scaled, and Centered) can be used to
	  specify the fitting of the backdrop image on the screen, depending
	  on its size. You can also select the "Automatic" item if you want to
	  let &app; take care of this setting.
	</para>

	<para>You can create a list of backdrop images that will be randomly
	  used at startup. Click the "New list" button to open the list 
	  editing dialog:
	</para>

	<figure id="xfdesktop-list-fig">
	  <title>Backdrop List</title> 
	  <screenshot>
	    <mediaobject>
	      <imageobject>
		<imagedata fileref="images/xfdesktop-list.png" format="PNG"/>
	      </imageobject>
	      <textobject>
		<phrase>Shows backdrop list manager.</phrase>
	      </textobject>
	    </mediaobject>
	  </screenshot>
	</figure>

	<para>You may want to change the default path and name of your
	  custom list of backdrops in the "List file" entry.
	</para>
  
  	<para>You can easily add an image file by clicking the "plus" button.
	  That action will open a file-browsing window. You can remove a file,
	  if you select it in the list and click the "minus" button. When your
	  list is complete, click the "Save" button to save it. If you want to
	  modify its content later, use the "Edit list" button of the
	  Backdrop settings manager.
	</para>
	
	<para>You can recover an older list by dropping its name.list file on 
	the backdrop settings dialog from a file manager.</para>

	<para>To refresh the backdrop with a new random image from the list
	  just run the &app; command again, e.g. from a terminal or the run 
	  dialog, or &app; <arg>-reload</arg>.
	</para>

      </listitem>

    </varlistentry>
    
    <varlistentry>
      <term>Don't set backdrop</term>

      <listitem>
	<para>There are many programs that can set the backdrop image. If
	  you prefer to use one of those programs, you can check this option
	  and xfdesktop will refrain from setting the backdrop.
	</para>
      </listitem>
    </varlistentry>

  </variablelist>
	
</sect1>

<sect1 id="xfdesktop-menu">
  <title>&app; root menu</title>

  <para>&app; provides a mouse menu that appears when you click on the 
    desktop backdrop with your right or middle mouse button.
  </para>

  <para>A right-click on the desktop backdrop opens a menu that allows you to
    start some applications. Its configuration file, menu.xml, can be found
    under the path <filename>$sysconfdir/xfce4/menu.xml</filename>. For binary 
    packages $sysconfdir is often <filename>/etc</filename> and for source
    compiles it defaults to <filename>/usr/local/etc</filename>.
  </para>

  <para>While it is possible to edit the file manually, the recommended method
    for editing the menu.xml file is via the Xfce 4 Menu Editor, which can be
	found by running <application>xfce4-menueditor</application>.  The menu
	editor also supports drag'n'drop from the file manager.
  </para>

  <para>NOTE: If you choose to edit the file manually, menu.xml has to be in
    UTF-8 encoding for the toolkit to be able to display accented or other
	non-ASCII characters. Therefore, you need an editor that supports UTF-8,
	like <application>gedit</application>.
  </para>

  <figure id="root-menu-fig">
    <title>&app; right-click mouse menu</title>
    <screenshot>
      <mediaobject>
	<imageobject>
	  <imagedata fileref="images/root_menu.png" format="PNG"/>
	</imageobject> 
	<textobject>
	  <phrase>Shows &app; right-click mouse menu.
	  </phrase>
	</textobject>
      </mediaobject>
    </screenshot>
  </figure>

  <para>A middle-click on the desktop backdrop shows a list of all opened 
    windows ordered by workspace. It also allows you to add or remove 
    a workspace.
  </para>

  <figure id="root-menu2-fig">
    <title>&app; middle-click mouse menu</title> 
    <screenshot>
      <mediaobject>
	<imageobject>
	  <imagedata fileref="images/root_menu2.png" format="PNG"/>
	</imageobject> 
	<textobject>
	  <phrase>Shows &app; middle-click mouse menu.
	  </phrase>
	</textobject>
      </mediaobject>
    </screenshot>
  </figure>

  <para>You can open the menu or window list from the commandline as well.
    This can be useful for keyboard shortcuts. To open the menu run the
    command &app; <application>-menu</application>, and for the windowlist use
	&app; <application>-windowlist</application>.
  </para>

</sect1>

<sect1 id="xfdesktop-copyright">
  <title>About xfdesktop</title>

  <para>&app; was written by Jasper Huijsmans
    (<email>huysmans@users.sourceforge.net</email>), Olivier Fourdan 
    (<email>fourdan@xfce.org</email>), Biju Chacko
    (<email>botsie@myrealbox.com</email>), and Brian Tarricone
	(<email>kelnos@xfce.org</email>).
    For more information, please visit the 
    <ulink url="http://www.xfce.org" type="http">Xfce web site</ulink>. 
  </para>

  <para>To report a bug or make a suggestion regarding this application or
    this manual, send an email to the 
    <ulink url="http://www.lunar-linux.org/mailman/listinfo/xfce4-dev/"
      type="http">xfce4-dev</ulink> mailing list &mdash; this is the preferred
    method &mdash; or use the Xfce's <ulink url="http://bugs.xfce.org/">bug
	tracking system</ulink>.
    If you have questions about the use or installation of this package,
    please ask on the 
    <ulink url="http://www.lunar-linux.org/mailman/listinfo/xfce/"
      type="http">xfce</ulink> mailing list. 
  </para>
    
  <para> This program is distributed under the terms of the
    GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; 
    either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.
  </para>

  <para>You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License 
    along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software 
    Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple Place - Suite 330, Boston, MA 02111-1307, 
    USA.</para>

</sect1>

</article>
