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<html><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=ISO-8859-1"><title>Xfce 4 Session Manager</title><link rel="stylesheet" href="../xfce.css" type="text/css"><meta name="generator" content="DocBook XSL Stylesheets V1.68.1"><link rel="start" href="#xfce4-session" title="Xfce 4 Session Manager"><link rel="next" href="#xfsm-intro" title="Introduction"></head><body bgcolor="white" text="black" link="#0000FF" vlink="#840084" alink="#0000FF"><div class="article" lang="en"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h1 class="title"><a name="xfce4-session"></a>Xfce 4 Session Manager</h1></div><div><div class="authorgroup"><div class="author"><h3 class="author"><span class="firstname">Benedikt</span> <span class="surname">Meurer</span></h3><div class="affiliation"><div class="address"><p><code class="email"><<a href="mailto:benny@xfce.org">benny@xfce.org</a>></code></p></div><span class="orgname">os-cillation<br></span><span class="orgdiv">System development<br></span><span class="jobtitle">Software developer<br></span></div></div></div></div><div><span xmlns="http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/transitional" class="releaseinfo">
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This manual describes the <strong xmlns="" class="application"><code>xfce4-session</code></strong> package, version 4.2.0. Last updated: Jan 2005
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<br></br></span></div><div><p class="copyright">Copyright � 2003, 2004 Benedikt Meurer</p></div><div><div class="legalnotice"><a name="legalnotice"></a><p>
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This document is provided under the terms of the GNU GPL, version
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2 or (at your option) any later version.
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</p></div></div></div><hr></div><div class="toc"><p><b>Table of Contents</b></p><dl><dt><span class="sect1"><a href="#xfsm-intro">Introduction</a></span></dt><dt><span class="sect1"><a href="#xfce4-session-settings">Session Manager settings</a></span></dt><dd><dl><dt><span class="sect2"><a href="#xfsm-general-settings">General preferences</a></span></dt><dt><span class="sect2"><a href="#xfsm-advanced%20settings">Advanced preferences</a></span></dt></dl></dd><dt><span class="sect1"><a href="#xfsm-customize">Customizing the Session Manager</a></span></dt><dd><dl><dt><span class="sect2"><a href="#xfsm-engines">Splash screen settings</a></span></dt><dt><span class="sect2"><a href="#xfsm-shutdown">Shutdown/reboot options</a></span></dt></dl></dd><dt><span class="sect1"><a href="#xfsm-advanced">Advanced</a></span></dt><dd><dl><dt><span class="sect2"><a href="#files-and-env-vars">Files and Environment Variables</a></span></dt><dt><span class="sect2"><a href="#xfsm-kiosk-mode">Kiosk Mode</a></span></dt></dl></dd><dt><span class="sect1"><a href="#xfsm-copyright">About <strong class="application"><code>xfce4-session</code></strong></a></span></dt></dl></div><p>�</p><div class="sect1" lang="en"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h2 class="title" style="clear: both"><a name="xfsm-intro"></a>Introduction</h2></div></div></div><p><strong class="application"><code>xfce4-session</code></strong> is a session manager for Xfce 4. Its task is to save the state of
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your desktop (opened applications and their location) and restore it during a next
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startup. You can create several different sessions and choose one of them on
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</p><p><strong class="application"><code>xfce4-session</code></strong> provides session management for both X11R6 and
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legacy X11R5 protocols. If you don't need legacy session management
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support, you can disable it at compile time, giving
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--disable-legacy-sm to ./configure. Do <span class="emphasis"><em>NOT EVER</em></span> run <strong class="application"><code>smproxy</code></strong> in
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session that is managed by <strong class="application"><code>xfce4-session</code></strong>, or weird things will happen.
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The included legacy session management does everything that <strong class="application"><code>smproxy</code></strong>
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would do, and besides that, it also supports multiscreen display.</p></div><p>�</p><div class="sect1" lang="en"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h2 class="title" style="clear: both"><a name="xfce4-session-settings"></a>Session Manager settings</h2></div></div></div><div class="sect2" lang="en"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h3 class="title"><a name="xfsm-general-settings"></a>General preferences</h3></div></div></div><div class="figure"><a name="xfsm-general-fig"></a><p class="title"><b>Figure�1.�<code class="application">xfce4-session</code> general preferences</b></p><div class="screenshot"><div class="mediaobject"><img src="images/xfsm-general.png" alt="Shows the General tab of the xfce4-session settings dialog."></div></div></div><div class="variablelist"><dl><dt><span class="term">Display chooser on login</span></dt><dd><p>If set, the session manager will ask you to choose a session every
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time you log in to Xfce.</p></dd><dt><span class="term">Automatically save session on logout</span></dt><dd><p>This option instructs the session manager to save the current
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session automatically when you log out. If you don't select this option
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you'll be prompted whether you want to save the current session on
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each logout.</p></dd><dt><span class="term">Prompt on logout</span></dt><dd><p>This option disables the logout confirmation dialog. Whether
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the session will be saved or not depends on whether you enabled the
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automatic saving of sessions on logout or not.</p></dd></dl></div></div><div class="sect2" lang="en"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h3 class="title"><a name="xfsm-advanced settings"></a>Advanced preferences</h3></div></div></div><div class="figure"><a name="xfsm-advanced-fig"></a><p class="title"><b>Figure�2.�<code class="application">xfce4-session</code> advanced preferences</b></p><div class="screenshot"><div class="mediaobject"><img src="images/xfsm-advanced.png" alt="Shows Advanced tab of the xfce4-session settings dialog."></div></div></div><div class="variablelist"><dl><dt><span class="term">Launch Gnome services on startup</span></dt><dd><p>Enable this option if you need the GNOME keyring daemon to be run
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on startup. This option also instructs <strong class="application"><code>xfce4-session</code></strong> to bring up the GNOME assistive
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technologies at startup (if enabled in the GNOME control center). See the
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GNOME documentation for more information on this topic.</p></dd><dt><span class="term">Launch KDE services on startup</span></dt><dd><p>Enable this option if you plan to run KDE applications as part of
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your Xfce Desktop session. This will notably increase the startup time,
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but on the other hand, KDE applications will startup faster. Some KDE
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applications may not work at all if you don't enable this option.</p></dd><dt><span class="term">Manage remote applications</span></dt><dd><p>Allow the session manager to manage applications running on
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remote hosts. Since this option may constitute a security risk, by listening to
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a TCP port on your system, do not enable it unless you know what you are
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doing.</p><p>System administrators may want to disable this option globally using the
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session managers <a href="#xfsm-kiosk-mode" target="_top">KIOSK
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capabilities</a>.</p></dd></dl></div></div></div><p>�</p><div class="sect1" lang="en"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h2 class="title" style="clear: both"><a name="xfsm-customize"></a>Customizing the Session Manager</h2></div></div></div><p>You can customize the splash-screen that <strong class="application"><code>xfce4-session</code></strong> will use when you log in to
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Xfce 4. There is a dedicated dialog available from the <span class="emphasis"><em>Xfce 4
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Settings Manager</em></span>.</p><div class="sect2" lang="en"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h3 class="title"><a name="xfsm-engines"></a>Splash screen settings</h3></div></div></div><div class="figure"><a name="splash-screen-settings-fig"></a><p class="title"><b>Figure�3.�Splash screen settings dialog</b></p><div class="screenshot"><div class="mediaobject"><img src="images/xfsm-splash.png" alt="Shows the xfce4-session splash screen settings dialog."></div></div></div><p>On the left, the dialog shows a list of all installed engines.
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Select an engine, and you will see, if available, a preview and
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information about it. You can click on the <span><strong class="guibutton">Test</strong></span>
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button to see a demonstration of the selected splash screen
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engine.</p><p><strong class="application"><code>xfce4-session</code></strong> provides three Splash themes engines by default. Their
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respective configuration options - if any - are available from the
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<span><strong class="guibutton">Configure</strong></span> button.</p></div><div class="sect2" lang="en"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h3 class="title"><a name="xfsm-shutdown"></a>Shutdown/reboot options</h3></div></div></div><p><strong class="application"><code>xfce4-session</code></strong> supports shutting down your computer when you log out
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of your desktop session. To be able to shutdown the computer, you
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have to be listed in the systems <code class="filename">sudoers</code> file,
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in particular, you must be allowed to execute the command
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<code class="filename">${libexecdir}/xfsm-shutdown-helper</code>
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(<code class="filename">/usr/sbin/xfsm-shutdown-helper</code> on Debian GNU/Linux)
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as user root (where <code class="filename">${libexecdir}</code> is the <code class="filename">libexec</code> sub directory in the prefix you
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installed <strong class="application"><code>xfce4-session</code></strong>, for example
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<code class="filename">/usr/local/libexec</code>).</p><p>For example, lets say, you installed <strong class="application"><code>xfce4-session</code></strong> into <code class="filename">/usr/local</code>, your hostname is <span class="emphasis"><em>myhost</em></span>
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and your user account is named <span class="emphasis"><em>myuser</em></span>, then you
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would have to add the following line to your <code class="filename">sudoers</code>
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file (remember to use <strong class="application"><code>visudo</code></strong> to edit
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that file):</p><pre class="programlisting">
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myuser myhost=/usr/local/libexec/xfsm-shutdown-helper
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</pre></div></div><p>�</p><div class="sect1" lang="en"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h2 class="title" style="clear: both"><a name="xfsm-advanced"></a>Advanced</h2></div></div></div><div class="sect2" lang="en"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h3 class="title"><a name="files-and-env-vars"></a>Files and Environment Variables</h3></div></div></div><p>Xfce now uses the Basedir Specification as defined on <a href="http://freedesktop.org/" target="_top">Freedesktop.org</a> to
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locate its data and configuration files. This means that file locations
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will be specified as a path relative to the directories described in
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the specification.</p><div class="variablelist"><dl><dt><span class="term">${XDG_CONFIG_HOME}</span></dt><dd><p>The first base directory to look for configuration
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files. By default this is set to <code class="filename">~/.config/</code>.</p></dd><dt><span class="term">${XDG_CONFIG_DIRS}</span></dt><dd><p>A list of system directories that contain configuration
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data. By default the panel will look in <code class="filename">${sysconfdir}/xdg/</code> and
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<code class="filename">/etc/xdg/</code>. The value of
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${sysconfdir} depends on how the program was build and will often be
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<code class="filename">/etc/</code> for binary
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packages.</p></dd><dt><span class="term">${XDG_CACHE_HOME}</span></dt><dd><p>Specifies the root for all user-specific cache data. If
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this environment variable is unset, it defaults to <code class="filename">~/.cache</code>.</p></dd><dt><span class="term">${XDG_CONFIG_DIRS}/xfce4-session/xfce4-session.rc</span></dt><dd><p>This is the location of the configuration file that
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includes the various settings for <strong class="application"><code>xfce4-session</code></strong>, which can be changed
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from the settings dialog.</p></dd><dt><span class="term">${XDG_CONFIG_DIRS}/xfce4-session/xfce4-splash.rc</span></dt><dd><p>This is the location of the configuration file that
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includes the configuration for the splash screen, which
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can be changed from the settings dialog.</p></dd><dt><span class="term">${XDG_CACHE_HOME}/sessions/</span></dt><dd><p>The directory where <strong class="application"><code>xfce4-session</code></strong> and <strong class="application"><code>xfwm4</code></strong>
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store the session data to.</p></dd><dt><span class="term">${sysconfdir}/xdg/xfce4/kiosk/kioskrc</span></dt><dd><p>Kiosk mode configuration file. See <a href="#xfsm-kiosk-mode" target="_top">next
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section</a> for an explanation.</p></dd></dl></div><p>None of the configuration files, except the <code class="filename">kioskrc</code>,
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are designed to be edited by hand during a Xfce session; in fact, the changes will
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be overwritten if you edit them while the session manager or the settings managers
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are running.</p><p>System administrators might want to customize the file
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<code class="filename">${sysconfdir}/xdg/xfce4-session/xfce4-session.rc</code> to change
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the default applications that are run on Xfce startup. For example, if you want to
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start the <strong class="application"><code>xfce4-iconbox</code></strong> instead of the
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<strong class="application"><code>xftaskbar4</code></strong>, you would change the <span class="emphasis"><em>[Failsafe
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Session]</em></span> section like to something like this:</p><pre class="programlisting">
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Client0_PerScreen=False
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Client1_Command=xfce4-panel
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Client1_PerScreen=True
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Client2_Command=xfce4-iconbox
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Client2_PerScreen=True
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Client3_Command=xfdesktop
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Client3_PerScreen=False
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</pre></div><div class="sect2" lang="en"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h3 class="title"><a name="xfsm-kiosk-mode"></a>Kiosk Mode</h3></div></div></div><p>The session manager offers support for the Kiosk Mode, that helps to
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prevent users from making changes to their session settings. To use it you
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have to edit or create the file
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<code class="filename">${sysconfdir}/xdg/xfce4/kiosk/kioskrc</code>.</p><p>The way to explain the format of this file is by using an example. The
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xfce4-session section of your <code class="filename">kioskrc</code> might look like
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this:</p><pre class="programlisting">
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CustomizeCompatibility=%wheel
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CustomizeSecurity=NONE
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</pre><p>This allows all users to change their splash, chooser and logout settings,
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but allows only users in the group <span class="emphasis"><em>wheel</em></span> to customize the
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compatibility settings and shutdown the system. No one will be allowed to adjust
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the security settings.</p><p>The session manager supports the following KIOSK capabilities:</p><div class="variablelist"><dl><dt><span class="term">CustomizeSplash</span></dt><dd><p>Whether or not the user is allowed to customize the splash screen.</p></dd><dt><span class="term">CustomizeChooser</span></dt><dd><p>Whether or not the user is allowed to customize the session chooser settings.</p></dd><dt><span class="term">CustomizeLogout</span></dt><dd><p>Whether or not the user is allowed to customize the logout settings.</p></dd><dt><span class="term">CustomizeCompatibility</span></dt><dd><p>Whether or not the user is allowed to customize the compatibility
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settings (KDE/Gnome compat)</p></dd><dt><span class="term">CustomizeSecurity</span></dt><dd><p>Whether or not the user is allowed to customize the security settings.
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This is one of the most <span class="emphasis"><em>IMPORTANT</em></span> settings, since it
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prevents users (actually <code class="filename">libICE</code>) from binding to a TCP port.</p></dd><dt><span class="term">Shutdown</span></dt><dd><p>Whether or not the user is allowed to shutdown (reboot or poweroff) the system.
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If a user lacks this capability the reboot and poweroff options in the shutdown
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dialog will be greyed out.</p></dd></dl></div></div></div><p>�</p><div class="sect1" lang="en"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h2 class="title" style="clear: both"><a name="xfsm-copyright"></a>About <strong class="application"><code>xfce4-session</code></strong></h2></div></div></div><p><strong class="application"><code>xfce4-session</code></strong> was written by Benedikt Meurer
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(<code class="email"><<a href="mailto:benny@xfce.org">benny@xfce.org</a>></code>).
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To find more information, please visit the
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<a href="http://www.xfce.org" target="_top">Xfce web site</a>.
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</p><p>To report a bug or make a suggestion regarding this application or
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this manual, use the bug tracking system at <a href="http://bugzilla.xfce.org/" target="_top">http://bugzilla.xfce.org/</a>.
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</p><p>If you have questions about the use or installation of this package,
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please ask on the <a href="http://lunar-linux.org/mailman/listinfo/xfce" target="_top">xfce</a> mailing list. Development discussion takes
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place on the <a href="http://lunar-linux.org/mailman/listinfo/xfce4-dev" target="_top">xfce4-dev</a> mailing list.
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</p><p> This program is distributed under the terms of the
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GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation;
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either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.
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</p><p>You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
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along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software
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Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple Place - Suite 330, Boston, MA 02111-1307,
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</p></div></div></body></html>
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