No background image with fluxbox and VL5.8 Gold

[cousinnewt]

Hey All:

After a fresh install of VL5.8Gold, creating a ".fluxbox" directory in my home directory, and subsequent Gslapt install of fluxbox (and -themes, -slit, -custom, and esetroot), I can't get any background image when starting fluxbox. The background shade/colour changes with the selected theme, but no image. If I try to force an image with fbsetbg, the image flashes briefly when restarting fluxbox, but is then "covered" by the theme colored background. Menus and apps work OK otherwise.

A previous post raised this issue, but subsequently digressed (I couldn't find it again to quote, sorry), and I've compared config files to my fluxbox install on VL5.1 running on my old laptop without being able to find any obvious differences.

Any suggestions appreciated...I like xfce, too, but..mmmmmm...fluxbox.

Cheers. N.

[lagagnon]

Well that is a bit strange but to forcefeed fluxbox the image you want edit the ~/.fluxbox/init file and
do this to the rootCommand line, substituting your image file's location.

session.screen0.rootCommand:    fbsetbg -f /home/me/my_image.jpg

Then edit ~/.fluxbox/lastwallpaper and put it in there like this:

$full $full|/home/me/my_image.jpg|:0.0

[easuter]

The fluxbox package in the repo first checks for any existing .fluxbox directory in /home/username. If it finds one, then it _doesn't_ add any custom configs so as to not overwrite any configurations a user may have had already.

So, since you created a .fluxox directory, the fluxbox package does not make any configs for you because it thinks you already have working ones.

Just remove .fluxbox from your home directory, and then as root run:

Code:

slapt-get --install fluxbox --reinstall

to reinstall the package. After the package reinstalls, you should see a new .fluxbox directory appear.
That should fix the problem you are having. This is for fluxbox 1.0RC3 btw.

[cousinnewt]

Thanks easuter for the reply. Tried deleting the .fluxbox directory in $HOME and reinstalling, but no joy (Fluxbox 1.0rc2...couldn't find -rc3 on the repositories).

Cheers. N.

[exeterdad]

It's there.  Do you have

http://ftp://ftp.osuosl.org/pub/vectorlinux/veclinux-5.8/extra/

as one of your sources?

[cousinnewt]

Thanks, exeterdad for the link.  Sorry for the delayed reply.

Upgraded to 'rc3 and have backgrounds. (Oddly, first login to fluxbox after upgrade gave me a blackscreen...no wm. Had to Ctl-Alt-Backspace and login again...then had much fluxbox goodness.)

Thanks to all for the help.

Cheers. N.