Hi Stefan,

Infact - I asked someone at motifdeveloper.com the same question.

Bottom line its not true. 2.2 is better than 2.1.30 in every respect.

I must say I absolutely do not trust the information I got from my question.

I was told that 2.1.30 and 2.2 were highly experimental and completely non-thread safe. Also 5dwm was suggested as a good destop manager to try. And some other bull I found hard to beleive so I did some research on my own.

Nothing could be further from the truth. 5dwm was full of probems and the developer says so. The one feature I thought it had it doesn`t have (virtual desktop) (5dwm shows a gnome desktop styled like an SGI box). A neet project if it ever surfaces though.

On the other hand, the official Motif 2.1.30 is *completely* thread safe - that is one of its major upgrade points. Remember that a full licence to CDE is only $50,000 US dollars ) And is licenced by companies like Sun, IBM, SCO, et al.

Back to OpenMotif. It is not the full and reliable Motif. Their is a test suite that test CDE for errors and compliance and OpenMotif fails many (more or less `upper echelon` features have problems or are missing).

OpenMotif doesn`t have CDE nor its helpers like a help system and like a Motif enabled bash shell, a desktop manager, application session controls, ... OpenMotif certainly isn`t perfect. But used correctly it may well be more stable than GNOME (ie, a few releases of GNOME 1.4 I`ve tried).

What OpenMotif does do is allow allot of software to be used, freely, that otherwise would require a purchase of Motif (I think a entry level proffesional level kit can be gotten for $35 - one of which I`ve been meaning to order myself). It also enables linux users to purchase developer toolkits that in my opinion are just what one needs in the average desktop app-building grind.

I often use OpenMotif as my desktop because it is, on my boxes, time tested less problems. I use it especially for deep projects where any problem costs me more time than given back by extra desktop features of GNOME has. And thats most of the time. That goes double for Windows lockups.

Maybe the really interesting twist, motif wise, is that Sun released some of its source code and offers free downlods now. Their boasting more linux compatibility for Solaris 9i - and a GNOME deskto to boot. However they maintain that Motif will stay intact as the mainstay for serious development (users would run Motif apps in gnome or under mwm).

Anyway motif is like sh. Many major apps use it (apps that would be a gift to anyone) and so it will stay supported. There are even a few ways to port motif apps to windows. Though developing in motif for windows end users who expect a pop-up tie-in to Office in every screen object, might not be wise.

Have fun,
John Hendrickson

P.S.

I had some recent lockups in OpenMotif (I though). Turns out if you use a questionable true-type font server It`ll lock X and the rest of your box hard.