# How to add a scroll bar to a XTerm using FVWM Window Manager ?



## R6exe (May 18, 2020)

Hello everyone.

I'm having some trouble trying to add a scroll bar into a Xterm terminal. I tried to find on the internet some way to get it work but I can't because I can't find the right config file, most of the tutorials that I saw were just for Arch Linux and as I can see Xorg is a little bit different in an Arch Linux environment than FreeBSD, and as I'm a newbie in Xorg I would like to ask to the community to help me.

As I understand, at least in FreeBSD the FVWM config file is in /usr/local/share/fvwm/default-config/config, but I think that is not the file that I need to make changes. Most tutorials used the file ~/.Xresources to add the scroll bar, I checked in my home directory for .Xresources, but I don't have it, and the xrdb command that I try to use to create it gives me this error: xrdb: can't display ''.

I searched a lot but in the end I couldn't make it.

I appreciate every answer even if this doesn't solution my problem.

At least I found one way to open the scroll bar but it's a little weird, and it's by using the command xterm with the parameter -sb.

Thank you very much for your help, cheers.


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## SirDice (May 18, 2020)

R6exe said:


> Most tutorials used the file ~/.Xresources to add the scroll bar, I checked in my home directory for .Xresources, but I don't have it,


You need to create this file.


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## zirias@ (May 18, 2020)

Furthermore, this has nothing to do with FVWM. X resources are a traditional way to configure X applications, xterm supports a lot of resource settings, you will find them in the man-page: xterm(1).


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## R6exe (May 19, 2020)

SirDice said:


> You need to create this file.


So if I create that file and then add the XTerm.vt100.scrollBar = true will work ?


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## SirDice (May 19, 2020)

Create a ~/.Xresources with your  settings. Load it with `xrdb ~/.Xresources` and open a _new_ xterm to see your settings (if they're correct). 

Add this  to your ~/.xinitrc (somewhere at the top):

```
[ -f "${HOME}/.Xresources" ] && xrdb "${HOME}/.Xresources"
```
That will make sure it's loaded when you login (or run `startx`).


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