# Starting up Firefox and other graphical apps



## keval (Jun 11, 2010)

Here are a couple of really basic general questions:
Why do I have to start Firefox (or any graphics-based application) from a graphical environment like xterm?  
At an engineering level, what's the difference between a graphical and a non-graphical environment?  
Why can't FreeBSD understand that Firefox requires a graphical environment and simply switch over for me?
Thanks,
Kevin


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## phoenix (Jun 11, 2010)

For the same reasons that you can't start Firefox from a DOS prompt ... terminals have no GUI support.

You first have to load a GUI environment in order to run GUI apps.

Do you really want GUI apps to start up the X server automatically in the background?


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## nekoexmachina (Jun 11, 2010)

write a bunch of scripts that start X with xinitrc that starts what you need. 
But why do you want that thing?
Also you can start firefox from a non-X terminal when you have your X running with something like `$ env DISPLAY=:0.0 firefox`


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## keval (Jun 12, 2010)

OK.  We're edging towards an answer here.  Why don't terminals have GUI support?  What's the fundamental difference between a screen full of CLI and a screen full of Firefox?
Sorry guys, but I have almost no computer background, so my questions might be a bit more basic than you think.
Kevin


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## wblock@ (Jun 12, 2010)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Text_mode
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raster_graphics


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## gilinko (Jun 12, 2010)

keval said:
			
		

> OK.  We're edging towards an answer here.  Why don't terminals have GUI support?  What's the fundamental difference between a screen full of CLI and a screen full of Firefox?
> Sorry guys, but I have almost no computer background, so my questions might be a bit more basic than you think.
> Kevin



What you are asking for is the difference between different enviroments in computer terms, and a CLI has it's properties and a GUI has it's properties. 

Essentially you are asking the question _Why can't my car fly like an airplane when they are both used for transportation?_

So I would suggest that you start with the links those links above and then use google as there are tonnes of general information about how computer systems interact with a display.


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## jb_fvwm2 (Jun 12, 2010)

```
ldd `which abiword ` | wc -l
```
63 

```
ldd `which nano` | wc -l
```
6
...
So there are (could be) 50 more shared libraries needed
(for example) for "desktop" based editors (programs) than
"text" based ones.  (It can vary widely, of course).
Then, in windows, those might be "dll" files instead,
(as I recall), rather than ".so." files


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## keval (Jun 12, 2010)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Text_mode
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raster_graphics

Great links.  Answers my question.
Thanks,
Kevin


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