Cygwin Configuration Department of Computing Science University of Alberta

Cygwin with X11

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Go to http://sources.redhat.com/cygwin/ and click on "Install Cygwin now"
Save it to your desktop.
Exit your web browser.
Double-Click on the "Setup.exe" you just downloaded (should have the Cygwin Icon).
Click NEXT.
Choose "Install From Internet".
I will assume you leave the default install directory at c:\cygwin.
Make sure All Users and Unix are selected.
Click NEXT.
Leave the Local Package Directory as "C:\WINDOWS\Desktop".
Click NEXT.
Choose the appropriate connection option. Most common is the IE5 Settings.
Choose an appropriate download site.
Find X11 and click on the Default beside it so it says Install.
Find net and click on the + beside it to expand the list.
Find openssh and click on the Default beside it so it says Install.
Click NEXT.
At this point you may get a "Download Incomplete" or "Download Failure" message. If so, you need to start over again.
Click FINISH to have the icons created for you.
You should then get an "Installation Complete" message box. Click OK.

You will see a folder on your desktop called "http%3a%2f%2fmirror.csclub.uwaterloo.ca%2fcygwin" or some such thing. It is safe to delete this now.
You can also delete the Setup.exe file from your desktop as well.

You can now start Cygwin by clicking the Cygwin icon. This will present you with a BASH prompt.

You can type "ssh «username»@«server»" to get an ssh connection to one of our servers.

To get X running do the following:
There will be a new item on your start menu called Cygwin-X.
There will be an icon labelled X-Win Server.
This will start X and if you do a right-click on the X-Server icon in your system tray you can start xterm.

To shutdown the XWindows, you right-click on the icon in the system tray again and choose exit.

You can now type "ssh -X «username»@«server»" in the new xterm that you opened to get an ssh connection to one of our servers with X forwarding enabled.
Launch your XApps as you normally would from the command line.

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