The files in this archive provide a method for darkening the NeXT display completely when logging out. This prevents burn-in of the login dialogue box. This technique has been tested under NeXTStep 1.0 and 2.0. To use the technique, follow these steps. 1. Pick a place to install the VidLev program and the LoginHook and LogoutHook shell scripts. If you don't want to use /usr/local/etc, modify the BIN string in Makefile to identify the installation path. Make sure that the BIN path exists. If you're using VidLev with a version of NeXTStep less than 3.0, you will have to locate the evsio.h and video.h header files and change their #include statements in VidLev.c. For NeXTStep 2.1 they were: #include <nextdev/evsio.h> and #include <nextdev/video.h> Other header information from NeXTStep 2.1, missing from NeXTStep 3.0, is defined in "missing.h". (NeXTStep 3.0 is missing the <next/scr.h> and <mon/nvram.h> header files.) If you're installing VidLev on an NFS client where the client root maps to another UID on the server (e.g., to -2 for "nobody") you might have to set the NOBODY string in the Makefile to the mapped UID. 2. Become root and: # make install The install rule will compile VidLev, customize the LoginHook and LogoutHook shell scripts, install all three, and set root's defaults for the loginwindow program's login and logout hooks. Caution: if you already have root login hooks, the install rule will over-write them. If you don't want that to happen, do your own login hook installation with dwrite. 3. Reboot. (This makes loginwindow aware of the login and logout hooks.) When you log out the screen will darken completely. You can rebrighten it by pressing the "brightness up" key on the NeXT keyboard (next to the "Power" key) -- moving the mouse or typing a login and password to the login dialogue box will not restore brightness until after the loginwindow manager has attempted to dim the login dialogue box (about 30 minutes after logoff). VidLev will darken the screen again every 10 minutes until someone logs on, so that loginwindow's post-logoff dimming won't accidentally raise the video level from VidLev's complete darkness to a dim login dialogue box level. At login the LoginHook script sends a SIGHUP to the VidLev process and it restores screen brightness values to ones remembered from logout time. Vic Abell <abe@mace.cc.purdue.edu> 30 October 1992
These are the contents of the former NiCE NeXT User Group NeXTSTEP/OpenStep software archive, currently hosted by Netfuture.ch.