Talk:Motif (software)

How about a screenshot?
Well? 83.228.150.89 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 22:35, 16 June 2009 (UTC).


 * there is one in the Common Desktop Environment article (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_Desktop_Environment), but it looks like something that escaped from the early 1990's and not like a desktop of 2009 though. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 212.224.146.190 (talk) 11:52, 4 November 2009 (UTC)

Peer review of a related article
I submitted X Window core protocol for peer review, as I intend to candidate it for featured status. I would appreciate comments (Peer review page). - Liberatore(T) 18:06, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

Notice of import
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"Competitor to Microsoft"
Microsoft actually collaborated on the Motif look-n-feel, so I removed that line. 64.171.162.77 11:03, 3 December 2006 (UTC)

"IEEE 1295" ?
Do a Google search for and it's obvious that it's well-known to be the industry standard definition for Motif. It's even listed as such on The Open Group's Motif page.

...well-known to everyone but IEEE, that is. How come I can't find it in the IEEE standards listings?

I know this is complicated by the fact that IEEE considers its standards specs to be proprietary, so they aren't freely available on the web, but if you browse their standards list by number, there is nothing in between 1293 and 1296.

I found a little more info on what appears to be a copy of an older Sun documentation page :

"The Motif 1.2 standard, IEEE Std 1295, is entitled Standard for Information Technology--X Window System Graphical User Interface--Modular Toolkit Environment."

...but a search on the IEEE store using the various terms in that title also turns up nothing.

Does anyone know the story? Was this a standard, a proposed standard, a draft standard? Was it ever finalized? If so, when and why did it disappear?

Pending any confirmation, I've fact-tagged this in the article. (No, I don't consider the Open Group's mention of it to be a valid cite, if one can't find out anything about the standard from the issuing standards organization.)--NapoliRoma 18:01, 31 July 2007 (UTC)


 * I've now been digging around: hindered by IEEE's refusal to let the general public see most of the content of their website, but helped by the fact that they seem to have let Google index large chunks of it! As a consequence, you can read bits of the full-text, but only two lines at a time...


 * Anyway... There's enough floating around to make me fairly sure that there was an IEEE standard 1295-1993, whether or not it's still current or being sold. The following search seems to confirm from their own website that the standard existed:
 * ... and if you go here: and drill down to 4.9.5.1.1, you can see "IEEE Std 1295-1993 {127}" listed as a section heading in a chapter on POSIX standards for Windowing Systems Services.


 * I will happily accept that none of this is citeable, but coupled with the cite you found from Sun, I think it's sufficient to make a presumption that the standard did, in fact, exist in some form. What do you think? Tom Harris (talk) 21:35, 8 March 2008 (UTC)


 * That's about as far as I got last July: there clearly was something called IEEE 1295 related to Motif, but what its status is today is unclear. The material you and I have found strongly implies it once was a standard but at some point (after 1995?) was withdrawn. But I can't find an explicit reference for this—thus the tag.
 * The article as it stands appears to be either incorrect or incomplete. It should either mention that the standard was withdrawn, or maybe it should just say exactly what we know, which is that it appears to be withdrawn, and leave the tag in place.--NapoliRoma (talk) 01:28, 9 March 2008 (UTC)


 * I posted this question to comp.org.ieee and someone replied with the following information:


 * I'm not sure it was ever an "IEEE STANDARD" proper. What I found was some references to IEEE MTE 1295. The MTE is apparently Modular Toolkit Environment which didn't spec Motif but instead used motif to describe what they wanted. At any rate the most informative information I found was here:


 * 


 * I hope that this helps to get more information about this.--68.164.14.33 (talk) 05:10, 30 March 2008 (UTC)

OK, still trying to figure out how to most accurately capture this in the article. Just saying, as the article does today, "The IEEE 1295 standard defines the Motif API," would seem to say there is a such a thing as an IEEE 1295 standard, which according the IEEE, there is not.

If the article is to mention IEEE 1295, it should mention that it hasn't actually existed for about 15 years, and it's even unclear whether it ever achieved final status, and if it actually was a definition of Motif APIs or a more general description of window systems.--NapoliRoma (talk) 20:42, 7 August 2009 (UTC)

I Decided to search again, and found a page on the IEEE site that I had not seen before, which gives this standard's status as "withdrawn." I went ahead and noted that in the article.--NapoliRoma (talk) 09:42, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

Windows 3.11
The article states "Motif's operation was designed to correspond closely with the then-familiar Microsoft Windows 3.11", but this cannot be true, since Motif pre-dates Windows 3.11 by several years. According to the Motif FAQ it was designed around 1989. I think I saw it myself for the first time in 1990. I'm certain the 3D look appeared first in Motif, and only later in Windows (in version 3.1 from 1992). It is true that both Windows and Motif follow the CUA guidelines (IBM_Common_User_Access) developed by IBM. ErkkiRuohtula (talk) 08:41, 12 August 2009 (UTC)
 * Deleted the version number. Based on the reference it would have been something like Windows 2.x and OS/2. 1.x Atarivideomusic (talk) 05:57, 29 August 2009 (UTC)
 * From my understanding of it, both Motif and Windows 3.11 were designed to be IBM CUA compliant, which explains the UI similarities.--Flibble (talk) 15:15, 5 July 2011 (UTC)
 * The UI "look and feel" for both systems were derived from OS/2 Presentation Manager. (I would add, but I have no Internet-fetchable source.) --Joe Sewell (talk) 16:45, 5 September 2013 (UTC)
 * The Unix-Haters Handbook cites Windows 3, IIRC - probably wouldn't be a reliable source for this purpose in itself ;-) but may point to others - David Gerard (talk) 16:58, 5 September 2013 (UTC)


 * Sources are not required to be Internet-fetchable, just published. See WP:SOURCE.--NapoliRoma (talk) 06:28, 6 September 2013 (UTC)
 * I've had admins and bureaucrats basically say otherwise. No, thanks. --Joe Sewell (talk) 16:51, 9 September 2013 (UTC)
 * Sounds weird, particularly for stuff like this from just before the Web. A lot of early X Window System stuff basically requires printed sources - David Gerard (talk) 18:14, 9 September 2013 (UTC)
 * I used a non-online-book ref for OPEN LOOK and no one's complained yet.
 * Admins are as prone to "but I'm sure I saw something somewhere that said a thing" as anyone else -- if you get grief, refer them to WP:SOURCEACCESS: "...some print sources may be available only in university libraries or other offline places. Do not reject sources just because they are hard or costly to access."
 * ...or not; it doesn't sound like something you feel the urge to pursue, and that's fine, too.--NapoliRoma (talk) 18:38, 9 September 2013 (UTC)

History
Would love to read about the history of Motif. Thanks, Orimosenzon (talk) 23:10, 22 October 2011 (UTC)

Merge with Open Motif
Suggest that Open Motif be merged into this article. 76.104.96.192 (talk) 23:30, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
 * I concur. Are they now the same thing? - David Gerard (talk) 23:52, 6 November 2012 (UTC)
 * I can&rsquo;t tell; but here are two relevant references:
 * &mdash; The Open Group&rsquo;s (seemingly neglected and outdated) home page for Open Motif; and
 * &mdash; Integrated Computer Solutions&rsquo;s home page for Motif, which has the announcement that ICS has released Motif 2.3.4 under the terms of the LGPL version 2.1.
 * &mdash;76.104.96.192 (talk) 20:44, 7 November 2012 (UTC)
 * The Open Motif FAQ says "For the current stable 2.1.30 release, aside from some different copyright and license statements, both Motif and Open Motif share the same functionality and source code. The primary difference between Open Motif and the commercial product is the software license." So yeah, they're actually the same thing - David Gerard (talk) 09:10, 8 November 2012 (UTC)
 * If you merge, we should change the name from OpenMotif to Motif, as starting with version 2.3.4, it is simply named "Motif". — Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.22.189.88 (talk) 19:34, 20 November 2012 (UTC)
 * Concur There is no more non-open Motif. The debate between ICS' version and IST's version is reasonably moot. --Joe Sewell (talk) 21:35, 29 November 2012 (UTC)
 * I'll embark upon the merge now - David Gerard (talk) 21:48, 29 November 2012 (UTC)
 * Done. The Open Motif article was pretty insubstantial - David Gerard (talk) 22:00, 29 November 2012 (UTC)

Name change
Nice one, this was a very sensible move. I'm just going through now with AWB and fixing links from elsewhere - David Gerard (talk) 11:33, 29 September 2013 (UTC)


 * Thank you, I'm glad you found the name change useful :) --CoolingGibbon (talk) 06:44, 30 September 2013 (UTC)

New release - 2.3.8
There was a new release not long ago; can someone updated the main wikipedia page? 2A02:8388:1603:CB00:3AD5:47FF:FE18:CC7F (talk) 14:10, 9 December 2017 (UTC)

"Motif (widget toolkit" listed at Redirects for discussion
The redirect [//en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Motif_(widget_toolkit&redirect=no Motif (widget toolkit] has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at  until a consensus is reached. Utopes (talk / cont) 01:38, 14 February 2024 (UTC)